The Solution to America's Housing Problem

"The Solution to America’s Housing Problem".....ya, don't buy one!!!

Thanks Republicans, for another "fine mess you've gotten us into"! Bush's motto: "Don't worry, the markets will work it out". God forbid, there should be any rules in place to regulate lending practices. I wish people would just ask themselves ONE questions before going to the polls this Nov. (the same question Ronald Reagan asked in 1980): ARE YOU BETTER OFF TODAY THAN YOU WERE 8 YEARS AGO (BEFORE THE REPUBLICANS TOOK OFFICE)?!

why not have rates on mortgages reflect making timely payments in real time....the more months you make timely payments, your rate ticks down. Done

I despise Henry Blodget, who wrote this article. Henry is famous for misleading investors in the tech bubble, and not using simple, common financial analysis to see the bubble forming before his eyes. His reports then foolishly predicted money-losing tech stocks would rise in price for years to come, all the while calling himself a tech/internet expert. Now, he praises Shiller for calling the market in 2000 as Irrational Exuberance. Don't trust this guy. By the way, he wrote an article last week on Google's new web browser that many people found full of holes and wrong technical information. Blodget is not a tech expert, nor a financial expert. I'm surprised he still has a job.

IT WILL TAKE SEVERAL YEARS TO TAKE THE EXCESS PROPERTIES OUT OF THE MARKET. I WOULD NOT GO INTO THE HOUSING BUISNESS UNTIL THE SUPPLY OF PROPERTIES HAS GREATLY REDUCED. GOOD LUCK JIM

if this guy knows so much...look at downtown newhaven,ct...looks like a septic tank..wanna fix the housing ????why not start in the yale owned newhaven..maybe the crackheads can get pushed back to bridgeport...

The solution, from economics 101...let prices drop to where supply = demand!

Liars always figure, but figures never lie. A lot of loan originators figured out ways of getting someone making $45k a year into a $450k home. The figures show this person should only be getting a $86k home. Now you want the hard working people, who knew better, to pay for that house. KMA. Home prices have a long way to go, down, before the correction is over

This guy is nuts!!!!

repeat after me, "Exploitation begins at home".

More welfare checks? Oh yeah they are calling it "stimulus checks". How about that financial experts, their solution is they want more welfare checks to bail them out some more. What happened to your Capitalist pride? I guess you only have it, when you're doing well, and when you're not, you're not embarassed by accepting welfare checks! Look if a company can't stand out from it's own merit, then it should fall.

Its all too complicated. Get the govt. out. Let the chips fall and return the market to a free market. Not with all these ideas, quasi-govt. agencies.

Get rid of the Community Reinvestment Act. That's the cause of all of this. Don't work around it, just repeal it. I know that it is easier said than done. But for those of you who don't know what the CRA is just look it up on Wikipedia or Google it. At it's core it is Affirmative Action for mortgage loans and has been around for almost 30 years. Want to buy a house for no money down? We've seen these advertisements for a long time. It's because of CRA. Look it up.

With great disasters come great investment opportunity.......pre forclosures!!!!!!

With great disasters come great investment opportunity.......pre forclosures!!!!!!

Who's controlled congress (the majority) the past four years and has "allowed" the policies to ensue. Ask yourself that, then go to the polls. Do you want more of the same (Obama) or real change (McCain).

home prices will hit bottom in 2nd quarter of 2009. prices will continue to fall and credible people will start buying bargain homes. lenders are to blame as well as people who like to look good in their big houses and fancy cars that they cannot afford. now, it is all back firing on those folks who decided to buy 450k houses with 45k incomes. people with 60k mercedes but without $25 to put gas in the tank, no retirement savings, and other debt. thats the problem. by the way, this tech guy sucks

Henry Blodget is Yale economist ? Since when ? He has Bachelor of Arts degree from Yale. And it's a really great idea - give additional stimulus checks to the people who got a no money down ARM and can't pay their mortgage now. Let me go buy something so I can qualify.

Yes, I missed the bubble peak in 2000, which was a searing lesson. Certainly wish I had pulled the plug earlier, and I'll always regret missing it. The good news is that experience helped me spot the housing bubble early. Hopefully that will help in the future, too.

Shiller is a liberal nut case who has been sheltered in the world of academia for far too long. The underlying issue at hand has been GREED - greed on the part of lenders, greed on the part of developers and greed on the part of potential homeowners and investors. You reign in that greed by returning to more conservative underwriting standards i.e. putting people into mortgage instruments that they CAN ACTUALLY AFFORD (now there's a novel idea) - NOT by replacing one form of wacko debt instrument i.e. sub-prime mortgages - with Shiller's absurdly recommended "continuous workout mortgage." And handing out additional stimulus checks? That represents yet another form of welfare for those who should never have been allowed to purchase homes in the first place. Let the capital markets continue to do their thing and they WILL achieve equilibrium albeit with a lot of pain. Let's not, however, continue to spit in the face of those budget-minded consumers who only bought what they could afford and continue to make their mortgage payments and live by the rules.