'Flippings Over' In Tucson

The Arizona Daily Star has a report on Tucson. "The days of ever-higher local home prices may be over - new statistics show Tucson's median home price has hovered around $220,000 for the last three months. Patience doesn't guarantee buyers. Already, more homes are being listed at one price and then reduced, said (agent) Robin Sue Kaiserman." "'The flipping's over with,' Kaiserman said, referring to speculators who buy and sell for quick profit. The slowing is actually a good thing, she said. 'It's really better for the economy to have some normalcy. It's much scarier when it keeps going up because you know it can't sustain that,' Kaiserman said." "Home values in Tucson and Phoenix may actually dip in the coming months, said Dawn McLaren, an economist at Arizona State University. 'What you'll see is prices leveling out and after that, they may even drop,' she said. Prices will drop as speculative investors pull out of the Tucson and Phoenix markets and look to other 'hot' markets, she said." "None of that is going to deter Susanne Winick, a New York resident who has bought seven investment homes in Tucson. At the end of this month, she and husband Sherwin are buying two more. 'We had a long-term goal and we're not paying that much heed to the market. We had a game plan and we were going on that and not on listening to what was going on around us,' Winick said." "'I think people have to be sensible and not borrow what you think your asset is going to be worth next year,' ASU economist McLaren said. 'If they have an income to cover the payments and you're willing to live in it for a while, worrying isn't going to help at this point.' And if she were a speculative investor who just paid a lot of money for a house? 'I'd start chewing my fingernails.'"