A report from Mansion Global on New York. "Last week was a relatively sluggish one for Manhattan’s luxury housing market, according to Monday’s report from Olshan Realty. Sales volume, based on the most recent asking prices, took a notable dip, dropping from $246.96 million to $162.46 million, marking the first time since May that the weekly sales volume fell below $200 million. The next most expensive sale was a condo two blocks from the townhouse on Park Avenue. Initially listed last October for $12.95 million, its asking was reduced to $11.88 million, resulting in a significant loss for the seller who bought it for about $17.36 million in March 2014."

Community Impact in Texas. "Home prices have dropped year over year across most of The Woodlands-area community, and the number of homes sold declined, according to data on seven area ZIP codes provided by The Brashear Group, Martha Turner Sotheby’s International Realty. The community’s average home price decreased from $390,395 in June 2021-May 2022 to $353,315 in June 2022-May 2023. The largest decrease was in ZIP code 77380, which saw a 24.9% decrease."

South Side Weekly in Illinois. "With several hundred thousand units across Chicago, condos make up one of the city’s largest sources of affordable homeownership. But market trends of the last fifteen years have somewhat threatened their stability. After the housing market crashed, developers started eyeing condo buildings—some of them still struggling to rebuild their finances—as sources of new multifamily rental housing. Condo deconversions can be mutually beneficial for both parties, but that’s not always how it plays out on the ground. At the Silver Coast Citadel, and perhaps a handful of other condos throughout the city, resident-owners remain stuck between two market trends, beholden to the leadership of an investment company and locked out of the decision-making process."

"In an April 18 letter to unit owners, the board wrote that it was working with an independent consultant to 'prepare a reserve study…an in-depth analysis of the condition of all of our building’s common elements to help us anticipate and prioritize other major repair and replacement projects.' 'They’re trying to run us out of money,' alleged the building owner who requested anonymity. 'Everyone’s been pretty upset.''

The Advocate. "Anna Pollock still braces for the worst when she opens a closet. For nearly eight years, she and her family lived in a Lafayette Parish house contaminated with mold. The family moved out of the home two years ago and lives in Georgia now, but Pollock remains haunted by the experience. The Pollocks are among a growing list of Louisiana homeowners who allege houses built by D.R. Horton aren’t properly constructed to withstand Louisiana’s humidity. Many of those families are now suing the Texas-based construction company, with attorneys saying the nation’s leading homebuilder has erected defective homes along the Interstate 10 corridor from Slidell to Lake Charles."

"Wes and Alicia Dixon saved up for years to buy their first house. When they moved into a split-level ranch house in the newly built Sugar Ridge subdivision in Youngsville, they envisioned it as their forever home. But their dream house quickly turned into a nightmare after the ventilation system malfunctioned and mold began forming throughout the residence, they say. They say they can’t sell the home because it’s in such poor condition. And the working-class family can’t afford to move into a new home while keeping up with its current mortgage. 'It’s like we’re living in a molded prison,' Wes said. 'Financially, we just can’t get out.'"

The San Francisco Chronicle in California. "The San Francisco Board of Supervisors appears set to slash affordable housing requirements and lower or delay a slew of associated fees in an effort to resuscitate a residential development industry that has sunk into a deep torpor as the city scratches and claws its way out of post-pandemic economic doldrums. Against the backdrop of 1,100 out-of-work building trades members — and a skyline bereft of tower cranes — the Board of Supervisors Land Use and Transportation Committee Monday recommended that the percentage of affordable rental apartments developers are forced to include in their projects be cut."

"Rudy Gonzalez, who heads up the city’s Building Trades Council, said the legislation would help unblock a roster of fully approved developments that 'can’t bear the weight' of the city’s famously high fees in an environment where interest rates are high and the city’s rents are 10% to 20% lower than what they were pre-pandemic. 'We have to unlock the projects that were feasible in a different economy,' he said."

From Bisnow. "It's traditional in lease negotiations for the owner of an office building to ask a prospective tenant to show proof that they are in good financial standing and can be expected to pay rent every month. But the public prognostications comparing office real estate to an 'apocalypse' and a 'Category 5 hurricane' haven't escaped the companies in the market for office space, leading to an increasingly common role reversal: tenants asking landlords to open up their books and provide protection in case they go under. From New York to Atlanta, Miami to Los Angeles, across all types of building classes and lease lengths, more companies are forcing their potential landlords to reveal details about their financial backers and assure them of their ability to meet lease terms and hold onto buildings, industry players told Bisnow."

