A report from the Providence Journal. "The price of a single-family home in Rhode Island has nearly doubled since 2019. In June, the median price for a single-family home hit $494,000. Five years ago, in the pre-pandemic days of 2019, the median price was $250,000. 'It's nuts, it's crazy, it's nuts,' said Redfin real estate agent Bryan Quinlan. Quinlan recently listed a single-family house in Coventry for $510,000 – a price that left him reeling. 'It's just a normal house,' he said. 'Three bed, one bath. A ranch. It's not even on the water. I don't want to say it's absurd, but prices have gone a little absurd,' he continued. 'There's no other way to put it, no other way to talk. This is the new normal.'"

KSL News Radio. "The average price of a house in Utah is $522,732 — up 2.1% over the past year. With a down payment of 20%, prepare to drop more than $100,000 for that house to start the buying agreement. But can you actually purchase a home with no money down? Co-owner of The Stern Team, Russell Faucette, spoke with Dave & Dujanovic about how to buy a home with little or no money down. He added the most popular no-money-down program in the state is Utah Housing Corporation, which is an FHA loan. 'The other three and a half [percent] is a Utah Housing product where they actually give you a second mortgage,' said Faucette. 'All you’re doing is coming in with your closing cost, and if you can negotiate that with the seller, then you don’t have any money out of pocket, essentially.' The buyer is essentially taking out a second loan for $3,500, which is attached to the house."

"Because first-time home buyers don’t typically have the equity to use from their former house, they typically pursue no-money-down loans, such as FHA, Freddie Mac or Fannie Mae. 'It’s a way for them to get in without having to save a ton of money; especially with inflation right now, more and more people are living paycheck to paycheck,' Faucette said."

Vail Daily in Colorado. "For serious sellers, increased inventory and more options for buyers underscores the importance of pricing your property to the market. Eagle County’s mid- to downvalley markets, including Edwards, Eagle, Eagle Ranch and Gypsum are cases in point about the ever-changing dynamics of our different markets. Rick Messmer, managing broker for Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices Colorado Properties’ Eagle Ranch office, says that the market is continuing to improve for buyers, with more options and more competitive pricing, including 44 new listings and 15 price reductions in just one week earlier this month. 'For the past several years, buyers have been struggling to find even one property that met a few of their criteria, which put many in a holding pattern. Now, multiple properties check many of their boxes which is causing a reverse holding pattern — too many options to choose from,' Messmer said."

"'If the property you are going to bring to market is unique, and in a desirable location for the buyer pool, you may still be able to set the market and be the highest-priced home ever sold in your neighborhood,' Messmer said. 'However, if your property is not that property, you must price it to today’s market conditions. With the right marketing and exposure, you can have buyers competing and pushing your price up — but only if the market — and buyers — feel you are underpriced. Otherwise, your property will likely sit and be forced into a price reduction.'"

The Herald Tribune in Florida. "The Sarasota-Manatee real estate market is leveling out, per a new report from the Realtor Association of Sarasota and Manatee The data reflects a general slowdown in demand that’s taken hold of the market following a post-pandemic boom. Simply put, prices are dipping as supply is rising. In the broader North Port-Sarasota-Bradenton metropolitan area, the median sale price at large dropped 3.7% to $504,900 compared to $524,450 in June of 2023. Active listings in the area shot up 61% — 5,719 from 3,545 — in the same timeframe. As for what the numbers mean for those looking for a new home or listing an old one, the report advises that buyers may find themselves with more opportunities, while sellers may need to lower their expectations to stay competitive. The new data, said Realtor Association President Tony Barrett, reflects the market’s regular flux, and he advised buyers and sellers to remain flexible. 'This cooling trend highlights the importance of staying adaptable,' Barrett said."

WINK News in Florida. "A quiet Cape Coral neighborhood faces a lot of noise thanks to 3613 SW 12th Ave, 1137 SW 37th St, and 1149 SW 37th St, all of which are vacation rental homes. The biggest complaint from Southwest Cape neighbors is the noise. Neighbors told WINK News Reporter Olivia Jean that groups of up to 30 people come to Cape Coral and throw massive parties in quiet residential neighborhoods. 'If there were just kids playing and just a family group, that would be totally fine. But it’s the loud music. And it’s the loud talking, like, we can hear them inside of our home,' said Macy Magas. And when these neighbors say something to the loud vacationers…'They yell right back at us. They just start screaming without even any context or anything. They’re just they get so mad at the fact that we’re asking not a hard thing,' Magas said."

