Edmonton – New figures published this week suggest the gingerbread housing market has gone stale, while the looming fiscal cliff heads our way. Edible housing starts in November are at their lowest level since 2008, despite being in the industry’s busiest time of year. The many vacant properties suggest that a tiny, whimsical version of a Detroit-like ghetto nightmare could  be due to strike the  this once prospering and delicious sector.

Among the hardest hit are angry independent contractors like Sherwood Park’s Phil Scrawchuck,  who are heavily invested in the future of the delicious, usually pepper-minted construction projects. He quotes,“Back in boom-times,  we just about had a dozen guys in on the Temporary Foreign Worker program. But since the 2008 recession , they had to ship ’em all back to Thaigeria – or where ever the hell Fillipinos come from.”

Prior to the 2008 financial crisis, investors and analysts alike were buoyant about the future of the tiny and edible housing market. However, since then, swatches of gingerbread planned neighborhoods are left vacant – many houses abandoned, stripped of their their chocolate or gumdrops, mid-syrupy construction. Where it seems confidence has returned to other useless, whimsy markets worldwide,  consumers may never be as sweet into investing into the heated gingerbread market as they were prior to 2008.

The Edmonton West Star, 12/12/2012