Austin Market Update

The economy continues to be a concern, although the Austin market is definitely more stable

than that of many other cities. For example, according to the Chamber of Commerce information:

Austin saw 14,700 net new jobs created during the last 12 months, or an average of 1,225 new

jobs monthly. This performance places the Austin metropolitan area as the third fastest growing

among the nation's 50 largest metropolitan areas for the period.                                          



There appears to be pent-up buyer demand from buyers who have been sitting on the fence.  Buyers are once again looking into real estate as evidenced by

website traffic, property phone calls and internet inquiries. An additional good sign is that I have gotten four properties under contract within the last

couple of weeks. However, some buyers are still skittish and I fear that any major unsettling developments in the economic world could negatively affect our

situation here.

I am hopeful that as we move into the New Year and the changing of the president, people will feel increasingly optimistic about moving forward with a home purchase. Additionally the housing market will benefit from increased credit availability and federal stimulus packages. Contact us for further information. If you are thinking of buying, it’s a great time to take advantage of low mortgage rates. If you are thinking of selling, I would advise you to put your house on the market as soon as possible.

In the face of an intractable credit crisis and a recession that could be the deepest since World War II, economists are expecting another downcast year for housing in 2009. Mission Residential Chief Economist Richard Moody, for example, projects home prices to continue along their downward slope for the entire year before hitting bottom in early 2010. But while there's no shortage of gloomy data-rising unemployment, higher mortgage delinquencies, increasing foreclosures-glass half-fullers do have a number of hopes to cling to. And while these more optimistic factors might not be enough to spring housing back to life in 2009, they could-with a few lucky breaks-prevent the market from declining as sharply as it otherwise might.

1. Cheap mortgage rates: With inflationary pressures easing and economic concerns mounting, shell-shocked investors are seeking the protection of government securities, such a 10-year treasury notes, driving down yields. The lower yields, coupled with the Fed's recently announced plans to buy up debt and mortgage-backed securities from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have dragged mortgage rates to multi-year lows. Thirty-year, fixed mortgage rates hit an average of 5.47 percent last week, the lowest they've been since 2004, according to Freddie Mac.

To be sure, not everyone will be able to take advantage of these attractive rates: Tougher lending standards will prevent many would-be buyers from getting into the market, while homeowners whose houses are now worth less than what they owe on their mortgage won't be able to refinance. Still, the rates present a welcome incentive for qualified borrowers to step up to the plate. "Lower mortgage rates mean more people with those credentials will be able to qualify," says Patrick Newport, a U.S. economist at IHS Global Insight. While that might not make a dramatic impact on the market, it could be enough to keep home sales from declining as much as they otherwise would, Newport says.

2. Lower prices: Home prices at the national level have already fallen 21 percent from their 2006 peaks. And in certain bubble markets, the crash has been even steeper-prices have fallen more than 30 percent in Phoenix and Las Vegas over the past year alone. Although that's a big blow to homeowners-the housing bust is expected to wipe out more than $2 trillion in home values in 2008-lower prices do help stimulate buyer demand, which is badly needed to mop up the excess housing inventory. And while home prices are expected to drop further in 2009, values in certain markets are already at levels low enough to tempt bargain hunters. "Falling home prices aren't part of the problem, they are part of the solution," says Mike Larson, a real estate analyst at Weiss Research.

3. Fewer housing starts: In the face of dwindling demand, home builders have been forced to sharply pull back on new construction. The government reported Tuesday that November housing starts dropped to their lowest level since 1959, when officials started keeping the statistics. While that's bad news for the economy-because it means fewer jobs for builders and others-it's an important step in bringing housing supply back in line with demand. The cutback will limit the supply of new homes coming into the market, which helps to reduce the glut of unsold homes that is putting such downward pressure on housing prices. "In order to get rid of the inventory, builders have to cut back even further and prices have to drop," Newport says. "It's very painful, but there is no way to get around the fact that that's what you need to do to equilibrate the market."

4. Obama stimulus: In an attempt to hoist the economy out of its rut, President-elect Barack Obama has announced plans for a massive federal spending program. The initiative is expected to put between $500 billion and $1 trillion into infrastructure repair and other projects in an effort to keep Americans working. Should this program succeed in preventing unemployment from skyrocketing and keeping the economic contraction from hitting the dourest projections, certain housing markets may firm up quicker than expected, says Susan Wachter, a professor of real estate at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School of Business. In the best-case scenario, "the housing market declines become contained to those markets where house price declines are significant," Wachter says.

