A report from the Palm Beach Daily News. "Michael Milillo thought his home in the Flagler House condominium in West Palm Beach would be his last. Coastal breezes drift through the 74-year-old’s unit hugging the Lake Worth Lagoon. He and his wife bought the two-bedroom condo in 2013 for $150,000. 'And we thought we were set,' Milillo said. 'Then they show up.' Milillo’s aging condominium — a three-story art deco artifact from the early 1960s — is one of an untold number of South Florida buildings developers are soliciting as they hunt for waterfront deals in the wake of new laws that followed the 2021 Surfside condominium collapse. For some condominium unit owners, buyout offers from developers are a lifeline. For others, it’s an unwanted petition, but one they may not be able to refuse. 'I love my unit and don't want to be thrown back into the real estate market and have to live out west,' Millilo said. 'Even though they are giving a sizable amount of money, it's not enough to replace what we have.'"

"'For many of the condominiums in South Florida, they have woefully ignored the practical maintenance and repair of their buildings,' said Michael Gelfand, a board certified real estate and condominium law lawyer. 'Especially for maturing condominiums, associations may have been patching things up ad hoc and ignoring the signs of systemic failure that are costly to fix.'"

Florida Today. "Q: My adult daughter keeps renting an apartment in Atlanta — I keep telling her to buy a home as she is wasting money renting. Am I right? A: Maybe, but maybe not! Let’s run some numbers to see. The apartment your daughter rents is in a condo building, and an equivalent condo would sell for $650,000. She is paying rent of $2100/month. Let’s be conservative and say the 'cost' of the money is 6% per year. Next, add certain costs such as property taxes and insurance. Then, add expected maintenance and repairs. If she buys the condo or many other properties, add in monthly HOA fees. Again, to be conservative, we’ll ignore costs that are likely but hard to quantify. Adding up the certain costs above, we are at a cost of 9-10% of the value of the property per year. In your daughter’s case, this would be between $58,500 and $65,000 per year. Her rent is $25,200 a year. I’d say she is getting a deal!"

Hawaii News Now. "An influential Hawaii economist is apologizing for an obscene gesture he made during an emotional hearing about vacation rentals. Paul Brewbaker says he sorry he made the gesture and the man he aimed the gesture toward says he was not offended. But now he’s under fire for a two-second statement with his middle finger. Justin Kekiwi was testifying on Webex during Tuesday’s marathon hearing of the Maui Planning Commission. He said he wants short-term rentals phased out to generate more housing for Hawaii residents. Brewbaker, who had done studies supporting the rental industry in the past and was listening on the Webex feed, apparently didn’t like what he heard next."

"'Those kind of people no belong here and we don’t want you here,' Kekiwi said. 'So sell your units give them back to us …' At that point, in a box in the lower right corner of the Webex display, Brewbaker’s full name appeared briefly and then his video opened, displaying clearly his face with his left hand in the foreground with the middle finger prominently pointing up."

Bisnow on Maryland. "The White Marsh Mall, a massive 1980s-era shopping center outside Baltimore, has faced a declining financial picture over the last four years as it has struggled to recover from the pandemic. The latest sign of that distress is a new appraisal that puts the mall's valuation at $80M, down 73% from its $300M valuation when a CMBS loan backed by the mall was issued in 2013, according to Morningstar Credit. 'The other thing here is that Brookfield really had no skin in the game,' Morningstar Credit Senior Vice President David Putro said in an email to Bisnow. 'The equity in the deal was all on paper — the loan had paid off an existing loan and returned equity to GGP. So when COVID hit, it moved to special servicing and got reappraised below the loan balance, Brookfield no longer had even paper equity so its motivation to contribute additional equity or work towards a resolution with the servicer was probably limited.'"

Des Moines Register. "A rush of farm-related layoffs in manufacturing and food processing has Iowa leaders and workers worried about how long and deep this agricultural downturn will be. Nationally, farm-related bankruptcies climbed 47% from 2014 to 2019, the U.S. Department of Agriculture reported. 'Every single farm is different … but for a lot of folks, with these prices today, they're in the red,' said Mike Naig, Iowa’s secretary of agriculture. 'We have seen the storm clouds coming,' said Michael Langemeier, a Purdue University agricultural economist. With high costs and low commodity prices, 'I think we're right back where we were during the 2014 to 2019 period.'"

The Globe and Mail. "In late February, mortgage broker Claire Drage, founder and CEO of Hamilton-based Windrose Group, sent a frantic e-mail to hundreds of Canadians who had invested with her company. Their money had been lent to a small collection of businesses that bought and renovated homes and, in total, Ms. Drage’s company had funnelled more than $135-million in mortgages and other loans to this coterie of house flippers. Now, she was letting everyone know that those loans and that business had gone badly wrong. Her investors, it turned out, were caught in what would become one of the largest real estate lending insolvencies in Canadian history."

