A report from the Los Angeles Times in California. "It’s not just renters who are benefiting from expanded unemployment payments. Nearly half of the tenants in the 16-unit apartment complex Kim Pierce owns in Echo Park are behind on their rent, Pierce said. She was able to defer her $10,000-a month mortgage for six months. But after that, her lender is adding the missed payments to her monthly bill over the next year."

"'Had I not gotten the help, for sure I would have gone bankrupt,' Pierce said. 'I could not possibly have hung on.' Pierce is concerned that the expiration of the expanded unemployment benefits means even more of her tenants will fail to pay just as she’s needing to make up her missed mortgage payments. 'I’m headed toward a cliff,' she said. 'And if something doesn’t give, we’re all going over.'"

From Socket Site in California. "As we highlighted last month, offers of complimentary rent have been on the rise in San Francisco. And with the weakness in San Francisco’s rental market accelerating, and Oakland now following suit, a big landlord is upping their rent concession ante while trying to maintain their advertised/base rents. And in addition to offering up to 8 weeks or 2 months of complimentary rent, Related is now offering $2,000 gift cards to signees of new leases in at least two of their buildings in San Francisco."

From Fox Business on California. "On a year-over-year basis, the rent cost for a one-bedroom in San Fransisco dropped 11.8 percent, Zumper found. It is the first time San Fransisco's rent price has fallen by double-digits, Zumper CEO Anthemos Georgiades said in a July 1 tweet. Georgiades also noted in his tweet that rent prices also dropped in the double-digits throughout Silicon Valley; rents fell 15.1 percent in Mountain View; 13.5 percent in Menlo Park; 11.1 percent in Palo Alto; and 15.7 percent in Cupertino. In San Jose, rent for a one-bedroom fell 5 percent to $2,300, and rent for a two-bedroom fell 3.1 percent to $2,860, Zumper found."

"'Two trends have driven this,' Georgiades wrote. 'One macro-economic, one micro: 1. Enormous recession brought on by #Covid19 2. Move to remote future of work for large tech employers like FB The Bay Area's dips are sharper than any other major metro due to the latter.'"

From Fox News on Florida. "Jared Ringel, a principal agent at The Atlas Team in Miami, uses the word 'abundant' to describe the opportunities. 'If someone truly didn’t need the cash now and wanted to get a market rate price for their home, they would have pulled it from the market during the pandemic,' says Ringel. 'Now buyers have more leverage and it’s the time to strike.'"

"According to Homes.com, in May, 27 percent of new listings in Miami were discounted below pre-pandemic prices. Still, just because the price is low today doesn’t mean it will be a good investment tomorrow. Ringel recommends thinking about the potential for return post-pandemic."

From NBC Miami in Florida. "Business was slowly starting to come back for Andy Korge, who owns about 30 short-term vacation rentals in Miami-Dade County, most of them in condo hotels that are advertised on popular sites like Airbnb. It's his main source of income. Last week, the county ordered new restrictions on the industry -- capacity limits and rental agreements were only allowed on a monthly basis. On Tuesday, the city of Miami Beach rolled it back completely, announcing that all short-term rentals in the city had close down again by Thursday."

"Those in the business, like Korge, say the blanket decisions are unfair. 'I think the condo hotels need to be carved out of this order,' Korge said."

From AZ Family in Arizona. "It's a growing problem across the Arizona. Many tenants are finding themselves unable to pay the rent, because they've gotten sick or lost their job during the COVID-19 pandemic. But any fears of being kicked out of their homes have been put on hold, with the Governor's decision to extend his ban on evictions until October 31. Ajai Sherma is one of many property owners who understands why the Governor did what he did. However, Sherma said it will place a huge financial burden on landlords, who need to pay their mortgages, insurance, property taxes, and other expenses."

"Sherma owns two apartment complexes in Mesa, and said the number of renters who haven't paid, or delayed rent payments has doubled the past few months. And it may get worse. 'Think about it. If somebody is not paying, not able to pay $900 for next month, that person will owe $1,800, then $2,700,' said Sherma. 'It will just keep piling up, and I really don't see a way those guys are coming up with $4,000, 5,000 down the road.'"

From Real Estate Weekly on New York. "As New York City faced the worst impacts of the coronavirus pandemic in the second quarter of 2020, the city’s real estate market reeled. Demand for rentals plummeted at a time when it normally rises, interest in the outer boroughs shot upward, and rents in Manhattan fell for the first time since the Great Recession, according to StreetEasy’s Q2 2020 Market Reports. The period saw a record high for rental discounts in Manhattan: 34.7 percent of all borough rentals received a discount. Landlords cut a record 6.7 percent off the median asking rent in the borough."

"'Commuting to the office and living in the center of the city were simply not on the list of priorities for renters during this past quarter, and landlords reacted by slashing rents and trying new tactics in order to attract tenants,' says StreetEasy Economist Nancy Wu. 'Landlords are in for a much slower than normal summer rentals season, even as the city slowly begins to reopen. Remote work has given many renters the option to live anywhere they please, making it too soon to predict when rents will rebound.'"

From Market Watch. "It’s an open secret that commercial real estate owners take cash out of buildings. When they do, unlike homeowners, criticism often is sparing. After all, hotels, shopping centers, office towers and other commercial buildings are run as businesses, where the whole point is to reap a profit."

"'The real-estate industry is all about taking cash out, and on a tax-deferred basis, at that,' said Scott Tross, co-chair of real estate litigation and dispute resolutions at Herrick Feinstein, a law firm. 'That’s nothing new. But in may respects, what’s happening now is reminiscent of what happened ten years ago or so.'"

"By that, Tross was referring to the deluge of late payments, defaults and foreclosures that swept up some of the biggest names in U.S. commercial real estate in the wake of the 2007-08 global financial crisis, and saddled their investors will losses. 'You had people borrowing as much money as they possibly could, none of it on a recourse basis. And if things move in their direction, that’s great,' he said. 'If they don’t move in their direction, they just hand back the keys.'"

"That threat of borrowers walking away once again looms over the commercial real-estate market. Another new twist is that borrowers, ahead of this downturn, pulled more equity out of U.S. commercial buildings than ever before, when they have refinanced in the commercial mortgage-backed securities (CMBS) market, a key source of loans for hotels, skyscrapers, warehouses and other business properties that end up packaged into bond deals."

"Debt relief conversations already started in April, a month into the first round of coronavirus lockdowns, between the hardest-hit commercial property borrowers and their lenders. Since then, delinquent CMBS loans have climbed to nearly 10%, rivaling the worst levels of the global financial crisis."

"'I think people by nature are greedy, especially developers, who always want to tap into equity from one project and use it for another,' said Stan Bril, chief executive officer of MCG, a private commercial real estate and small business lender. He also thinks the equity investment proposal is 'like trying to put a Band-Aid on a gash,' he told MarketWatch. 'There’s nothing they can do to stop the hammer from coming down.'"