Wednesday, August 09, 2006

Has the Real Estate Bubble Bell been Tolled?


Today, CNN had an article from one of the largest home builders Toll Brothers which did not point to good news on the real estate front. In fact this maybe the real signal that the real estate bubble has actually popped.

An interesting quote from the article worth noting:

is the first downturn in the forty years since we entered the business that was not precipitated by high interest rates, a weak economy, job losses or other macroeconomic factors


I give their point of view alot of weight considering the amount of experience they have (40 years), country wide view of markets and their apparent non "spin" which is so common with quotes coming from other real estate professionals.

Lastly, since Toll Brothers builds high-end luxury homes and is seeing this kind of downturn we may see a much broader impact in the future as studies have been made that indicate that high-end real estate is often the leading indicator or real estate price direction.

This comment appears to support what many real estate bubblers have been warning of. What do you think? Has the real estate bubble bell been tolled?