Foreclosure Mills Helped Revive Miami Housing Market, Consultant Says
Miami’s housing market is seeing a resurgence, and one consultant says developers can thank foreclosure mills for the reprieve.
Home sales in the metropolitan area are up by 16 percent for the first half of the year, and prices are holding steady or even increasing, the New York Times reports.
“Much of Miami is gripped by a housing mania as the oversupply of distressed homes dries up and foreigners and investors swoon,” the newspaper says. “Only a few years after it seemed there were so many unwanted high-rise condominiums that the only solution was to tear some of them down, there are plans to build even more.”
Peter Zalewski, founder of real estate consulting firm Condo Vultures, credits the foreclosure freeze and the mass law firm operations that caused it. “People should thank the foreclosure mills,” Zalewski told the Times.
Still, real estate prices at are about half of their peak levels. Another real estate consultant, Jack McCabe, warns of more foreclosures to come. “There is going to come a day of reckoning when they will have to move this inventory,” he says of the banks.
