Big Numbers
October 25th, 2007 by 
reality
Some numbers to keep in mind:
- Current value of US household real estate: $21 trillion
- Total mortgage debt: $10 trillion
- Percentage of households that “own” their home: 69
- Fraction of owner-occupying households with no mortgage: about 1/3 (paid cash or paid off)
- Number of excess vacant housing units (excess above long-term average vacancy rate): 1.5-2 million
Note that the mortgage-free households are probably quite a bit less than 1/3 by value.
Posted in Debt, Fixed Income, Real Estate | 
October 25th, 2007 at 6:56 pm
Someone check my math…
3 million foreclosures by 2009.
http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/viewArticle.asp?articleID=41234
Median housing price is about $225,000.
http://therealreturns.blogspot.com/2007/06/median-and-average-house-prices-in-usa.html
3 million * $225k = $750,000,000,000 (750 billion)
I don’t know what the expected default rate is but I assume that 8% of US mortgages defaulting is bad and that the 100 billion dollar MLEC won’t be enough…
October 25th, 2007 at 7:36 pm
Half of all mortgages went into default in the Great Depression.