Housing slump even hits Houston

For those of you who think Texas is immune from housing problems, this should make you think again. The Big H is going to see a 20 percent drop from last year’s record. The details:

In May, sales of homes in the $80,000 to $140,000 price range — which made up 32 percent of the transactions during that month — were down 8.3 percent, compared to the year before, according to the Houston Association of Realtors.

And there is that ripple effect which ostriches don’t want to see

“When you start building fewer homes, you're selling fewer appliances, less carpeting, less cement and less wood to the local suppliers,” said Jim Gaines, a research economist at the Real Estate Center at Texas A&M University. “Generally, it takes awhile for that to show up.”

Oh, I did also find it halfway refreshing for a story about the construction industry in Texas to mention that “immigrants” are a lot of its workers. Try to be fully refreshing in the future, real estate writers, and tell us that illegal immigrants work there. We know it, and so do you, since you said they’re not counted in employment counts, but have the conejos to spell it out.