Jobs, shopping and real estate
Consumer spending in the U.S. rose in October while new claims for jobless benefits dropped last week (according to Reuters) hinting to some analysts that a recovery was within sight but that didn’t help sliding consumer confidence nor did a decline in orders for U.S. produced goods. The question now is what happens next year when we’re not propped up by the stimulus?
Consumer spending extended to the real estate market as existing home sales unexpectedly surged to its best performing month since February 2007 but not everyone believes that this uptick is indicative of a recovery.
Real Estate Investment Specialist, Jeff Brown of Brown & Brown Inc. has strong feelings regarding increased consumer spending, saying, “put in real estate investment-speak, it won’t mean crap. It’ll make a difference when Fannie Mae extracts its head from a very unwelcome place.”
Brown is not alone in his sentiment that the credit crunch and federal demands placed on the investment sector have it in a choke hold, making it nearly mandatory that the surviving investment specialists be educated with up to the second Fannie Mae requirements to close transactions that once were golden and now must cut through much red tape and endlessly changing field goals.
What is good news to retailers equates to no news at all for real estate investors as the controlling factors are seen by some as disorganized and unreasonable.
