Amazon.com: Sell Now!: The End of the Housing Bubble: John R. Talbott: Books

From Publishers Weekly
Talbott's latest effort in warning of the coming housing crash bluntly advises owners to liquidate in a hurry. Raising the stakes from his previous best-seller (The Coming Crash in the Housing Market), Talbott argues housing prices will plummet by as much as 50 percent over the next five to seven years, a hit that will be felt on an international level and cascade into larger economic problems: more job losses and a weaker banking infrastructure. As a guide for the average homeowner, this book is a convincing argument broken down into laymen's terms, albeit one fueled by bias: Talbott admits he, "allowed his anger and bitterness," to influence his writing, making it less a studied survey than a "creative analysis," as Talbott terms it.
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Product Description

How Far Can Home Prices Fall?
What Can You Do to Protect Yourself?

Home prices are seriously overvalued in many regions of the United States. The question is no longer if, but rather how far, home prices will fall and over what time frame this bubble will deflate. Home values have been escalating in real terms since 1981, the year nominal interest rates last peaked. And the greatest price increases in percentage terms have been in the wealthiest and most exclusive cities in the world.

Sell Now! analyses the evidence and offers clear explanations of these perplexing issues. Overly aggressive mortgage lenders have fueled this overheated market by extending too much credit to home buyers and by offering ever-more exotic forms of mortgages. Many home buyers have been caught in a never-ending race to achieve status, often overpaying for homes in the “right” neighborhoods. And people’s pursuit of easy profits has pushed prices to unsustainable levels.

Finally, there is a reasoned analysis that not only explains how home prices got this high, but why they are sure to fall and by what amount. Sell Now! debunks many theories that purport to show that home prices are either reasonable or are sustainable at their
current high levels.

How bad can it get? Unlike previous home-price declines, this cycle has the potential to be not only national, but international in scope. The national economy, so dependent on the housing, mortgage, real estate, banking, and construction industries for growth, is at risk and the entire banking system might come under fire.

You owe it to yourself to become better informed about the possible impact on you, your family and your most important asset---your home.

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Product Details

Paperback: 208 pages
Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin (January 10, 2006)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0312357885
ISBN-13: 978-0312357887
Product Dimensions: 8.1 x 5.4 x 0.7 inches
Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)

Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars See all reviews (21 customer reviews)

Amazon.com Sales Rank: #297,195 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Inside This Book (learn more)

First Sentence:
Housing prices in America have been increasing for fifty straight years. Read the first page

Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
United States, San Francisco, San Diego, New York, Federal Reserve, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Santa Barbara, Year Source of Data, Los Angeles, Statistical Yearbook, Carnegie Hill, National Association of Realtors, Price Metropolitan Area, Real Price Decline Required, Wall Street, Las Vegas

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Citations (learn more)

This book cites 10 books:

Irrational Exuberance: Second Edition by Robert J. Shiller on page 26, page 27, and Back Matter
Risk Management by Will in Back Matter
Where America Went Wrong: And How To Regain Her Democratic Ideals (Financial Times Prentice Hall Books) by John R. Talbott in Front Matter
Making Waves by Jaci Burton in Back Matter
The family home (Modern legal studies) by W. T Murphy in Back Matter

See all 10 books this book cites

Books on Related Topics (learn more)

Salomon Smith Barney Guide to Mortgage-Backed and Asset-Backed Securities by Lakhbir Hayre

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Customer Reviews

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3.8 out of 5 stars (21 customer reviews)

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33 of 34 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Compelling Analysis, Skip the Politics, April 16, 2006

By	Beth Fox "Beth A. Fox" (Los Angeles, CA USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

About a year ago, I read Talbott's first book, "The Coming Crash in the Housing Market." At the time, I agreed with the premise but felt that the author had failed to marshal sufficient support for his claims.

This book is much better. Talbott starts out by quickly demolishing arguments that real estate will always increase in price. Talbott not only explains why the housing bubble is about to burst in many areas, he describes the nationwide and international ramifications of that crash. Although Talbott builds on work done by Robert Shiller (who determined that real housing prices have been increasing only since 1997), Talbott advances the research by considering the tax benefit received by homeowners as an independent asset. Once that tax benefit has been factored into the equation, Talbott finds that housing prices have risen, in real terms, since 1981, when nominal interest rates began their descent. Talbott demonstrates (persuasively, in my opinion) that a major reason for the bubble was banking practices that enable buyers to borrow more when nominal, but not real, interest rates are low. Because nominal rates are low when inflation is low, however, new buyers have a harder time "growing their way out" of a large mortgage.

This could have been a five-star book. Talbott's analysis of the real estate market is spot on. I only deducted a star because of the existence of Chapter 4, entitled "Can You Say 'Conspiracy'?". In the middle of cogently explaining the housing crisis, Talbott veered off course to write a chapter about the Federal Reserve, the FDIC and Alan Greenspan. I am not convinced that there is any "conspiracy" here, or that the one statement about ARMs made by Greenspan is evidence of malevolent intent. A fuller discussion of the Federal Reserve's actions in the early 2000s would take into account its attempt to prevent the dot.com implosion for wrecking the entire economy. Although Talbott acknowledges this fact, Talbott does not persuasively counter it. This chapter is, alas, in line with Talbott's own political orientation, as he jabs the "Bush" tax cut and those "status-seekers" who buy large houses.

Fine, if you agree with Talbott. For the rest of us, the politics are just noisy intrusions in an otherwise well-reasoned, compelling book. Highly recommended.