5. Credit programs: It will be tough for the housing market to come back to life until the credit markets-which have been log-jammed by fear for more than a year-begin to unlock. Like the fight to limit unemployment, reviving the credit markets is a daunting challenge. But remember, the federal government has already taken a number of steps designed to do just that. The Federal Reserve has slashed its benchmark interest rate to between 0 and 0.25 percent and committed nearly $2 trillion to new lending programs, bailouts, and additional measures designed to bolster the financial markets. Meanwhile, Congress passed a $700 billion bailout and the Treasury has already injected a chunk of that money into banks of all sorts. While these efforts haven't been enough to restore the credit markets to health, they have produced results. Interbank lending, for example, has eased. And should this modest victory lead to a broader recovery in the credit markets, the economy-and the housing demand that comes with growth-could turn around quicker than expected. "Right now, panic is driving the credit markets," says Moody of Mission Residential. "If, for whatever reason, confidence were to resume and people's appetite for risk was starting to increase, then you could start all of a sudden seeing credit flowing much more freely, which obviously supports spending in both business and households."

Texas has three of the hottest jobs markets, former leaders Phoenix, Las Vegas, others slipbizjournals - September 8, 2008by G. Scott Thomas

The past year has been a rocky one for the U.S. economy.The nation has seen 394,000 private-sector jobs slip away since mid-2007, equaling a loss of 7,570 jobs each week. The unemployment rate has shot up a full point during the same span -- from 4.7 percent at the halfway point of 2007 to 5.7 percent this year.But a few sections of the country have managed to dodge this economic carnage. The most prominent exception is Texas, which is home to America's three hottest labor markets, according to a new bizjournals study.Houston, Austin and Dallas-Fort Worth are 1-2-3 in the latest employment rankings of the nation's 100 largest metropolitan areas. The three Texas markets have added a total of 107,200 private-sector jobs since mid-2007, while keeping their unemployment rates below 5 percent.Texas' impressive performance, ironically enough, is partially the result of higher energy costs, the same factor that has bedeviled much of the rest of the nation."The state's natural resources and mining industry, helped by higher oil prices, posted an annual employment growth rate of 6.4 percent from June 2007 to June 2008 and ranked first among Texas industries in employment-growth rate," said a midyear report from the Real Estate Center at Texas A&M University.Texas also has been able to avoid the mortgage bubble that burst with devastating impact in other high-growth states such as California and Florida. A bizjournals study in March identified Houston as one of the nation's 10 most-affordable housing markets, with Dallas-Fort Worth and Austin close behind in 15th and 22nd place, respectively.Bizjournals used a nine-part formula to analyze employment trends in the nation’s 100 largest labor markets. The formula was fueled by midyear data complied since 2003 by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.The 100 markets, taken collectively, contained 69 percent of the nation's 116.2 million private-sector jobs as of June 2008.The top-rated labor market outside of Texas -- fourth in the overall standings -- is Raleigh. Its job base has ballooned by 22.1 percent since 2003, dwarfing the national five-year growth rate of 6.3 percent.Seattle ranks fifth, largely because of its addition of 20,500 private-sector jobs since mid-2007. Only Houston and Dallas-Fort Worth have posted bigger gains during the past year. For employment profiles on these cities and the rest of the 10 hottest job markets, click here.The recent volatility in the U.S. economy has shuffled the standings dramatically since they were last compiled a year ago. Phoenix, which was No. 1 in bizjournals' 2007 employment rankings, has dropped all the way to 28th place this year. Six of last year's 10 hottest markets have fallen out of the top 10 this year.The bottom of the list is considerably more stable, though it does include a few surprises.Last place belongs once again to Detroit, which has ranked as the coldest job market in America the past two years. The biggest problem remains Detroit's heavy reliance on domestic automakers, resulting in a loss of 30,800 jobs since mid-2007."Obviously, the Michigan economy has been dreadful this decade," said a recent report from Michigan Future Inc., a nonprofit group that aims to rejuvenate the state's economy. "An unprecedented seven consecutive years of job losses. At the bottom of the national rankings in both employment and per capita income. This is largely because the engine that still drives the Michigan economy is the troubled domestic auto industry." The second-coldest labor market has suffered a dramatic decline the past couple of years. Sarasota-Bradenton, Fla., which was fourth-best in bizjournals' 2006 employment rankings, now sits in 99th place, a victim of Florida's real-estate woes. It has lost 11,400 jobs since mid-2007.Other industrial markets among the coldest job markets include: Providence, Toledo, Lansing, Mich., and Dayton. All but Providence were also in the bottom 10 last year.

