I admit, I read Dr. Housing Bubble Blog out of Southern California. Very little of the hysteria and a good read on where values should be compared to where they are. So I was more than a little shocked and/or dismayed when I read a recent interview with bubble author John Rubin.

According to Mr. Rubin, home values in higher-priced metro areas will be down by 80% by the year 2010 …

What’s your take on the tens of thousands of Real Homes of Genius in high priced metro areas?

Down 80% by 2010.

I’m not sure if he includes Phoenix but let’s assume so.

So, let’s take my parents house. According to Mr. Rubin, the value of my parents’ house will drop below where it was before the 2005 run-up in home values. Fair enough. But it also will drop below where it was in the days of double-digit interest rates.

In fact, an 80 percent drop in home value would mean their home would be worth less in 2010 than it was as a new build in 1976.

Read that last sentence again … according to him, home prices would retreat to levels from the Ford administration.

For that matter, I believe he’s also predicting your microwave will stop working on Jan. 1, 2000. Oh wait, that’s already passed. Different hysteria for a different book I suppose.

Amazingly, Dr. HB gives him a pass on this utterly ridiculous statement. Lord knows that if someone holding a real estate licensed predicted even an eight percent rise by 2010 they would be lambasted by the bubble-heads. Yet this lunacy gets a free pass.

Well, almost free. Several readers jumped in against the 80% drop stupidity, restoring at least a little faith in the collective brain matter of this country of ours.

What frightens me, though, is some still will read comments such as this and assume there is an ounce of truth when it is rhetoric designed to drive book sales.

But hey, the bubble folks all are objective observers with no profit motive.

Right?

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