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The Domino Effect Of This Unwieldy Upward Trend Is Obvious

It’s Friday desk clearing time for this blogger. “Consider a few of these recent headlines from major newspapers around the state: ‘Bay Area home prices fall 1.7% in May, biggest year-on-year drop in 7-plus years,’ said the San Francisco Chronicle on June 27, 2019; ‘Sluggish sales suggest peak has come and gone,’ said the Mercury News on June 27, 2019; and ‘Southern California home prices are flat in May as sales fall,’ said the Los Angeles Times on June 26, 2019.”

“And it is no secret that statewide real estate trends can be reflected in the Davis micro-market. Broker Cory Gold added that ‘With the buyers that I am working with, there seems to be no urgency. They find a house they like and they don’t immediately put in an offer. They take their time with their decisions and have the sense that if this one sells, there will be another one.'”

“‘It’s just absolutely critical to price the property correctly, and by that I mean don’t overprice it or you’re going to be following the market down. The price strategies that worked in the market in 2017 don’t work in the market in 2019,’ said California Association of Realtors chief economist Leslie Appleton-Young.”

“Plano home prices have started to cool over the past year, according to industry experts. One particularly high-value Plano home Realtor Cassandra Stahl had been trying to sell recently has been sitting on the market for longer than usual. Her client, after buying the home for $630,000 two years ago, was still having trouble selling it recently after bringing the asking price down to $599,000.”

“‘It’s frustrating for the seller, and frustrating for me too because it’s got great schools, so it would seem that it should move very quickly,’ Stahl said. ‘But it hasn’t. It takes a while for people to really get on the bandwagon and say, ‘OK, I’m going to sell my house.’ And I think now we’re seeing more sellers saying, ‘OK, I’m ready to sell,’ but we don’t have the same influx of buyers.'”

“Like other taxi moguls who owned the properties where they parked their fleets, Victor Weingarten parlayed the wealth he made in the yellow cab business into another booming industry: real estate investment. But Weingarten is facing foreclosure on an Upper West Side apartment building where he and his partner Simon Baron Development have struggled to execute a plan to turn rent-stabilized apartments over into free market units.”

“‘They’re willing to cut their losses and walk away from it,’ one source familiar with the property said.”

“An Ontario bankruptcy trustee has launched an investigation after a developer failed to pay millions of dollars owed to investors who financed a housing development north of Toronto. President Dino Sciavilla said on Thursday the investors were not paid because the project did not make a profit.”

“‘There were no funds to pay – the houses were sold under-price … for the mortgages that were on them,’ he said. ‘That’s unfortunately what happened.'”

“The value of properties in Nicaragua has fallen between 20% and 30%, as a result of the crisis that has plagued the country for fifteen months, three experts from the legal, stock and financial sector told Confidencial. ‘The real estate market is at a standstill. There are no credits, no appetite for this type of assets, which also applies to cars and any other capital asset,’ an expert in financial matters explained.”

“‘When they are in a hurry to sell (because they are leaving the country, do not want to lose their houses, or need the money) then the discount is higher,’ stated Rosario de Tefel, President of the Nicaraguan Chamber of Real Estate Brokers. This is somewhat what is happening in the coastal areas, where many people have chosen to sell their homes with much higher discounts, ‘up to 50% in some specific cases.'”

“There are certainly opportunities in the current 2019 market to pay less than the last price. A three bedroom Parramatta apartment in the Meriton-built Altitude complex has been bought by an investor for $990,000. This represents a 30% drop in value since purchase when it was sold for $1,285,000 off the plan in May 2015.”

“Detroit’s renaissance in the downtown and Midtown areas has earned the city a national reputation as the Comeback Capital of urban America. But the market giveth, and the market taketh away.”

“The Detroit Free Press identified a market that has ‘hit the pause button.’ The price of housing is also a worrisome development. ‘The back-to-the-city trend has reversed,’ William Frey, an internationally recognized demographics expert, recently told the Wall Street Journal.”

“As Deadline Detroit recently reported, the newest apartments available in Midtown and downtown rent for somewhere between $1,000 and $2,500 per month. And that doesn’t include electricity or a covered parking space. Worse yet, the domino effect of this unwieldy upward trend is obvious.”

