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Wishful Thinking And Delusional Behavior Worthy Of A Stay At A Facility With Tall Walls

It’s Friday desk clearing time for this blogger. “If selling apartments at one of Manhattan’s most troubled residential condominiums wasn’t hard enough, now its owners can’t even afford to rent a sales gallery to sell them. The sponsors of the under-construction 125 Greenwich Street tower in Lower Manhattan, where construction has all but stopped and two foreclosure proceedings are ongoing, are being accused of failing to pay rent for a sales gallery at One World Trade. It is the latest setback for the residential project, which has been marred by crawling condo sales and internal fighting.”

“Last summer, the project’s sponsors defaulted on loan repayments. Construction costs totalling almost $40 million also went unpaid as the capital dried up. In the last quarter of 2019, just 86 apartments were sold, the lowest of any fourth quarter in more than fifteen years, according to brokerage Corcoran.”

“The recently released Elliman Decade Survey of Residential Sales provides the autopsy details: The average sales price in the Hamptons market ($1.68 million) is down nearly one percent for the decade, and almost 10 percent from the same quarter a year ago. These are unchartered waters. The best indicator of improved sales (besides sales!) is average time on the market, which has shrunk from 155 to 141 over the decade. To accomplish this, though, sellers have had to accept deep discounts, 14.1 percent in 2019. This is a huge discrepancy that, at best, indicates wishful thinking and, at worst, delusional behavior worthy of a stay at a facility with tall walls.”

“Seattleites want to live more like Manhattanites. Or at least, that was the gamble made by developers of The Emerald, a 40-story luxury condominium near Pike Place Market, when they decided to include fewer parking stalls than any comparable new residential tower in the city. Marketing director Josh Nasvik said presales at The Emerald had been slowed by a molasses-like condo market, not the relative lack of parking. On Capitol Hill, recent condo project 750 On The Hill doesn’t have any parking. The condos there, 34 studios and one-bedrooms, go for around $400,000. Though it opened a year ago, the building is one-third empty, which listing agent Victor Smith attributed to a condo market downturn.”

“Denver’s housing market is showing a shift — with 90% surge in the number of homes for sale last month. More than 4,800 homes were for sale in January — up from 2,564 in December. A veteran real estate expert told CBS4 that buyers are in a good position to start shopping now. Todd Crosbie with LIV Sotheby’s International Realty says a lot of single family residences like condos and townhomes are on the market right now. ‘There’s an opportunity now. You can get in beforehand and start looking beforehand before the normal buildup of spring buyers happens,’ Crosbie said. ‘And it’s an opportunity — to have more opportunities. So if you’re looking to buy or sell in 2020, start now.'”

“Residents of a boutique Hamilton condominium are contemplating selling off the entire building and terminating the condo corporation as a way to ward off a financially ruinous special assessment for repairs. Because there are only 12 units in the building and 11 owners, even if the bill for repairs was spread out, each unit-holder could end up on the hook for as much as $250,000.”

“‘It’s insane. It’s the worst real estate transaction I’ve done in my life,’ said Nancy Forrester, a Hamilton real estate agent and a former member of the condo board, speaking of her decision to buy in the building at 35-43 Duke St. in 2014. ‘I look at the worst-case scenario: either we can’t sell [the building] for enough, or we make 12 people go bankrupt and then the property is worth nothing.'”

“Wheelock and Company has won a discounted residential site in Hong Kong’s New Territories amid a plunge in property prices in the Asian financial hub – a nearly 12 percent discount from the premium paid on the housing estate’s previous phase when it was awarded ten months ago. The property agency said that during the third quarter of last year the average price of new flats in the city had dropped 25 percent from its all-time high in 2018 to slide to HK$10.87 million per home. The downturn rubbed off on Wheelock’s sales of its existing developments at Lohas Park, with buyers passing on 80 percent of the homes made available at launch day of the latest tranche of condos at the developer’s Grand Marini project last October.”

“Malaysia’s property market, which has been in part supported by the easy and cheap money from the global quantitative easing (QE), could be in for a tough first half of the year as the global economy slows, and investors shy away from the market due to the coronavirus outbreak. Economist and political analyst Prof Dr Hoo Ke Ping expects the economies of many countries will be dragged down by the coronavirus outbreak as China has been the biggest provider of capital that helped boost sales at property companies across the region.”

