Ok so you buy a house for 60k here, put a few grand into work into it and live in it for 2-3 years which would amount to paying about 2-3k in escrow/mortgage/interest, when the market rebounds and you can sell the house for double, you wouldn't do it? 58-60 thousand isn't worth it?
Its all feasible, just because a house won't sell for 120 now doesn't mean it won't in the future.
If I had the patience and money to fix up this house I bet I could sell it for 120 easily. Thats well over double what I paid for it.
In the future yes, at some point it will be, however 2 years? nope, not going to happen, that's like saying my house will be worth 500K in a few years, my house was well in the 400s at the peak of the market, I bought it for $305 I live in a hot area that will rebound better then most areas thanks to government workers I will be very happy if I break even in 2-3-4 years when I go to sell the house.
If my house is worth 400K in less then 5 years, I will be VERY surprised. The housing market just went though another run up on prices, my parents house was worth low 200 in the mid 80s, 300 towards the end of the 90s and from 03+ went from low 300K up to near 650-700K it took nearly 15 years to gain 50% of its value yet pulled 100+% in 2-3 years. As of right now its worth maybe 450ish.
The days of a housing market running up are gone at least for this decade, we will see a bump in prices at first when everyone jumps back in but it will pan out and we'll see nice small yearly gains of 3-6% After while we'll see yet another run up and pull back.
Long term, homes are always winners, however your idea of flipping a house thinking you'll see 100% gain on money in a few years.... look at the hard facts.
1980-1989-52% appreciation
5.2% per year
1990-1999-45% aprreciation
4.5% per year
2000-2008-42% appreciation
4.2% per year
Each decade had its own bubble where the market went crazy, we just went though it. Chances of it happening again in the next few years are slim. Yes values will go up, but we will not see 20%-30% gains in a single year let alone 50%
Its like playing the stock market, (insert any stock name) sold for 10 bucks then shot up to 70 dollars, fizzled out back down to 20 bucks, chances of it making another run soon? good luck with that.
Buying a trashed house in your area for 50K spending 15K on fixing it up then selling it for 75-80K wouldn't be a bad idea IF you have the cash, but then you have to deal with capital gains if you sell without owning it for 2 years. To avoid that you need to either rent or live in it. If you don't live in it financing will be high cost, if you do live in it then its more then just a investment, in order to make it worth while you'll have to flip 2-3-4 houses. Then there's selling it, don't forget about paying your agent up to 5-6% =(
You are in a good position with your house, you already own it, you can fix it up and hopefully ride out the initial bump in gains and then 4-5-6% over the next year or 2 then sell it hopefully making enough profit to move up to a bigger better house. I just hope you don't really believe you'll see up to a 100% gain in only a few years.