KFMB in California. "We are one year into a San Diego city ordinance that aimed to crack down on short-term vacation rentals like Airbnb's. Some say requiring a $1,000 Short Term Rental Occupancy license has helped, but others say there are loopholes. The vast majority are compliant mom and pops. 'We do this for the money but also for the joy of hosting travelers, please, please don't shut us down,' another woman said at the meeting."

KTVU in California. "Gov. Gavin Newsom’s executive order is finding support in the South Bay. On Thursday, Newsom issued an executive order that allows agencies to clear encampments on state property. The move comes a month after a Supreme Court ruling that allows cities more authority to prohibit people from living on the streets. Housing and homeless advocates in San Jose say they’re disappointed by Newsom’s order. 'I believe he’s doing it because his affordable housing policies in California have failed. He’s failed to provide enough affordable housing. He’s failed to take on the real estate profiteers who continue to raise rents,' said Sandy Perry, of South Bay Community Land Trust."

The Hyde Park Herald in Illinois. "Nearly one year after a temporary shelter for migrants opened in East Hyde Park amid last summer’s influx of new arrivals, Ald. Desmon Yancy (5th) hosted a virtual community meeting Thursday night to discuss area residents’ concerns about noise, cleanliness and public safety. Representatives from the Mayor’s Office, the city’s Department of Family and Support Services (DFSS) and the Chicago Police Department (CPD), attended and gave brief presentations about shelter services and steps they are taking to address those concerns. In response to neighborhood residents’ concerns about public urination and defecation, Danny Castañeda, the deputy commissioner for new arrivals at DFSS said that every shelter resident signs a community guidelines agreement prohibiting such behaviors. Noting that these acts are violations that can result in people being removed from the shelter system, he added that 'it's still our task and responsibility to ensure that they understand those social norms.' Castañeda said the city has partnered with local community organizations like the Illinois Venezuelan Alliance to educate asylum seekers about those norms in culturally relevant ways."

"Beatriz Ponce de León, Chicago’s first-ever deputy mayor for immigrant, migrant and refugee rights, said the city is reevaluating shelters every six months to see if there is still a need to keep operating it. Neighbors also complained about shelter residents driving without licenses or proper registration, to which Ponce de León said the CPD makes arrests almost daily for such offenses. She also said the city is working with the Secretary of State to educate people about the requirements for purchasing and operating a motor vehicle and ensure that they can get licenses."

From KTNV. "A recent report shows a serious uptick in notices of home default. Previously, I highlighted the delinquent hotspots of 2022 and now, I'm digging deeper to see if there has been any improvement. Instead, I found a 41% increase in 2024, revealing foreclosures are increasing across the valley. Yolanda Perkins' story is becoming all too common across southern Nevada. 'The cost of living is so high, I live from paycheck to paycheck and I can barely make it,' Perkins told me. I asked her if she. is having to readjust her budgeting to afford the roof over her head. 'Yes and I work two jobs, it's really hard,' she said. 'I make over 5,000 a month and I can not make it.'"

"Could another real estate bubble like what we saw in 2008 be looming? What can you do if you're struggling with your mortgage? I reached out to loan officer Bryan Feldman to find out. 'Ask about a forbearance or a mortgage modification,' he told me. 'Those might be the two things that are the most helpful initially if they want to keep the home to try to do that.' While that may be a solution, Yolanda hopes the cost of living in Las Vegas becomes more affordable. 'You go to a grocery store and in the past, you spend 30 dollars and now it's over a hundred. And without my second job, I don't know I would be done and end up on our streets,' Perkins said."

Blog TO in Canada. "It is decidedly an exceptionally bad time to try and sell or build condos in the GTA, as purchases of the housing type have fallen to record lows, dropping in June to 70 per cent below the 20-year average. With such little activity, some ongoing projects are going into receivership as pre-construction sales struggle to cover building costs. Others are being completely put on hold until the market improves — progressively more of them, too. As Urbanation and CIBC explain in a report about the sector this week, 'the GTA condo market is in a state of economic lockdown. The math doesn't make economic sense from both the demand side (investors) and the supply side (developers), leaving the market at a standstill.'"

