Worst May Well Be Over in U.S. Housing Slump

Alan Greenspan (Former Federal Reserve Chairman) said the "worst may well be over" for the U.S. housing slump.

Greenspan, speaking at a conference in Calgary on Oct 6, 2006, pointed to a "flattening out" of weekly mortgage applications after they went down "very dramatically".

The Fed vice chairman, Donald Kohn, a former top adviser to Greenspan, also said this week that while he doesn't know how long and deep the housing slump will be, it probably won't sink the U.S. economy into a recession.

The graph shows the MBA Purchase Index since it's inception in 1990. On a long term scale, I don't see any significant "flattening out".