“‘For example, Forest City and other properties in Brooklyn, New York, Australia all dried out even before this virus problem, two to three years back after China put restrictions on cash transfers. That’s why Chinese buyers cannot even buy Forest City. Forest City and Danga Bay are ghost towns,’ he said.”

“He foresees the problems in China will drag down the global economy with reports saying the global property market might be hit hard if the coronavirus becomes a pandemic. Hoo foresee the outbreak in China will last more than six months for a simple reason: It’s out of control. ‘China’s GDP constitutes a big part of the global GDP. So, when China sinks, all countries around the world whether it’s South Korea, Japan, Singapore, Malaysia (partly) or Thailand will be affected.'”

“‘When the global supply chain is affected, we will have a big negative impact. When China’s capital doesn’t come out, how or who’s to buy property?’ he said, adding that property developers in Malaysia should now instead cash out. ‘They should try to sell houses at a cheap price to raise cash for the rainy days because the rainy days are heavier and longer. Companies who went outside Malaysia must have cash. If they start borrowing, they will have problems because there is always an exception,’ he said.”

“Sydney’s prestige housing market is expected to be one of the casualties of the coronavirus after the traditional influx of high-end shoppers from China are forced to stay home. The Lunar New Year is typically the busiest time of year for visitors from China, and agents on both sides of Sydney Harbour have long made the most of the annual holiday by timing the launch of their high-end listings accordingly. ‘This has forced our best buyers to stay away,’ said Rob Klaric, of property advisory The Property Expert.”

“‘The other concern weighing on would-be buyers is the ripple effect of China’s manufacturing and economic slowdown on our Australian wallets,’ said LJ Hooker Double Bay’s Bill Malouf. Australia’s standing as an international housing destination was already suffering from this summer’s catastrophic bushfires before the coronavirus appeared, said Ken Jacobs, of Christie’s International.”

“‘This summer’s blanket coverage internationally of these huge fires, burnt animals and smoke hanging over Sydney changed that perception of blue skies and natural environments,’ said Mr Jacobs. ‘The question is, how long will that perception of Australia as a wasteland last?'”

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This Post Has 105 Comments

  1. “‘It’s insane. It’s the worst real estate transaction I’ve done in my life…I look at the worst-case scenario: either we can’t sell [the building] for enough, or we make 12 people go bankrupt and then the property is worth nothing’

    Well, it was cheaper than renting Nancy…

    1. But…but…but I thought realtors like Nancy were supposed to be experts on local housing markets. Cuz they have research ‘n tools ‘n stuff. Suzanne assured me of this.

  2. ‘Seattleites want to live more like Manhattanites. Or at least, that was the gamble made by developers of The Emerald, a 40-story luxury condominium near Pike Place Market, when they decided to include fewer parking stalls than any comparable new residential tower in the city’

    OK, this is classic new paradigm thinking invented after the fact to justify paying too much for the land. Now they are fooked.

    ‘Marketing director Josh Nasvik said presales at The Emerald had been slowed by a molasses-like condo market, not the relative lack of parking. On Capitol Hill, recent condo project 750 On The Hill doesn’t have any parking. The condos there, 34 studios and one-bedrooms, go for around $400,000. Though it opened a year ago, the building is one-third empty, which listing agent Victor Smith attributed to a condo market downturn’

    Looks like somebody has been a lion, eh Seattle Times?

    1. We both know that the developers painted whatever picture of their eager buyers that was necessary to get the deal done and line up a future bag holder to take it off their hands once complete. Facts and Logic were optional.

    2. I don’t know anyone who likes living without a car. Sure, a household can drop from two cars to one car, but one car to NO cars is *big* step. As someone who lived carless in college towns and urban areas, I’ll say it’s not impossible, IF you are young, strong, single, and live in an apartment. OR, IF you have a lot of disposable income to pay for everything to eat out or order in almost every day, or to hail cabs and Ubers everywhere. If you have kids or a house, good luck.

  3. ‘‘For example, Forest City and other properties in Brooklyn, New York, Australia all dried out even before this virus problem, two to three years back after China put restrictions on cash transfers’

    How many in the US are even aware of this crater years ago?

    ‘That’s why Chinese buyers cannot even buy Forest City. Forest City and Danga Bay are ghost towns’

    To bring up yet another time tested truth: if your market relies on outsiders for lofty prices, it’s gonna fall in eventually.

    1. Speaking of outsiders propping up markets, this happens inside Mainland China, too.

      For example, people in tier-1 cities are buying up properties in tier-3 cities as “investments”.

