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A Cascading Series Of Events Threatening Our Basic Economic Structures

A report from Bisnow. “The COVID-19 pandemic is impacting the commercial real estate market in ways both large and small. Shares of real estate investment trusts have fallen 34% between February and March 16, which implies a 24% decline in real estate asset values, an analysis by Green Street Advisors found. The indicated drop-off ranges from a 10% decrease in the value of office towers and data centers to 50% in senior housing properties. REITs are trading at roughly a 22% discount, to Green Street’s ‘best guess’ of the underlying value of their portfolios.”

“‘Private market real estate investors, who just weeks ago were racing to deploy billions upon billions of dollars of dry powder, are tapping the brakes,’ the Green Street report said. ‘A sharp drop in transactions will limit visibility on property prices. Nobody knows where real estate values will ultimately settle.'”

From Multi-Housing News. “As lenders nationwide hunker down and prepare for an economic downturn, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are implementing stricter multifamily loan terms. The sudden economic downturn has affected all types of lenders, not just the GSEs. Securitization programs (CMBS, CLOs) are facing little demand for bonds, and most banks are stepping back. ‘Unfortunately, I think that loans of all sizes will be challenged and only those that have to be financed will,’ said a capital markets professional at an international brokerage.”

From CNBC. “Construction of single and multifamily housing units is expected to decline now, as the economy stalls in the face of the coronavirus epidemic. Single-family homebuilders don’t want to be stuck with supply they can’t sell, and some multifamily projects are now facing trouble with funding.”

From Boca Mag in Florida. “For large, investor-financed projects, the short-term outlook is bleak. A Daily Business Review story quoted a developer as saying that lenders aren’t even looking now at the sort of large, multi-family projects that have sprung up in Boca Raton and Delray Beach in the last decade.”

The Commercial Observer Florida. “In the first quarter of 2015, average rental rates in Southwest Florida were $1,068 monthly, according to commercial real estate brokerage Newmark Knight Frank. By the end of last year, however, average rents had climbed to $1,342 per month – a 25.6% jump despite the thousands of new units that had come online. But with all the gains and new product have come concerns from some quarters that inventory has begun to outpace demand. Fort Myers’ multifamily vacancy rate now stands above 11%, according to CoStar, one of the highest rates in the nation.”

The Gainesville Times in Florida. “Heavy machinery is still in motion at a large tract off Phil Niekro Boulevard, even as businesses are shutting down due to the coronavirus pandemic and economic forecasts are grim. ‘We are under construction and by the time we begin to lease, we hope things have started to improve,’ said Kurt Alexander, principal with The Residential Group, which is grading for a 324-unit apartment complex near Interstate 985 in Flowery Branch.”

“While the Flowery Branch project is forging ahead, an apartment project planned in Oakwood is iffy, Alexander said. ‘Financing is very difficult,’ he said. Asked to elaborate, Alexander said, ‘Banks, as well as equity investors, are taking a wait-and-see approach.'”

From Banker and Tradesman in Massachusetts. “The coronavirus has managed the turn the global economy and all our lives upside down in a few short months. We may very well see a shakeout in the Greater Boston development market. James Kirby, chief executive of Commercial Construction Consulting, said he is fielding calls from pension and sovereign wealth funds asking for help in evaluating projects that ‘were planning to start this year who have lost some or all of their financial backing recently.'”

From Real Estate Weekly in New York. “While residential brokers had hoped 2020 would be the beginning of things finally looking up after two years of sluggish sales, the first quarter of 2020 unsurprisingly saw home sales nose dive as coronavirus crippled the market in a matter of weeks. The latest first quarter market reports for Manhattan don’t paint a pretty picture for sellers or agents with sales in March having dropped 42 percent year-over-year. Calling the market ‘stagnant’ in every single neighborhood in the borough, Compass concluded that conditions will be ‘significantly softer’ for at least the next 30 days.”

From Crain’s Chicago Business in Illinois. “Many apartment landlords today are in a pickle, under pressure to give struggling, out-of-work tenants a break on rent but limited in how flexible they can be by their own obligation to pay the mortgage. They’ve had the upper hand over tenants for most of the past decade, allowing them to hike rents and sell their properties for hefty gains. The coronavirus adds more uncertainty to the market here and beyond. Worried about overpaying for properties, Chicago-based Origin Investments put more $241 million in apartment deals on hold last month in cities including Houston, Denver and Charlotte, N.C.”

“‘We’re certainly hearing that nobody wants to take a deal out on the market right now,’ said Ron DeVries, senior managing director in the Chicago office of Integra Realty Resources, a consulting and appraisal firm.”

From Oregon Business. “Sales of commercial real estate, particularly for large transactions, may take a while to pick up gain. ‘Investors and buyers and sellers of real estate have hit the pause button,’ says Adam Taylor, capital markets director at JLL. The slowdown in deal flow will be particularly felt in transactions worth more than $10 million.”

The Oregonian. “The agency’s state and private forest divisions are funded almost entirely through harvest revenues from state forests and taxes on private logging. And with the pandemic’s vast economic fallout, Oregon’s wood products industry is already beginning to tank, erasing some of the best paid jobs in rural Oregon and dragging the agency’s revenues with it. ‘April will be bad compared to March, and May will be a disaster,’ said Andrew Miller, president of Stimson Lumber, one of the largest buyers of state forest logs.”

“‘We were going to have an amazing housing year, but when all this started our order file began to evaporate,’ said Steve Zika, the president of Hampton Lumber. Hampton is shutting two of its nine mills next week, and will reevaluate on a week-to-week basis. ‘I’d be surprised if you didn’t see some form of curtailment for almost everyone,’ he said. ‘You can only stack your lumber for so long.'”

From KGW 8 in Oregon. “Protections designed to help renters who lost work because of COVID-19 could seriously hurt landlords. That’s the message from Multifamily NW, which represents 2,500 landlords who collectively own 250,000 properties in Oregon. The executive director of Multifamily NW, Deborah Imse, fired off her own letter to the governor and others after seeing the city commissioners’ letter. She warned that forgiving rent would create a ‘cascading series of events threatening our basic economic structures.'”

From Socket Site in California. “Having already started to slip earlier this year, prior to the COVID-19 hit, the weighted average asking rent for an apartment in San Francisco dropped around 2 percent in March to $4,000 a month, which is around 1 percent lower on a year-over-year basis and 10 percent below its 2015-era peak of around $4,450 per month, with the average asking rent for a one-bedroom in the city down to around $3,475 per month (which is around 4 percent lower than at the same time last year and 5 percent below peak).”

