Likelihood of Success

The New York Times says we’ve hit the ceiling of spiraling high-end real estate prices:

Consumers are rejecting any projects that involve developers turning existing hotel units into condominiums because the consumers fear that they could lose their deposits if these projects are never converted.

Instead, Wall Street bankers, baby boomers and Europeans are more often snapping up condominiums from developers with projects that are being built from the ground up.

“The market is separating the contenders from the pretenders,” Mr. Semilof said. “The consumer is not buying projects where they sell units and then do the conversions. People are willing to put money where they know where the building is going to be built.”

In other words, they’re pulling back from involvement in what was essentially absurd speculation. Is this the sign of a beginning of the end of the real estate boom? Or — more likely, I would think — a sign that a boom need not be a bubble?