3 Responses to “Boston real estate: Promising signs for 2012” »»

1. John Adams
   Comment by John Adams | 01/02/12 at 7:08 am

   Good luck with that!

   Not if the stock market falls off a cliff and with the world replete with over overindebtedness and potentially much slower growth rates moving forward there may be a greater possibility that Boston’s real estate prices get really hammered based on our reliance on the financial services industry (and, of course our large medical community which will soon see the effects of Obama’s national healthcare).

2. Dem Economist
   Comment by Dem Economist | 01/03/12 at 9:00 am

   John Adams, interesting comment. If so kind, please tell me why you think that the Obama Health Care Bill will have a negative impact on the local Boston condo market. I’m not arguing, but I’d like to read your logical arguments. I’m on the fence. Please tell me more….

3. John Adams
   Comment by John Adams | 01/03/12 at 12:04 pm

   Presently newly minted docs, finance folks and lawyers find it almost impossible to be able to live in the City of Boston due to the high cost of living and their extremely high student loans which they incurred in grad school.

   Many folks who could make it through med school on their horsepower and academic backgrounds are instead going in to finance (not necessarily a good time for that either!).

   According to the New York Post:

   “Everyone except primary-care docs would see payments for their services cut by 5.9 percent a year for three years (totalling a 16.7 percent cut in income), followed by a seven-year freeze at the reduced levels. Primary-care providers would have their reimbursement rates frozen at today’s pay levels for the whole decade. All this is part of a larger effort to save Medicare upward of $300 billion over 10 years.”

   So, given this scenario, I expect that there will be fewer folks wanting to become docs and that those who do won’t make as much money as previously which will mean less demand for Boston condos – at least from this group of potential buyers (and, if the stock market gets in to real trouble then the finance folks will suffer the same as the medical folks with the same results as regards the condo market).

   I remember a very recent conversation that I had with a young medical specialist and I asked him if he was going to buy a condo in Boston and he replied that he couldn’t possibly afford to with his student debt and with what Obamacare would do to their profession (his words, not mine).

   John

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