“At the same time, the weighted average asking rent for an apartment in Oakland dropped down around 3 percent in March to $2,600 a month, which is less than a percent lower than at the same time last year but around 8 percent below its peak in the second quarter of 2016, with the average asking rent for a one-bedroom down to $2,300 a month (versus closer to $2,500 a month at peak).”

From Curbed Los Angeles in California. “It took a pandemic to make it happen, but Los Angeles rental prices appear to be on the way down for the first time since the Great Recession, according to a new report from real estate data tracker CoStar. According to CoStar, it’s newer apartments—which aren’t covered by LA’s rent control regulations—that are seeing the biggest price dips right now. Typical rents for these units fell by 0.75 percent between March 11 and March 30. If that trend continued over a full year, it would amount to a 12 percent drop in the monthly cost.”

“Brand new units in particular could be difficult for property managers to fill at a time when public health officials have urged residents to avoid contact with those they don’t live with, and stand at least six feet apart. The report notes that prices for newly built apartments in the Downtown area were on the way down prior to the outbreak; rents there have declined 4 percent since the beginning of the year.”

From D Magazine in Texas. “Fluid. That’s the best word to describe the current state of multifamily housing during the Coronavirus pandemic. Investors started pouring in from markets like New York and Los Angeles. Average sales pricing appreciated almost 140 percent since the beginning of the cycle, outpacing the U.S. norm. And the average cap rates have compressed more than anyone could have imagined (a decade ago we saw cap rates at 7 percent to 8 percent versus 5 percent to 6 percent just before the downturn).”

“Now, with a bear market at hand, everyone is eyeing rental collections for the next few months, and many are adopting a ‘wait and see’ approach. There is also concern over newer assets. RealPage has seen traffic to multifamily property websites drop by 15 percent. Dallas-Fort Worth has about 30,000 units under construction, so with less demand in the coming months, it’s going to be tough to get that new supply through lease-up.”

The Lumber Building Material Journal. “Bob from Unstoppable Homes, is always looking for a big score. For example, when it was clear that there was a need for rental properties in your market, he went all-in on multifamily construction. At first it was great with landlords snapping up the apartment buildings, and Unstoppable Homes appeared, well, unstoppable. Bob was hiring like crazy, planning to grow his company and expand into other regions, and become one of the big builders on the cover of a magazine. Until the tide turned, and the local rental market was overbuilt. Then Bob was forced to backtrack, lay people off, downsize his operation, and focus on the fundamentals.”

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This Post Has 162 Comments

  1. ‘Private market real estate investors, who just weeks ago were racing to deploy billions upon billions of dollars of dry powder’

    Wait for it…

    ‘are tapping the brakes’ ‘Nobody knows where real estate values will ultimately settle’

    1. If real estate sales were not a critical infrastructure industry, the market could just be mothballed during the coronacrisis, thereby avoiding price discovery at a point when demand has collapsed.

    2. “Nobody knows where real estate values will ultimately settle”

      True but we know which direction the values are headed! Eat your crow Thornburger, eat your squirrel realtor

  2. ‘Having already started to slip earlier this year, prior to the COVID-19 hit, the weighted average asking rent for an apartment in San Francisco dropped around 2 percent in March to $4,000 a month, which is around 1 percent lower on a year-over-year basis and 10 percent below its 2015-era peak’

    You read that right. Rents in SF have been sinking like a turd in a well for 5 years. And these aren’t effective rents which include vacancies and concessions. Gosh, that sure isn’t what the REIC have been saying!

      1. Read the Yahoo Finance article posted below if you feel like throwing up inside of your mouth 🙁

  3. ‘Investors started pouring in from markets like New York and Los Angeles. Average sales pricing appreciated almost 140 percent since the beginning of the cycle, outpacing the U.S. norm. And the average cap rates have compressed more than anyone could have imagined (a decade ago we saw cap rates at 7 percent to 8 percent versus 5 percent to 6 percent just before the downturn)’

    Cap rates don’t include financing. These guys are losing money every day.

  4. Re-post of BubblevilleCa’s post on the last thread:

    “The most unconventional aspect of this new age real estate industry is the fact that touring homes is currently impossible, as it should be. I’ve taken a hard stance for ALL OF US to STAY HOME for almost a month. Ironically, people are staying home – as they should be.

    Prospective buyers will most likely remain hesitant to buy before they can physically tour a home but we can all pivot and redefine the way we work.

    The minute that people are legally allowed to take a physical tour, the market is going to boom. It’s like when the new iPhone comes out. We want and expect lines out the door, just no tents, please.

    People will be lined up at the doors of those homes they have obsessed over for months.

    In the meantime, real estate professionals are utilizing virtual tours to keep buyers excited, and it is working, and relationships are getting back to the core — the heart.”

    https://finance.yahoo.com/news/real-estate-boom-once-coronavirus-102329282.html

    These people have no shame or self-awareness. Disgusting!

    1. No shame and no soul…

      Seems some Sellers are following the recommendation here but major photo fail on the one below. After commission and fees these sellers wont be walking away with any of that sweet 4 years of equity…. oh the horror!

      Red, i doubt its your type (not single level) but i bet they would take “offers” If you were interested ;). Im smelling fear and desperation on this listing.

      13855 Belvedere Dr, Poway, CA 92064

      https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/13855-Belvedere-Dr-Poway-CA-92064/16828939_zpid/

      Pictures from previous sale (why not use these?)

      https://ranchophotos.com/13855-belvedere-dr/

        1. I was gonna say the same thing. Obvious who ever staged the place never actually played pool. And that is by far the WORST Japanese garden I’ve ever seen.

      3. I get that the selling point is the hilltop location, but that is one poorly staged house, not to mention that even when it was well staged the house wasn’t very attractive.

        It also crosses my mind that being on a hilltop might increase the fire risk. How much is the insurance?

        1. fire risk

          That one probably isn’t too bad. NE, particularly across Poway Rd, is the bigger concern.

      4. i doubt its your type (not single level)

        In addition to that, the yard doesn’t look suitable for a kid with a history of eloping. I already torn one ATFL franticly looking for him.

    2. “People will be lined up at the doors of those homes they have obsessed over for months.”

      Yep. Buying used homes is really no different than snapping up toilet paper at Costco, once the shortage ends.

    3. This reminds me: What happened to all the prognosticators who just a few weeks ago were predicting that COVID-19 would be good for real estate sales, even though stocks were cratering mightily.

      Could we please see some posts from the real estate permabulls who predicted that real estate would power right through the crisis?

      1. I am sure the hysteria will swamp them as well, but so far Swedes seem to be the most rational people of all in regards to Corona beer.

    5. People will be lined up at the doors of those homes they have obsessed over for months.

      You keep trying to drum up that false enthusiasm and sense of urgency, REIC shills. Let’s see how that works out for ya.

