The market has vanished.

An opportunity knocked. We're moving cross country to pursue it.

Which means we need to sell a house.

The first time we sold a house, many, many years ago, we sold without a broker to friends of friends. That house never went on the MLS at all. And both parties walked away very happy. Last time we sold a house, seven years ago, we sold it by owner for close to the asking price in less than three days. That was then. 

This is now. And what we've discovered - the market for homes has vanished completely. There are no buyers at all.

We are motivated sellers. We've priced our home competitively. Yet let me repeat: there are no buyers. And if you look at market metrics, for several years now, the supply of homes for sale far exceeds the number of buyers. Within any given month, there are several hundred homes for sale, and just a handful of sales.

That's grim news if you've signed the contracts and are moving cross-country in a couple of months. The one bit of green we see - the market for renters is apparently robust. And at least we're not under water with the mortgage.

But I remain absolutely stunned at the absolute absence of the housing market. 

What our financial sector did to the housing market is unconscionable. They maxed out the housing market with leverage - as is their habit - and then got bailed out when the market collapsed.

For people like me, however, those who got the 30 yr fixed mortgage we could afford - we're screwed. Totally and completely screwed by "the market." Which was totally and completely manipulated and destroyed by our financial sector. 

And there's no bailout for us.