When Patty Marquez graduated from the University of Minnesota more than five years ago and moved to Southern California, she thought about buying a house.
But with prices already sky-high in the Southland market, “I was scared,” says Marquez, now 31. So she rented for more than four years.
But all along, even as prices in the region continued to climb, she kept thinking to herself: Isn’t owning a home the right thing to do? Last February the school psychologist, who now makes $77,000 a year, took the plunge and purchased a $600,000 duplex, putting 3 percent down on a 40-year fixed-rate mortgage.
Though prices started to ease by the time she bought, her timing was still poor. Since Marquez bought the property in Signal Hill, Calif., just north of Long Beach, home values in her area have fallen more than 3 percent, and they’re expected to drop an additional 9 percent in 2008.