"'Prices are too high for investors to buy given current resale prices, rents, and interest rates, while developers can't lower prices due to high construction costs. As a result, new condo sales — the primary driver of new home construction in Canada's largest market — have dove off a cliff to their lowest level since the late 1990s.'"

From Domain News. "House hunters on a iron-fisted budget will find a collection of lifestyle-driven suburbs where property prices have slid backwards by up to 24 per cent. It could be a sign of what is to come for patient buyers across a broader range of locations, after an 'extreme' hot streak of price growth around the nation that could not be maintained. From a retail mecca in Melbourne’s east to a pretty Victorian coastal hamlet with a lighthouse and spots on the glittering Gold Coast, buyers will be relieved to find properties have declined by as much as 24.4 per cent compared to this time last year, June quarterly data shows. Chadstone in Melbourne, which tops the list, is the home of Chadstone The Fashion Capital, the biggest shopping centre in Australia."

"In Chadstone, units prices have dropped 24.4 per cent to land at $550,000, according to the Domain House Price Report for June 2024. Domain’s list is a welcome index the postcodes where the affordability door has been not just opened, but kicked down. These are markets where aggressive spurts of house price growth have lost steam. Biggera Waters – a suburb on the Gold Coast, about an hour north of the high-value capital – should be on buyers’ GPS. There, houses have decreased by 24.4 per cent, and the median is now $630,000. Number three is Clayton South, in Melbourne. Properties here are the cheapest of the top ten – just $460,000 for a unit, after a fall of 23.3 per cent."

"Domain’s chief of economics and research Dr Nicola Powell says the locations on the list previously experienced unsustainable growth. On the Gold Coast, unit prices dropped from their record high last quarter, Dr Powell says. 'It is a sign of what could unravel across other suburbs also, as we are starting to see weakness in some areas. It is premium locations that are declining,' Dr Powell says."

The Globe and Mail. "The political will needed to design and implement remedies that match the gravity of the problems does not exist in China, because this Third Plenum of the 20th Central Committee is the stillborn child of a contradiction. The reform era, launched by Deng Xiaoping in 1978, gave China economic liberalization without political reform; in 2008, the CCP called a halt to that project because it threatened its monopoly on political power. China’s economy can only be restored to health by resuming its full liberalization – and that requires systemic political change."

"The great majority of China’s political elite understand that. But President Xi Jinping is determined to defend the present system, and he currently has sufficient grip on the levers of hard power – the country’s military and security apparatus – to block change. Consequently, achievement of the worthy goals enunciated by the Resolution – shifting from rapid growth to high-quality growth, reducing pollution and carbon emissions, and strengthening social security – will be stymied by a failure to tackle the deepest problems generated by the contradiction between economic change and political stasis."

"The most spectacular of these is the collapse of the property market. It has undermined household savings, more than 75 per cent of which has been invested in property; it has undermined economic growth, 30 per cent of which was driven by property development, until the collapse; and it has undermined local government revenues, 40 per cent of which previously came from the sale of land to developers."

"In China, local governments matter hugely: they raise more than half of total government revenues and account for more than 85 per cent of total government expenditure. But in its latest report on the Chinese economy, the International Monetary Fund warned that 'fundamental demand for new housing is expected to decline by almost 50 per cent over the next 10 years… in some regions, the adjustment could be much sharper.' To put it bluntly: there is no prospect of reviving land sales as a source of local government revenue in the foreseeable future."

"Central government cannot bail out local government because the problem is too big. But the regime cannot just inflate the problem away, because that would undermine the currency. Local governments are effectively using Ponzi schemes to keep themselves afloat. When those schemes run out of road, as sooner or later they must, there will be dire consequences for services, employment, savings and the financial system. Outrage and unrest will follow, and threaten social stability. To save what they can of their own wealth and power, China’s elite and 600-million-strong property-owning class will demand an end to the political system that has caused this national disaster, and its replacement by one that gives them freedom of expression, rule of law and a right to vote."

"In the meantime, last week’s meeting of the Central Committee will go down in history as one more futile gesture in denying reality and staving off the fundamental change that’s needed."