A report from the News Press in Florida. "Lee County Property Appraiser Matt Caldwell released his preliminary report on real estate values in Lee County during 2022. Two barrier island communities hit hardest by Hurricane Ian saw sharply falling values, a nearly 40% decrease in Fort Myers Beach and 31% in Sanibel Island. The lower values could strip them of enough cash to support municipal services at current levels."

The Durango Herald in Colorado. "Greed. Price gouging. Theft. 'Everyone is kind of freaking out about the percentage increase,' said Kim Cofman, a real estate agent in Durango with Sotheby’s International Realty. The notices contain the assessed property values, upon which property taxes for 2023 (to be paid in early 2024) will be calculated. And homeowners, some of whom have made no improvements to their properties in the two-year cycle of revaluation, have received assessed values that are 40%, 60% or even 100% higher than the one issued in 2021."

"Bill Fisher said he opened his notice of valuation 'with a great sense of dread.' The dread was justified. His Edgemont Ranch home, which he purchased for $699,000 in 2016, was valued at $764,000 in 2021. This year, the value had jumped 46%, to $1.12 million. 'Three sides of the foundation of the house are slowly sinking – that’s caused quite a number of interior cracks in drywall, walls and ceiling,' he said. 'So if I put the house on the market and someone came in to look at it, they would absolutely be asking about those cracks and offering less money.'"

The Ahwatukee Foothills News in Arizona. "The massive Upper Canyon development in western Ahwatukee is taking shape far slower than originally projected – partly because the site owner hasn’t paid most of the $175.1 million it owes Arizona for the site. While developer Blandford Homes told the city last year it expected to be selling homes by 2024, no construction activity has occurred on the 373-acre parcel of former State Trust Land. And no date has been set for D.R. Horton and Blandford Homes to start building the 1,050 single-family homes and 479 apartments and townhouses they plan for site, which Blandford won with its whopping bid in a June 7, 2021, auction."

"That second extension came after company owner Jeff Blandford indicated to the Land Department that housing market conditions had made the going tougher than it had expected. Based on the value of the land determined by an independent appraiser, the Land Department set a starting bid of $105 million for the June 2021 auction. Blandford’s $175.5 million bid stunned the other three bidders, who quickly folded. 'The (department) has a track record of entending out terms with NO additional payments even on properties NOT bid up like this one,' Blandford continued, reminding how high his company exceeded the opening bid, capitalizing a couple words to make his point. Last Nov. 28 – three days before he got his second extension on the auction debt – Blandford wrote then-Deputy Land Department Commission Jim Perry. 'I do not see what the issue is with (the department) in regard to extending this out as there is nothing whatsoever to lose as you will not be able to sell this property again over the next 12 months at the bid-up price we have as of now.'"

From Geekwire. "Real estate startup Flyhomes is laying off employees for the third time in a year, citing an effort to focus on profitability amid the broader housing market downturn. The Seattle company confirmed the cuts to GeekWire on Monday. 'I will confirm that this extremely difficult decision was necessary for the company to navigate the sustained, challenging real estate market conditions and drive our continued focus toward profitability,' Flyhomes spokesperson Justin O’Neill told GeekWire."

Yahoo Finance. "The spread between rates for jumbo mortgages, which are too big for government backing, and rates on those guaranteed by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac shrunk as much as 11 basis points in mid-May, an indication that banks no longer see jumbos as an attractive investment. 'On the securitization side of things, investors are dealing with massive extension risk,' Jeremy Collett, executive director of capital markets for Guaranteed Rate, told Yahoo Finance. 'Liquidity for jumbo loans is most likely to remain incredibly challenged for the foreseeable future. Not only are depositories struggling with underwater portfolios of loans with low yields and considerable duration risk, but the outlook for deposit growth is also not encouraging.'"

The Real Deal on California. "Wells Fargo Bank has found a mystery buyer for its 13-story office building in San Francisco’s Financial District, and appears poised to take a $60 million bath on the sale. The San Francisco-based bank has chosen a buyer for its 355,000-square-foot building at 550 California Street, expected to sell for between $42.6 million and $46 million, the San Francisco Business Times reported. The pending deal works out to between $120 and $130 per square foot. Wells Fargo bought the building in 2005 for $108 million, or $304 per square foot."

Bisnow Los Angeles in California. "The developer of an unfinished trio of towers that has stood for years across from what's now called the Crypto.com Arena has defaulted on an EB-5 loan tied to the project. Oceanwide owed $157.4M to EB-5 lenders as of January, according to a notice of default filed with L.A. County and reported by The Real Deal. The notice also says that the sale of Oceanwide Plaza can be scheduled after Aug. 8. Oceanwide 'failed to complete construction of the project in accordance with the loan agreement,' to obtain a senior construction loan and to keep all risk insurance on the development, the notice said. Oceanwide also allowed mechanic’s liens to be filed against the project, a violation of the loan agreement, TRD reported. The project, when complete, was planned to hold 504 residential units, a 184-room Park Hyatt Hotel and 153K SF of retail and restaurants."

