Has there ever been a better time to buy real estate? I believe that there hasn’t and property listings show that there are huge amounts of homes for sale.

The recent financial crisis, that has started in the subprime housing market, has caused major erruptions in the real estate market. A big amount of homeowners was forced to put their homes on the market and therefore the prices decreased significantly. This price decrease affected the low and mid price real estate market most, there has not been a significant fall in prices among high value real estates.

Now, you shouldn’t go out and blindly buy all the homes for sale, even though they might offer good value for the money.

There are a few things to consider:
Realestate Taxes : Many states tax real estate on living space or area of your property, so even though the property you bought might be a bargain, it could end up costing you a ton and make you wake up with a big and ugly hangover. Real estate agents often fail to mention this (not so) tiny little detail.
Neighborhood : In formerly nice living areas and decent neighborhoods (or neighbourhoods for our british friends) the real estate crisis has forced many home owners to sell, and lots of them will not have been able to sell their property. They have ended up in private brancrupcy, and their former home is now being neglected. There is no realestate management that takes care of those homes. It even happens that homless people move into those real estates and occupy them. That
causes whole neighbourhoods to decline and turn formerly nice neighborhoods into ones that you would definitely not want to live in. Owning a house there would also certainly not end up being profitable, because it will take decades for those neighborhoods to recover, if they recover at all.
Recent experience: The burst of the housing bubble has shown us, that the times where you could just buy any random house and be sure that it will rise in value are definitely over. The real estate market should now be seen like any other market. One where you need to make good descision to be able to make money. You need to know what you are doing and you need to be cautious. Don’t fall for cheap real estate websites or the first realestate sign you see.

Don’t fall for the same trap as many many others did.

Best regards