Another boom coming for Arizona

Real estate expert and economic forecaster Elliott D. Pollack said on Friday that the worst phase of the downturn is over for the greater Phoenix area, including Pinal County, but that recovery will be slow. “2012 and 2013 will be a hell of a lot better than 2011,” Pollack told a group of 200 or so government officials, developers, financiers and other business people at the Pinal County Partnership's annual economic forecast. “And 2011 will be a hell of a lot better than 2008 and 2009. By 2014 and 2015, you all will have big smiles on your faces again.” In the short term, according to Pollack’s analysis, economic progress will be modest, mainly because of the depth and aftereffects of the collapse in homebuilding and real estate prices including the continuing glut of foreclosures. Tight credit conditions for both homebuyers and businesses and continuing unemployment will also act as dampers, preventing the kind of robust bounce-back typical after most previous recessions. Pollack said that that Arizona cannot have a robust recovery until the construction industry gets back on its feet and that such a rebound won’t fully occur until 2014, when the current excess housing inventory is finally absorbed and population inflow becomes strong enough again to support a thriving new home building industry with all its attendant benefits in jobs, city revenue and positive psychology.

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