What The “Recession” Really Is … And What It Means For Your Real Estate Market Part 1

February 18, 2010

I almost always find talk in the media about the economy abstract, misleading and depressing.   Most pundits who opine on the economy don’t give a clear picture of present and future conditions because it’s such an enormous topic.  I find they’re really only talking about themselves in the end, not the many different realities out there many different types of people are facing.

So it was very refreshing to find something in the media that had both the pundits and people actually currently working in real estate talking about the economy, recessions, and the real estate market.  A very interesting 2009 article on the state of the economy and real estate market in the Toronto area came up in the National Post.  The Post put together a group of well known people in the Toronto real estate and business communities to discuss these matters.  The group included:

-    Brad Lamb, President, Brad J Lamb Realty, top condo firm in Toronto and host of Big City Broker on HGTV

-    Sherry Cooper, Chief Economist, BMO Capital Markets

-    Garth Turner, Business and Real Estate Commentator and Former MP

-    Elise Kalles, VP Harvey Kalles Real Estate, Toronto’s leading seller of carriage trade properties

-    Harry Stinson, Developer, One King West, Candy Factory Lofts

-    Richard Wengle, Toronto’s Premier Luxury Architect

-    Mike Eppel, Business Editor, 680 News

The group was asked some key questions about where the economy is at and where it’s going.  They were also asked what people are doing about real estate these days and what they should and shouldn’t do.  What’s interesting is the people in this group actually involved in day-to-day real estate sales and development had a very different perspective about the actual state of the real estate market and the economy than those who aren’t involved in the real estate business.

The Post asked the group,

Post: So is everybody just waiting?  Are potential sellers just sitting and saying, ‘I’m not going to sell right now, I’ll wait.’ And the same thing on the buyer’s side?

Two of the real estate people had interesting comments on the reality here:

Lamb: There are motivated sellers.  These are people who are caught between homes or they’re getting a divorce, but there’s not a lot of them.  There are virtually no power of sales or forced sales.  And, believe it or not, there are people who are motivated to buy.

Filed under: Inspiration

Tags: Big City Broker, Brad J Lamb, Brad Lamb, carriage trade, depression, doom and gloom, economy, Elise Kalles, Garth Turner, Harry Stinson, Harvey Kalles, Mike Eppel, real estate market, recession, Richard Wengle, Sherry Cooper