“The Corktown neighborhood bordering downtown was known not long ago for its vacant lots, waist-high weeds and abandoned buildings. Not far away, on the fringe of the inner city, are homes that sold in recent years for as little as $5,000. Now, prices for the newest three-story, two-bedroom Corktown condos start at about $400,000 and can exceed $600,000, which matches the cost of suburban ‘McMansions’ with three times as much square footage.”

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  1. ‘It’s just absolutely critical to price the property correctly, and by that I mean don’t overprice it or you’re going to be following the market down. The price strategies that worked in the market in 2017 don’t work in the market in 2019’

    Eat yer crowz Thornberg!

    1. “‘It’s just absolutely critical to price the property correctly, and by that I mean don’t overprice it or you’re going to be following the market down.”

      Translation: “pricing the property correctly” means asking a lower price for your property than other sellers are asking for their property. Which means instead of following the market down you will be leading the market down .

      1. Oh, by the way, when you and other successful sellers lead the market down by selling you properties at lower and lower prices you will be destroying equity wealth for all of your neighbors, and (this is the worst part) you may cause some lenders to experience a few moments of discomfort.

        1. It is ok Mr. Banker when they cannot get home equity loans due to reduced home equity they will turn to credit card loans on which you can charge much higher interest rates and late fees. The beatings will continue until morale improves.

          1. “The beatings will continue until morale improves.”

            True dat. What saves me much time and energy is the fact that these much-needed beatings of my customers are self inflicted. I receive the same degree of enjoyment of the beatings without the expenditure of the necessary energy. My customers voluntairly do it all.

      2. Thanks for correctly interpreting/deciphering the conundrum of Realtor-speak. We’ll call it the “Ben” or “truth” filter. 🙂

    2. “correctly”

      Is that a euphemism for ‘less than you expected to be able to get ‘?

  3. ‘Her client, after buying the home for $630,000 two years ago, was still having trouble selling it recently after bringing the asking price down to $599,000’

    Sux to be you.

    ‘It takes a while for people to really get on the bandwagon and say, ‘OK, I’m going to sell my house.’ And I think now we’re seeing more sellers saying, ‘OK, I’m ready to sell,’ but we don’t have the same influx of buyers’

    Ahem…

    ‘We have years of home price growth leaving borrowers with record levels of home equity,’ says Molly Boesel, principal economist at CoreLogic. ‘So if they’re in a situation where they can’t pay their mortgage, they would just sell. So they won’t wind up in default.’

    http://housingbubble.blog/?p=2083

  4. I am thinking two bubbles popping…uber with taxis and RE.

    ““Like other taxi moguls who owned the properties where they parked their fleets, Victor Weingarten parlayed the wealth he made in the yellow cab business into another booming industry: real estate investment.”

  5. “‘It’s frustrating for the seller, and frustrating for me too because it’s got great schools, so it would seem that it should move very quickly,’ Stahl said. ‘But it hasn’t. It takes a while for people to really get on the bandwagon and say, ‘OK, I’m going to sell my house.’ And I think now we’re seeing more sellers saying, ‘OK, I’m ready to sell,’ but we don’t have the same influx of buyers.’”

    But but but shortage???

    1. “…‘It’s frustrating for the seller, and frustrating for me too because it’s got great schools…”

      Oh Suzanne!, Oh the humanity!

  6. And with insane property taxes as insane public union pensions were barely touched in the city’s bankruptcy.

    “Corktown condos start at about $400,000 and can exceed $600,000, which matches the cost of suburban ‘McMansions’ with three times as much square footage.”

    1. Didn’t Ben say airboxes are mostly, well, air? Is this quickly becoming an “the emperor has no clothes” moment? (Rhetorical)

  7. ‘Consider a few of these recent headlines from major newspapers around the state: ‘Bay Area home prices fall 1.7% in May, biggest year-on-year drop in 7-plus years,’ said the San Francisco Chronicle on June 27, 2019; ‘Sluggish sales suggest peak has come and gone,’ said the Mercury News on June 27, 2019; and ‘Southern California home prices are flat in May as sales fall,’ said the Los Angeles Times on June 26, 2019’

    ‘And it is no secret that statewide real estate trends can be reflected in the Davis micro-market. Broker Cory Gold added that ‘With the buyers that I am working with, there seems to be no urgency. They find a house they like and they don’t immediately put in an offer. They take their time with their decisions and have the sense that if this one sells, there will be another one’

    wa·ter·shed
    /ˈwôdərˌSHed,ˈwädərˌSHed/
    noun
    noun: watershed; plural noun: watersheds

    2. an event or period marking a turning point in a course of action or state of affairs.

