Somehow I missed this last week ..

but another interesting piece in the USA Today on the history and potential future of the US real estate market. I guess you could say this is bad news for all those who used "creative financing" to buy second homes at Deep Creek Lake at the peak of the market, but with all the bailout programs in the works or still coming maybe all these debts will just magically go away. Read the full story from the USA Today entitled "Why home values may take decades to recover". If you click on the link to the charts under "Anatomy of a crisis" you'll also see some historical inventory charts not unlike the one I have linked at the top of this page for the Deep Creek market specifically. I also found it interesting that on a national level an inventory of 6 months is considered a healthy market. That begs the question what would the Realtors put that number at for the Deep Creek market? I'm guessing it would be considerably less than the current 37, perhaps more like 8-9 tops. There are a lot of interesting thoughts and charts enclosed in the links so check them out if you are a follower of the housing market.

Meanwhile, on a slightly different note, last week I also read on another blog that the current state of the economy is good news for Wisp ski resort and should increase revenue this season (as if it were likely or a given that this would happen). A good snow season might help increase revenues at Wisp this year but I highly doubt the folks at Wisp are counting on a banner year unless we get a really good snow season. The basic premise of the argument was that people are avoiding taking longer more expensive trips to western ski resorts and instead finding closer alternatives. While that may be the case for a select few, those following this logic also have to consider that some of the previous pool of regular visitors to Wisp may choose to stay home altogether. As it is however, I can only assume that this writer believes middle income people are less affected by the economic downturn than those higher up the scale who could previously afford regular ski trips to Vail or other western destinations. It's mindboggling the kind of logic (or lack thereof) you can find online these days.

Don't forget to check back to Dan's Deep Creek Blog for future updates.