Top of the Tweets – Home prices, Olympics, My Sharona
The glass-half-full or half-empty syndrome ruled for real estate this week. Consider the following tweets: “Housing prices swing up to close 2009, Still down from 2008” from @HousingWire and “National home prices declined by 3.7 percent in December 2009” from @KDMcrew. Both cited the same report and contained the same information. Home prices rose for the sixth straight month ending 2009 on a somewhat positive note even though they were down from 2008. No matter what the spin, this news generated a slew of tweets last week as did reports from lots of individual markets.
For luxury real estate, two stories reigned. One in the LA Times discussed price adjustments for luxury properties including some we reported last year in Unique Homes. The other involved the death of Doug Feiger from The Knack and the real life “My Sharona.” Check out the story behind the song by my fellow writer Ken Weingartner.
Improving builder confidence and a rise in housing starts posted by the National Association of Home Builders was another popular retweet. It’s also another sign that a recovery or sorts may be underway. Check out the most recent issue of Unique Homes for more positives on the Road to Recovery.
For those of us in the media, the week brought good news with a recent forecast from long-time advertising observers, Borrell Associates, projecting a rebound for real estate advertising in 2010. Thanks to @danielrmccarthy for this tip.
Watching the Olympics has become a part-time job and full-time obsession for winter sports fanatics and the fascination with all things Canadian continues. Just squeaking in at week’s end is a tweet from @LiRead (pictured) on her fellow countrymen and Olympic fever. It links to a recent blog post in which she shares, “Value the passion and the perseverance that delivered these athletes to the games. They are the best of the best, and in some way, we’re all ‘winners,’ as they carry us all along with them.” I can’t think of a better sentiment to begin the week. Thanks Li!
—Camilla McLaughlin