      1. false enthusiasm and sense of urgency

        With the backdrop of a falling stock market, where some of the money for these purchases are/were.

  5. Coronavirus Lands Another Blow to Senior Housing Operators

    The industry was facing financial pressures from a supply glut even before the pandemic erupted

    “Inquiries and tours have begun to decrease dramatically and move-ins have begun to slow,” Ventas said in a regulatory filing Monday.’

    ‘On average, shares of health-care real-estate investment trusts are down about 30% in March, but the slide for some big names goes much farther back. Brookdale Senior Living, one of the country’s largest senior housing companies, fell from close to $40 in 2016 to the $8 range in early 2020 before the pandemic erupted. Its shares are now trading in the $3 range.’

    ‘The senior housing industry was facing financial pressures from a supply glut even before the pandemic erupted. Anticipating surging demand from aging baby boomers, developers added over 21,000 units in 2018, more than double the number in 2014, according to the National Investment Center for Seniors Housing and Care.’

    ‘But anticipated demand didn’t materialize partly because the gig economy and new technology are making it easier for seniors to stay at home. The strain has been particularly acute on operators that agreed to annual rent increases, having expected their revenues to rise.’

    ‘Industry rents were “too high to be sustainable…and that was pre-Covid-19,” said Lukas Hartwich, an analyst with Green Street Advisors. Combined with the new stresses from the pandemic, “there are just a whole bunch of layers here of bad,” he said.’

    https://www.wsj.com/articles/coronavirus-lands-another-blow-to-senior-housing-operators-11585656000

    1. ‘But anticipated demand didn’t materialize’

      This rises out of what I call “The Story.” Luxury apartments, senior, luxury students, multi-million $ safe deposit boxes in the sky – they all had a story we watched them construct in market after market. Around 2011 to 2012, I documented land prices skyrocketing across the US. Even in little towns like Bozeman Montana, prices were doubling or tripling in 2 or 3 years. And the big cities – even more. So that luxury apartment? Rents gotta go to the sky! How? Amenities, maybe free booze. Boccie ball. Tenants were now rich! said the story. They “demand” luxury services which justify luxury rents and luxury land prices. And down the line it went. I think it was in 2015-16 I posted an article showing Phoenix was building 15,000 senior living units. And 95% of them were luxury.

      Somebody asked here last decade: “aren’t all new condos luxury?”

      1. “This rises out of what I call “The Story.” Luxury apartments, senior, luxury students, multi-million $ safe deposit boxes in the sky – they all had a story we watched them construct in market after market. Around 2011 to 2012, I documented land prices skyrocketing across the US. Even in little towns like Bozeman Montana, prices were doubling or tripling in 2 or 3 years. And the big cities – even more. So that luxury apartment? Rents gotta go to the sky! How? Amenities, maybe free booze. Boccie ball. Tenants were now rich! said the story.”

        – Developer: “(Most) all tenants have a champagne appetite.”
        – Prospective tenants (or the reality of the market): “(Most) all tenants may have a champagne appetite, but only a beer budget.”

        – And yet builders went for lux, largely ignoring the business case for it. It’s almost as if they were receiving false market signals due to artificially low interest rates and easy credit, or something…
        – Again, it was a failed business model well before the CV event, and already slowing under its own weight due to predictable overproduction of luxury product. Now with literally millions in the workforce suddenly unemployed and highly indebted, how, exactly does this “pencil out?”

        1. I keep this one bookmarked to remind us about these guys:

          April 19, 2018

          “‘Palm Beach is completely on fire,’ said Todd Michael Glaser, a high-end homebuilder who made his name in Miami but has lately been concentrating on Palm Beach County. ‘I’ve never seen the amount of $8M to $70M homes as in the last three and a half, four months. It’s staggering.’ It’s not just single-family homes that are hot, but a new wave of high-end condos and mutifamily apartments, especially in downtown West Palm Beach.”

          “Kolter Urban President Bob Vail, who is developing the Alexander, said that there is something of an arms race for amenities in the new supply of high-end homes. ‘You see that across the U.S. There are [apartment] buildings in Atlanta, Denver and Dallas that are nicer and more fully amenitized than condominium units, because that’s what it’s going to take to get people to choose that building,’ Vail said. ‘It’s just sort of a differential advantage. It’s really become a race in those more in-demand markets.’”

          “Though the market is healthy now, the developers agreed a slowdown is possible as new supply takes time to be absorbed, construction costs rise and actionable sites get harder to find. Low salaries in Palm Beach County mean that not many workers can afford high rents. When an audience member asked whether they were concerned with an economic downturn, Vail responded half-jokingly, ‘Condo developers, we don’t forecast those kind of things, you know what I mean? We’re just go, go go,’ he said. ‘And the faster we go, the faster we get to the closing, and then, I’m not going to say we don’t care, but … ‘ The audience chuckled as he trailed off.”

          http://thehousingbubbleblog.com/?p=10407

          1. Luxury; the most highly refined and concentrated supercharged engine of perpetual wealth consumption.

  7. Lumber Markets Hint at Housing Slowdown

    Mills are dramatically dialing back production of building materials as coronavirus pandemic slows construction

    (Theme: it’s not a bubble, it’s the virus!)

    ‘Lumber prices are signaling that the nascent housing boom is fizzling, despite home builders’ push to keep residential construction going through the coronavirus crisis.’

    ‘Lumber futures have plummeted of late, and mills are dramatically dialing back production of two-by-fours, plywood and other building materials. On Tuesday, lumber futures for May delivery fell 6.1% to close at $278.50 per 1,000 board feet on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange. That’s down 41% from a recent high of $468.30 hit Feb. 20.’

    ‘Lumber prices had been on the rise until then, with builders starting construction on more houses than at any time since 2006. Now the market is pricing in a lost spring, traditionally the busiest time for homebuying and when construction kicks off in much of the country.’

    “There’s zero chance that potential home buyers are waking up tomorrow and saying, let’s go buy a new house,” said Kansas City lumber trader Stinson Dean. “That’s not happening.”

    https://www.wsj.com/articles/lumber-markets-hint-at-housing-slowdown-11585659600

    1. Lumber is perishable…Its production volume is always a excellent construction indicator looking forward…

      1. The rail $trike in Canada this past winter put a monkey wrench in deliverie$, like $helter.$hacks, there is no $hortages. $tick trader$ were fully cognizant of future$ price$. That the 👾 is chewing into the pulp of con$truction project$ everywhere$ was the un$een unknown$.

        👾 … munch, munch, munch, …

    2. Theme: It’s a temporary dip due to the virus outbreak, not an avalanche of collapsing margin debt that was used to purchase risk assets at euphoric prices.