    This was a big week, IMO. The New York Times described a housing crash – in past tense! It also became clear (three years after it happened BTW) that the Chinese speculators are not only gone, but are selling and fleeing the US, (plus Australia, Vancouver, etc).

    And to wrap it up none other than Leslie telling sellers to cut yer prices you greedy bashtards, it’s only gonna get worser!

    1. “…Chinese speculators are not only gone…”

      Not to to leave out

      Chinese speculators / money launderers are not only gone…

    3. Realtors gotta sell to eat, and without price cuts in a market where the bottom has dropped out of investor demand, there are no sales.

        1. Don’t the Chinese investors who bought since 2009 now have to sell in order to realize their short-term speculative investment gains? Otherwise they might have to learn the hard way about the risk of catching themselves a falling knife.

          1. I just can’t honestly believe how pathetic the eCONomy in this country has become. Chinese speculators pricing out Americans, with record numbers of homeless? This is beyond disgusting. It’s shelter, for crying out loud.

          2. Some Democrats are claiming housing as a basic human right. While I don’t agree with them philosophically, I would love to see a bunch of Chinese specuvestors get wiped off the map by a flood of new building if these ideas gained political traction.

          3. Some Democrats are claiming housing as a basic human right.

            A New Law In Portugal Makes Housing a Right
            Pacific Standard
            Peter Yeung
            July 17, 2019

            “A bill passed by Portugal’s parliament sets out a legal basis for housing being treated as a citizens’ right. Under the new law, the Portuguese government becomes responsible for ensuring adequate housing for all citizens as “the guarantor of the right to housing.””

            “The Basic Housing Law emphasizes the “social function” of housing, with the explicit goals of eradicating homelessness, prioritizing the use of public real estate for affordable housing, and prohibiting tenant evictions across Lisbon—a pressing issue in recent years—unless the state is able to provide similar accommodation nearby. Framers of the law describe it as a foundation and roadmap for future policies, albeit one with some explicitly defined targets, rather than a direct instrument for giving people homes.”

          4. I do believe that housing is a right, not in the sense that the state should give people housing, rather than the state should make sure that conditions exist such that housing at every income level is available. Ideally the market should do this, but if it can’t/won’t, then state and even federal government should get involved to take measures such as what Canada did to tax foreign speculators driving up the cost of shelter.

          5. It might be worth going into outright socialism on housing for the near-term future, if only for the unbridled pleasure of seeing the Housing Bubble go through its final death throes, and taking the NAR and the REIC down in the process.

          6. Die, Bubble, die!

            I’m tired of tripping over homeless people and tiptoeing around feces every time I go downtown.

            Politics
            How Finland Slashed Homelessness by 40%
            By Kati Pohjanpalo
            July 18, 2019, 9:00 PM PDT
            – Government built more homes for those that needed them most
            – Over 17 countries have set up Housing First-style programs

            Look around the streets of Helsinki, peek into the nooks of buildings or under bridges, and here’s what you won’t see: the flattened boxes, sleeping bags, even tents that are the tell-tale signs of outdoor sleeping in cities around the world.

            In Finland, homelessness has fallen by roughly 40% over the past decade — despite a double-dip recession. As politicians from Berlin to London to New York struggle to solve their affordable housing crises with rent regulations and freezes, temporary accommodation, social housing and public co-financing of reduced-rent apartments, Finland took a more direct approach. The government built more homes and provided them to the people who needed them most.
            …

          7. federal government should get involved to “…take measures such as what Canada did to tax foreign speculators driving up the cost of shelter.”

            If it worked in Canada, why not implement a similar solution here in America? We could even call the policy Housing Tariffs, if that might help the idea catch on with American voters.

          8. If the market is not providing naturally occurring affordable housing, it’s time to intervene. I’ve come to believe that the state and local governments should get involved in building housing without a profit incentive for shareholders or perhaps make a small operating profit and funnel that into more affordable housing thereby creating a revenue stream that self-funds more development, a little bit like the grant program that Microsoft recently announced.

            If something like this were well planned and telegraphed well in advance, the luxury condo builders would know that they couldn’t count on supply constraints to fill up overpriced units. It would force them to sharpen their pencils and build more to what the market wants/needs.

