Big profits for home-flippers signal Phoenix-area rebound

In another sign that metro Phoenix's housing market is slowly recovering, hundreds of homes across the region sold by banks after foreclosure or through short sales are being flipped by investors for almost double the price they paid just a few months earlier. With metro Phoenix's median home price steadily climbing this year, speculators have seized on an opportunity to make fast profits and are selling houses across the region at prices not seen since the beginning of the housing boom in 2003-04. Home prices have climbed as the supply of houses for sale has shrunk. The number of homes for sale in the Phoenix area is half of what it was last May, and the median price is up by an astonishing 30 percent since then. < SCRIPT language='JavaScript1.1' SRC="http://ad.doubleclick.net/adj/N5664.2664.0290430894321/B6174107.6;abr=!ie;sz=160x600;click=http%3A//gannett.gcion.com/adlink%2F5111%2F334834%2F0%2F154%2FAdId%3D2382768%3BBnId%3D1%3Bitime%3D310458155%3Blink%3D;ord=310458155?"> < /SCRIPT>< NOSCRIPT>< A HREF="http://gannett.gcion.com/adlink/5111/334834/0/154/AdId=2382768;BnId=1;itime=310458155;nodecode=yes;link=http://ad.doubleclick.net/jump/N5664.2664.0290430894321/B6174107.6;abr=!ie4;abr=!ie5;sz=160x600;ord=310458155?"> < IMG SRC="http://ad.doubleclick.net/ad/N5664.2664.0290430894321/B6174107.6;abr=!ie4;abr=!ie5;sz=160x600;ord=310458155?" BORDER=0 WIDTH=160 HEIGHT=600 ALT="Advertisement"> < /NOSCRIPT> Lenders clearing inventories of foreclosure and short-sale homes, coupled with a shortage of other homes for sale, have led to a rapid increase in home prices this year. And the bounce in prices has given cash buyers a chance to make hundreds of thousands of dollars flipping homes. Real-estate experts say that's also good news for homeowners who have been battered by falling prices for six years due to record foreclosure homes flooding the market and selling for bargain prices. Now that foreclosures have dropped and home prices have started to rebound, many more homeowners may be able to sell for a profit again.

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