$hitloads of trouble

From Floriday Today, we have Scott Blake writing about Sluggish housing market showing mixed results.

On the Space Coast, reduced prices since last year have enabled some buyers to enter the market -- people such as Kanishka Perera, who was renting in Palm Bay before he bought a two-bedroom townhouse in Melbourne last month for about $176,000. Perera said the builder -- Mercedes Homes -- gave him incentives to buy, requiring only a 5 percent down payment and paying $5,000 of the closing costs.

"I always wanted to own a home. I just couldn't afford it earlier," Perera said.

Hint, babe: You still can't afford it; you've just lost your 5%; you still don't know it, and won't for a few more years.

To stimulate the local housing market, builders and others are hoping to persuade county commissioners to delay a scheduled increase in a county transportation impact fee on each new single-family home. The fee -- which applies to unincorporated areas of Brevard and most local municipalities -- is to increase from $1,414 to $4,353 on Dec. 31.

The delay could help the market, which already is burdened by higher property taxes and insurance rates, said Dave Armstrong, treasurer of the Florida Homebuilders Association and a local home builder.

"Right now, the animal is wounded and we don't want to kill it," Armstrong said about the housing market.

The animal is not only wounded but also dead with its guts spilling out, and the diseased carcass has started to rot in the rain. The smell is giving you the clue that anyone with half a brain would've figured out a long time ago.

I really doubt that $3000 is going to change anything in an area which has seen inventory that accounts for population growth for 10+ years.

However, we all need to be periodically reminded about the wisdom of Motoko Rich of the New York Times about all of this: "South Florida is working off of a totally new economic model than any of us have ever experienced in the past.".