A report from Sarasota Magazine in Florida. "The latest report showed that the median price for a single-family home is now $500,000 in Sarasota County and $485,861 in Manatee County, reflecting increases of more than 52 percent and almost 41 percent, respectively, since 2020. The median salary in Florida is just under $56,000 per year. Plus, a survey from the National Association of Realtors indicated some post-pandemic buyer’s remorse, which has also played a role in move-outs. 'In a market that’s not in a frenzy, buyers take more days and maybe look at 10 homes. In the last few years, if you wanted to buy, you didn’t have that time,' Brian Tresidder, 2023 president of the Realtor Association of Sarasota-Manatee, told us. 'People say they picked the best option at the time but would have liked to have more options. It’s tying into that rising inventory now.'"

The Coeur d'Alene Press in Idaho. "The number of single-family homes sold in 2023 in Kootenai County fell nearly 16% from 2022 and nearly 39% from the COVID year of 2021. The number of current active residential listings as of Jan. 1 in Kootenai County was 658, according to the CRR, up slightly from 634 a year ago, but a 72% increase from 184 two years ago during the buying frenzy. 'This last year, a buyer could expect a handful of homes that fit their needs to look at, and buyers were able to make offers below asking price. Something we didn't see a few years ago,' said Jared McFarland, Coeur d'Alene Regional Realtors 2023 president. 'Sellers were able to sell their home if they priced it correctly but weren't able to sell for over market value.'"

"He said the rental market saw a larger change with a huge increase in inventory and the start of rental rate decreases. 'We haven't seen rents go down in a long time. This will have an interesting effect on our market in the coming future,' he said. Investors bought a lot of rental properties during the height of the market, he said. 'If investors aren't able to rent for prices they are used to, they may sell their homes and investments, increasing inventory, shifting us to even more of a buyers’ market, and creating some interesting opportunities,' McFarland said."

The Ahwatukee Foothills News in Arizona. "Despite a somewhat rocky road last year in the Valley’s housing market, the Cromford Report assured homebuyers and sellers that there’s virtually no chance of a widespread crash either here or across the country. Phoenix REALTORS also gave an upbeat prediction. The Cromford Report noted that some people a year ago complained about its generally upbeat forecast for 2023. 'But the numbers never lie to us,' it said. 'The housing market has survived intact and is now in better health price-wise than it was this time last year, though admittedly we could all do with a lot more transaction volume. These emails were valuable to me because I took them as a signal that public perception was much worse than reality, even for experienced and highly competent professionals.'"

"Overall, much of the Valley has been trending in the direction of a buyers’ market, according to the Cromford Report’s analysis of the 17 submarkets in the Phoenix Metro area that it routinely measures. 'Eight out of 17 cities are still sellers’ markets,' the Cromford Report said. 'We have four cities that are balanced and five that are buyers’ markets. Maricopa stands out as by far the weakest market of the 17 and it has yet to turn around.' 'Developers have created a huge number of new apartments to cope with the rental demand along with an increasing number of build-to-rent single-family homes and condos,' it conceded. 'This massive additional supply has stopped rents rising.'"

The Dallas Morning News. "North Texas led the nation in apartment leasing in the final months of 2023. But with more than three times as many new apartments opening as were filled by tenants, Dallas-Fort Worth rental occupancies fell. Net apartment leasing in D-FW totaled 3,018 units in the fourth quarter. But at the same time, developers opened 9,695 new units, according to Richardson-based technology firm RealPage. In 2023, 29,035 new apartments opened in D-FW, almost double the net leasing in the area. Another 47,968 apartments are scheduled to be completed in 2024, according to RealPage’s estimates."

"'This was D-FW’s largest year-over-year rent cut since the second quarter of 2010, coming out of the Great Financial Crisis,' RealPage chief economist Jay Parsons said. 'It looks like 2024 could be the ‘year of the renter’ in North Texas and elsewhere across the country. Because apartment supply is at 40-year highs, renters instead are benefiting from a surge in new options, which in turn is leading to moderately declining rents and, in some cases, generous concessions.'"

The San Bernardino Sun. "California's attorney general has filed a lawsuit against a Los Angeles developer that defaulted on millions of dollars of loans under a state-run program to house the homeless in converted motels from San Bernardino to the Bay Area. In the 321-page lawsuit filed Monday, Jan. 8, in Los Angeles Superior Court, Attorney General Rob Bonta alleges Shangri-La Industries and other named defendants — including San Bernardino County and the cities of Redlands and Thousand Oaks — 'breached their obligations' under terms of their agreements with California's Homekey program. 'All seven Homekey properties in which (Shangri-La Industries) was a private grantee are at risk of imminent foreclosure,' the lawsuit states."

"The state alleges in the lawsuit that for each of the seven motel-conversion projects, Shangri-La created a shell company, in the form of limited partnerships, using the address of each motel as the name of the limited partnership. Those limited partnerships were named in the lawsuit as the 'titleholder defendants.' 'The property titleholder defendants were and remain undercapitalized and were created as shells for the sole purpose of carrying out the misconduct of (Shangri-La Industries) and Step Up,' according to the lawsuit."

From Bisnow. "While asset values are expected to fall in the year ahead, primarily in the office sector, the mood in the halls of the Loews Miami Beach was decidedly buoyant on the first day of the conference. As lender appetite for loan extensions wanes, they expect more owners of struggling assets to become resigned to the prospect of either selling at a loss or surrendering their properties altogether. 'You're starting to see equity that owns an asset willing to just turn it over to the lender without fighting,' said Craig Phillips, who recently launched an asset management firm targeting distressed assets."

