A report from Reuters. "The coronavirus crisis is likely to cut home and office building prices, may lead to a permanent shift in the demand for office space, and could push highly indebted households and companies toward default, Boston Federal Reserve bank president Eric Rosengren said on Wednesday. 'For both homes and apartments as well as office properties we are likely to see softening of prices in some markets and maybe a fairly significant softening over time,' Rosengren said."

"Rosengren, who in recent years has warned that historically low Fed interest rates encouraged unhealthy levels of borrowing, also said that overhang of debt could worsen the recession to come and slow the recovery from it. 'When you have a black sawn event like this individuals and firms that are very levered have much more difficulty in making sure they can manage through,' Rosengren said, adding he expected banks will see more commercial real estate borrowers fall behind on payments."

From Market Watch. "Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Mark Calabria told CNBC that ‘it is certainly possible’ the number of delinquencies caused by the coronavirus outbreak could exceed the subprime mortgage crisis in some segments of the market. 'The place to look right now is the FHA market with the credit quality of their borrowers,' Calabria said. 'They are going to be the first canary in the coal mine if you will in terms about what the broader implications are going to be.'"

From CNBC. "Some are concerned that the government’s forbearance program is ripe for fraud, because it specifically says borrowers do not have to prove any financial hardship. They simply have to ask. 'When Congress passed the Cares Act, it did so without either fully considering the risks it created in the housing market or consulting with the firms that would have to implement and step in on the borrowers’ behalf to advance forborne payments,' said Joshua Rosner, managing director at Graham Fisher & Co., an independent research consultancy. 'The Act does not require any proof be furnished, and in fact, prohibits mortgage servicers from asking for any proof of such an economic hardship.'"

"Rosner said that creates a dangerous moral hazard, ripe for fraud. Das, however, said he doesn’t see it that way. 'We’ve been thinking about the risk of moral hazard. We know that that existed even the last time around when there were principal reductions done,' said Sanjiv Das, CEO of Caliber Home Loans, which services about 750,000 government-backed mortgages. 'Look, the speed with which this is unraveling, it’s going to be very difficult to implement if we had to verify every piece of documentation to prove that somebody was sick. I think we need to act fast and if that means that on the margins some people abuse the system, I’m sure the system catch up with them.'"

From Yahoo Finance. "Between virtual tours and digital closings, realtors are hopeful they might be able to keep selling houses amidst the global pandemic that is keeping many Americans in their homes. But Barbara Corcoran, Shark Tank judge and founder of New York City residential brokerage The Corcoran Group, says relying on virtual tours is unrealistic. 'There is no way people are going to be buying units because of a phenomenal virtual tour,' said Corcoran. The only other way to find success with virtual tours would be to offer housing units at a steep discount, she said."

"If 'units could be offered at half price — hey — maybe even I’ll jump in there and say, ‘What the heck, let me take a shot!’ But it’s not the typical buyer by any means,' she said."

From Fox 11 Los Angeles in California. "Officials say sellers are canceling transactions, and brokerages are pulling homes from the market. 'The homes aren't selling, inventory is growing, and buyers are on the sideline,' Tarek El Moussa, host of HGTV’s 'Flip or Flop,' said. 'If you are in the market to sell your house in today's market, you want to sell it fast. You're going to have to sell it to an investor at a discount. Whatever you think your house is worth is a lot different today from two months ago.'"

The New York Times. "The luxury market, which is in a yearslong price correction, could be further affected. Last week, only two properties in Manhattan went into contract at $4 million or more, the lowest weekly sales rate since August 2009, during the last recession, said Donna Olshan, the president of Olshan Realty. 'Anything left on the market now, the price is just a suggestion,' she said, noting that sellers already in contract, as well as new buyers, are pushing for more aggressive price cuts."

"What happened in the first two months of the year no longer matters, said Jonathan J. Miller, the president of Miller Samuel Real Estate Appraisers & Consultants. After the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and the fall of Lehman Brothers in 2008, sale prices fell 25 to 35 percent, said Mr. Miller. It’s unclear where prices will end up, but they have been sliding since the market peaked around 2015, he said. 'We find ourselves with little to no empirical evidence of what’s happening,' said Mr. Miller, because the virus outbreak became a factor so late in March. 'I don’t have a sense, other than it’s going to be catastrophic.'"