"Brookfield, Blackstone and Related Cos. have all handed back properties to lenders, and defaults have been shooting up across the country. Last week, Starwood Capital Group defaulted on a $212.5M mortgage on Tower Place 100, a 614K SF, 29-story building in Atlanta — which sent a shockwave through the local market, said Jodi Selvey, a principal with Colliers in Georgia. 'If they can go belly up, anyone can go belly up,' Selvey said. 'It scares you if you are trying to put a tenant in a space. … After the Starwood thing in Atlanta, you will see more questions.'"

From Blog TO. "Buyers are pulling away from Toronto's real estate market, new home prices are on the decline, and experts are pinning the blame, at least in part, on continued interest rate hikes by the Bank of Canada. The Building Industry and Land Development Association (BILD) announced on Monday that the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) new home market experienced declining prices in June, while sales fell well below the ten-year average. A decline in sales — at least using long-term metrics — coupled with a spike in inventory (up to almost 16,400 units) has had what BILD describes as 'a softening impact on prices.'"

"The benchmark price for new condo apartments shrank by 8.4 per cent year-over-year in June to $1,090,494, while the benchmark price for new single-family homes dropped by 6.9 per cent to $1,716,467 during the same period."

Bloomberg on the UK. "About 40 minutes from the City of London financial district, a sign in the town of Laindon once promised that 'Something amazing is taking place.' Behind it lies the part-completed carcass of a shopping mall and housing project, where construction has stalled for two years. Work initially stopped to allow the developer, Swan Housing Association, seek new planning approvals. Further delays followed when the firm, which issued £250 million of bonds, ran into financial difficulties after writedowns on projects and breaches to asbestos and fire safety requirements at some of its properties."

"Like many others, they’re now getting squeezed between higher construction costs and rising interest rates on one side and falling sales and pressure on asset values on the other. It’s a story playing out across the property market, from office blocks to retail sites to residential properties. Many housing associations 'tried to become quasi private developers acquiring land and large development opportunities, some of this at the top of the market cycle and now not viable,' said Mark Farmer, chief executive at construction consultancy Cast. To him, it’s reminiscent of the last economic cycle, when 'over zealous development plans' led to balance sheet problems for some."

Domain News in Australia. "The Fear Of Missing Out (FOMO) that drove the property market to record heights during the pandemic has now been wiped out by the Fear Of Making a Mistake (FOMM) which is currently paralysing both buyers and sellers, according to experts. Anxious about the possibility of more interest rate hikes, worried by contradictory predictions on prices and nervous over the lack of supply, people are finding it hard to make momentous decisions about their homes."

"'I think in the last four or five weeks, we’ve really gone from FOMO to FOMM,' said Welsey Bucello, an agent at Melbourne’s Nelson Alexander Brunswick. 'People want to move, but while we’re getting record numbers of potential buyers coming through our properties, we’re then seeing very few bidders on auction day. For instance, we recently had 150 people go through a three-bedroom house at 242 Albion Street in Brunswick, but then only two bidders turned up. The week after, we had 100 people go through another house at 19 Ford Street but then when we were made an offer pre-auction, we took it and ran, as people are just too scared at the moment to bid, so we thought we should.'"

"It’s a trend that’s now being seen throughout Australia. In Sydney, buyers’ agent Dan Sofo, the founder of Unicorn Buyers Agents, said that the segment of the market comprising inexperienced buyers and vendors, particularly, has been beset by raging FOMM. 'We’re finding a lot of people are just bewildered at the moment by what’s happening in the market,' he said. 'There are so many contradictory signals in the media about interest rates, inflation and whether or not we’re sliding into a recession, and people are confused and wary.'"

The Malaysia Sun. "Country Garden, one of China's largest property developers, which has witnessed a sharp fall in the value of its shares and bonds, capped a turbulent week for the country's struggling property sector. The company's Hong Kong-listed shares dropped more than 5 percent and its bonds closed to record lows late last year, after it moved to refinance part of a 2019 loan agreement. Country Garden has thousands of projects in nearly 300 Chinese cities."

"Raymond Cheng, head of China research at CGS-CIMB Securities, said the company's issues was part of the broader problem with Beijing's approach to the crisis. 'If sales do not improve, people will worry about the repayment ability for developers like Country Garden, who have large exposure in smaller cities,' Cheng said, as quoted by Reuters. 'Country Garden is a top developer, in terms of sales. If it defaulted it would send a very bad signal to the market that the central government does not care about more developers going down and has no plan to bail it out,' he added. Other high-profile China property firms currently struggling with debt are Dalian Wanda Group and state-backed Sino-Ocean, which have been hit by major ratings downgrades and seen sizable sell-offs this week."