          9. If the market is not providing naturally occurring affordable housing, it’s time to intervene.

            It’s highly likely that past interventions are the problem. Just stop rewarding speculation.

            I’m very concerned that the people saying housing is a right and healthcare is a right don’t have a very complete understanding of rights. You can have a right to be allowed to do what you want, but how can you have a right to be provided with something by someone else?

          10. You can have a right to be allowed to do what you want, but how can you have a right to be provided with something by someone else?

            I understand the argument that a right to something implies that someone else has to be forced to provide it. This is the entire argument about negative rights vs. positive rights (e.g. liberties vs claim-rights). I don’t think the market will provide affordable housing and I don’t think it is because of past interventions, though I do think some of the current structure makes naturally occurring affordable housing less likely (e.g. down payments of 3%, MID, prop 13 in CA, excessive zoning/NIMBYism, etc.). But even if we rolled those back, I think there would still be a need for some section of the population to have support for housing, whether from private or public. But I think the need would overwhelm the private, charitable sector, so an advanced economy should provide some very bare bones housing to the truly indigent.

          11. an advanced economy should provide some very bare bones housing to the truly indigent.

            I think your intentions are good but I don’t think the word “right” should be used to describe the charity that I think you’re talking about. Also best of luck with drawing the line between “truly indigent” and “almost truly indigent”.

          12. Also best of luck with drawing the line between “truly indigent” and “almost truly indigent”.

            I concede that it is difficult to draw a line. My rule of thumb is that it that such dwellings should be very spartan and not create a perverse incentive to “become indigent”, which is what we often see with government schemes and SSDI and the like.

    5. People were focused on “Chinese buyers” but missed the big picture: ALL foreign buyers are down! Canada, UK, Mexico…..all negative and in some cases by double digits!

  8. ‘There were no funds to pay – the houses were sold under-price … for the mortgages that were on them…That’s unfortunately what happened’

    So basically you don’t have any money.

    1. What the heck is “under-priced?”

      The house sold at market prices.

      Your business plan, counting on massive appreciation for no reasons, sucked.

      1. People selling after only holding for two years , expecting a profit are speculators. The closing costs are going to be a bitch also.

        Sellers who have held for a long time should have some equity, and should be able to get a cheaper house if they had to sell out cheaper.

        1. Those who are selling now are the smart ones. Even with a modest decline, the market is going to be quite different in 8-9 years with the demographic bomb. Lots of people who have stayed put will find out that mobility is an issue and life circumstances will force them to sell when biology dictates, regardless of whether the market is good or not.

          1. And unless Elizabeth Warren or similar Democratic candidate running on a Housing Bubble reflation platform gets in, sellers will discover a dearth of demand remains among next generation at the prices they came to expect during the Bubble years.

  9. Those urban price differences are apparent in other areas of metro Detroit outside of the city, anywhere there is the perception of a “hip”, walkable downtown, which for this area is supremely ironic.

    1. I do not think walking in a lot of Detroit areas raises your life expectancy. Just saying.

  11. Only a complete moron would pay 600K for ANY house in Plano. It’s a place where sanity goes to die.

      1. “We are starting to run out of greater fools soon…”

        Wrong. The number of fools will remain, will probably increase. What will change will be their access to money.

  13. I think the time has come for me to recommend the 1951 book by Eric Hopper called “The True Believer.”

    This is a handy book that explains mass movements being political or otherwise.

    The book explains what’s really going on in the psych of the true believer who will attach to a cause and even deny their own self interest or logic for the cause.

    We see a lot of this behavior today so the book is revelant. I read the book when I was a teenager , but the books points are timeless.

        1. the word ‘duck’ is the most dangerous for typos. d and f and u and i are next to each other on the keyboard. I once replied to a pot luck sign up at work saying I would be “bringing dick like I usually do”. never hit send at work until you’ve proof read at least twice.

          1. Dick’s Sporting Goods announced they will no longer sell guns at 125 stores in March. One of those stores is in our hometown. A small rival sportsman shop and local competitor’s marquee currently reads: “We still sell guns, we’re not Dick’s.”

          2. It takes balls to take on a big rival like Dicks. Stiffing the gun/hunting community was a cocky move anyway for a retailer.

            ba da ding!