      I have a fond memory of a new development in an beautiful area 3 hours from a place with good jobs. Local wages were maybe $300 a month but apartments were going for $350,000 or more. On weekends the sales office parking lots were filled with German automobiles. Locals drive 125cc dirtbikes…

      1. ‘For example, people in tier-1 cities are buying up properties in tier-3 cities as “investments”.’

        What tier is Wuhan, and how are investments there HODLing up?

        1. I would bet that investors are snapping up Wuhan real estate as we speak. This virus is going to get drugs and vaccines within a year. Not a long time to wait.

          In one Real Vision Finance Youtube video, investors were chomping at the bit to buy bonds in Venezuela, especially for the oil infrastructure (they aren’t allowed to sell bonds because of sanctions or something). They are betting that conditions will eventually improve and those pennies-on-the-peso bets will pay off.

          And yet, nobody wants to invest in Ferguson, MO. That only shows how little faith investors have in American flyover. Which is too bad. I’m convinced that if there is a collapse in civilization, American flyover will be the last area standing, especially the southeast.

        2. Wuhan is a tier-2 city.

          Tier-1 are Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Shenzhen (BeiShangGuangShen).

          I’m sure the relevant authorities are ensuring all investments are not HODLing up and going straight to the moon!

  4. ‘showing a shift — with 90% surge in the number of homes for sale last month. More than 4,800 homes were for sale in January — up from 2,564 in December. A veteran real estate expert…says a lot of single family residences like condos and townhomes are on the market right now’

    No shift Todd, almost 5,000 shacks and airboxes – boom – where did they come from? Were they just built? No, so, help me with this Todd, they must have been there all along. Which means, there never was a shortage Todd!

    1. “before the normal buildup of spring buyers happens”

      That’s not happening in Denver. More people are leaving now than moving here.

      1. My Salt Lake City apartment building is 25% vacant, near good jobs, and it’s relatively affordable.

        The population projections used by the state government and local developers has fallen short two years in a row. A few more years of those shortfalls and they’ll need to backpedal on their population projections for 2050.

        It’s probably worth mentioning the projections were created by an organization founded and funded by real estate developers…

    2. “Denver’s housing market is showing a shift — with 90% surge in the number of homes for sale last month. More than 4,800 homes were for sale in January — up from 2,564 in December. A veteran real estate expert told CBS4 that buyers are in a good position to start shopping now. Todd Crosbie with LIV Sotheby’s International Realty says a lot of single family residences like condos and townhomes are on the market right now. ‘There’s an opportunity now. You can get in beforehand and start looking beforehand before the normal buildup of spring buyers happens,’ Crosbie said. ‘And it’s an opportunity — to have more opportunities. So if you’re looking to buy or sell in 2020, start now.’”

      Now is the best time to BUY. I promise this time. Really!

  5. Boots on the ground, I’m seeing a lot more foreclosures going to auction. Last year it was mostly in the $300k range in the far suburbs in foreclosure. Now I’m seeing more central and higher priced foreclosures.

    Saw one recently that was a $1m mortgage taken out less than a year ago, already at auction. I assume it was mortgage fraud and they ran out of runway when they couldn’t flip it.

  6. A Stunning 400 Million People Are On Lockdown In China As Guangzhou Joins Quarantine | Zero Hedge
    https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/more-400-million-people-lockdown-guangzhou-joins-quarantine

    (snip)

    Guangzhou, the capital of China’s southwestern Guangdong Province and the country’s fifth largest city with nearly 15 million residents, has just joined the ranks of cities imposing a mandatory lockdown on all citizens, effectively trapping residents inside their homes, with only limited permission to venture into the outside world to buy essential supplies.

    The decision means 3 provinces, 60 cities and 400 million people are now facing China’s most-strict level of lockdown as Beijing struggles to contain the coronavirus outbreak as the virus has already spread to more than 2 dozen countries.

    That’s more than 400 million people forcibly locked inside their homes for 638 deaths? Just think about that: If there was ever a reason to believe that Beijing is lying about the numbers (and not just because Tencent accidentally leaked the real data), this is it.

    1. Wow, who wouldn’t take it serious that China is locking down about a third of their population. They know this virus is bad.

      1. “Clearly there is something much more serious going on than is being reported in the media.”

        Copy that!

      2. Off to the incinerator.

        Meanwhile, the lamestream media is hammering the internet with “but look how many people the flu has killed” stories.

    3. My conspiracy theory is their financial system was about to collapse and they decided to institute martial law now rather than later.

