Canary in the Global Coal Mine?

From the Associated Press:

A growing majority say they won't buy a home anytime soon, the latest sign of increasing pessimism about the nation's housing crisis, a poll showed Monday...Sixty percent said they definitely won't buy a home in the next two years, up from 53 percent who said so in an AP-AOL poll in September 2006. At the same time, just 11 percent are certain or very likely to buy soon, down from 15 percent two years ago.
...
The growing reluctance to dip into the housing market seems to stem partly from worry that housing prices will continue falling....Expectations for rising prices are highest in the South, with Westerners likeliest to predict they will drop.
...
Daniel Gallego, a warehouse worker in Stockton, Calif., said he may have to sell his home at a big loss. He said rising gasoline and other costs have made his adjustable rate mortgage unaffordable. Because he doesn't expect his home's value to recover soon, he said he may be better off moving now, before his rates rise. "We may have to move in with my wife's parents or my parents," said Gallego, 30, who has two young children. "I could pay off some debt, then we could rent, and maybe buy another house in a few years."

From the International Herald Tribune (hat tip smf):

The collapse of the housing bubble in the United States is mutating into a global phenomenon, with real estate prices down from the Irish countryside and the Spanish coast to Baltic seaports and even in parts of India. This synchronized global slowdown, which has become increasingly stark in recent months, is hobbling economic growth worldwide, affecting not just homes, but also jobs.

In Ireland, Spain, Britain and elsewhere, housing markets that soared over the past decade are falling back to earth. Experts predict that some countries, like Ireland, will face an even more wrenching adjustment than the United States, with the possibility that the downturn could turn into wholesale collapse.

To some extent, the world's problems are a result of American contagion. As home financing and credit tighten in response to the crisis that began in the U.S. subprime market, analysts worry that other countries could suffer the mortgage defaults and foreclosures that have afflicted California, Florida and other states.

Flashback: California's New Canary in the Coal Mine
Flashback: "Loans to Sacramento Trailer-Home Buyers...Trigger a Global Credit Crisis"

From the Sacramento Bee:

Folsom home builder consultant Greg Paquin reported last week that area builders opened 2008 with their fewest sales since possibly the early 1990s. That's nothing to sing about in a region that has seen sales and prices slide for the better part of 33 months. But here's the bright spot: Paquin sees in the new numbers some signals of a market approaching bottom.

Throughout the housing downturn, his predictions about the number of homes that will be built in a given year in the region have tracked pretty close to reality.

Maybe next time Wasserman can ask Paquin about how his sales predictions have held up.