The Dallas Morning News in Texas. "U.S. foreclosure starts in February were up 3% from the previous month. Texas had one of the biggest percentage jumps, increasing 28%. Foreclosures were up 63% in Nevada, 49% in Oregon and 47% in Washington, according to Attom Data. Frank Nothaft, chief economist with CoreLogic, expects the number of mortgage defaults to rise. 'It will definitely happen,' Nothaft said. 'We have seen it happen in every single recession the U.S. economy goes into.'"

From Toronto Life in Canada. "Steven Argyris is CEO of SkyView Suites, a purveyor of upscale, furnished condo suites for on-the-move corporate execs in need of short-term accommodations. Q: I guess that business has, unfortunately, evaporated for you right now. A: Yeah. But, ironically, there’s an opportunity there. There’s some vacancy that we can take advantage of. And we’re trying to repurpose that to help people out. Q: How many condos do you have available for this purpose? A: Speaking for SkyView, we have about 170 units. But if you’re talking about the whole corporate housing industry, there’s upwards of a thousand."

From Scottish Construction Now. "Britain’s mortgage lenders have dramatically increased their loan-to-value deposits for house purchases with Halifax and Barclays among those seeking 40% down-payments to fund buyers amid rising expectations of a housing crash. Barclays and Halifax’s intermediary brands have stopped selling mortgages above 60% loan-to-value this week, coinciding with the drastic slowdown of the UK housing market. The move means that prospective buyers without a deposit or equity worth at least 40% of the property’s value will no longer be able to secure a mortgage to buy a property, or even remortgage their existing home, with both Barclays and Halifax."

The Phnom Pen Post in Cambodia. "Vin Chhunhiet is a real estate entrepreneur who buys parcels of land in Kampot province and in the capital’s outskirts and subdivides them into separate plots for resale. There are currently no buyers, he said. The impact has been huge and it echoes across all sectors. 'Weeks ago, before the Covid-19 outbreak, my company was able to sell more than 20 parcels per week. However, since the beginning of March, sales have been steadily declining, especially over the past week. It is impossible to sell,' said Chhunhiet."

From Interest New Zealand. "Quotable Value is warning that the fallout from the Covid-19 lockdown could have an adverse impact on the residential property market until the end of the year. 'Up to this point we were seeing multiple buyers, often with plentiful funds available, competing for tightly held stock,' QV General Manager David Nagel said. 'Selling an existing property and upgrading to a different home will likely be furthest from their mind, although some may be forced to downsize or even relocate to another city in order to gain employment.'"

The Financial Standard on Australia. "Gone are the days of 'business as usual' with Australia's capital cities and skyscrapers empty and its employees now working from the comfort (and safety) of their homes. But what impact will this have on our real estate investments? Principal Real Estate Investors real estate securities portfolio manager Shern-Ling Koh said Australian REITs had been the hardest hit during the COVID-19 sell-off. 'Asia has held up quite well in this bear market, with REITs displaying their typical defensive characteristics going into a period of uncertainty, until a week or two ago when there was a sharp collapse,' he said. 'This selling-off had a material impact on REITs. Australia was impacted hardest in the region, down almost 50% in US dollar terms year to date, while Hong Kong has held up the best down 23%.'"

"Investors in residential real estate also face a tumultuous period ahead, according to research by RiskWise. Investing in rental apartments has become more risky of late, and now with COVID-19 threatening employment, it is even more so, RiskWise chief executive Doron Peleg said. 'In the past few years what we have seen is a series of events that resulted in price reductions due to oversupply of units in many major cities, followed by the credit restrictions on local and foreign investors and then the potential changes to negative gearing and capital gains tax,' Peleg said."

"Peleg believes housing prices will continue to fall as population growth and employment decelerate. 'While it is a bit early to say what the price reductions will be, if these projections are correct, they will be highly likely across Australia as unemployment and underemployment materially increase,' he said. 'And this is the first problem for the majority of people when they buy an investment property because the key driver is long-term capital growth and not cash flow.'"

"Investors need to be careful during this period of uncertainty, Peleg said. 'First, they should ensure that financially they are in a very strong position to service the mortgage or to potentially address longer periods of vacancy or provide a discount on the rent,' he said. 'Then, if they do want to invest, they should pay a discounted price for the unit to reflect both the risk for a price reduction and the cash flow risk associated with the property.'"