HUD Secretary Steven Preston: ‘It feels like we’re finding a floor’

Read what HUD Secretary Steve Preston had to say about the credit crunch in an interview with CNBC on August 29th.

CNBC: In your perspective this housing crunch still has quite a bit left to go before we can see light at the end of the tunnel?

SP: I think that we do have a ways to go. We’ve seen some encouraging signs. Earlier this week, we saw that sales of new home were up on a month-over-month basis and that was an encouraging sign….We have a fundamental supply imbalance.

I think it’s going to really take time for the market to work its way through it but the good news is, for the people who having trouble paying their mortgages today because they are resetting or whatever, we are increasingly there to help them refinance into something they can afford.

CNBC: Are you confident enough to say that you think maybe the accelerated erosion in housing may be more behind us and in front of us?

SP: I do believe that. It feels like we’re finding a floor here and I think the other thing we’re seeing is that in selected markets around the country we are starting to see some strength. So in some cases we’re actually seeing a flattening of prices or actually some price appreciation.

CNBC: Which markets are you talking about?

SP:Charlotte for example or parts of Texas. Now in Florida and California and in some of these markets that have seen greater difficulty been we still have some tough waters ahead of us because the inventories are much deeper. But it does seem that there are parts of the country that are beginning to stabilize and in fact starting to improve.

CNBC: If you think things are going to continue to get worse, is the administration prepared to do more to help people in need?

SP: I’m not saying that it’s going to get worse, I think what we’re going to see is a period of time before we’re going to see energy coming out of this, which is different than saying things are goign to get worse.

I do think it’s important to note that programs that have been put in place like FHA and like Hope Now are increasingly helping people. I think the word is getting out early on and even though the programs have been in place, many people didn’t know about them, so the flow is coming our way and more and more people are getting help.

Watch the whole video here