      They can blame the collapse on the virus instead of mismanagement.

    4. When I think of how people outside of China are casually disregarding the severity of this virus, the image which comes to mind is that of a large gathering of sheep on the train tracks, oblivious to the locomotive belching black smoke off in the distance.

        1. This is the best site that I have found on the virus. Some key points, the virus is probably less deadly than the 2 to 3% estimate, lots of very mild cases but a person is more likely to infect others than originally thought but more like flu than say measles. Based on the figures I can see the Chinese government within a week will announce that the numbers of deaths per day is not rising. Of course, we have no way to know if the numbers are accurate. Finally, we know not only deaths from this data but patients who are critical. Outside of China there are only five despite there being over 300 infected:
          https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/

        2. Luckily my daughter’s 2019 school trip to Wuhan was over many months before the virus emerged.

  7. Residents of Wuhan who have been sealed into their homes as part of the CCP’s quarantine are reviving the use of morse code to communicate among and between themselves by tapping on the walls of their apartments with tin cups. While some are cursing Communist authorities and their response to the virus, the most common message being passed is “Realtors are liars.”

          1. Does anyone know if the virus can be spread in the water supply in China. Also because the virus has coughing symptoms , that in itself would spread it more.

            Also, nobody really talks to much about the Communist China health system. I suspect that it leaves a lot to be desired , also given their high population.

          2. “There is no medicine, no medical staff, no hot water, very limited food, no heating, unstable electricity… Please help us!” said one patient who was being confined at a makeshift hospital in Wuhan, where the coronavirus first broke out. In a Feb. 6 video posted onto social media, the patient can be heard saying, “This in fact is a death camp!”

            https://www.theepochtimes.com/scenes-from-wuhans-makeshift-hospitals-for-coronavirus-patients-like-a-death-camp_3230436.html

          3. no heating

            It’s 40 deg F there right now.

            Some say that viruses transmit better in colder air.

            Too bad they wasted their credit line on showy construction projects.

          4. In a Feb. 6 video posted onto social media, the patient can be heard saying, “This in fact is a death camp!”

            I suppose it is. And it’s not surprising. In fact, should the same percentage of people be infected in the US, overwhelming the system, I’d expect similar results due to the sheer numbers. I do, however, think we’d do a better job of supplying the hot water, electricity, heat, etc., but maybe I’m a tad optimistic.

          5. Broad Street Pump Outbreak

            By the middle of the 19th century, Soho had become an insanitary place of cow-sheds, animal droppings, slaughterhouses, grease-boiling dens and primitive, decaying sewers. And underneath the floorboards of the overcrowded cellars lurked something even worse — a fetid sea of cesspits as old as the houses, and many of which had never been drained. It was only a matter of time before this hidden festering time-bomb exploded. It finally did so in the summer of 1854.

            When a wave of Asiatic cholera first hit England in late 1831, it was thought to be spread by “miasma in the atmosphere.” By the time of the Soho outbreak 23 years later, medical knowledge about the disease had barely changed, though one man, Dr John Snow, a surgeon [actually an anesthesiologist] and pioneer of the science of epidemiology, had recently published a report speculating that it was spread by contaminated water…

          6. @HousingWizard:

            There are three types of hospitals in China — foreigner hospitals in cities, regular urban hospitals, and rural hospitals.

            The foreigner hospitals are fabulous. Efficient, cheap, and relatively clean. About what you’d expect to find in poorer European countries.

            The regular urban hospitals are atrocious. Overcrowd, NO SOAP in the restrooms, and you need to pay and receive a receipt before a doctor will acknowledge you.

            The rural hospitals are horrible, but that is understandable because those areas are legitimately poor.

            Needless to say, I’d probably stay home if I couldn’t access a foreigner hospital in China during a viral outbreak.

          8. The ‘death camp’ theme is showing up in the MSM in various versions.

            The Financial Times
            Coronavirus
            Coronavirus turns Asian cruise ships into prison hulks
            Quarantined vessel in Japan becomes host to biggest outbreak outside China
            — Ambulance vehicles are seen in front of the Diamond Princess cruise ship with over 3,000 people on board anchored at Yokohama port on February 7, 2020. –
            — Another 41 people on board a cruise ship off Japan’s coast have tested positive for the new strain of coronavirus, Japan’s health minister said. (Photo by STR / JIJI PRESS / AFP) (Photo by STR/JIJI PRESS/AFP via Getty Images)
            An ambulance parks near the Diamond Princess cruise ship, which is under quarantine in Yokohama © JIJI PRESS/AFP via Getty
            Robin Harding in Tokyo, Nicolle Liu in Kumamoto, Japan and Kathrin Hille in Taipei yesterday

            Passengers on cruise ships across East Asia are finding their luxury liners are turning into prison hulks as nations deny them entry for fear of the coronavirus, leaving the wandering vessels with few ports to visit.