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23 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Talbott is Brilliant, April 12, 2006

By	Schahrzad Berkland (San Diego, CA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Talbott, like the other scholars/economists at the UCLA Anderson School of Management, has got it right! Unlike the housing cheerleaders at the NAR, Talbott gives straight talk about the origins of the housing bubble, and the 8 myths for permanently high housing prices. He explains that the real culprits of the bubble were overly aggressive banks. As of this writing, every day I read something about the FDIC trying to rein in these agressive banks, and how people are getting foreclosed on because they cannot pay their adjustable rate mortgage as the interest rate has gone up. Talbott predicted all of this.

He devotes an entire chapter to the Greenspan conspiracy. Why did our smartest and lead banker, Alan Greenspan, tell the American public in late 2004, to get adjustable rate mortgages? He knew people would have trouble paying as interest rates climbed. I knew it too, so I avoided it although I would have saved a bundle initially on the payments. Talbott explains that Greenspan was helping out the banks, and preventing a recession after the dotcom collapse, without worrying too much about the more painful consequences he was creating by later foreclosures and bank collapses from declining real estate.

He explains from an economist view why houses are overvalued in our most expensive cities in the US and the world, draws comparisons to Japan whose housing market is declining for the 18th year!, compares us selling houses to each other to a Ponzi scheme, and asks people to evaluate if they are in trouble too. He devotes some pages to the effects of a housing bubble bust on the economy, and the recession that will rise over the entire country, since the majority of new jobs have been created in real estate: lenders, realtors, construction, and retailers/remodelers/car and boat stores who profited as consumer spent their home equity.

Talbott makes some other interesting observations that I had not read anywhere else. I am rereading it the second time, and underlining as I go along. I would be delighted to meet Mr. Talbott, so I could ask him more questions about the economy, and the role of the housing bubble collapse on our economy.

Straight talk! That's what you'll get from this book. He'll go down in history as one of the only economists who foresaw the effects of the housing bubble. I recommend anyone who owns real estate or is thinking of buying, to read this first!!

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18 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars lies, damn lies and statistics, June 7, 2006

By	John - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)

This book mainly argues that the price of real estate has become de-coupled from the "fundamentals" (rental values, income) worldwide, resulting in a bubble that will burst. It also argues that this has been caused and pushed by Alan Greenspan at the Fed. (he lowered interest rates to cause the housing sector to get pumped up, mainly to cause a "soft landing" for the economy right after the dot.com stock market bubble burst). And it argues that non-market forces, such as aggressive lending by banks and mortgage brokers, as well as status-seeking has caused the bubble. All this with a background of a federal government that is not overseeing lending and banking the way it should (as was the case in the 1980s with the savings and loans debacle, and in the 1990s with Enron). In short, Talbott accuses Bush of being "in bed" with the banking industry, and being more a propoent of the banking industry, instead of being a proponent of the average working family. His analysis is brilliant and wideranging, and he does not stop at economics, but questions the American obsession with "image over substance" (highly-leveraged people buying villas and mansions way beyond their means, financed by increasingly complex "jumbo mortgages").

The bubble is here, and when it bursts, it will take the world economy down with it. The Economist has already predicted this, and they also predicted the 2000 stock market bubble bursting. The first signs of it are now appearing in Britain, Australia, and Ireland (not to mention Japan, which has had 18 years in a row of falling real estate prices).

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Most Recent Customer Reviews

3.0 out of 5 stars Too Late
I was surprised to find reviews of this book still being generated in Nov. '08. I was (still am) going to use this review site as a toxic review dumping ground of other financial... Read more

Published 7 months ago by mike ferry

1.0 out of 5 stars obamanomics
I just watched this clown on CSPAN,in the words of one of our greatest Presidents "pure unadulterated horse manure".
This clown didn't know at the time that Mr. Read more

Published 7 months ago by C. Gable

5.0 out of 5 stars He was a lone voice.
As a Florida west coast realtor and real estate investor; I was desperately seeking an explanation to the incredible drop in buyer's demand in our real estate market, which began... Read more

Published 9 months ago by Holding a vision of justice an...

5.0 out of 5 stars I hope John talbott reads this.
Today is September 19, 2008, the day after the World Banks stepped in and the Feds gathered to try and fix what John Talbott and others like him warned. Read more

Published 9 months ago by archimedies

4.0 out of 5 stars his predictions are dead on
If a book like this was written in 2008, it would be a no surprise.

But, writing this Jan 2006 was probably would not have been easy since, real estate market was... Read more

Published 10 months ago by mrc

5.0 out of 5 stars A great book. I wish that I read it earlier
This book is published in 2006, with some revision of the author's the other book in the same topic. Read more

Published 13 months ago by Yan Han

4.0 out of 5 stars He was not exactly Nostradamus...................
but it seems Talbott's insights to the Housing Bubble were spot on even though the crisis was managed by smoke and mirrors until the last quarter of 2007. Read more

Published 13 months ago by Skylark Thibedeau

2.0 out of 5 stars do not buy............
waste of money, a very hard read, and it seems the RE market is doing great in many of the areas he said would tank. Read more

Published on May 23, 2007 by chrissy f

5.0 out of 5 stars Sobering
Beneficially sobering for anyone considering a house purchase, or for a heads up on a crisis that may very well affect us all! Read more

Published on March 12, 2007 by Wiliam D. Walton

3.0 out of 5 stars Better than average read
Nice insight into the dark underbelly of US real estate. Slightly paranoid, esp. concerning the Fed,etc...But definitely worth reading

Published on March 11, 2007 by Robert H. Hardin Jr.

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