Builders didn't recognize that the local market is healthier than the rest of the country, economist says.

Economist Angelos Angelou acknowledged Thursday that this is a chancy time to be making a forecast on the Austin area's near-term growth prospects. But he took a shot at it anyway.

Despite international panic in the financial markets and rising worries about the implosion of the American subprime lending bubble, Angelou said he said he expects Austin to muddle through 2008 with modest job growth before seeing an economic upturn in 2009.

"We have been through tough times before, and Austin has always weathered the storm pretty well," he said. "But that doesn't mean we are not going to go through a storm this time."

Angelou, who heads an economic development consulting firm, delivered his 23rd annual economic forecast Thursday, predicting that the Austin metro area will create 17,000 jobs in 2008 for a 2.3 percent growth rate, which would be the area's lowest job growth rate since 2004, when the area was climbing out of a prolonged high-tech slump.

Angelou began issuing economic forecasts for Austin in 1985, when he was economist at the Greater Austin Chamber of Commerce. He later became head of economic development at the chamber before starting his own economic development consulting firm in the mid-1990s.

Next year, he expects the five-county metro area to add another 24,000 jobs, an increase of about 3 percent.

But all bets are off, he said, if the national economic picture turns really bad or if one of the area's major private employers announces a big downsizing move.

The biggest job growth sectors for 2007 and 2008, Angelou said, will be the area's traditional standbys: government, professional services, leisure and hospitality, wholesale and retail trade, and education and health services.

New private sector jobs in the area are mostly coming from small businesses, venture-backed startups and young technology companies, he said. Big companies "FFFFFF97 including Dell Inc., Freescale Semiconductor Inc. and Advanced Micro Devices Inc. "FFFFFF97 all suffered through weak years in 2007, he noted.

"We are modestly optimistic," Angelou said, "but the situation needs to be monitored closely depending on national trends. If we don't have any significant challenges (downsizing moves) from major employers, then I think I am going to stick with my numbers."

Angelou expects the area's population of 1.58 million to increase by 85,000 people over the next two years. That is on par with the local population increase estimated at 42,000 for last year, but well below the 2006 increase of 58,900.

The biggest local impacts from the national real estate crunch, he said, are likely to be rising apartment rents, slow demand for houses costing less than $180,000, increasing foreclosures and an overreaction from major builders who cut back too far on new housing starts.

Austin could face a shortage of new homes in the next year or so, Angelou said, because builders overreacted and didn't recognize that the local market is healthier than most of the nation's other housing markets.

"The home building industry is reacting to national trends, and Austin is not a typical U.S. community," Angelou said. "The big winner is going to be apartments. People will have to live somewhere. Apartments rents are going higher.

"We are concerned about the low number of housing starts," he added. "Austin is a different market, and the development community is treating this market like it is treating everyone else (by cutting back sharply on home building). We may find ourselves with a serious housing shortage."

On the national level, Angelou says it is hard to say whether the U.S. will slide into a formal recession. He expects there will be continued problems in the mortgage lending industry, which will bleed over into the broader investment finance industry.

"It is going to be a prolonged slowdown (in growth), which is going to feel like a recession" at the national level, he said. "It may take the nation a year or two to go through these tough times.

"The recovery is not going to be quick. In any economic recovery, you need to have the financial sector drive it, and a lot of those folks are hurting.