          5. Real restaurant near where I work:

            Pho King

            (Only funny if you frequent Vietnamese establishments)

          6. they thought their anti-gun policy would be effective, but it just turned out to be Dick’s shooting blanks. Their sales went flaccid and share holders and investors who disagreed with the policy but couldn’t change it were left feeling impotent. They did gain some loyal customers in the transgender community with their PR slogan for the new anti-gun policy, “Dick’s becoming pussies”.

    2. Pretty good human observation’s from a self.ed.a.cated longshoreman … Began bye wonder why a seed sprouts to sunlight even iffin’ ya place it upside down.

      In my top 10 list …

  14. Yet another parallel to 2007+ period. Mentality of confused sellers. “Great schools, great location, attractive place, how could buyers not be flocking?”

    Uh, let’s see. Maybe asking price? The new reality, which is the same as previous realities 12 years or so removed, is outside the comprehension of people like this. The sad part is that her reality is not an isolated one. Very common, and one reason declining RE market can morph into broad based recession.

    It’s a comin.

  15. Does it seem like the world is falling into moral and economic depravity. News is full of accounts. Another reason, I believe, that a significant change for the worse is coming

    We will see soon.

    2. After I read about the young man who beheaded the “Instagram micro-influencer” and then posted her nearly decapitated picture on Instagram for all the world to see, I’d say you’re right. The world is worse than it’s ever been. This social media stuff is rotten to the core.

  16. Is the Fed’s 1/2 point rate cut off the table? Or might they merely want to create that impression for shock-and-awe effect, in case they do opt for 50 bps?

    1. Stocks skid lower as Fed signals modest cut, Iran seizes tankers
      By Clive McKeef
      Published: July 19, 2019 3:55 p.m. ET

      U.S. stocks were mostly lower in late trade Friday, giving up earlier gains following a report that said Fed officials were gearing for a quarter-point rate cut at the end of the month, rather than a half-point move, and after Iran said it seized a British-flagged oil tanker in the Strait of Hormuz.
      …

    2. Short-term Treasury yields jump after Fed signals 25 basis point rate-cut
      By Sunny Oh
      Published: July 19, 2019 3:59 p.m. ET
      …
      On Thursday, New York Fed President John Williams on Thursday spurred hopes for a half-point rate cut, suggesting central banks should act aggressively to counter emerging signs of economic distress when interest rates are near zero.

      But a New York Fed spokesperson later played down Williams’ remarks saying his comments only pertained to academic research and did not hold immediate policy implications. And St. Louis Fed President James Bullard said on Friday that a 50 basis point cut would be excessive.

      Traders on the fed fund futures market are now anticipating a 22% chance of a 50 basis point rate cut in the July 30-31 meeting, from 60% a day ago, CME Group data show.
      …

      1. “rate-cut”

        There is absolutely no good reason for a rate cut right now. This is the most reckless central bank we’ve ever seen. It’s time to end the Fed.

    3. It seems like Wall Street stock and bond traders are experiencing a Fed-induced sugar high!

      1. dtRump, Ha$$ett, Mnuchin, $heldon, Kudlow, Navarro, & Ro$$:

        “Lower the damn rate$ for $helter.$hack loan$ to ZERO, NOW!I

        Oh, JOY!

  17. The Trade War Impasse Continues. Companies Aren’t Waiting to See How It Ends.
    July 19, 2019 at 11:52 a.m. ET
    By
    Reshma Kapadia
    Photograph by STR/AFP/Getty

    Trade talks are stuck in a rut. This week’s conversations between trade envoys haven’t yielded a planned face-to-face meeting. U.S. restrictions on telecom gear maker Huawei Technologies remain a sticking point, and the threat of more tariffs still loom.

    But in the interim, companies are reshuffling their supply chains, often making them more Asia-centric. Those shifts are unlikely to revert—even if a trade deal materializes.
    …

      1. If you look at the current account surplus for China it has dropped by an order of magnitude since 2008. There has been a sharp drop off since Trump took office. China is paying dearly for soybeans from Brazil for example. Take a look at a map and it is easy to see why. Meanwhile Trump has not only raised tariffs on steel and Aluminum from China, it has ended China’s hiding of exports from third countries but widely tariffing countries. Of course, China continues in it’s efforts to cheat but the channels are diligently being shutdown. Good news for housing if Chinese businesses are not profitable they do not make money to buy houses in the US.

