BluefoxToday blog : Las Vegas underwater homeowners to float by 2020? It's possible

Many Southern Nevada - including Mountains Edge, Summerlin, North Las Vegas, Henderson, Canyon Gate and Spanish Trail - mortgage borrowers are still dealing with the effects of the great real estate meltdown. Short sale has recently become a more acceptable avenue for home loan banks to address the lingering issue of delinquency, giving people a somewhat more palatable way out of a tight spot. Despite that, high mortgage foreclosure filings continue clouding the sandy landscape of Las Vegas valley. The once in a lifetime housing upheaval is by no means over and done with yet.

Sin City's homeowners have watched in horror as property values have taken a perilous plunge over the cliff, slamming them so low that scores are now in negative equity. An altogether regrettable situation. They are now spending quality time wondering about the future of housing here. More specifically, when the underwater label would be ceremoniously blacked out from the local real estate vocabulary.

First American CoreLogic, a real estate research boutique, has taken the brave step of trying to answer that tricky question. It took a close look at ten markets, one of which was Las Vegas, in order to arrive at a time frame when the average mortgage recipient would break surface and again breathe fresh air. It used unpaid principal balances, short-term housing forecasts, a standard measure of long-term value trends, amortization and predictably some other exotic proprietary data to make it happen.

Las Vegas real estate market has a long way to go according to FACL findings. The average mortgage borrower in Southern Nevada will break even by 2020, ten years from now, it says. The valley's price erosion has been very uneven. Some areas have suffered only mild losses while others have seen multiple G-force dives. It's the latter category that will likely linger in the netherworld well past 2020. These subdivisions generally were built right in the middle of the bubble when new home prices in particular were shamelessly hiked just about monthly, if not faster, steadily hauling them to bizarre heights. Buyers were undeterred, as were mortgage lenders, feeding the frenzy that soon made the term underwater, or upside down, a household word.

For some Southern Nevada real estate owners it will unfortunately be a long road to salvation, for others likely under ten years. It's all about the location.