Experts: North Georgia housing market in depression

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Experts: North Georgia housing market in depression
Banks starting to turn against builders, lawmakers told at hearing

By KEVIN DUFFY
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Thursday, December 11, 2008


The housing market is so bad that some banks and builders that had been business partners are now adversaries, and experts are using the dreaded “D” word.

“In northeast Georgia we’re not in a housing recession, we’re in a housing depression,” Jim Williams, president of Southern Highlands Mortgage in Blairsville, told state lawmakers at a daylong hearing Wednesday. “The retiree market, the secondary market has all but dried up. There are no homes being built.”

Likewise, Eugene James, head of the Atlanta division of the research company Metrostudy, said the 22 metro counties it covers “are in a housing depression right now.”

James said sales closings were down 44 percent for the third quarter, compared to the same period last year, and housing starts had plunged 67 percent. The metro area also has about 148,000 lots with infrastructure but no homes — a 117-month supply, he said.

Legislators are trying to figure out what they can do to encourage home buying and rescue residential builders. The General Assembly convenes next month, and new bills might be introduced calling for tax incentives, expanded down payment assistance or reductions in home building regulations.

“A down payment assistance obviously would be very, very beneficial to citizens,” Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle said after speaking to the joint economic development committee. .......(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.ajc.com/search/content/business/stories/2008/12/11/georgia_housing_market.html