10 BEST BIG CITIES 50 SMART PLACES TO LIVE TOP 50 SMARTEST CITIES TOP 10 CITIES FOR WALKING

CNN.Money.com Kiplinger.com June Austin Business Journal Prevention Magazine
2006 2006 June 2006 April 2006

1. Colorado Springs, CO 1. Nashville, TN 1. Seattle, WA 1. Portland, OR
2. Austin, TX 2. Minneapolis-St. Paul, MN 2. San Francisco, CA 2. Colorado Springs, CO
3. Mesa, AZ 3. Albuquerque, NM 3. Austin, TX 3. Madison, WI
4. Raleigh, NC 4. Atlanta, GA 4. Colorado Springs, CO 4. Boise City, ID
5. San Diego, CA 5. Austin, TX 5. Minneapolis, MN 5. Las Vegas, NV
6. Virginia Beach, VA 6. Kansas City 12. Arlington, TX 6. Austin, TX
7. Omaha, NE 7. Asheville, NC 35. Dallas, TX 7. Virginia Beach, VA
8. Columbus, OH 8. Ithaca, NY 38. Houston, Tx 8. Anchorage, AK
9. Wichita, KS 9. Pittsburgh, PA 40. San Antonio, TX 9. Fremont, CA
10. New York, NY 10. Iowa City, IA 48. El Paso, TX 10. Raleigh, NC
TOP 10 CITIES FOR TOP 10 WIRELESS CITIES TOP 10 METROS FOR FUTURE TOP 10 HOT CITIES
MOVIEMAKERS LiveScience.com BUSINESS LOCATIONS FOR ENTREPRENEURS
MovieMaker Magazine June 2005 Expansion Magazine 8/2006 Entrepreneur.com 9/2005

Winter 2005 1. Seattle-Bellvue-Everett-1. Austin-Round Rock, TX 1. Phoevix-Mesa, AZ

1. New York, NY Tacoma, WA 2. Minneapolis-St.Paul-2. Charlotte-Gastonia
2. Austin, TX 2. San Francisco-San Jose-Bloomington, MN-WIS Rock Hill, NC-SC
3. Philadelphia, PA Oakland, CA 3. Raleigh-Cary, NC 3. Raleigh-Durham
4. New Orleans, LA 3. Austin, TX 4. Dallas-Ft.Worth-Arlington,TX Chapel Hill, NC
5. Portland, OR 4. Portland, OR-Vancover,WA 5. Houston-Baytown-4. Las Vegas, NV-AZ
6. Chicago, IL 5. Toledo, OH Sugar Land, TX 5. Indianapolis, IN
7. Los Angeles, CA 6. Atlanta, GA 6. Washington-Arlington-6. Washinton-Baltimore
8. Miami, FL 7. Denver, CO Alexandria, DC-VA-WVA DC-MD-VA-WV
9. Baltimore, MD 8. Raleigh-Durham, NC 7. Madison, WS 7. Atlanta, GA
9. Minneapolis-St.Paul, MN 8. Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue,WA 8. Nashville, TN
10. Orlando, FL 10. Orange County, CA 9. Pittsburgh, PA 9. Austin-San Marcos, TX
TOP HEALTHIEST CITIES THE 50 CLEANEST CITIES 10. Phoenix-Mesa-Scottsdale, AZ 10. Memphis, TN-AR-MS
IN AMERICA IN AMERICA

Sperling’s Readers Digest
July 2006 July 2005 More Austin Accolades...

1. San Jose, CA 1. Portland, OR
2. Washington, DC 2. San Jose, CA See Back Page
3. San Fancisco, CA 3. Buffalo, NY
4. Seattle-Bellevue, WA 4. Columbus, OH Call Your Austin Title Sales Executive
5. Salt Lake City, UT 5. San Francisco, CA
6. Oakland, CA 6. Denver, CO For Your Free Link To Our
7. Sacramento, CA 7. Rochester, NY Online Relocation Guide
8. Orange County, CA 8. Austin, TX with Complete Community Information.
9. Denver, CO 9. Orlando, FL
10. Austin, TX 10. San Diego, CA

More Austin Accolades
Information compiled from: http://www.austintexas.org/visitors/austin-rankings
Relationships
Austin is the top of the top 10 metro areas containing the highest percentage of women from 18 to 44. According to the study Austin is
45 percent female. (July 2005) Singles are happy—Sperling’s BestPlaces names Austin “The Best City for Dating” (May 2004)

Active

Runner’s World names Austin 11th of the “25 Best Running Cities in America.” (July 2005) and “the Coolest Host City” for the annual
Motorola Marathon. (January 2004)

Condé Nast Traveler’s readers choose Barton Creek Resort and Spa as having one of the top 100 Golf Courses in the

world (June 2005)
The American Hiking Society named the Barton Creek Greenbelt 2nd on its “Top 10 Walking Trails.” Each of the trials named can be
completed in 60 to 90 minutes and are within 10 to 15 miles of a major metro area. (May 2005)

The city proves it’s a world-class destination for “fat-tire fun,” when Men’s Journal makes Austin’s trails #2 on its list of “The Ten Best
Fall Mountain Bike Rides.”

