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Return of the 1980s?
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March 5, 1997: 6:25 p.m. ET
With interest rates low, sales improve while price gains stay in check
From Correspondent John Metaxas
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NEW YORK (CNNfn) -- After a devastating setback in the early 1990s, the real-estate market appears to be building profits.
Home buyers have returned to the market, but this time around, nobody's expecting the price gains of the 1970s and 1980s.
"We were surprised by the market and what we could afford," said John Stueck, a new homeowner in Scotch Plains, N.J..
"We knew we had a lot of expenses coming up, and we didn't want to put ourselves into any artificial struggle," said his fiancee, Jill Feinberg. "If the conditions hadn't been right, we would have just rented and waited."
The time seems right for a lot of people.
Last year, with interest rates attractively low, new and old homes sold at a pace not seen in decades. January sales have also come in surprisingly strong.
Now, every region of the country has rebounded from the recession of the early 1990s, including hard-hit California and the Northeast.
"What's going on right now, which is only the last couple of months, is making me feel it's 1985 again," said Ann Allen of Coldwell Banker in Westfield, New Jersey.
While prices last year rose more than they had in five years, the gains were modest. The Midwest came out on top, up nearly 7 percent. The Northeast saw the lowest increase at under 3 percent.
"The greatest rates of appreciation have been in the Rocky Mountain states, where job growth has been exceptional," said John Tuccillo, chief economist of the National Association of Realtors.
"Atlanta is an extremely hot metropolitan area because job growth is good," Tuccillo said. "The Washington, D.C., area is a very bad market because we have been cutting government workers."
With inflation so low, no-one expects to see the double-digit price gains of the 1970s or '80s anytime soon. But buyers like John Stueck are thrilled with the tax breaks and a home to call their own.
"We didn't purchase it as an investment, so we'll be happy if we just get the money back," Stueck said. 
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