            Japan has vowed to turn away foreign passengers on the incoming Westerdam and Taiwan has refused to admit 29 foreign passengers on board the Super Star Aquarius, forcing the vessel to return to its previous port. No cases have been confirmed on either ship.

            The increasingly severe measures to try to halt the spread of the lethal virus come as Japan announced it had identified another 41 cases of the pathogen on board the Diamond Princess, in quarantine off Yokohama, where it is based.
            …

    2. I was just about to ask how Morse Code could possibly work with the Chinese language. But I don’t doubt that people probably are banging with tin cups.

      This is pretty bad. Why hasn’t this spread more in other countries? Are we just waiting for a two-week incubation?

      1. Chinese telegraph code – Wikipedia
        https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_telegraph_code

        (snip)

        A codebook is provided for encoding and decoding the Chinese telegraph code. It shows one-to-one correspondence between Chinese characters and four-digit numbers from 0000 to 9999. Chinese characters are arranged and numbered in dictionary order according to their radicals and strokes. Each page of the book shows 100 pairs of a Chinese character and a number in a 10×10 table. The most significant two digits of a code matches the page number, the next digit matches the row number, and the least significant digit matches the column number, with 1 being the column on the far right. For example, the code 0022 for the character 中 (zhōng), meaning “center,” is given in page 00, row 2, column 2 of the codebook, and the code 2429 for the character 文 (wén), meaning “script,” is given in page 24, row 2, column 9. The PRC’s Standard Telegraph Codebook (Ministry of Post and Telecommunications 2002) provides codes for approximately 7,000 Chinese characters.

        Senders convert their messages written with Chinese characters to a sequence of digits according to the codebook. For instance, the phrase 中文信息 (Zhōngwén xìnxī), meaning “information in Chinese,” is rendered into the code as 0022 2429 0207 1873. It is transmitted using the Morse code. Receivers decode the Morse code to get a sequence of digits, chop it into an array of quadruplets, and then decode them one by one referring to the book. Due to lack of non-digit characters, the Morse codes for digits could be simplified, for example one several consequent dashes could be replaced with a single one.

  8. “Last summer, the project’s sponsors defaulted on loan repayments. Construction costs totalling almost $40 million also went unpaid as the capital dried up. In the last quarter of 2019, just 86 apartments were sold, the lowest of any fourth quarter in more than fifteen years, according to brokerage Corcoran.”

    Gosh, I sure hope this is an isolated incident.

    1. ‘its owners can’t even afford to rent a sales gallery to sell them. The sponsors of the under-construction 125 Greenwich Street tower in Lower Manhattan, where construction has all but stopped and two foreclosure proceedings are ongoing, are being accused of failing to pay rent for a sales gallery at One World Trade’

      Stalled, in foreclosure. Still no bubble NYT or WSJ?

      1. Construction costs totalling almost $40 million also went unpaid as the capital dried up.

        Key takeaway: liquidity drying up. Even with the Fed’s desperate liquidity pumping, banks have virtually stopped inter-bank lending because they know the collateral being offered to secure those loans is toxic-waste crap whose true market value is anyone’s guess. As that underlying collateral continues to deteriorate and lenders find themselves stuck with burgeoning non-performing loan portfolios and deteriorating collateral, how long before the Fed’s desperate attempts to forestall the inevitable and levitate its asset bubbles are overwhelmed by the sheer magnitude of the liquidity freeze-up?

        1. With 80 something sales in a quarter, thousands for sale and more on the way, these builds should stop. Of course then you get half finished towers looming over you for years, like Miami, LA and San Francisco.

  9. Seattle, WA Housing Prices Crater 17% YOY As Amazon And Microsoft Layoffs Clobber Homeowners

    https://www.zillow.com/seattle-wa-98102/home-values/

    *Select price from dropdown menu on first chart

    As a noted economist said, “I can $50k for my run down Chevy truck but where is the buyer at that price? So it is with all depreciating assets like houses and cars.”