  9. Andrew Hamrick of the Apartment Association of Metro Denver talks about the potential effects of rent regulation in Denver

    ‘According to a recent National Apartment Association study, a 7 percent rent cap would have devastating long-term effects on four major cities: Chicago, Denver, Seattle and Portland. The study suggests that this limit would cause drops in new construction, decreased property values, loss of tax revenue and lower annual maintenance spending.’

    ‘Hamrick: Artificially fixing rent rates has a devastating effect on the availability of housing…Since the valuation of a rental property is a function of rent receipts, arbitrarily capping rents lowers the property’s value and the real estate taxes collected on that property.’

    https://www.multihousingnews.com/post/denvers-affordable-housing-issue-an-insiders-perspective/

    You can see how precarious a position these guys are in.

      1. These guys are crying about not being able to raise rents more than 7% a year because they paid too much. They literally priced in future rent increases forever, at a time when rents have never been higher in dollars nor ever higher in the percentage of incomes spent on rents. In retrospect, that was sorta irrational. The virus will be over soon, and all these moratoriums will face court challenges. As I said the other day, you expect lenders to loan hundreds of thousands of dollars at less than 4%, with no prospect of collecting even interest? Good luck with that.

        1. “These guys are crying about not being able to raise rents more than 7% a year because they paid too much. They literally priced in future rent increases forever, at a time when rents have never been higher in dollars nor ever higher in the percentage of incomes spent on rents.”

          We can thank the Fed, with its protracted period of extraordinary accommodation, for training a generation of greater fools to believe that real estate and rents go up at 7%+ in perpetuity.

          1. ‘We have never seen this kind of devastation in the industry’: Best Western CEO

            https://finance.yahoo.com/video/never-seen-kind-devastation-industry-160456603.html

            Comments:

            ‘This market is still over priced. Just look at HLT (Hilton hotel) IT dropped about 50% but still has a pe ratio of 18(will get higher soon). Still above its 10 year lows. For all we know it could go bankrupt. The fed blow this bubble up so big its insane’

            ‘I travel for work and spend around 75 nights a year in hotels, I try to stay on the lower end price wise when I look for hotel rooms, I’m a diamond member and I can tell you they are extremely overpriced. How they are out of money in a month is beyond me.’

          2. ‘Brookfield Asset Management Inc. chief executive officer Bruce Flatt says his company is moving away from private assets and buying publicly traded debt and stocks – including its own – in the recent market carnage. “We have switched our focus for investments to the listed stock markets. … There are some stocks and debt starting to trade at a large discount to intrinsic value and we are focused on these,” Mr. Flatt said in a shareholder letter released Monday.’

            ‘It’s a massive shift for a company that manages more than US$500-billion in assets, largely by buying multibillion-dollar companies, real estate properties or infrastructure assets. Until the current crisis, Mr. Flatt had been sounding the clarion call that these “alternative assets” were in such demand for their long-term outperformance, they would eventually trump the public stock markets as the top option for pension funds and other huge money managers.’

            ‘In the past month of rapidly falling asset prices, however, the market for big private deals has frozen. Private-equity investors such as Brookfield borrow money to make long-term investments. Rock-bottom interest rates are great news for them – unless the companies they buy crumble in an economic crisis and can’t generate the profits needed to pay the debt. That concern may explain why shares in Brookfield and its publicly traded affiliates have been hit harder than the average stock in the S&P/TSX 60 index of large companies. Since the Canadian markets peaked on Feb. 20, Brookfield and its Brookfield Infrastructure Partners LP, a fund focused on bridges, roads, and technology assets, are down about 40 per cent. Brookfield Property Partners LP, focused on commercial real estate, is down about 55 per cent.’

            https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/article-brookfield-asset-management-shifting-investment-focus-to-publicly/

          3. equity investors such as Brookfield borrow money to make long-term investments

            One of these days, borrowed money will not be considered “equity”.

          4. This market is still over priced. Just look at HLT (Hilton hotel) IT dropped about 50% but still has a pe ratio of 18(will get higher soon).

            My employer, a large IT firm that makes a steady $10B profit year after year, and just reported a solid quarter has had a P/E of 15 for quite some time now. How can a lousy hotel chain have a higher P/E?

            I know, forget it, it’s Chinatown.

        2. 7%/year are they nuts? All that will do is drive renters into their parents’ basements, and the LLs won’t collect any rent at all. Either that or they can rent to illegals and Section 8 and see their luxury units trashed in no time.

  10. ‘The spread of the coronavirus across the globe has impacted essentially every aspect of the real estate industry, with southeastern Wisconsin being no exception.’

    ‘Market uncertainty from the outbreak caused the Wisconsin Center District to push back issuing bonds to pay for the expansion of the downtown Milwaukee convention center. The decision could delay the project’s groundbreaking next year by months.’

    ‘In Waukesha, a planned luxury apartment project in that city’s downtown was halted after an investor backed out. Atlanta-based Campbell Capital Group LLC notified city officials in early March that an investor had pulled money out of The Reserve at Waukesha, a development consisting of 186 residential units and 2,100 square feet of commercial space about a block west from the southwest corner of St. Paul Avenue and Barstow Street.’

    ‘Tom Shepherd, partner at Colliers International|Wisconsin and lead of the firm’s Wisconsin investment services team, said he expects to see a greater impact from the coronavirus on the commercial real estate industry in the coming weeks and months. He said the real estate market has been on a sustained peak — in terms of activity, pricing and liquidity — since 2016.’

    ‘People knew the time would come that the market would start trending downward, but that happening by way of global pandemic was not in anyone’s “wildest imaginations,” he said.’

    “I’d be naïve to say there wasn’t going to be a little bit more of a fallout,” Shepherd said. “Real estate is not immune to uncertainty and volatility. We’ve had an unbelievable 11-year run, just like the stock market.”

    https://biztimes.com/coronavirus-effects-felt-in-all-aspects-of-real-estate/

    And of course you saved your pennies during that unbelievable run, right Tom?

    1. And of course you saved your pennies during that unbelievable run, right Tom?

      Given the Fed’s scorched-earth War on Savers since 2008, I’m guessing only a small minority of the prudent and responsible – a vanishing species in ‘Murica – bothered to save for a rainy day. Today’s NEA indoctrination mills certainly aren’t teaching the timeless parable of the grasshopper and the ant, unless it’s to exalt the grasshoppers as fine examples of collectivist comrades and the ant as a selfish hoarding kulak who clings to his Bible, Constitution, and guns.

