My new podcast episode is out.

Brad DeLong — Atif Mian and Amir Sufi: Who Bears the Cost of Recessions? The Role of House Prices and Household Debt

“We… show… differential shocks to household net worth coming from elevated household debt and the collapse in house prices play an underappreciated role…

WCEG — The Equitablog
Atif Mian and Amir Sufi: Who Bears the Cost of Recessions? The Role of House Prices and Household Debt
Brad DeLong

Bill McBride — Comment on House Prices: Real Prices, Price-to-Rent Ratio, Cities

Even if you don't follow housing closely, this is something to be aware of. Charts illustrate if you just want a quick overview. Housing seems to have bottomed and recovery is in progress. As Bill notes, the figures are through June and don't take into consideration the recent rise in mortgage rates. Latest reports are indicating that this is having an adverse effect on the recovery, along with stagnant incomes in a weak economic recovery and credit still relatively tight.

Calculated Risk
Comment on House Prices: Real Prices, Price-to-Rent Ratio, Cities
Bill McBride

Dr. Housing Bubble on shrinking income, increasing debt, and housing prospects

The sustainability of the housing market is going to come from the potential pool of younger home buyers. The housing market since World War II has followed a very common and steady path up until the 2000s. Each year it was expected that home values would increase but this also came hand and hand with rising household incomes. There is little mention of how big of a hit household income has taken over the last decade. The pattern is broken so to expect that we are now going to be back on a similar path that was very familiar to the baby boomer generation is simply not the case. When we look at the actual income declines taken by the younger groups we realize that something is very different now. Combine this stagnant household income with large levels of student debt and you have headwinds that are likely to keep a lid on the entry level of the market.

Dr. Housing Bubble
The indebted young and shrinking middle class – 6 charts examining fluctuating income changes and the impact on the future housing market