A report from the Globe and Mail in Canada. "Canadian home sales tanked and price dipped in April over the previous month, marking the weakest activity since 1984. Last month, 16,612 homes were sold on a seasonally adjusted basis, down 57 per cent from 38,493 in March, according to the Canadian Real Estate Association, with Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver and other large markets continuing to deteriorate. The average selling price across all types of residential properties fell 10.9 per cent to $475,310 in April from $533,504 in the previous month."

"The country’s most expensive markets declined, with the average selling price in the Greater Toronto Area down 11.8 per cent to $789,274 from $894,745, and in the Vancouver region it was down 6.2 per cent to $1,009,570 from $1,076,461. CREA suggested that the low activity along with drop in sales of luxury homes pushed the average price down."

"Phil Soper, Royal LePage chief executive, said there were still some properties in Toronto that were drawing multiple offers. But he also said the financial distress for some homeowners, especially real estate investors, may contribute to lower prices. 'There are investors that feel overextended and are deleveraging. So there will be some bargains to be found,' he said."

"And the housing market has yet to feel the full impact from the economic crisis, as banks have deferred mortgage payments for more than 740,000 property owners for as long as six months. 'You are going to start to see a lot of these people having to start making their payments again. And if they haven’t gone back to work, if their industry has been decimated by COVID or their company downsized, I think there will be an oversupply [hitting] the market in the winter months,' said Dave Butler, principal broker with Butler Mortgage Inc."

The Financial Post in Canada. "Not many condos are being sold in Toronto, (sales were down 70% year over year in April), but those that are appear to be going for lower prices. In a study of condo prices in April using data from the Toronto Regional Real Estate Board, online realtor Zoocasa found the median price dropped by $65,000, or 10%, to $574,000 from February."

"Depending on the neighbourhood, that drop could have been even more. Based on neighbourhoods with at least 10 sales in April, Zoocasa found median prices dropped over $100,000 in two neighbourhoods, between $50,000 to $100,000 in four neighbourhoods and by up to $50,000 in 7 neighbourhoods. Toronto Centre took the biggest hit, with five neighbourhoods in this district seeing the largest declines. Mount Pleasant East was at the top of the list with the median condo price dropping $131,500 (-18%) to $617,500."

The Daily Mail on the UK. "Prices on dozens of properties across Britain – especially in London – have been reduced in recent days as sellers do their best to shift their homes in a time of economic crisis, with further examples seen this morning. Banks are now looking at reassessing many loans - some even after contracts have been exchanged - with millions of workers having since had their pay cut, been put on furlough, lost a bonus or been made redundant."

"Sarah Coles, of Hargreaves Lansdown, told The Times: 'Mortgage lenders are free to withdraw their mortgage offer even after you've exchanged contracts. They can do it if they believe the value of the property has dropped significantly or if your circumstances have changed and they no longer consider you an attractive mortgage customer.'"

The Sydney Morning Herald in Australia. "This week the country’s biggest lender for home loans, the Commonwealth Bank of Australia, predicted 11 per cent property price falls from March 2020 to March 2023 as their 'base case' scenario. In a prolonged downturn, where jobs do not recover quickly, CBA suspects declines could be as drastic as 32 per cent. National Australia Bank has forecast an 11 per cent decline in 2021 as a base case, and estimates price falls of more than 30 per cent over the next two years in a severe downturn."

"The small Queensland mining town of Moranbah has become a cautionary tale for property investors. At the start of 2013, the peak of the mining boom, the median-priced house in this remote town was $750,000. By the end of the year it was $500,000 as the work dried up and investors sold quickly. Today, houses can be bought for half this price again."

"The rental market has already started to show signs of struggling in some areas. For instance, high-density sections of Melbourne, like Docklands, and in Sydney, such as the CBD and Ultimo, where two-thirds of homes are rentals, have seen vacancy rates triple. In these locations more than one in 10 rental apartments are currently sitting empty."

"Property owners who lease their homes and rooms out on Airbnb to tourists at higher rates have also started putting their properties onto the private market. According to data website AirDNA, which tracks Airbnb listings, the number of active short-stay holiday rentals in Australia fell from 202,000 in early February to 164,000 by the end of April. New bookings fell from 78,000 to 27,000 over the same period."

"'The lenders have seen the writing on the wall and have moved to avoid immediate problems, but if you’ve lost your business or your work, you're going to be facing longer-term problems than the next six months,' says UNSW professor and director of the City Futures Research Centre Bill Randolph. 'There will almost certainly be some blowback in terms of negative equity for people in danger of not being able to pay their mortgage. That will slowly unravel and impact prices if people foreclose and there’s a fire sale. There could be all sorts of longer-term impacts.'"

"Those who have bought in the last two years would 'probably be facing negative equity' soon. 'You can usually sit through these things if you can repay the mortgage, but the double whammy is so many people are losing their incomes and have financial commitments.'"

"There could also be more radical changes in the future, Randolph says, including a fresh way of looking at the incentives for investment and affordable housing. 'We have to wake up to the fact the housing market is failing,' he says. 'The pandemic allows this government to ask questions it could not possibly address before. This includes looking for tax savings. Negative gearing is an obvious one. I suspect those things are on the table in a way they've never been before.'"

From The Age in Australia. "Property tycoon Larry Kestelman has resorted to Supreme Court action to claw back millions of dollars from investors who failed to pay up for luxury apartments inside one of Melbourne's most high-profile developments. The $700 million LK Tower development, rising 50 storeys on the corner of Toorak Road and Chapel Street in South Yarra, is the tallest building outside the Melbourne CBD and pitched to the market as 'where the city's style aficionados meet and mingle.'"

"But for some customers who bought the Capitol Grand apartments off the plan after its launch in 2015, when Melbourne's property prices seemed on an endless upwards trajectory, the Hollywood bubble has burst. Mr Kestelman's Capitol Grand development company filed Supreme Court writs against 16 people who were not able, or refused, to settle on time; other cases have been mediated privately."

"Sources with direct knowledge of the situation said some buyers who paid high prices for units in the early stages of development were stung on settlement when property experts attached to lenders valued the properties well below the agreed sale price. Highlighting the risks of buying off the plan, the lower valuations and the softened Melbourne property market, even before the coronavirus crisis, has spooked the banks and left some buyers short of finance."

"'This is the problem, it takes so long to get these thing out of the ground before settlements, and circumstances can change — and they did change a lot,' said one industry insider, who asked not to be identified. 'Is it the fault of the developer? I don't necessarily think so. (Buyers) probably paid too much for it and the value came in too low.'"

"Apartment buyer Bao Anh 'Louis' Tran, who was among those embroiled in Supreme Court action after failing to settle on the unit, agreed to buy a two-bedroom, two-bathroom unit inside LK Tower with a car space and storage cage, for $1.295 million in November 2017. The pocket-sized 82.91 square metre apartment is now up for rent, asking $850 a week. Similar-sized apartments in the development with the same bedroom, bathroom and car space count are on the market asking between $999,000 and $1.18 million."