The Real Deal. "Earlier this year, RXR dropped a bomb on New York commercial real estate. CEO Scott Rechler signaled that his firm might hand lenders back the keys of two office towers that he likened to film cameras in a digital world. Last month, RXR’s default on one of them, 61 Broadway, became official. The firm will return the FiDi office tower to its lender rather than try to recapitalize its debt, which RXR stopped repaying in December."

"Banks that long delayed writing down distressed property debt, favoring an extend-and-pretend approach in the hopes of a turnaround by the struggling asset, are abandoning that strategy, preferring to rip off the Band-Aid instead. 'I’ve never heard of this happening before,' said Mark Edelstein, co-chair of law firm Morrison Foerster’s distressed real estate group. 'Banks are actually coming to us saying, ‘We’d rather take the hit today and lose maybe $10 million than give the borrower two years when we might take a $40 million loss.'"

"'We’re actually working out deals where lenders are questioning whether this thing will even exist as a fundamental asset,' Faisal Ashraf, founder of restructuring firm Lotus Capital Partners, said of office buildings."

The Daily Hive in Canada. "Vancouver developer Coromandel Properties is the subject of a new civil suit over an unpaid debt of more than $8 million. The financially troubled developer initiated insolvency proceedings earlier this year, only to halt them after coming to an agreement with several of its lenders. The fate of several of its existing projects was called into question, with one being foreclosed this month. Now, Coromandel is being sued by Woodbourne Capital Management, a real estate firm with offices in Toronto and Boulder, Colorado, for over $8 million that Coromandel owes."

"The notice of civil claim was filed in the BC Supreme Court in May and explained Coromandel never repaid its $8.3 loan, despite a demand letter sent on January 25. At the date of the demand letter, interest on the loan was accruing at about $3,300 per day. The two companies were working together on the Southview Gardens project in Champlain Heights. Coromandel wanted to redevelop the existing townhouses’ 140 apartment units into four six-storey buildings with 1,150 rental homes. According to court documents obtained earlier this year, Coromandel owed more than $80 million for Southview Gardens."

The Globe and Mail in Canada. "An Ontario court has ordered the sale of land assets held by Stateview Homes as part of a rolling insolvency process following the collapse of the company’s home-building business that has put hundreds of purchaser contracts at risk of cancellation. On Monday Justice Michael A. Penny agreed that the sale of seven Stateview housing projects or phases would go ahead immediately in an effort to raise money for lenders who are collectively owed $349-million."

"Left on the sidelines are those who put deposits down with Stateview in hopes of getting a new-construction home. The sales process contains explicit conditions that buyers of the defunct Stateview projects will not be required to honour agreements of purchase and sale for new homes that hundreds of buyers signed and put down millions of dollars in deposits for. In all, Stateview collected $77.2-million in deposits from 765 homebuyers hoping to one day occupy of one of seven still unfinished Stateview townhouse and detached home projects. According to KSV, almost all of that deposit money has vanished, with only $349,945 remaining in all the bank accounts connected to the projects that have been placed under the receiver’s control."

ABC News in Australia. "The Reserve Bank has lifted its official interest rate to 4.1 per cent, a level not seen since early 2012. Veteran housing market analyst and SQM Research managing director Louis Christopher believes rates have now hit a tipping point that will trigger a double dip housing downturn. 'While our numbers on distressed listings today remain largely benign (except for Tasmania), we can now expect distressed activity to rise based on a new round of forced and panicky selling starting sometime in the second half of this year,' he warned in a note."

From Reuters. "Some of China's distressed property developers face the risk of being delisted, which would reduce their options for restructuring and make them more vulnerable to liquidation, S&P Global Ratings said on Wednesday. Property companies were among the biggest high-yield issuers in Asia and many aim to use shares of their listed entities to restructure offshore debt after having defaulted on their repayment obligations."

"The Shanghai stock exchange delisted Sichuan Languang Development on Tuesday, the first such case for property A shares, and Sinic Holdings was delisted from Hong Kong in April. In mainland China, S&P said the 11 firms at risk of being delisted, including Shanghai Shimao and Yango Group, have offshore and onshore bonds outstanding collectively worth $21 billion. These firms either closed below or just above 1 yuan on Monday or before they went into trading halt."

"The agency said its empirical study shows investors typically get about 2-4 cents on the dollar in liquidation, and liquidation terminates jobs, meaning homes that buyers have bought may not be completed. '(Delisting) closes options for Chinese developers to recover, and for investors to get their money back,' said S&P credit analyst Esther Liu, adding it discourages parties from seeking an out-of-court restructuring."