  19. Are the folks who claim the end of the gasoline powered automobile era is at hand pretty much full of cr@p?

    1. Technology
      Electric Cars Still Face a Major Roadblock
      To wean drivers off gas vehicles, automakers need to help them develop a whole new understanding of what it means to own a motorcar.
      Ian Bogost
      Jun 27, 2019
      An electric vehicle at a Whole Foods–branded charging station
      Rogelio V. Solis / AP

      I have an old Jeep that’s on its last legs. We’ve rebuilt the transmission and replaced most of the suspension, at a cost that far outstrips the hypothetical value of the car. It runs, but just. It burns oil like a refinery and gets terrible gas mileage to boot.

      Replacing it with an electric car seems like a no-brainer. Used lease returns for the less expensive models, such as the Nissan Leaf or Fiat 500e, can be cheap—less than $10,000 in some cases—and come with less than 30,000 miles. But they pose other problems, largely related to the fact that electric vehicles (EVs) don’t operate like traditional cars. Many of the early models you can now buy used have ranges less than 90 miles a charge, for one. Some can’t use the fastest public chargers. The standard 110-volt outlet in my garage would take about 24 hours to fully charge one of these cars. I could add a 240-volt outlet, but my circuit box is full, so I’d need to spend a lot more money to add a subpanel. Used EVs tend to appear in the markets where they were first introduced, California especially. But with such a small range, you can’t drive one cross-country; it has to be shipped. That’s more money. The range is plenty for city driving, but what if my older daughter wants to take it to school? That would be impossible.
      …

      1. Everything I own and have owned which is battery powered has ultimately become a major PITA. Batteries wear out. That supposed 300 mile “range” will become less and less over time, like a golf cart. NO THANKS.

        1. You are right, the battery capacity does degrade over time. Some brands are pretty bad. Teslas are remarkably good. Less than 10% degradation at 160k miles.

          1. My six speed standard Chevy Cruze gets around 45 miles per gallons combined (I do a lot of highway driving) and has a range around 650 miles and I can refuel in less than five minutes can you match that?

          2. can you match that?

            I drove 305 miles and spend about $.05/kWH on electricity. So my MPG equivalent is about 185/mpg. Yeah, I think I do beat that. I am sure I spend a lot less time than you recharging than you do at gas stations refilling since most of my recharging is done at night when I am asleep.

            All that aside, Chevy Cruze is a good car. I was disappointed when they discontinued it and closed down those plants in Ohio.

            Last month’s top selling passenger vehicles in the US:

            1. Toyota Camry
            2. Honda Civic
            3. Toyota Corolla
            4. Honda Accord
            5. Nissan Altima
            6. Nissan Sentra
            7. Ford Fusion
            8. Hyundai Elantra
            9. Kia Soul
            10. Tesla Model 3

            Only 1 of those cars is from US auto maker (well, the Ford Fusion is, but it’s made in Mexico). Care to guess which one it is?

    2. Without Obama-era and similar emissions rules in other countries, would there even be a market for electric vehicles?

      The Wall Street Journal
      Heard on the Street
      The Big Obstacle on the Road to Electric Vehicles
      Batteries may not follow the same deflationary cost path as consumer electronics and solar panels, weakening a central pillar of the global auto industry’s emissions strategy
      Cutting the cost of batteries is arguably the global car industry’s most urgent challenge.
      Photo: wolfgang rattay/Reuters
      By Stephen Wilmot
      July 18, 2019 10:19 am ET

      The lithium-ion battery is a complex industrial product, not just another component in the consumer electronics supply chain. This inconvenient truth is a major obstacle on the global auto industry’s road to an electric future.

      Cutting the cost of batteries is arguably the industry’s most urgent challenge. They account for a huge chunk of the cost of an electric car—between 35% and 45%, according to McKinsey. Unless costs fall, most consumers will continue to prefer cheaper traditionally powered cars and manufacturers won’t hit strict carbon-emissions targets set by the European Union and China—two of the world’s big three auto markets. This will trigger crippling fines.