      1. Wasn’t that parable taught by Aesop, who was IIRC a pagan? He was neither a Kulak, a Christian and never owned a gun.

        1. He was personifying the ant of course as the Kulak hounded by the Bolshevik grasshopper and his comrades aka your friends.

  11. ‘Residents of a luxury Park Avenue building are up in arms after their management company suggested they “volunteer” as doormen if staff shortages continue amid the coronavirus pandemic, The Post has learned.’

    “As we continue to work through this evolving coronavirus pandemic we must focus on the potential reduction in staffing and a reduction of services,” read the email sent last week to residents of 254 Park Avenue South, where condos sell for as much as $4.75 million.’

    ‘The memo asks owners to pitch in on manning the lobby and disinfecting common areas, sorting package delivery and even taking their own trash to the basement.’

    “On all levels this is complete bulls–t!” griped one resident. “Do you think for a minute that other luxury buildings’ residents are going to be f–king playing doorman?”

    https://nypost.com/2020/03/27/luxury-park-ave-condo-owners-asked-to-volunteer-as-doormen-amid-coronavirus-pandemic/

    2. Now that they have voted to de-fund maintenance of the subway system to divert money to operating costs (even more than they were already doing it), where do they think their doormen will come from, and how will they get there?

      Metro NY’s economy rides on the back of its transit system. Generation Greed re-pillaged it, perhaps back to the 1970s.

  12. ‘A growing number of cities across Orange County have adopted temporary bans on evictions due to the economic fallout of the state’s stay at home order — which shut down large swaths of the economy — to curb the spread of the novel coronavirus.’

    “We’re not taking into consideration the landlord’s mortgage, if they’re not receiving rent, how do they pay their mortgage? Are they going to fall behind on their payments? Are they going to go into foreclosure? Not everybody is the Irvine company. There are mom and pop owners,” Mansoor said.’

    ‘Genis opposed the ban because she said the ordinance could put a burden on “mom and pop landlords” who are also senior citizens. “We’re pulling the rug out from under them,” Genis said.’

    https://voiceofoc.org/2020/03/cities-across-orange-county-adopt-eviction-ban-ordinances/

    1. “We’re not taking into consideration the landlord’s mortgage, if they’re not receiving rent, how do they pay their mortgage?”

      What utter nonsense. Everybody and his dog knows that wealthy landlords purchase with cash. No mortgage is involved.

      1. Even in the case of the rare landlord with a mortgage, Unlimited QE is ready in the waiting to provide a personalized bailout.

        It’s turtles all the way down.

      1. Ya Hwy throw them out, then face massive $$$ penalties even jail for illegally evicting (your deadbeats).

        1. Eye’$ was referring to the wanker.non.banker$ to$$ing out the $mart land.lordie$ fer knot honoring their financial commitment$.

          Wouldn’t it be great iffin’ bidne$$ ju$tice was that $wift!

          1. Eye getz it. just funnin wid U ……..but how many will self evict and get arrested??? Most tenants dont know they can call the cops and demand the cops arrested him for a lockout without a court order.

    3. A growing number of cities across Orange County have adopted temporary bans on evictions due to the economic fallout of the state’s stay at home order

      My understanding is that here in the Centennial State courts aren’t handling eviction cases and Sheriff’s departments are not handling eviction orders.

      1. This does seem to be the perfect time to stop paying. Even if the system worked as it should, when in the age of covid is anybody actually going to come out and physically remove you? Seems to me it could be quite some time…and a lot could happen on the legal side between now and then.

        1. If they sent somebody to forcibly evict, I’m sure a coughing fit would keep them at bay.

  13. ‘you might be interested in the recent return of a mansion that once belonged to Hollywood royalty to the real estate market: Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston. Now, the Beverly Hills mansion is for sale with an asking price of $44.5 million.’

    ‘The home was most recently listed for sale in April of last year, when it had a more optimistic price of $56 million. A month after that, Realtor.com reports, it got a significant price slash and was down to $49 million. Now we see it has another price reduction, so the hunt for a buyer is officially on once again.’

    https://www.celebritynetworth.com/articles/celebrity-homes/mansion-that-once-belonged-to-brad-pitt-and-jennifer-aniston-is-back-on-the-market-for-44-5-million/

    1. ‘Now we see it has another price reduction, so the hunt for a buyer is officially on once again.’

      Are quite a few real estate investors out hunting for multimillion dollar investment properties during the coronacrisis? Seems like this could be a tough time to hunt for a buyer.

  14. LA cracked down on McMansions. Developers are still building them.

    Huge single-family homes are nearly taking over entire blocks

    ‘Padded with amenities like massage parlors, floor-to-ceiling wine racks, and rooftop decks, McMansions have taken over almost entire blocks in some neighborhoods. In the areas around Melrose and Fairfax, they list for about $3 to 4 million, which is nearly double the estimated Zillow value of many of the older homes that sit next to them. Several mansions are also listed on short term rental sites like Airbnb, where nightly rates can exceed $1,000.’

    ‘Ryu says he plans to introduce legislation in the coming weeks that would expand the baseline mansionization ordinance to multifamily lots, in an attempt to close the loophole. “It’s completely changing the character of the neighborhood,” he says. “But more importantly, we are in need of more housing, especially affordable and moderate income housing. We’re not in a shortage of McMansions.”

    https://la.curbed.com/2020/3/17/21183633/mcmansions-big-houses-rules-los-angeles

  15. wouldn’t it be healthy if storage places went bankrupt and no new one are ever built again , because people threw out their junk or sold it on ebay

    1. Our friends who run a storage business, and who recently built a $1+ million dollar home on the border of Rancho Santa Fe, would not fare well if the storage industry collapsed.

      1. could the indoor ones be repurposed into homeless shelters? 10×12 individual rooms, communal high school type bathrooms showers? and a kitchen on each floor?

        1. I worked with someone in construction who lived with his girlfriend in a storage locker. This was in summer 2017.

          1. There’s a story that gets passed down about a student in a past cohort of my graduate program who lived in a closet in the building where my department was housed while completing his PhD. The guy allegedly does quite well for himself now, having survived the cash crunch of graduate school. (I’m two degrees of separation away from him…)

        2. That’s what convention centers are for. (Ignore the date on the story below…it’s really happening.)

          I wonder what the contingency plan is for a COVID-19 outbreak in a makeshift indoor homeless shelter?

          San Diego Convention Center Opens to Homeless to Prevent Virus Spread
          Posted by Chris Jennewein on April 1, 2020 in Politics
          …

          San Diego Convention Center Opens to Homeless to Prevent Virus Spread
          Posted by Chris Jennewein on April 1, 2020 in Politics
          …

          1. San Diego Convention Center Opens to Homeless to Prevent Virus Spread

            Has San Diego Comic Con been cancelled yet? The Denver one has yet to throw in the towel and cancel. It’s scheduled for the July 4 weekend.

