MN Chair in Real Estate Steve Mooney sent me a copy of his report along with the press release that surveys graduates of his program to determine conditions in the real estate industry as discussed earlier. The survey was of 141 graduates, with 42 of them having three or fewer years of experience. Here are a few interesting tables:

Table 1 � How Do You Rate the Market?

2005						2007
	Very Good	Good	Average	Poor			Very Good	Good	Average	Poor
Appraisal	14%	66%	21%	0		Appraisal	0	17%	57%	27%
Development	38%	38%	23%	0		Development	14%	57%	14%	14%
Property Management	29%	57%	10%	0		Property Management	0	38%	54%	8%
Mortgage Banker	3%	84%	13%	0		Mortgage Banker	0	12%	35%	53%
Broker	13%	80%	7%	0		Broker	0	26%	41%	33%
Assessor	7%	57%	36%	0		Assessor	0	0	73%	27%
Res-All	11%	63%	25%	0		Res-All	0	12%	37%	51%
Comm-All	19%	71%	10%	0		Comm-All	1%	23%	52%	21%

That is as telling about the movement in the market as anything we can publish. In particular for mortgage bankers, the market is grim. When asked whether the respondents see themselves in the same business five years from now, here are the percentages who said "yes".

Table 2

	2005	2007
Appraisal	93%	90%
Developer	100%	100%
Prop Mgt	76%	88%
Mortgage Banker	91%	59%
Broker	100%	92%
Assessor	100%	86%

29% of respondents see the market improving in the next 1-3 years and 13% think it will get worse. (The rest believed it would "stabilize" -- at what level? I don't know.)

Labels: economics, housing, SCSU