  10. Despite the documentary evidence Ben posts on a daily basis of a bubble collapse in progress, against a backdrop of low interest rates, low unemployment, and a macroeconomic boom,
    the experts are offering assurances that home prices will not fall in the next recession, when people typically don’t buy houses due to the risk of losing their jobs and getting foreclosed.

    What am I missing here?

    1. Buy now, or get priced out forever.

      Are you waiting for house prices to drop during the next recession? Why you could have a very a long wait
      By Jacob Passy
      Published: Feb 7, 2020 12:56 p.m. ET
      The last recession was caused in part by a downturn in the housing market
      Bloomberg News/Landov
      The housing market could provide a cushion to the national economy in the next recession, economists say.

      It’s unclear when the next recession will come. But a recent report argues that when it does the U.S. housing market is unlikely to adversely affected in any major way.

      Researchers at First American Financial Services (FAF, -1.45%), a title insurance company, examined how the country’s housing market has fared historically during recessionary periods. Based on what’s happened in past recessions, the report argues that the next recession is unlikely to prompt a major downturn in housing.

      “While the housing crisis is still fresh on the minds of many, and was the catalyst of the Great Recession, the U.S. housing market has weathered all other recessions since 1980,” wrote Odeta Kushi, deputy chief economist at First American and the report’s author. “In fact, the housing market may actually aid the economy in recovering from the next recession — a role it has traditionally played in previous economic recoveries.”
      …

        1. Can it be in a disguised room thats actually an incinerator in wuhan. This world would be much better of without those two

      3. “…the U.S. housing market has weathered all other recessions since 1980,” wrote Odeta Kushi…”

        Seems to me this report is a convoluted way to say that ‘housing never goes down’, ‘we have reached a permanently high plateau’ , ‘buy now or be priced out forever’ and all the other nonsense catch phrases the REIConplex has spewed over the past decades.

        Like Prince says “forever is a mighty long time”

      4. Such sloppy, lazy, “real journalism.”

        REALTOR, it is mid-winter, almost spring, the Souper Bowl was last week. Are you using other credit cards to make the minimum payment on your credit cards? I’m talking about the really big balance cards, not the ones you can (usually) pay off every month, just enough to convince you that your solvency is salvageable.

        It’s not.

        Get a real job, before it’s too late…

  11. Speaking of wishful thinking. Check out the wish price on this English Country house. There’s a Marketwatch article which says that the owner (celebrity plastic surgeon) bought the house for $7M in 2007 (peak). Now he wants $15M. HA! Would you pay $15M for this?

    https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/707-N-Arden-Dr-Beverly-Hills-CA-90210/20519318_zpid/?

    Note that Zillow doesn’t show the price history. By the way, house itself isn’t all that. The exterior and the fences/gates are beautiful, but the interior is bland. The location of the range in the kitchen is downright dangerous. The pool is completely surrounded by grass, no place to walk with wet feet. The guest house is nice tho.

    1. Yep. I just made an offer to purchase, all cash, 20% more than asking price. And also made my wife write a letter.

    3. Look at the property taxes for this baby

      YEAR PROPERTY TAXES TAX ASSESSMENT
      2019 $96,469 (+4%) $8,126,255 (+2%)
      2018 $92,769 $7,966,918 (+2%)
      2017 $92,769 (+2.4%) $7,810,705 (+2%)
      2016 $90,579 (+1.7%) $7,657,555 (+1.5%)
      2015 $89,072 (+8.1%) $7,542,533 (+2%)
      2014 $82,379 $7,394,786 (+2.5%)
      2012 — $7,217,026 (+29.1%)
      2011 — $5,590,000
      2010 — $5,590,000 (-20.6%)
      2009 — $7,039,320 (+2.6%)
      2008 — $6,861,000 (+1262.2%)
      2007 — $503,655 (+2%)
      2006 — $493,780

        1. I looked for something in that house that had good style or proportion. I couldn’t find anything. The wicker chairs might have been OK, but my eye was drawn to the table, which is sagging like the back of a broken down donkey.

          1. I agree. Something is definitely wrong with the decor. A house like that should have dark wood paneling and trim, and at least one great-hall looking room with a vaulted ceiling. Instead, it looks like they tried to combine coastal and farm country inside the Globe Theatre, and it’s weird. I’d buy the place for $4 million and get one of those handy-dandy $3 million renovations.* Even then I may not break even.

