Reuters:

On the auction block in Detroit: almost 9,000 homes and lots in various states of abandonment and decay from the tidy owner-occupied to the burned-out shell claimed by squatters.

Taken together, the properties seized by tax collectors for arrears and put up for sale last week represented an area the size of New York’s Central Park. Total vacant land in Detroit now occupies an area almost the size of Boston, according to a Detroit Free Press estimate.

Go ahead and make all the jokes you want; Detroit is and likely will be an easy target. But I found this Craig's List ad quite interesting.

We've got two options when it comes to all the soon to be unused real estate and "development" in this country. We can leave it to rot, and thus makeover the nation in the image of Detroit in the 70s; or we can accept that what a friend calls 'the suburban-industrial complex' model of the economy isn't ever going to come back, and thus different approaches to development are required.

Big Blue has yet another post about the collapse of the Inland Empire, and I'm sure a review of housing and real estate blogs would show equally grim news for overdeveloped regions all over the country. The truth is, the economic situation we find ourselves in comes in large part from the mythology of the ever-expanding American realty bubble. We let deregulation go too far, and the banking industry took that myth and fucked our entire economy with it when it burst. But like a lot of us hippy crunchy types have been saying for a long time: cheap energy, cheap imported supplies, and cheap credit can't go on forever. That day is here.

I don't know much about this Detroit deal other than the fact that downtown really could use some smart development, and I like the way this sounds. It's time for all of us to take steps to make sure those with different approaches to development to be given their turn. I often imagine what could be done with the decaying, empty strip malls and shuttered big box stores that are popping up with increasing frequency where I live. But I'm also not so hopeful that state and local governments will act in time, and repurpose those properties before the decay makes them uninhabitable. Perhaps I'm wrong in that, and approaches like the one found in this link will become more common than I'd imagined.

My grandparents were amazing people. Despite racism and poverty, they managed to retire in wealth and comfort, because they beat the odds and worked the system and carved out a very profitable little real estate empire in the latter halves of their lives. Beginning when I was 12, I got sent to live and work with them in the summers, the better to learn about "the value of the dollar" and "where money comes from" and other wholesome lessons. It worked. I learned over those summers that "business" in America means one must at all times be on guard for lying, thieving, stealing, misreprestation and demonic evil. Sometimes, I wish I had my grandfather's mettle; I left the business and went off to college to study things that didn't make me feel so "icky," which is always how I feel in a sales position. But it turns out he was right and I was wrong; if I'd skipped college and taken over the business, I'd be rich and powerful enough to buy me some politicians, instead of poor and with a head stuffed with pretty words and dates in history that no politician seems to be able to hear.

Anyway, this post from a blog that's new to me really brought back the real estate nightmares every salesperson has had:

Imagine a 40% crash in housing prices . Seriously just run through the scenario in your head. How much of your net worth is accounted for in your house? How much of your retirement nest egg? How much have you drawn out of said house in equity? What would that wonderfully extended mortgage look like, you know the adjustable one with the interest only for the first five years or so; the mortgage that will last you a good fifty years – yeah that one. You in the service industry, the paper pusher who is about to be down sized, the data entry operator or phone jockey making more than you know you should – you. How would you like to be holding a mortgage on a property that is worth about half what you paid for it, making half of what you used to? Get the picture? I’ll buy it off you for transaction cost.