The economic crisis in the USA has spawned a new type of bargain hunting tourist: tour groups traveling to the USA to seek out deals in a free falling real estate market. The first group landed in the states this week. Organized by a real estate company in China the group of about 40 will visit New York, Boston, Los Angeles, Las Vegas and San Francisco seeking foreclosure properties to purchase while taking in the sights, according to
NPR.
I don’t resent this type of tourism. The food chain of material consumption is realigning. Perhaps like nature it will evolve to be a more balanced and realistic ecosystem when all is said and done. But I do wonder how much feng shui would be needed to make a home purchased under these conditions auspicious. You can listen to NPR’s report
here.
Photo: Boarded up brownstones New York City
I don’t resent this type of tourism. The food chain of material consumption is realigning. Perhaps like nature it will evolve to be a more balanced and realistic ecosystem when all is said and done. But I do wonder how much feng shui would be needed to make a home purchased under these conditions auspicious. You can listen to NPR’s report here.
9 comments:
Welcome to the Brave New World of Trauma Tourism...exactly the same thing happened during the crash in 2002 in Buenos Aires...( my phrase by the way which I am hereby patenting!)
Whatever works for people...! I guess the Realty boards/agents have to make a living for themselves. And they know that they have to look beyond their "own backyard" for clients.
Interesting find. It's a little weird to see real estate tourism, but people have people have been doing it with other types of shopping like clothing or electronics for years (London to NYC especially).
Hmmm... interesting.
Paz
Assuming this is for investment, not habitation.
They are certainly hitting the higher-end housing markets. If they gave up some of the tourism aspect, they could be buying up entire neighborhoods in the flyover states.
Feng sui is right. Purchasing property under those circumstances is never good karma. I suppose they are buying to invest but the energy from the whole transaction is still negative. It will be interesting to see how long these kind of trips remain popular.
and now india is looking at slum tourism !
This is an interesting kind of tourism. Not buying but renting properties is extremely common.. they can have a home away from home with their own people.
Catherine, Love the phrase and def protect your intellectual property.
Jen, I agree
Gennaro, when the dollar was very weak I had friends and family from the U.K. take advantage of this.
Paz,Thanks for stopping by.
Roy, Detroit comes to mind.
Flygirl, unfortunately I think the mess we are in will last well into next year.
Lakshmi, I read about that. I guess the upside is that Slumdog Millionaire will help tourism in Mumbai. So many long time business owners went bust after September 11th because of the drop in tourism and I would hate to see the same happen in Mumbai.
Cuckoo, I would love to have a home away from home overseas. One day perhaps...
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