She had it listed on craigslist when I found it and there was a for sale by owner sign in front of the house. Given your previous housing situation as well as your ongoing financial situation, this is something that you really should have discussed with the owner prior to moving in. I realize that you were under serious time constraints at the time because of having to quickly move out of your last house but it appears that you knew the situation going in. So at this point I would speak with the landlord and try to come to some type of terms that will be acceptable for both of you. I really hope you take this in the spirit in which it is given. Time and again you get yourself into situations that are not at all comfortable and then ask here for advice on how to get out of it. Knowing all that you have been through, you should seriously consider speaking with a counselor to work out some issues. What I notice is that posters here continually give you great advice that is frankly not always followed. A situation arises, posters here do the work and greatly assist in advising you out of the situation, life is quiet and normal for a minute and then rinse and repeat and the cycle starts all over again. Clearly you knew about the landlord's position when you went to look at the house and accepted the terms and moved in anyway. Now once again there is a potential threat of you losing your home. I admit it irks me that posters here are spending time researching potential options for you when clearly you should have done this yourself. Given the fact that you are fully aware that there is yet another potential housing issue, yet from your recent postings on the other side, you are once again spending and perhaps you should be saving in case you have to quickly move again. Please speak with your children and seriously consider counseling whether it be through your priest or someone else. There is clearly a vicious cycle going on and given the fact that you now have a clean bill of health physically (thank God!), now you need to work on other areas. You have been given a gift, please don't waste it. I know my post to many is going to seem harsh but Eileen, you need some serious help and I think it is more than time that someone was flat out honest and said so. I've been around long enough to know exactly how this is going to play out and I just don't want to see it happen again.

webe, Hi, I'm in CT also. Mystic. Yep, the market (to use a boating term) is in the dol drums for sure. Here, prices have been drifting for the better part of 18 months & started declining 3-5 months ago. We're potential buyers but are under no time pressures so we're just waiting & watching. Our trigger will be when we see prices start to rise again consistently over about a six month period. We won't catch the bottom with that approach but we're also unlikely to experience the bottom falling out from under our purchase price either. It'll also be better to sell our existing house when we reach that point since a rising tide floats all boats. Again though, we're under no time restraints. We have the luxury of waiting this market out and that could be 2-3 years. CT has about 24,000 subprime loans. Not enough to move prices, IMO. Our market is drifting along with the national markets. Even though nothing much negative is happening here people watch, read, & hear about other states & it affects mindset. The SW corner of the state 'may' experience some downturn due to Wall Street job reductions but I think it's hard to really judge whether that will occur, or not. Our unemployment rate did jump between 4Q '07 & 1Q '08...5% up to 5.5%. Again, I think that's reflecting Wall Street job loses. I understand what you mean about comps being tough to get a hold of now. There's been nothing comparable to our place that's sold in over a year within the historic district. So, we'd have to make some large +/- adjustments in looking at comps. If I were going to buy today...I'd start looking at making offers around -20% from July '05 prices. Some CT towns have sales data available online. Sometimes, your gut feel will tell you the right price if you're in tune to local market conditions. It also depends on the price bracket. Under $500K is still chugging along in our area because of the Groton sub base (transfers), Pfizer, & Electric Boat. Between $500-$900K is slow as a snail, & over $900K is just plain dead in the water. Congratulations on your sale! BTW, renting is not a bad suggestion. /tricia

I've never heard of some "secret" database for this sort of thing. Often it's communication and connections between agents. For example, a person in my office knows I live in a certain neighborhood. She has a client that wants to buy in this neighborhood, but nothing is for sale. She asks me if I know of anyone that "might" sell. I do and contact my neighbor for this "one show" listing. She shows it, buyers love it, sold! In my board we have the ability to send out broadcast emails. If I cannot find a particular type of property, I'll send out an email to all agents asking about any "one shows" or upcoming listings that might work. One recent email turned up 5 additional houses in a very high demand area for me to show clients. (That might not sound like a lot, but when there are only 2 listings for the area, it's significant.) Occasionally agents will send out information regarding a house that is not listed but could be sold. And 60 minutes thinks RE can be bought and sold like books?

According to this chart, median income has little to do with medial home price. In fact, the income is the least affordable city is about 15 % *less* than in the most affordable. Least affordable City State Income Median price % affordable Los Angeles CA $56,200 $523,000 1.8% Santa Ana CA $78,300 $626,000 2.6% Modesto CA $54,400 $372,000 4.1% Stockton CA $57,100 $310,000 4.8% San Diego CA $64,900 $477,000 4.9% New York NY $59,200 $500,000 5.1% Riverside CA $57,500 $393,000 6.7% San Francisco CA $91,200 $759,000 6.8% Fresno CA $47,000 $306,000 7.1% Nassau/Suffolk NY $91,000 $450,000 7.9% Most affordable Metro area State Income Median price % affordable Indianapolis IN $65,100 $122,000 85.9% Youngstown OH $52,100 $86,000 85.5% Detroit MI $56,700 $95,000 85.5% Buffalo NY $58,300 $88,000 82.9% Grand Rapids MI $61,500 $128,000 81.6% Dayton OH $59,800 $113,000 81.2% Toledo OH $58,900 $115,000 80.5% Harrisburg PA $64,300 $140,000 79.5% Akron OH $61,300 $115,000 79.5% Rochester NY $64,100 $117,000 79.0% . As far as population, the 2nd largest population in the US in is TX which has cities on neither list. #3 NY has cities on both list. #4 FL- none, #5 IL-none , #6 PA-most, #7 OH-most, #8 MI-most, #9 NJ-none, and #10 GA-none. I'd like to see the entire list with population breakdowns, but I've been unable to find it. Also, as another poster listed, even within higher priced cities, there are homes more affordable homes if you're willing to compromise. I think breaking things down into clarifies the issue. Broad generalizations can be just as invalid. Statistics are open to intepretation. How many times on this board has someone mentioned buying a home for $X and someone posted "I can't build a garage/buy a 1/8 ac lot/remodel a kitchen for $X in my area"? RE is a regional thing. Then there are micro markets within the region. Simply saying that houses are less affordable now than they have ever been is silly if you look within the big picture. Many of the areas with "rising inaffordability" are simply leveling out to where median income buys median home. Again, I'm not claiming to be any sort of RE expert. I'm just trying to get a clearer picture and the more research I do, the more I realize I have not been hearing or reading about the RE market.