            —————
            *The first thing to go will be the gas range in the kitchen. It’s stuffed into an alcove. There’s no room to maneuver, no countertop to put anything on, and the sink is a mile away. That’s downright dangerous, almost as dangerous as a gas range on an open island.

          2. Oh, and on a side note, NOBODY is playing that Steinway. Th bench is too close to the piano and the whole thing is squished up against the wall. I guess those perfectly “chopped” pillows were more important.

          3. I guess those perfectly “chopped” pillows were more important.

            The two of us house shopping together would be a realtor’s worst nightmare.

    1. One is a short sale that’s listed for slightly less than the lender will accept. It’s fallen out of escrow twice.

        2. I forgot to mention the Motel 6, Holiday Inn Express and La Quinta Inn & Suites across from the gated entrance.

        3. Over $1 million for that place? Does not look like things are crashing or doom and gloom in Carlsbad.

          Bubble still rampant.

          A few anecdotal examples of celebrity / huge price drops (on already exorbitantly high-priced homes) does not a housing crash make.

          1. Does not look like things are crashing or doom and gloom in Carlsbad.

            This property may be a harbinger of things to come. The bank will accept $1.085M but a buyer won’t pay that. Time will tell.

        4. Cheap tile countertops, white grout every four inches. In a year or two it will look like sh!t. Geeze I’d rather have laminate. Gated community… so how much is the HOA fee on top of the monthly nut?

          2. HOA is an immediate red flag, better off renting. Add in mello roos (most san diego developments have this) and your double f’d. No thanks!

          3. @Mike in Carlsbad

            Which areas in Carlsbad have Mello-Roos? It’s not an area I’ve personally considered so I’ve no clue.

          6. the link

            Thanks! I’ll pass it along to my friend.

            Poway seems to be dominating the list of Mello-Roos…

            Not surprising with PUSD’s expansion into 4S Ranch, Del Sur and Torrey Highlands.

        1. i follow quite a few Carlsbad homes going back to the bank. I will say my friend lives in the Water’s End neighborhood and I’ve house sat a week for her. Its a good neighborhood and walking distance to the train stop for better or worse. Still double what she paid, its going to come back to Earth in the next recession.

  13. It would be ironic if the death of a heroic truth-teller was the catalyst for millions of Chinese resolving to throw off the tyranny of the oppressive, mendacious Chinese Communist Party.

    https://www.scmp.com/news/china/politics/article/3049606/coronavirus-doctors-death-becomes-catalyst-freedom-speech

    The death of a doctor in China is threatening to turn into a public confidence crisis for Beijing, just as it faces unprecedented challenges from the coronavirus outbreak.

    Doctor Li Wenliang died on Friday in the central Chinese city of Wuhan after being infected with the virus, sparking a huge outpouring of grief and anger online in China. For many, his death symbolised government inaction in dealing with the outbreak, when he was one of the first to warn of the new disease. For that he was reprimanded by the police.

    1. “Bernie’s gonna win:”

      Pay off all the student loans, free healthcare and Open borders is tough to beat.

      “He Has Made Wild Shifts”: How Bernie Sanders Has Changed His Approach To Immigration

      Nidhi Prakash
      BuzzFeed News Reporter
      Posted on January 19, 2020,

      “I believe we have very serious immigration problems in this country,” Sanders said during a 2007 press event, with AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka behind him. “I think as you’ve heard today, sanctions against employers who employ illegal immigrants is virtually nonexistent. Our border is very porous.”

      “And I think at a time when the middle class is shrinking, the last thing we need is to bring over in a period of years, millions of people into this country who are prepared to lower wages for American workers,” he later added. Sanders voted against the 2007 bill, but went on to vote in favor of a similar 2013 bill while making plain his fears that it could exacerbate the issue of immigrant workers “making it harder for US citizens to find jobs.”

      That rhetoric stands in stark contrast to how Bernie Sanders sounds today. Just four years after a contentious presidential primary where his immigration record was a consistent point of attack, Sanders has changed, people who have worked with him closely on immigration issues told BuzzFeed News. Sanders, they said, has spent time closely listening and working with immigrant rights activists, forming new policy and finding new ways to talk about the issue, in line with the more progressive conversations in this primary. And he is now running for president with the support of grassroots Latino activists and major immigrant rights groups.

      https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/nidhiprakash/bernie-sanders-immigration-record

      Bernie Sanders: I Will Cancel All $1.6 Trillion Of Your Student …

      https://www.forbes.com/sites/zackfriedman/2019/06/24/student-loans-bernie-sanders/ – 484k – Cached – Similar pages
      Jun 24, 2019

      1. Left wing extremists have no chance of beating Trump, but that won’t stop te Donkey party from nominating one of them.