        3. “could the indoor ones be repurposed into homeless shelters? 10×12 individual rooms, communal high school type bathrooms showers? and a kitchen on each floor?”

          – The wife and I just watched “Dr. Zhivago” this weekend. Great idea comrade! The party approves! The outcome of a centrally-planned, command and control economy, which, BTW, wasn’t a lot different then than what we have now, with predictable outcomes. In other words, that’s how we got here; with the Fed as the central planner. Recall that the (former) USSR no longer exists. Let’s not be the USSA.
          – Three financial catastrophes in 20 years. Their record speaks for itself. Unfortunately, the 99% are taking it on the chin, again, but maybe that been the plan all along?

          “The enduring lesson of the 20th century is that socialism is a failure, and free markets are a success. But the politicians keep advocating just a little more socialism.” – Milton Friedman

          “The society that puts equality before freedom will end up with neither. The society that puts freedom before equality will end up with a great measure of both.” – Milton Friedman

          1. – The wife and I just watched “Dr. Zhivago” this weekend. Great idea comrade! The party approves!

            With dumbed-down graduates of our NEA indoctrination mills conditioned to believe the collectivism holds all the answers, the 1992 Russian film “The Chekist” should be required viewing for all voters. It also explains why a well-armed population is the ultimate check on tyranny, which is why globalist minions are so keen to void the 2nd Amendment.

            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k8GzBJK8c-U

    2. But you do raise an interesting point: How often do people ever use the junk they relegate to storage again in their future lifetimes? Wouldn’t it be better to just dispose of old junk at the Konmari point when it no longer provides joy, rather than permanently sequestering it into an offsite vault which generates a monthly charge?

      1. Over the years I’ve had some conversations with people in the storage unit business.

        Their rule of thumb was that 1 year’s rent is approximately equal to the value of the items people store in the unit.

        1. It’s a provider’s conundrum when you’ve lost your job, have little savings and a family to support.

        2. “People”…mostly American women of European descent who don’t pay the bill and have no intention of ever paying the bill, seem to get extremely attached to their collection of worthless stuff that represents memories of other times and places where they were also not paying the bill.

      2. How often do people ever use the junk they relegate to storage again in their future lifetimes?

        Hoarder’s gonna hoard.

        I’ve read some real doozies of stories of extreme hoarders, who have worn out spare tires stacked in their bedrooms.

          1. May favorite episode is the massive historic Julian Price mansion in Greensboro North Carolina. Good lord that was a beautiful house — built 1929 — and took 100+ dumpsters to get everything out. A very nice gay couple paid $415K for the whole thing, and were in the process of renovating it as a bed-and-breakfast.

            I hope they aren’t sidelined too much by COVID-19. I know HBB likes to crow about LLs losing their shirts. But there really ARE people who respect old well-built houses and want to bring them back to former glory.

          2. Over the years I’ve met people who are extreme hoarders. I’m not a health care professional, but it does seem like a mental disorder to me.

          3. And what is especially interesting is that outside of their home you would never guess that they are extreme hoarders.

      3. junk they relegate to storage again in their future lifetimes

        I have every intent of using the contents of the 10’x25′ unit I currently have. This outbreak is extending the term. AFAIK, the carrying cost is considered an expense relating to the sale for tax purposes.

        1. It’s different when you are in a move process. The thing I find puzzling is when people keep stuff in storage long-term.

          1. PB, i knew quite a few Mobile DJ’s who had rented spaces for years in Long Island City easy 24 hour access but this is NYC area its actually far cheaper to rent a unit then to move up from a 1 bdrm to 2 apt. or 2 to 3 to store it.

          2. far cheaper to rent

            Same for businesses (doctors, attorneys) that need to keep records for a certain period of time.

    3. ” …because people threw out their junk or sold it on ebay”

      Contrary to current.event$, China/Walmart & Co. ain’t di$appeared.

  17. ‘Despite social distancing orders, video posted online and on social media reportedly showed a large crowd gathered near downtown Cincinnati on Friday night. According to the Cincinnati Police Department, a man present at the event was arrested Saturday. Rashaan Davis was charged with Prohibited Violations, a second-degree misdemeanor, for violating Gov. DeWine’s “Stay at Home” order.’

    ‘The CPD said that the offense was particularly “egregious,” as Davis posted a 10-minute video to YouTube where he urged others to defy Gov. DeWine’s order.’

    https://wjla.com/news/coronavirus/police-man-arrested-in-ohio-downtown-gathering-for-violating-stay-at-home-order

    Gods Gift – see photo.

    1. There are some interesting humans on the loose around Cincinnati. They easily put California diversity to shame.

        1. “The deep south probably tops the list for lowest forms of life.”

          Take a quick look at the Wiki pages of these guys.

          Jeffrey Lionel Dahmer
          May 21, 1960
          Milwaukee, Wisconsin, U.S.

          Charles Milles Maddox (Charles Manson)
          November 12, 1934
          Cincinnati, Ohio, U.S.

          Theodore Robert Cowell (Ted Bundy)
          November 24, 1946
          Burlington, Vermont, U.S.

          Robert Ben Rhoades
          November 22, 1945
          Council Bluffs, Iowa, U.S.

          1. My limited observations were based on my military experience, which took me to many places. While I enjoyed the laid-back South, the density of dull characters became apparent despite being focused on other matters.

          2. Jeff,

            Mr. Dahmer grew up in Northeast Ohio and briefly attended *The* Ohio State University main campus in Columbus.

            No disrespect intended, but he was not a Wisconsin native 😉

        2. Cincinnati is not the deep south. It’s technically Union although it’s on the river. Deep south is usually south of the Tennessee line.

    2. All of our parks and beaches are now closed. Why pay exorbitant San Diego rents if you aren’t even able to socially distance in your favorite outdoor space?

      San Diego County Sheriff’s Department
      Deputies Issuing Citations to People Found Violating Stay-at-Home Order at Beaches
      San Diego Sheriff’s Department said they conducted targeted social distancing enforcement on Friday between 5 p.m. and midnight
      By Brenda Gregorio-Nieto • Published April 4, 2020 • Updated on April 4, 2020 at 7:28 pm
      …

    3. Amish elders need to rein in their youth who are letting their Rumspringa capers get out of hand.

    1. “Go ahead, put your house on the market”

      …if you dare.

      Abandon hope, all ye who enter here.

