It’s Not All Doom and Gloom

The news is full of economic woes and horrible housing statistics, however, I ran across an interesting statistic which I found pretty amazing. Taken from the website www.housingpredictor.com; “There are an estimated 78 million homes in the U.S. today, the highest number in history and according to a study by the National Bankers Association more than 40% are paid-off without mortgages.” Wow – according to the local and national news – I thought the majority of people were facing foreclosure.

Additionally, here in Maine, we are one of the two states in the Northeast that has seen a small population growth in the last year. There have been a growing number of new employers that are attracting younger residents, as well as an influx of retirees. Our overall housing market is down only around 4%. While that isn’t good news, it sure beats the worst housing markets across the nation which are down an average of nearly 20%. Comparatively, we’re looking strong and I think our recovery will be relatively quick.

With all the doom and gloom, sometimes it’s just nice to concentrate on the positive – it doesn’t get as much press as the negative which we are bombarded with daily. There are some good things reported, we just need to look harder for them.