It's Friday desk clearing time for this blogger. "'Perhaps there could be some recovery taking place, but the last couple of data releases are implying no,' said Lawrence Yun, the NAR’s chief economist. 'Things are slumping down again.'"

"The 10-year Treasury yield surged to 4.46% in morning trading Thursday, up from 4.40% late Wednesday and from 0.50% three years ago. It’s now near its highest level since 2007. 'It’s possible mortgage rates may go up to 8% in the short run,' Yun said."

"Las Vegas has the fourth highest home foreclosure rate in the country, according to ATTOM. I spoke with an associate professor of real estate at UNLV and a resident who's witnessed the impact firsthand. 'This stuff is killing us here in Las Vegas, which used to be the place where everyone wanted to move to cause it was affordable,' said North Las Vegas resident Orlando Cotton. He says he is paying significantly more to keep a roof over his head, and he is not alone. 'Were you surprised when your neighbor's home went into foreclosure?' I asked. 'Yes, I was, and she just couldn't afford to keep it after her parents passed away,' he said. Cotton says he has seen more foreclosures in his neighborhood."

"'Can you agree with what they are finding?' I asked the Director and Associate Professor of real estate at UNLV, Shawn McCoy. He is monitoring foreclosures in the valley regularly. 'Consumer savings that was piled up during the COVID economy through massive injections of capital from the feds, a lot of that consumer savings that homeowners used is expiring,' he said."

"McCoy says they use a map to identify hotspots throughout the valley that may have more foreclosures. 'Up here in the north part of town, we are seeing a lot of red,' McCoy told me. 'In the northwest and north part of town, income levels are lower than many, and I think most would agree it is going to hit or bind homeowners at lower income levels first,' he answered. Cottons says he agrees with McCoy's findings and says the people in his area struggle. 'You can't afford it,' Cotton said. 'The bottom line is you can't afford to pay $2,500 to $3,000.'"

"New numbers show home sales on the Wasatch Front plunging to a nine-year low and prices also dropping in many areas of the state, triggered by rate hikes that top economists say have abruptly snuffed out a 10-year run of booming real estate markets as of late least year. With the slowdown, Salt Lake County’s median price on a single-family home dipped to $582,500 as of the end of June, off 7% from a year before — when, according to the Salt Lake Board of Realtors, it stood at $623,138. Compared roughly to this time last year, Tooele County’s single-family home prices are down overall by at least 9%. Utah County has seen a 7% drop, Weber County is 6% lower and Davis County is also down by 5%."

"The median price of a detached home in Marin has fallen to $1.51 million, a year-over-year decline of 11%, according to new data from the county assessor's office. The data are based on market activity for August. For condominiums and townhomes, the median price fell to $794,000 last month, down 9% from $875,000 the previous August. The median home price in Marin hit $2.12 million in April 2022 before beginning its descent."

"For two years, the Turkish property investor thought he had purchased a renovated rowhome in the Park Heights area that had tenants who were paying rent. He’d received 20 months of such payments. Then, five months ago, the money stopped. Property Invest USA, the Miami-based company that facilitated the transaction — along with nearly 300 others across Baltimore to buyers in Turkey and Central America — was being evasive under questioning, he said. So the 34-year-old investor, a commercial airline pilot, decided on a recent layover in Washington to make the trek to Baltimore and take a look at the property for the first time since he bought it in June 2021. 'Yeah, here we are,' he said, standing on the sidewalk looking at a front lawn that hadn’t been mowed in ages. 'It’s obvious there’s no tenant.'"

"He says he did not know that on the day of his closing, Property Invest USA paid $53,000 to acquire the property, and would sell it to him for twice the amount in what’s called a 'double closing.' Now it was time for the pilot to see what he paid for. A local Realtor he had contacted prior to arrival, Nick Pfisterer, led the way up to the front door. 'I’ve seen some bad houses, and this looks like it hasn’t been touched in years,' said Pfisterer. 'Even if it was renovated, pardon my language, it’s a shit job.' Standing on the porch of his home waiting for a locksmith that never arrived, the pilot wondered if he’d been naïve to invest in property 5,000 miles from home. A group of other pilots had recommended it. 'This is United States. If something bad happens, I can go to court. The United States works efficiently. I thought that,' he said."

