If it was up to local Realtors, Obama would lose in a landslide
The Bay State may still be perceived as a liberal stronghold, but the president does not appear to be getting a lot of love from local real estate agents.
A startling 78 percent of Massachusetts real estate agents polled by HomeGain "strongly disapprove" of the Obama's performance.
The survey, taken in the third quarter amid a pileup of bad housing market news and the fallout from a tough spring market, is a big jump from the roughly 50 percent who gave the president failing grades at the start of the year.
It is further reflection of the deep quagmire the housing market has bogged down in. And while it would be unfair to blame the president for creating the housing mess we are in, he has arguably taken a bad situation and made it worse.
I'll lift here from my weekly Banker & Tradesman column, which came out today, which delves into the HomeGain poll numbers.
It is by far the highest level of discontent among real estate agents in any major state, including other liberal bastions such as New York, New Jersey and California, according to the survey by the online real estate site.
And Obama's plunging poll numbers among Realtors points to a much bigger problem when it comes to the president's reelection hopes - a muddled housing strategy that took an already a messed up housing market and made it worse.
"It's the lack of any meaningful recovery in the housing market, in spite of expensive Obama signature programs," that has disillusioned so many Realtors, notes Louis Cammarosano, a HomeGain spokesman. "Generally, it's the realization that hope and change don't pay the bills."
Here's a great piece in the The Washington Post that details Obama's many housing policy flops and how the housing market has emerged as the major obstacle to economic recovery.
Let's face it. Obama treated the housing market as a sideshow to his ambitious health care push. Now that decision is coming back to haunt us all.