"Ms. Drage’s missive came less than a month after her largest borrower, a syndicate of companies, had declared itself insolvent and sought court protection to reorganize. The syndicate was run by a former actor named Robby Clark – best known for a 2000 YTV kid’s show – who has recently confirmed he was 50-per-cent owner of all 11 companies named in the insolvency. While the insolvency of Mr. Clark’s companies came first, Ms. Drage claimed several other borrowers soon stopped making loan payments to her clients as well. And the overall impact has been devastating. 'With depleted savings and no foreseeable income, we face the looming threat of losing our home,' wrote one unnamed lender in a March 29 affidavit."

"Private mortgage lending with property speculators is risky by its nature: Most of the borrowers have too much debt and not enough income to qualify for loans from banks. 'These are high risk or speculative investments,' said Harold Geller, a lawyer who focuses on litigation around investment losses. Mr. Geller has decades of experience with lenders losing money via prom-note schemes, because without collateral or a property asset to back them up the notes are literally just a promise to pay. 'In effect it’s a guarantee of nothing, of air. That is akin to a pyramid scheme: it all works until it doesn’t,' he said."

"'You went in with eyes open; you said ‘Yes, I want risk.’ If you didn’t there’s no way you’d ever put your name on the promissory note,' said Robert Gaudet, a real estate investor who has loaned mortgage and promissory note money to Ms. Drage in the past and whose wife currently holds more than $100,000 in prom notes issued by Lion’s Share. Mr. Gaudet, who has been through a consumer bankruptcy himself, has a starker prediction, particularly for all the unsecured creditors such as prom-note lenders: 'Every one of us is going to get pennies on the dollar. The only people who are going to get any money are lawyers.'"

The Associated Press on Spain. "Barcelona City Hall announced last month that it would not renew any tourist apartment licenses after they expire in 2028. Property owners plan to fight the decision, arguing that eliminating short-term rentals would threaten their livelihoods and leave the city without enough temporary lodging. Residential real estate prices in Barcelona have increased by an average of 38% over the past decade, a period in which the average rent soared by 68%, according to the municipal government. Like in other popular urban areas, many young people who grew up there struggle to afford a place of their own."

"Bonaventura Durall runs a company that owns and rents out 52 apartments near Barcelona’s beachfront. He says the municipal government's plan to phase out vacation rentals is unfair and puts his business and its 16 employees at risk. 'There is an investment behind this that has created jobs and tax revenues and a way of life, which will now have its wings clipped,' Durall said. Esther Roset, a 68-year-old retired bank worker, has spent years complaining about the tourist apartment above her home. Some guests have done things like vomit off the balcony, brought in prostitutes and opened a fire extinguisher in the stairwell. 'I shouldn’t have to leave. This is my apartment. If the tourists who came behaved, OK, but one out of every 10 doesn’t,' she said. 'At the end, I will have to follow the advice of a lawyer and hang a sheet from my balcony with the message ‘Tourist go home.’"

ABC News in Australia. "Flood victims say insurers are bullying them into accepting 'lowball' payouts while their homes remain unliveable seven months on from record flooding in Far North Queensland. The Queensland Reconstruction Authority said 1,863 properties were damaged, including 20 being destroyed, in Cairns and the surrounding regions by flooding and heavy rain caused by Tropical Cyclone Jasper in December last year. Port Douglas family support worker Erin Easton has advocated for flood victims while enduring her own nightmare. Their house was insured for $700,000, but Ms Easton finally accepted a payout of less than $200,000 to rebuild it. 'To get to where we got to has been mentally draining, exhausting, and has worn me down to literally nothing,' she said."

From News.com.au. "A leaked draft document has revealed China plans to coerce government officials and employees into having more children. It’s something the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) realised it must address in 2015 when it abandoned its long-enforced one-child policy. But the nation’s birthrates have only continued to decline since. Now, a leaked draft document circulating on Chinese social media reportedly details plans to 'organise and implement' Chairman Xi Jinping’s 2021 'three-child' policy among party officials and municipal employees. 'Party members and cadres at all levels of government agencies, state-owned enterprises, and public institutions should take the lead in implementing the three-child policy,' the Chinese Sina news service reports. 'This has aroused public concerns about ‘disguised forced’ childbirth.'"

"'In the section on ‘organising and implementing the three-child policy’, the mention of party members and cadres taking the lead in implementing the three-child policy made some netizens feel uncomfortable,' the Sina report reads. 'Some people worried that it would become a disguised forced birth of three children.' The Chinese Jiemian/Sina News service is unusually frank in reporting negative social media reactions to the Quanzhou plan. One quote about the leaked document reads: 'It was a veiled reference to forcing people to have three children.' Those who do not comply 'can forget about getting promoted or getting rich,' another commentator noted."