Food

Tyson Cole, owner & chef of South Austin restaurant Uchi, is one of “America’s 10 Best New Chefs,” according to Food & Wine

magazine’s annual ranking. (July 2005)
USA Today declares the Saveur Texas Hill Country Wine and Food Festival one of the most notable food and wine festivals in the country.
(January 27, 2005)

Music & Nightlife

American Way magazine features “The Top 10 Lists of Great American Music” and Austin appears on three of the lists including “great
music towns,” “great bigger-is-better music festivals” for the Austin City Limits Music Festival and “sacred ground” for Threadgill’s
restaurant. (June 1, 2005)

Entertainment Weekly declares local radio station KGSR as one of five “Great Old-School Radio” stations, citing “an only-in-Austin blend

of alt-country, hippie jams, singer-song-writers, and lots of Willie Nelson, of course.” (October 21, 2005)
Austin’s Mean-Eyed Cat bar makes Condé Nast Traveler magazine’s annual “Hot Nights” list. The bar is one of only 35 bars or clubs
from around the world named in the publication, including nine from the US. Oslo nightclub made the list in 2004. (May 2005)

Sports Illustrated recognized the Longhorn hangout of Scholz Beer Garten as 18 of the “25 Best Sports Bars in America,” noting the bar
as being the oldest continuously operated business in Texas.

Travel & Leisure

Austin joins the likes of Bermuda, Hilton Head, South Beach and Yellowstone as one of MSNBC’s “top 10 memorial getaways.”

(May 26, 2005)
For the first time, Lake Austin Spa Resort ranks 10th on Travel & Leisure magazine’s list of the world’s best spas, as voted by readers.
(August 2005)

-Each year, Intel ranks the top 100 U.S. Cities and regions with the greatest number of commercial and public wireless Internet access
points and Austin ranks third. (October 2005)
-Austin earns the #2 spot on Vegetarian Times’ “Ten Greenest Cities” list. (July/August 2005)

American Style magazine chooses Austin #8 in the “Top 25 U.S. Arts Destination.” (June 2005)

Business & Technology
Austin-based companies, Whole Foods Market (ranked 30) and National Instruments (ranked 40) make Fortune magazine’s list of “100
Best Companies to Work For.” (January 24, 2005)
Austin is among the coolest cities for young professionals, according to Kiplinger.com. The website sited University of Texas, the
city’s musicians, margaritas and cheap rent as contributing factors to the Capital City’s cool factor. (September 2005)
Austin came in sixth in a study by Silicon Valley naming the nation’s top tech hubs. The study compared business and quality-of-life
issues, claiming Austin has affordable housing, electricity and state taxes. (September 2005)
The Austin area ranked third on Forbes magazine’s “Best Places” for business and careers, giving the Capital City high marks for
education attainment, net migration to the area and the cost of doing business in the region. (May 2005)
Austin again makes an appearance on Forbes magazine’s “The Top 10 Places for Business” – this time ranking third. (May 24, 2004)

Families & Relocation
Austin is the “Best Large City for Relocating Families,” according to The Worldwide Employee Relocation Council (ERC), Primacy
Relocation and Sperling’s BestPlaces. (June 2004)
Austin is #1 for the second consecutive year on Hispanic magazine’s, “Top 10 Cities for Hispanics to Live In” list. (August 2005)

The economic storm sweeping the country has left Americans with few places to hide.

But those looking to hunker down might want to head to Texas, where they can get the best value for their dollar.

That's because Austin and San Antonio lead our list of places where your money goes farthest. Residents of both enjoy affordable housing and promising prospects for job growth in coming years. Houston and Dallas also land in the top 10, at Nos. 4 and 7, respectively.