      In the U.S.—the third biggest market—President Trump is trying to roll back Obama-era emissions rules, but Detroit can’t afford to relax. Vehicles sold nationwide will likely be influenced by stricter Californian rules and U.S. auto makers also have operations in Europe and China to worry about. Ford tried to resolve its European emissions problem by signing a platform-sharing deal with Volkswagen this month, while Fiat Chrysler in May unsuccessfully sought a merger with local electric-vehicle leader Renault.
      …

      1. The fact that trucks and SUVs are driving auto sales right now does not portend well for electric vehicles.

        1. Heh heh…there’s the hype, and there’s the reality, and it pays to know the difference.

        2. Ford just invested $500 million in electric truck company Rivian. That comes on top of Amazon’s $700 million investment. Rivian has a really good operation team and has been working on this for years. Ford is supposedly using Rivian’s tech to make an electric version of its F-150.

    3. The Atlantic article is a good one. I found this true:

      Jonathan Levy, a vice president at the vehicle-charging-station company EVgo, pointed out that the average commute is about 30 miles a day. “Sipping on 110v is fine for many people,” Levy said, “supplementing at work and with fast-charging in public.”

      The main reason I went with a Tesla model 3 long range was because it was intended to be our sole car. I wanted the full 310 miles, not just the 240. The under $10k early-gen used Leafs in this article are only suitable for city cars since they have a meager range of 90 miles. It’s the type of car you buy for your daughter when she wants to drive to school.

      2. You know what a pain in the rear it is to have to try to find a spot to charge a vehicle, then plug it in, while you’re out?

        1. I don’t know what that is like. It’s never happened to me yet in the 5 months I’ve owned my car. It is nice though to be able to charge at home. We live in an apartment too without a garage.

        2. I recently stared at the Hilton garden Inn in Redondo Beach, California. Not far from LAX. And just off the 405 Freeway.

          They have a Tesla charging station in their parking lot. I think there were 7 spots, and one of the chargers was out of order. The working chargers were in use almost all the time. At least between, say, 6 AM and 10 PM. Sometimes there were other teslas parked nearby, waiting for a chance to recharge.

          1. Tesla is planning a massive rollout of more supercharging stations all across US, Canada, Europe, and even central Europe. The 3rd V3 charging station just opened up right below the High Roller, near the Linq hotel. There are 24 V3 chargers plus 12 level 2 chargers. These V3 chargers can do 0-80% state of charge in about 9 minutes. These are going up in strategic locations based on usage. CA has tons of Teslas, so I would expect they will get some soon. The larger point though is that 80-90% of charging is done at home (or at work). I went from Salt Lake City to St. George, UT just a few days ago. I stopped in Beaver, UT for about 8 minutes to charge (just enough time to stretch and use the bathroom). That is all I needed for my 300+ mile trip. I do that trip several times a month and never have any issue. But even when I get to my apartment, I am only plugging into a 110 wall outlet and that has always been enough. It only gives me about 12% recharge per night. If I need more there are tons of L2 chargers around the city I can use, but I typically don’t.

          3. Didn’t mention it last week because it’s off topic but I saw one getting loaded on a rollback at a rest stop on 95 near Aberdeen. The entire wheel and strut assembly fell off and the rocker panels were melted as though there was a fire in the floorboards.

            Where are the batteries stored on these jalopies?

  22. Wamnna bet they were in Apt 1 A with exclusive access to a back yard in Manhattan???
    ———————————–
    When the landlord moved to evict a pair of tenants it claims were behind on their rent, Simon Baron said it discovered a stipulation the previous landlord had entered into with the renters that entitled them to $250,000 in damages and a right to exercise a $3.5 million buyout if eviction proceedings were initiated.

  24. Davos
    July 17, 2019 / 7:49 AM / 2 days ago
    UPDATE 1-Investors offload emerging-market bonds with negative yields
    (Recasts, adds details, graphic.)
    By Karin Strohecker and Tom Arnold

    LONDON, July 17 (Reuters) – Global investors plan to ditch emerging-market bonds whose yields have been dragged into negative territory by the renewed commitment of the world’s major central banks to continue monetary easing if necessary.

    Germany’s benchmark 10-year government bond yield plunged further below zero in recent weeks, pulling other euro zone government and corporate debt with it. But the collapse of the benchmarks has even drawn some junk bonds and emerging-market bonds into negative yielding territorym too.

    “Very low or negative interest rates in European sovereign debt is spilling over into EM debt in the higher-graded space and impacts investors that are chasing yield in that part of the market,” said Marcelo Assalin, head of emerging market debt at NN Investment Partners.