"'The fence-sitting that's been going on between lenders and borrowers is going to come to an end in 2024,' said Tad O'Connor, co-chair of real estate litigation practice at New York-based Kasowitz Benson Torres. 'It's actually pretty surprising how many relatively short-term loans there are that were done after Covid that are now maturing. People's expectation was that they were going to mature into a different world, and this world is as uncertain as it was in 2022 and 2023. A lot of the hopefulness is gone.'"

"Selling office buildings in this market means taking anywhere from a 40% to 70% cut on asset value, said Lonnie Hendry, head of commercial real estate at Trepp. This kept many owners out of the market last year and made lenders more amenable to renegotiating and extending terms. The hold-on-for-better-days mentality is beginning to give way in the office sector, with several properties trading at significant discounts in recent weeks. The largest recent markdown came when a Morgan Stanley entity sold the leasehold interest for a 12-story Chicago office building for just $4M last week, a nearly 90% drop from its appraised value when it last sold in 2012."

CTV News in Canada. "It's a harsh lesson on buying at the peak of the housing market. Two years ago, newly built townhomes in Carleton Place, Ont. sold for nearly $900,000. Low interest rates were a driving force behind the hefty price tag. 'Those townhouses were overpriced to begin with,' said Jeff McGuire, who lives in the area. 'I think they were asking 200k over than they should have originally.' Some people bought high but couldn't keep up with payments, falling into default. The builder re-listed the homes for much less at the end of 2023 — $499,000."

"'They couldn't afford the home or what they wanted to afford. So their plans changed,' explained real estate agent Peter Sagos. He sold a few properties in the new subdivision, including 182 Hooper St, both times. The original buyers who couldn't make the payments may be in further trouble from the builder, he says. 'The seller could go back and through litigation receive the other end of the money that was from the original contract.' 'A couple of the builders I work with did the exact same thing,' said real estate broker Paul Rushforth. 'They lowered the price drastically, called it a Christmas special.' These were priced high and sold during a low interest rate fueled boom in 2022."

"'When something sells at a lower price, that sets the bar,' said Rushforth. 'As a resident, does it suck? Yes, but listen, the builder needs to do what he has to do to get his product sold.' Garet Avery lives nearby and is worried about the fluctuating prices and what this means for his home's value. 'Even if I wanted to sell this place, with the current taxes and the property assessment, it's just going to drive people away and look the other way, look somewhere else because the value of the house and the amount of taxes,' he said. 'It's not looking good for turnaround.'"

Edinburgh Live in Scotland. "Midlothian owners of a Stewart Milne Group home fear they have left to live on a building site after the firm collapsed into administration - with 200 employees facing losing their jobs. Retired couple Keith and Elizabeth Hamilton, both 68, moved into the new-build property in Shawfair, Danderhall, in March 2022 for a new 'dream life' after leaving their home in the West Midlands. Building work on other homes on the estate continued until the firm went into administration on Monday. Keith said: 'Clearly we are all very anxious about the state that the site has been left in, the security of the area, and the unfinished work including pavements and all those sorts of things.'"

"Gillian, who moved to the estate almost a year ago, says she is worried about the future maintenance upkeep of her home, she said: 'I feel really sorry for all of the workers because what was envisioned looked so amazing and they have all been so nice.' An anonymous resident, who only moved into the Shawfair estate a few months ago said: 'I think we are the lucky ones, we moved in at the end of October and we are the last ones to have moved in. It's not nice living on a building site, especially as we don't have a road which is really bothering us and we'd obviously like that to be finished at some point. I haven't had the time to think about the repercussions of this because it is such a massive blow.'"

From The Star. "Speaking at a conference on Scenarios for the Vietnam Real Estate Market in 2024 in Hanoi last Friday, Vietnam Association of Realtors (VARS) chairman Nguyen Van Dinh said 2023 was a difficult year for the real estate market. Few new projects were approved, while thousands of unfinished projects were put on hold due to legal problems. Many other projects were stalled due to a lack of capital, which was the main cause of the problem, Dinh said. Dinh added that investment demand was clearly affected when customers and investors gradually lost confidence in the real estate market."

"Housing prices were still relatively high compared to both the real value and financial capacity of people, especially in two big cities, with the average apartment price in Hanoi of 51.7 million dong per square metre and 71 million dong in Ho Chi Minh City. For the land segment, high-value villas or townhouses, investors accepted a loss of 30% to 40% compared to the peak."

South China Morning Post. "China Evergrande Group stood by audited annual reports from 2021, rejecting claims by financial analysts that changes to its accounting methodology suggested the debt-laden property developer was 'never profitable' in its years of operations. GMT Research, a Hong Kong-based accounting research firm founded by former CLSA and Nomura analyst Gillem Tulloch, published a report on December 1 focusing on the changes to the developer's accounting treatments. The firm was among the earliest to raise red flags on the developer more than five years ago, citing many unfinished housing projects."

"'Evergrande significantly overstated revenue and earnings, most likely for many years,' the report said. 'Contrary to what some people think, Evergrande was not so much a victim of tightened liquidity or a Covid-induced property market downturn. Its problems were far more fundamental - there were never any profits.'"