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Home market being held back by wary first-timers

By Derek Kravitz

 |  Associated press  

  December 01, 2011

This should be a great time to buy a first home. Prices have sunk to 2002 levels. Sellers are waiting anxiously as homes languish on the market. Mortgage rates are their lowest ever. Yet the most likely first-time homeowners, especially young professionals and couples starting families, won’t buy these days. Or they can’t. Or they already did, during the housing boom. And their absence helps explain why the housing industry is still depressed.

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