"Texas, as a whole, is one of the few economies that's performing extremely well because of the energy and technology sectors," says Andrew Gledhill, an economist at Moody's Economy.com. Plus, he added, military bases in San Antonio have continued to draw a steady steam of personnel and federal employees to the city, spurring widespread job growth.

The state's manufacturing sector has also grown in recent years, and a reputation for affordable housing continues to lure people to the South. When accounting for median household income, a house in Dallas, for example--with a median price of about $150,000--is four times more affordable than a house in Los Angeles, the worst-ranked city on our list.

A house in New York is three times less affordable than in Charlotte, N.C., and four times less than in Denver, two cities where your money goes far and where the median house costs $245,000, according to the National Association of Realtors.

Housing has remained affordable in the South and Midwest, thanks to growing populations, relatively lax building regulations and "lots and lots of land," said Daniel McCue, a research analyst at Harvard's Joint Center for Housing Studies.

Plus, he added, housing in cities like Houston "grew at a more controlled pace and didn't go overboard like in Phoenix or Las Vegas," which means houses won't lose much value in coming months.

Three Midwestern cities round out the top 10: Indianapolis; Columbus, Ohio; and Minneapolis. The worst-ranked cities, after Los Angeles, were Providence, R.I.; New Orleans; Philadelphia; and Cleveland.

To ensure that our list reflected future value instead of past bargains, we began by looking at projected job growth through 2012 in the 40 largest U.S.-Census-defined metropolitan areas of the country with data from Moody's Economy.com.

Texan cities were a clear winner, with economists predicting job growth of at least 2% by 2012 in Austin, San Antonio, Dallas and Houston. By comparison, job growth in cities at the bottom of our list, including Los Angeles, Philadelphia and Cleveland, is expected to be about 0.2%.

We then calculated the ratios between each city's median house price and median household income, using 2000 U.S. Census figures, the latest available, and 2007 data from the National Association of Realtors. Next, we compared median income to Moody's cost of living index.

Final factors included the average gas price in each city on a given day in October as collected by AAA, and year-over-year inflation growth as calculated by Moody's and Forbes.com.

The factors that make the cities on our list valuable--affordable housing, relatively low gas prices, sluggish inflation, a job market that's more vibrant than most--are more than an indication of cheap deals. Instead, they give us a glimpse of the cities that are likely to offer value. Cities like Detroit (which didn't make it to our list) are cheap, but low-income figures and a fading job market won't do much for sustaining worth.

The cities where you'll get the least value include areas like Los Angeles, New York and Washington, D.C., where median house prices are more than $400,000 and relatively few people can afford them. Cities like Providence, R.I., and Philadelphia are suffering from large waves of out-migration as more and more residents decide to pick up and leave. As a result, local economies stagnate, and prospects for job growth seem bleak--economists predict the number of jobs in Philadelphia will grow by 0.2% by 2012 and by 0.1% in Providence.

"California is being faced with a combination of a zillion things--the state's been in a prolonged recession, and at the same time, you have some of the least affordable housing in the country," says Gledhill. "We'll probably start seeing a bottom in the housing market late next year, but it'll be a while until we see a real recovery."

Los Angeles' misfortunes, however, have helped boost the economy in cities like Portland, Ore. It and Seattle have become attractive alternatives for those looking to leave California in search of affordable housing and lower costs of living.

The value of a dollar in different cities is also closely linked to local inflation rates. In Austin, for example, year-over-year inflation rates rose by 5%, while in Portland, that figure was nearly 5.7%. Local inflation rates ranged from 3.2% in St. Louis (No. 8 on the worst list) to 5.82% in Dallas (No. 7 on the best list).

But keep in mind, even cities that ranked well on our list aren't immune from the forces of today's downturn. Gledhill says economic growth in Portland, which has already begun to slow, will be compounded further by California's slowdown.

Things won't be much better in Columbus, according to Bodhi Ganguli, an economist at Moody's. So far, the city has weathered the storm better than its local counterparts. But he said, "an extremely high foreclosure rate" and bleak expectations for job growth will begin to take their toll on the city's economy.

Things may turn for those in Charlotte, which has fared relatively well so far. That's because housing prices never reached exorbitant highs, which shielded the city from a major housing bust.

But as the Charlotte-based Wachovia gets swallowed by Wells Fargo, Gledhill says, "a more measured deterioration is on its way."

The Top 5 Housing-Market Hopes for 2009