      — Dante’s Inferno

    2. The first comment is a veritable humdinger!

      richard t 4 hours ago
      READ: Real estate agents are desperate and earning no money. They are fine with you giving your home away at a tremendous loss as long as they get the 6% commission. In reality, there is every likelihood that there will be a mortgage meltdown as bad or worse than the Great Recession. 10 million people lost their jobs in two weeks. The stock market lost 35 trillion dollars in two weeks. Do you really think real estate isn’t going to be affected by this? All sales property sales contracts have been cancelled just like cruise ship bookings. No one is going to sign a 30 year contract when they either don’t have a job or don’t know if they’ll have a job tomorrow. The government has stopped immediate foreclosures but in a couple of months, the court will be flooded with them. People who have bought in the last 5-6 years have lost all the equity that Zilliow said you built up. They will be the first to walk away. Then you have the Silver Tsunami, baby boomers that are retiring or have lost their jobs at a rate of more than 10,000 a day. I am already beginning to see the signs of a meltdown. A drive through Los Angeles and I’m seeing evidence of move outs; home furnishings and trash dumped in front of residences and in the alleys. This is the same thing I saw in the Great Recession. On the retail level, expect homes to drop 50% or more. On the wholesale level, homes-especially those in need of repairs and maintenance will drop to 10% or less (yes, this really happened!). There was a new development in the desert that was bulldozed because it was deemed of no value. The developer realized that just leaving them unsold for years would result in them being taken over by squatters and they would bear the liability. Homes are the “American Dream” until they’re not.

          1. I think we linked the same one.

            An Everything Bubble implosion update would certainly be awesome.

      2. Like everything else in life, the truth will end up being somewhere in between the two extremes.

      3. “People who have bought in the last 5-6 years have lost all the equity that Zilliow said you built up.”

        Woe$er iffin’ after x3 years they met mr.banker🕴 🏦in person & $igned on his dotted line$ 🏡🏧 fer even more equitie$ monie$ 💰on accounts real.e$tate 🏚🏠, like $tawks 🎪📈📈📈 alway$.goe$.↗️↗️⬆️👏

        👾 … Howdy!

        1. I wonder if the serial home equity extractors will get no-questions-asked bailouts this time around?

      4. Then you have the Silver Tsunami, baby boomers that are retiring or have lost their jobs at a rate of more than 10,000 a day.

        Coronavirus, aka Boomer Remover, is also cutting a swath through that cohort.

      5. “People who have bought in the last 5-6 years have lost all the equity that Zilliow said you built up.”

        More likely the case, they have barely paid for the mortgage broker’s origination fee, the realtor’s commission, title insurance fee and other closing costs.

    3. “The minute that people are legally allowed to take a physical tour, the market is going to boom. It’s like when the new iPhone comes out. We want and expect lines out the door, just no tents, please.”

      REALTOR, you’re gonna wish you had a tent to live in when the reality of this recoveryless recovery sets in.

      Get a real job.

    4. Here’s another beaut. It appears that there’s a real estate collapse underway that Fox and other MSM propaganda allies of the National Association of Realscamartists won’t be able to hide.

      The NAR is wrecked.

      Julie Wilde 4 hours ago
      This is a buyers market like crazy out there its a feeding frenzy banks, holding companies, landlords are all unloading tons of properties right now well below market value to try and liquidate those properties. The bank broker we buy rental properties from has been personally showing my husband properties the bank is trying to give away right now. They are offering a 30 % below market and a 10% cash rebate to take properties off their books right now. That is the reality of the real estate market and it will continue to get even worse for sellers as more and more need for cash sets in to the bigger banks that have even more properties on their books.

    5. Something is up in Hawaii, a bunch of homes for sale in my area just went under contract, 750k and up. Wondering if some socal people are pulling the trigger and getting out of the asylum. Here the beaches are still open along with a few trails but state and county parks are closed. Kinda weird seeing the beach parks so empty.

    6. That comments aren’t just funny; they’re scathing. They also show that huge numbers of people see right through the REIC industry’s dissembling and cheerleading.

  20. Shares of real estate investment trusts have fallen 34% between February and March 16, which implies a 24% decline in real estate asset values, an analysis by Green Street Advisors found.

    Is that a lot?

    1. It seems like REITs have fallen into a bottomless crater.

      From another of Ben’s posts today:

      “That was last Saturday. In the week since, three top investors in the sector have engaged restructuring advisers, two others sold $7 billion of debt at a discount and publicly traded mortgage REITs in the U.S. lost more than $12 billion of market value, bringing total declines this year to at least $50 billion.”

  21. By the end of last year, however, average rents had climbed to $1,342 per month – a 25.6% jump despite the thousands of new units that had come online.

    B…b…but the Fed and our lying CPI inflation statistics say inflation is sub-2 percent.

    1. +1

      – The Fed’s machinations, just like the last time, have caused tremendous asset inflation, as was intended. The “wealth effect” (see Bernanke’s classic 2010 NYT OpEd) targeted housing and stock prices. Note: The wealth effect = asset bubbles re-blown. The unfortunate unintended consequence of all of this is that asset bubbles always pop. The Fed knows this and is now furiously throwing the entire kitchen as well as the kitchen sink at the current conflagration. Apparently their fire hose dispenses gasoline during the bubble-blowing phase, and then taxpayer $ after it pops! Nice job guys!

      The last two bubbles also popped with devastating effect. “It’s (not) different this time”, (it’s worse). The Fed is a serial arsonist pretending to work as a fireman. Recipe for disaster, three times now in 20 years. That’s some stellar track record, and yet, these guys are still in charge. Wonderful!

        1. Sounds like the fireman’s equivalent of the Keynesian ditch digging business model:

          1. Grow out the tinder until a spark starts the forest ablaze.

          2. Generate a tsunami of liquidity to douse the forest fire.

          3. Serially repeat 1. and 2. in perpetuity.

          2. Agreed with 2a. The Fed offers special loans at special rates for special people to get in the first bids in the fire sale that ensues once the fire is done burning down the forest.

    2. What share of the CPI consumption basket does real estate comprise these days? Many years ago, when I used to pay attention to such mundane details, it was around 28 percent.

      1. If I am reading this data correctly, the recent CPI-U calculation assumes we spend 1/3 of our expenditures on housing.

        I just calculated our own household’s housing expenditure share. Since we are poor renters, our housing share of expenditures is only 16%, about half the national average.

    3. No worrie$, Mr. Ben Jones has been telling this $tory, well, fer a long$ time$!

      Economic$:

      Dangerou$ Dis$inflationary $hock $lams Reeling World Economie$

      Bloomberg / By Rich Miller and Enda Curran / April 5, 2020

      Global con$umer price$ may briefly fall into deflation zone

      Central bank$ might keep rate$ at rock-bottom level$ for year$

      The %inking global economy is suffering through a colo$$al di$inflationary $hock that could briefly push it into dangerous deflation territory for the first time in decade$.

