Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan spoke to the American Bankers Association yesterday and re-visited the topic of housing. He indicated that any decline in home prices would not necessarily be disruptive.

Some key points from the a new study he co-authored:

Owner-occupied homes have risen 9% on average annually.

US housing market is a collection of local market loosely connected by mortgage rates, migration and construction capacity.

Speculation is largely local, the fees associated with a sale are a formidable barrier.

14% of home purchases are second homes up from 7% in 2000.

Less than 5% of all home mortgages have an LTV greater than 90%.

The use of piggy-back loans is not strongly correlated with housing appreciation.

LTV are lower in states with the highest appreciation rates.

These are interesting points that seem to believe many of the arguments made for high risk financing is causing a housing bubble.

Homeowners who’ve been trying to pick the right time to sell are grappling with a new set of questions. Among the deciding factors: A neighbor’s home wasn’t selling, leading them to believe the market was cooling.

The optimistic view of the market, held by economists such as David Lereah of the National Association of Realtors, argues that housing prices could continue to grow. Yet the more pessimistic feeling among other economists is that the rapid home-price growth over the last eight years is winding down.

This article from the RealEstateJournal discusses whether the market has tapped out or not, and what the factors are that determine whether we’re seeing the top of the market.

Is the US housing market cooling off? If you read some of the news, the answer is a definite “maybe”.

The Associated Press reports that there are signs of a slowdown, even with strong sales and continued rising prices. The number of existing homes sold in July was down nationwide, and the demand for mortgages has also declined.

The article “analysts are forecasting that housing sales will begin to decline from record levels by the end of this year and into 2006. The slowing sales pace is expected to end the super-sized price gains many parts of the country have experienced.”

To read more, including “advice from housing experts on what people should consider in the current environment”, read this article.

The Los Angeles city council recently passed an ordinance that limits home size in the Sunlund-Tujunga area.

Residents in Chevy Chase, Md., an upscale suburb of Washington, recently announced a six-month moratorium on home construction to make time to examine how to deal with the proliferation of oversized single-family houses.

Interestingly, homes are getting bigger, but the number of people living in them is getting smaller. What raises hackles is Gulliver-sized homes on lilliputian lots. Further, long time residents of these cities fear that these new SUV-type homes will change the character of their beloved cities.

Read the whole article here.

The median price paid for a home in the nine-county region, which includes San Francisco and the Silicon Valley high-technology hub, rose to $619,000 in August, an increase of 2.1 percent from July and a 19-percent jump from a year earlier, according to the report by DataQuick Information Systems.

This article discusses the strength and stability in the Bay Area real estate market. Is it really going to be like this through the end of the year? Read this article and tell us what you think.

The housing market has taken off again, after a brief typical slowdown. Hurrican Katrina has contributed to certain areas seeing even more of a boom.

According to the National Association of Realtors, with inventory of homes available for sale across the country so tight anyway, rebuilding the Gulf Coast will place additional pressure on all home prices.

This isn’t just a backlash to the thousands of displaced families in the Gulf Coast though. The market is going strong in Florida and New York as well. This article discusses Florida’s and New York’s red hot real estate market in some detail.

Here’s some alarming news about lending trends in California…

In an article from the LA Times, it appears that Californians are stretching further than people in most other parts of the country to meet their mortgage payments.

More than 50% of California state residents who bought in the last two years spent more than a third of their pretax household income on housing, the top threshold recommended by the Department of Housing and Urban Development. An additional 20% paid out more than half their earnings, according to a study released last month by the Public Policy Institute of California.

The run-up in debt has been fueled by soaring home prices and made possible by lenders willing to give borrowers mortgages that eat up 40% to 50% of their total income, the study noted. And even among those who spend less than 30% of their income on housing, an increasing number have interest-only, no-down-payment and negative-amortization loans, leaving themselves vulnerable down the road.

Read the full article here.

In a report by economist Celia Chen for Economy.com, it was found that only 20 percent of families living in inland Fresno County can afford a median-price home, which has risen from $230,000 to $287,500 over the past year. The study examined the relationship between price and income, measuring what ordinary people can afford.

The top 10 overpriced housing markets, according to the Chen study:

1. Fresno, Calif.
2. West Palm Beach/Boca Raton/Boynton Beach, Fla.
3. Bethesda/Frederick/ Gaithersburg, Md.
4. Washington, D.C./ Arlington-Alexandria, Va.
5. Bakersfield, Calif.
6. San Diego/Carlsbad/ San Marcos, Calif.
7. Fort Lauderdale/Pompano Beach/Deerfield Beach, Fla.
8. Visalia/Porterville, Calif.
9. Santa Barbara/Santa Maria/Goleta, Calif.
10. Sacramento/Arden- Arcade/Roseville, Calif.

Read the article here.

Trouble in Paradise?

Have you ever thought about buying property in Maui? The beautiful Hawaiian oceans. The warm tradewinds. The relaxed lifestyle.

Real estate prices have increased 190 percent from 1997 to this year, and the boom isn’t over yet. Affluent baby boomers are nearing retirement, and they still favor real estate over the stock market as the place to invest their money.

But housing prices are now well beyond the reach of many Maui residents, especially new home buyers and recent arrivals on Maui, and the problem of affordability has reached beyond the working class to include professionals. Maui is benefiting from healthy economic conditions on the Mainland and in the rest of the state, where personal income growth hit 3.4 percent last year, and job growth was healthy.

Has the market topped out in Maui, or will it continue to out pace the locals? Read this article and find out.

After Hurricane Katrina decimated New Orleans, neighboring cities, like Baton Rouge, have seen a sudden home buying surge. At the core is a feeling of desperation, with families transplanted for the near future, and real estate agents working 14 hour days to do what they can to help people relocate, and find homes. While the first home shoppers were able to lock in contracts at pre-storm prices, by the end of the first week after the hurricane, much of the inventory of homes for sale was gone. Mayor Kip Holden said that he has been hearing stories of people bringing cash in and saying ‘I don’t care what it cost, let me have the house.’ Read more from this article on CNN Money.