    With the European Central Bank expected to deliver more quantitative easing (QE) and the U.S. Federal Reserve likely to cut interest rates, this was a “new reality” emerging market investors had to live with, Assalin said.

    “This is one of the unintended consequences of QE – it distorts prices, and that is clearly a distortion.”
    …

  25. “‘They’re willing to cut their losses and walk away from it,’ one source familiar with the property said.”

    A familiar reprise of:

    “They basically said they didn’t have any money” — Random HBB 2019

  27. Has anybody who reads here checked out the book referenced in the article posted below?

    May 29, 2016,11:57 am
    Do We Need The Fed? Maybe Not, But We Need Free Markets
    Simon ConstableContributor
    Author | Broadcaster | Journalist | Commentator | Speaker.

    Reason Foundation scholar, and economics journalist, John Tamny has written a new book titled Who Needs the Fed? If you believe Tamny and what he’s written, then the answer is clearly, not us.

    His book, published earlier this month, is about much more than the Federal Reserve, the central bank of the United States. It’s about sound economic policy. It’s about what works in economics, and what doesn’t work.
    …

    1. The Financial Times
      US interest rates
      Fed comes under fire from Wall Street over rate confusion
      Markets gyrated after conflicting messages on size of July cut
      Colby Smith in New York and James Politi in Washington yesterday
      64

      The Federal Reserve came under fire from Wall Street for sowing “confusion” in the wake of a market-moving speech by one of its top officials, highlighting the communications challenge facing the US central bank as it moves towards a historic interest rate cut.

      The furore over remarks by John Williams, the president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and a key monetary policymaker, comes at a sensitive time for economists and investors as they weigh the scale of the likely monetary easing coming later this month.

      Until Thursday, the consensus had been for a 25 basis point rate cut by the Fed, as a limited insurance policy against a weakening global economy and trade tensions. But the odds of a 50 basis point cut soared and US Treasuries rallied after Mr Williams laid out the case for “preventive” action in low interest rate and low inflation environments.
      …

  28. Are the many consecutive weeks of outflows from leveraged loans a cause for concern, or does this sort of financial experience happen on a frequent basis?

    1. Looks like lotsa gamblers lost their @sses betting on higher interest rates by investing in variable rate instruments, just before bond yields began to get sucked into a black hole.

      8 Jul, 2019 | 11:54
      Leveraged loan fund withdrawal streak hits record 33 weeks, totaling $32B

      Retail investors withdrew another $754 million from U.S. funds investing in leveraged loans during the week ended July 3, the 33rd straight net outflow, making for the longest such streak since LCD began following this data in 2007, according to Lipper.

      Over that period outflows have totaled $31.8 billion, meaning the current run in the red is far more severe than during the previous record streak, which saw $17.6 billion exit the investor segment over 32 weeks, starting in July 2015 and ending the following March, according to Lipper weekly reporters.

      Year to date, U.S. loan funds have seen a net outflow of $18.3 billion.

      The investor flight from the leveraged loan asset class has taken root over the past few months as prospects of interest rate hikes by the Fed have evaporated, with the consensus now expecting rate cuts in the second half of 2019.
      …

  30. Everything that is going on today was the progression of what would happen if correct measures weren’t taken regarding the Wall Street sub prime lending fraud that popped around 2008.

    Fast forward to now and we have nothing but crazy unstable casino markets with faulty lending. The movement toward socialism is the direct result of the bail outs of the Wall Street investment banks, without meaningful correction of those casino markets.

    When the politicans opted for bail outs verses the application of standing law against the culprits of the bust in 2008 , the moral hazard has created the waco markets we have now.

    Further ,globalism, which was never good for the majority middle class in the USA is still operative, when this should be part of the discussion as to what undermined the USA population, and transfered wealth to big industry and the 1% and places like China.

    We are not the World, we are the USA. Transfer of wealth to the Globe was a act of treason on the part of the politicans and a padding of the pockets of the big industry and the 1% and Wall Street.

    Everybody is talking about rights, without talking about the real solutions.

    This has become a set up for Socialism, identify politics, and big brother government taking over.

    We will see what happens, but I feel freedoms that I have always known are at stake.

  31. ” I feel freedoms that I have always known are at stake. ”

    Yeah, having 10 BILLION$ of Jesus children mouths to feed might present challenges to the way things might have been envi$ioned in 1776 in American

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