SHADOW INVENTORY OF THE HOUSING MARKET

* "The official inventory: 3.5 million homes. The National Association of Realtors says the current inventory of existing homes that are listed for sale would take 8.6 months to work down at the current sales pace. In "normal" times, the inventory backlog is more in the vicinity of six months. * The unofficial shadow inventory: 1.8 million homes. According to research firm CoreLogic, there's another 1.8 million homes sitting in shadow inventory. These are homes that don't yet show up in NAR's Multiple Listing Service as being for sale, but that are likely to hit the market at some point. They include homes that banks have already foreclosed on but have yet to put up for sale, homes that are somewhere in the foreclosure process, and homes in which owners are at least 90 days late on their mortgage payments. CoreLogic estimates that those 1.8 million homes represents an additional 9 months of potential supply given the pace of how bank-owned property and pending foreclosures make their way to market. * The severely underwater inventory: 2 million. CoreLogic uses this category to refer to homeowners that are at least 50 percent underwater on their mortgages. Now there's nothing that says homeowners with negative equity will in fact walk away from their mortgages. But it's reasonable to presume that short of a quick turnaround in home values or a settlement between the state attorneys general and lenders that leads to substantial loan modifications, a significant chunk of these homes will end up on the market in the coming months or years. Add it all up, and NAR's 8.6 month official backlog triples to about two years or so. " The rally in stocks is sort of like the "shadow Inventory" in housing....and when LIGHT is shined down on truth it is ugly D