With the recent increase of housing
prices, economists in the US are predicting we are near closing in on
an end. Property values in Dade County Florida, have soared to a
point where they have almost doubled in 1.5 years. This is
reminiscent of the San Francisco / San Jose era of dot com. It is now
to a point where the San Francisco Bay area is being reported as a
housing crash. This appears to be an overstatement, but is this what
the rest of the country should start looking forward to?

Reminiscent of the Stock Market Crash,
people are getting rich too quick. Money Magazine has dedicated their
past two issues on people who got rich quick by gambling on the real
estate market. These articles could actually be enticing people to
try to do this on their own instead of reading the cautionary note
that the articles advise.

Home investors in South Florida are
still buying up properties at values unheard of 7 years ago. Homes in
Fort Lauderdale that in 1998 were selling for one hundred and fifty
thousand dollars have now moved upwards in to the low four hundred’s.

Investors are kidding themselves if
they think this will continue. 60 minutes last weekend also had a
feature story about investors and how they are basically purchasing
properties in South Florida, particularly Naples Florida from simply
searching on Realtor.com. The purchaser in the story tried to
rationalize it by stating that he knows the Naples area due to coming
down on summers as a teenager. Doesn’t seem like any irrationality to
us.. does it?

If you are really in the need to
purchase some real estate as an investment, just make sure that you
do your homework (i.e. shop some foreclosure, pre-foreclosure
websites) and also check the property out yourselves. Also, be
prepared for a correction that will happen.