Real Estate Dips, Touches Toes

The latest Case-Schiller numbers are out, and they're...not great. Seattle area housing values are down "8.8 percent from August 2007," says the P-I, and they quote an economist who says that "as bad as the latest Case-Shiller numbers appear to be, they are bound to get much worse." We were having lunch with a friend of ours who was reminiscing how, in the mid-80s, he and his wife bought a teensy bungalow for a price also in the mid-80s. He was making about $30,000 a year. Not quite ten years later, they sold for over $300,000, and the property kept appreciating. However, to this day, his old job pays around $30,000 a year. "I don't understand," he said, shaking his head. "We couldn't get started here, today."