      With many national economie$ all but $hutting down in an effort to contain the coronaviru$, price$ on everything from oil and copper to hotel rooms and restaurant take-out are tumbling.

      “A powerful di$inflationary tide is now ri$ing,”

      While weak or falling prices may seem like an unalloyed good for consumers, a widespread deflationary price decline can be deleterious for the whole economy. Households hold off buying in anticipation of ever lower prices, and companies postpone investments because they see limited profit opportunities

      With assistance by Christopher Condon, Sam Kim, and Yuko Takeo

      1. Since when is affordability a bad outcome? It’s been a primary objective of U.S. housing policy for as long as I can remember. Now that the goal is in plain sight, nattering nabobs of real estate negativism are decrying the situation as though the end of the world were at hand.

        1. affordability

          You keep using that word…

          In the Dark Age of Debt the meaning of that word has been changed. It used to mean a price that could be paid without too much pain. The kleptocrats now mean generation long crippling payments that can be qualified for when they say “affordable”.

          1. There’s never been a better time to correct the terminology to reflect its actual meaning.

  22. “Many apartment landlords today are in a pickle, under pressure to give struggling, out-of-work tenants a break on rent but limited in how flexible they can be by their own obligation to pay the mortgage.

    “I don’t want a pickle. Just wanna ride my motor-sickle.” — Arlo Guthrie

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i9S1o2RvcaE

  23. She warned that forgiving rent would create a ‘cascading series of events threatening our basic economic structures.’”

    In Deadbeat Nation, don’t expect your letter to get any traction, Deborah. And the only landlords who will be getting bailed out are the Wall Street vulture funds. But on a more positive note, once landlords go bankrupt and their rentals are auctioned off, they should return to the market as affordable, non-subsidized shelter instead of speculative investments.

    1. Housing as a consumer good? Not a get rich with little or no effort Ponzi scheme. What a novel concept.

  24. Then Bob was forced to backtrack, lay people off, downsize his operation, and focus on the fundamentals.”

    Don’t be Bob. Just don’t.

  26. I was just browsing the mls and I noticed something I never had before – a property that is a 1/10 share. I remember last bubble seeing some 1/4 share properties cropping up, but 1/10 share? This stuff is almost unbelievable.

    It is a symptom of this extreme financialization of the entire economy. Everybody is trying to get a cut somewhere without having to work for it, whether it’s in housing, crypto, stocks, etc. Seemingly everybody’s turned into rentseeker/speculator. It all needs to collapse. The entire system.

    1. By the way, here it is, only $82,500 for 5 weeks a year. What a bargain:

      Always wanted a home in Cannon Beach without the expense of full ownership? Own 1/10th Share of this family friendly home in the coveted East Presidential neighborhood. Spread out in the multiple living areas and well separated 4 BRs. Enjoy your large private patio or head a block to either the beach or town. Perfect home, perfect location-yours for 5 ultra flexible weeks/yr (Partial week or weekend only OK) a year. All the advantages of a beach home at a fraction of the cost

      https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/115-E-Washington-St-10THSHARE-Cannon-Beach-OR-97110/2080989781_zpid/

      1. The Oregon Coast is nice — but WTF? Even before the virus you could rent a nice place for five weeks for less than the carrying costs on this.

    2. A late model Toyota Tundra with 60k miles have asking prices averaging $32k dollars, and the prices appear stuck there too. That tells me that $32k is what remains of the loan balance. Even if it’s parked in the garage there’s age depreciation, full coverage insurance premiums, etc., just imagine the buyer’s remorse?

      1. Which is why, when I’m buying something on the used market, my first question is always: Do you have title in hand? If not, not interested.

      2. There are days I am tempted to trade in the car for a new one, until I remember that I don’t have any payments now. Then the temptation goes away.

        It reminds me of a saying in Spanish: Tiene cuerpo de tentacion, y cara de arrepentimiento. She has a tempting body and a face of repentance. The thought of 80 months (or whatever) of payments makes me repent quickly, long before Mr. Banker can set his dotted line special in front of me.

        1. “Tiene cuerpo de tentacion, y cara de arrepentimiento.”

          Madonna by day,
          courtesan by night?

  29. Now we’re talking!

    Except I don’t know how long it would take to set up this proposed program.

    And we might learn frightening things about the scale of the outbreak.

    And I don’t see how knowing who has COVID-19 would reverse the real estate collapse underway. I guess that’s why God invented bailouts.

    The Fed
    Fed’s Bullard says there is ‘good news’ for those worried about the economy’s future: that universal COVID-19 testing will help restore economic health
    Published: April 5, 2020 at 12:17 p.m. ET
    By Greg Robb
    A daily test would give Americans confidence to once again interact, St. Louis Fed president says
    St. Louis Fed President ames Bullard said the spike in jobless claims is a good thing in the sense that people will get government transfer payments.

    There is “good news” for those who think the U.S. economy will have a tough time recovering from the coronavirus pandemic, said St. Louis Fed President James Bullard, on Sunday.

    “There is a solution using available technology today to fix the economic part,” Bullard said, In an interview on the CBS News program “Face the Nation.”

    That solution? Universal testing.
    …

    1. Johnson’s fiancee Carrie Symonds, 32, revealed Saturday that she spent a week with coronavirus symptoms, though she wasn’t tested. Symonds, who is pregnant, said she was now “on the mend.”

      Is it his?

    2. The number of top government officials worldwide who have it or have zero degrees of separation from infected individuals suggests the outbreak is far more widespread than official statistics suggest.

      1. These 13 government officials and world leaders have reportedly tested positive for COVID-19
        Kayla Epstein and Kelly McLaughlin
        Mar 27, 2020, 1:19 PM
        Boris Johnson
        UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson. REUTERS/Simon Dawson/Pool
        -The novel coronavirus, which has infected more than 576,000 people worldwide, and killed at least 26,000 people, has made its way into the upper ranks of several world governments.
        – Officials in the US, Australia, Iran, and the UK have tested positive for the disease.
        – UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced he has tested positive for COVID-19.
        – Sophie Trudeau, spouse of Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau, tested positive for the coronavirus. Her husband is also under isolation, though he has not reported symptoms.
        – Australian Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton and UK Minister for Mental Health Nadine Dorries both announced their positive test results earlier this month.
        – Iranian media has reported that Vice President Eshaq Jahangiri and Iranian Deputy Health Minister Iraj Harirchi have also tested positive.
        – Sen. Rand Paul, two House representatives, and Miami Mayor Francis Suarez have announced they’ve tested positive.
        …

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