Housing rebound still a long ways off

Local economists agree with city of Cedar Hill Finance Director Hardy Browder — housing market recovery here in the Dallas-Fort Worth is a ways off.

How far off? Economists and housing industry leaders meeting in Dallas said very late 2008 or 2009 before the housing market begins to recover.

“I think we are at the bottom but I think the bottom is very rocky and long,” said Robert McLeod, chairman of San Diego-based Newland Communities, which has several housing community projects in Texas. “It’s not going to feel very good until about the third quarter of 2009,” McLeod told members of the Urban Land Institute on Friday. The international real estate

Nationally, with about $680 billion in ARMs due to reset this year, Texas A&M economist Jim Gaines said recovery might not start until 2010.