"A recent report by Rates.ca suggests variable rate mortgage holders have paid thousands more in interest since rate hikes by the Bank of Canada began. 'It's not exactly what they bargained for. You know, they're paying a lot more now,' said Rates.ca mortgage and real estate expert Victor Tran. 'Lots of regret in the market as well. You know, maybe they should have went for the fixed rate when that option was given to them.'"

"IT worker John Palmiero, from Buckinghamshire, and his wife have an interest-only tracker mortgage on their north London flat. A year ago they paid just over £200 a month – now it costs them more than £1,200 a month. Mr Palmiero, 61, said: 'For the flat in question, we chose an interest-only mortgage and having experienced very high interest rates in the past, we planned for the worst case scenario – which we are now in – so we have a break even to a small loss each month on the flat.' Mr Palmiero and his wife own three flat sas well as their family home. Mr Palmiero said: 'Over the past 20 years we have diligently saved and accumulated four jointly owned (husband and wife) buy-to-let flats that we planned to use for independence in our retirement.'"

"Mr Palmiero said he felt 'trapped' and 'let down' by the Government, whose response to the building safety crisis following Grenfell he believes has been 'ill-thought through.' Mr Palmiero said: 'The damage is done now. Another quarter of a per cent increase is going to take £1,300 or something we’re just going to have to suck it up, right, as we have up until now. What I’m focused on is the fact that it looks like this is the end of interest rate increases and because we are on a tracker mortgage, when they start to come back down, which they must, then we will see the benefits of that very quickly. So we’re not quite as upset about it. We were at one point, my wife was really upset about it. We’re trying to figure out how do we how do we live our retirement now knowing that our plan was to sell a flat in order to fund our retirement but as it is we’re going to have to figure out how to fund it.'"

"When Ella Keniz spent her life savings on an apartment in Sydney's inner west, she didn't imagine that almost $100,000 would be wiped away in just a few years. 'It's devastating, really,' Ms Keniz said. 'You're thinking you're buying an investment and you're going to do well down the track, and to sell at a loss is heartbreaking.' The 48-year-old office administrator bought a two-bedroom apartment in Homebush in 2018 for $760,000, but sold it in July this year for $670,000. 'You think to yourself, 'how much longer do I wait?' and prices could even go down so it's hard to know how much longer to hold on for,' Ms Keniz said."

"David Pisano, principal agent at LJ Hooker Strathfield, said sellers like Ms Keniz, who bought in the peak of the market were deciding to cut their losses. He said that's particularly pronounced in areas like Homebush where more construction is underway. Mr Pisano said owners are worried their values will fall further when those new units are complete, and want to get out now. 'A lot of people bought off the plan in 2016-2017 for probably $730,000-$750,000, and are selling them now for $650,000-$680,000 for second-hand stock, but that's mainly due to the oversupply there. I think it's just more people deciding that it's not going to increase, and they might as well get out now and make a loss rather than hold on and continue to make a loss.'"

"An accountant in northeast China deposited her life savings and received a letter guaranteeing her investment in a trust firm. Workers at a state-owned utility pooled money from friends and relatives believing that their investments were backed by the government. A man sank $140,000 into an account that he was told would make a 10.1 percent annual return. They are among the hundreds of thousands of Chinese investors confronting a distressing reality: Their investments with Zhongzhi Enterprise Group, a financial giant managing $140 billion in assets, and its trust banking arm, Zhongrong, might be at risk. Starting in July, companies affiliated with Zhongzhi missed dozens of payments to investors. They have offered no timetable for when people will be paid, fueling concerns that one of China’s largest so-called shadow banks may be near collapse."

"In a brief statement last week, Zhongrong said some investment products were 'unable to be paid on schedule' because of 'multiple internal and external factors.' It did not mention whether investors would get their money. Zhongzhi has not made any public statements about its finances, and it did not respond to an email seeking comment. The accountant in northeast China said she had invested $1.5 million into two Zhongrong trust products. 'It’s like my heart is bleeding every day,' Ms. Wang said, sobbing on the phone. She had planned to buy a home for her child in Beijing with the money she had invested. After Zhongrong missed its payments, angry investors gathered outside its Beijing headquarters, demanding that the company 'pay back the money.'"

"Logan Wright, director of China markets research at Rhodium Group, said China used to embrace bailouts, because faith in a government backstop allowed credit to flow for a fast-growing economy. But as China’s debts ballooned, the government changed course. 'That strategy is now coming to an end,' he said."