Time to make our resolutions once again. This year, many of us may want to make two resolutions that will brighten not only our personal finances, but the country’s as a whole. Two scary facts: the savings rate of the average American has dipped to an all time low of -0.7%, while personal debt is at an all time high ($8,000 in credit card debt per person).

With nothing to fall back on, many Americans are forfeiting their ability to ever qualify for a mortgage, especially as lending standards tighten.

“If you’re relying on home equity to make you rich, but are tapping into your home equity line of credit every time you’re short at the end of the month, something’s going to give.”

“Managing your financial future means taking responsibility for your major assets, including real estate, stocks and bonds, and any retirement accounts you may have. It also means spending less and saving more.”

Read the whole article here (reg required).

Bernice Ross lays down some valuble tips for negotiating through the murky waters of the current real estate market. As interest rates rise, most real estate agents are going to be faced with tricky new situations that they haven’t faced before - buyers pulling out, sellers balking, and housing prices depreciating in the middle of a sale.

“In a bad market, many sellers are desperate. Due to transfers, divorce, or other financial difficulties, many people must sell. If the appraisal comes in low, the sellers may have no option but to lower the price or pay for an interest rate buy-down so the buyer can close the transaction.”

Read the whole article here (subscription).

Here are two takes on how Real Estate “Reality” shows are taking their toll on the American consumer.

This writer thinks that now that the housing bubble has burst, we’re left wih nothing to do but watch.

“This, people, is how you know the fearsome bubble is finally bursting (as if the moss growing on your neighbor’s For Sale sign weren’t enough of a clue): We’re finally left with nothing to do but watch. This collective lust for landholding, this national pang for property, has morphed into a strange new obsession. Instead of shopping for a house, we’ve taken to camping out in front of the telly, watching other people on the prowl for a place: “House Huntersâ€? and “What You Get for the Moneyâ€? on HGTV. “Location, Location, Locationâ€? on BBC America.”

While over in blogville, Ben Jones muses on the effect that shows like MTV Cribs are having on the bling-conscious.

“Sure, many of those MTV Cribs were done by a professional designers, for millionaire sports stars, actors, or recording artists. They can actually afford to pay cash for the TV, and not finance it over 3-5 years. Debt is what happens when people try to live a life they cannot afford today. Everybody wants to live like a millionaire, but does anybody really want to do the work, or wait the time it takes to REALLY be able to afford these things?!?!? Why wait until tomorrow, when you can finance today?!?!?”

Here’s the latest on the most overvalued markets. In a survey of the top 299 markets across the U.S., 65 are “severely overpriced” and might experience “preice corrections.”

At least that’s the word from the third-quarter Housing Market Analysis conducted by National City Corp, a financial holding company, in conjunction with Global Insight, a financial information provider.

Naples, Florida topped the list as the most overvalued market in the country. A single-family, median-priced home there sells for $329,970, 84 percent more than what it should cost — $180,956 — according to the analysis.

How does your hometown rank?

The San Jose Mercury News reported yesterday on something that most of us already know - it’s a buyer’s market.

Contributing to slowing price gains are lower mortgage rates, which helped out the previously luckless buyer last week.

“…according to loan giant Freddie Mac. Rates on 30-year, fixed-rate loans dropped to 6.22 percent, down from November’s two-year high of 6.37 percent. Fifteen-year, fixed-rate loans were at 5.15 percent, and one-year adjustable-rate loans were at 5.15 percent.”

Read the whole article here.

The Boston Globe reports today that sales of single family homes dropped for the second month in a row, although the average price rose a modest 1.7%. The rise could be attributed to sellers refusing to lower their asking prices, even as the market cools and inventories continue to rise.

Condo sales are still rising, though not at their formerly rapid pace.

“‘Prices are lagging, and there’s inertia in them,’ said Karl Case, Wellesley economics professor and housing specialist. The reason: ‘Demand drops because people get spooked and sellers hold out,’ he said”

Read the whole article here.

In another vote of confidence for a “soft landing” in the housing market, analysts today pointed to slowly declining home sales being balanced out by a strengthing labor market.

“‘As more listings of homes come on the market during this period of modestly declining sales, more home buyers will find themselves in a better position to negotiate,’ said the association’s president Thomas Stevens.”

“Meanwhile, a Labor Department report showed that new applications filed for unemployment insurance last week edged up to 322,000 — a level that is still consistent with a labor market revival, economists said. That report provided further evidence the jobs market is back on its feet after being knocked around by Gulf Coast hurricanes.”

Read the whole article here.

This optimistic report in Inmans contains two pieces of contradictory information:

1. California home prices are expected to rise 10% in 2006

and

2. At the same time, there will be a dip in sales

Which is it? Can declining home sales really lead to an increase in prices in the homes that do sell, or will it be a classic case of supply and demand pricing (more available homes = lowered asking prices)?

Read the whole article here (subscription).

Following a drop in new home sales, existing home sales also experienced a modest drop in November, according to the eagerly awaited report from the National Association of Realtors.

As expected, this drop signals a further cooling off in the US housing market.

“Yet, even with the drop, economists said the housing market remains in healthy shape and is on track to set record-high home sales for the fifth year in a row for all of 2005.”

“‘We are really on track for a soft landing,’” said David Lereah, the association’s chief economist. Moderately rising mortgage rates are allowing the housing market thus far to land safely, he said. ‘There are no balloons popping,’ he said.”

Read the whole article here.

Here’s an interesting piece in today’s New York Times that argues that even though home prices are much higher than they were 20 years ago, they are actually more affordable.

How can this be?

It seems that in an era of “creative financing” and lower interest rates, “People aren’t really shopping prices,” said Bill Trask, a broker at Coldwell Banker Friends and Neighbors Realty in suburban Portland. “They’re shopping payments.”

Time will tell if the majority of these houses are actually affordable, especially as the popular ARM come due. But in the meantime, “families in the vast majority of the country can still buy a house for a smaller share of their income than they could have a generation ago.”

Read the whole article here (reg required).