        The Financial Times
        James Carville
        Hey Democrats, it’s the winning, stupid!

        To beat Trump, the party should not be running to the furthest reaches of the left
        …

      1. I’m a little more by concerned about China than I was a couple of days ago. I really hope they get a handle on this virus and no doubts their people are in misery.

        China should come clean on anything they know so they can get help from the rest of the World.

    2. The testing capacity constraint on confirmed cases in China did cross my mind. If they ran out of test kits, is it possible that confirmed cases might decline while actual cases continue to grow exponentially?

      1. testing capacity constraint

        There is some talk that they have a precinct reporting quota, which may not be exceeded. Must “data” somehow be based on reality?

        1. I can’t rule out the possibility that they just throw out statistics to balance acknowledging the epidemic without creating mass panic. This is an additional issue to possibly lacking the medical resources to accurately assess the true number of cases, even if that were a goal. How could one know, looking in from the outside as we are?

      2. Just for kicks, go to your local Walgreens and look for N-95 masks. None to be found. If the supply chain can’t provide enough masks, we can forget about testing kits,

        1. No worries. We’ve been told by the CDC to not wear masks. And, it’s 24/7 bombardment from the lamestream media about how we should worry about the flu, not the virus. Meanwhile, China has quarantined 400 million people and is showing up to peoples’ apartments with death cubes and physically hauling them away.

  18. Cupertino, CA Housing Prices Crater 22% YOY As Bay Area Housing Hens Weep

    https://www.zillow.com/cupertino-ca/home-values/

    *Selet price from dropdown menu on first chart

    As a noted economist said, “I can $50k for my run down Chevy truck but where is the buyer at that price? So it is with all depreciating assets like houses and cars.”

  19. Yes, the rich are fleeing Illinois and they’re taking billions with them – Wirepoints Original | Wirepoints
    https://wirepoints.org/yes-the-rich-are-fleeing-illinois-and-theyre-taking-billions-with-them/

    (snip)

    We’re often told that Illinois is not losing its highly taxed residents. For example, a Chicago Magazine article last week had a headline saying exactly that. Don’t worry about lost income from the rich leaving, we’re supposed to believe. It’s just poorer folks fleeing.

    It’s simply not true. There’s recent, hard data directly refuting that claim. If you want the best evidence, the Internal Revenue Service released its latest state-to-state migration numbers last month. Wirepoints analyzed the number of people moving into and out of Illinois and their net impact by income groups.

    The data show that while lower income groups are fleeing Illinois in somewhat larger numbers, bigger earners are leaving, too. And they’re the ones that account for the overwhelming share of wealth lost by the state.

    Specifically, tax filers with income over $200,000 made up 11% of all filers who fled, and they accounted for over half of the income that left Illinois.

    (End of snip. There’s much more to read but to read it you will have to click on the link.)

  21. Here’s a good read …

    Smaller Restaurants Forced Into Bankruptcy As Foot Traffic Collapses | Zero Hedge
    https://www.zerohedge.com/personal-finance/smaller-restaurants-forced-bankruptcy-foot-traffic-collapses

    And here’s a good comment …

    “Two items to monitor are retail store front closures including small scale restaurants/food service due to foot traffic and also the bankruptcy courts and the court order to auction business inventories.

    “Auctions are showing a continuous flow of restaurants having their inventory auctioned off here in southern California including Fuddruckers, sports themed restaurants, pizza shops and yogurt/specialty food small stores.

    “The prices for all the stainless kitchen works, refrigerators, ovens, stoves… everything is 10 cents or less on the dollar. Crisis means opportunity.”

    “Crisis means opportunity” in this case translates to not having the number of restaurants vanish but instead merely having the restaurants, or at least the equipment for restaurants, change hands.

    If “ten-cents-on-the-dollar” seems attractive to some people then these people will dig deep into their bank accounts to buy up the equipment and either keep the restaurant alive or open up another restaurant. This does nothing in the area of reducing the number of restaurants, it merely insures that most everyone in the restaurant business that is losing money will continue to lose money.

    This is an example of Ben Jones’ “Dry Cleaner Effect” in action.

    1. The guys who get in at ten cents to the dollar start out with a cost advantage over those who paid full price, giving them a better chance to be one of the few restaurants to survive the next recession.

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