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People Trying To Sell Want To Do It Quickly But Buyers Have Really Dried Up

A report from Atlanta Agent Magazine in Georgia. “The country is much better positioned to rebound from the current recession than in the Great Recession, according to Lawrence Yun, chief economist for the National Association of Realtors. The housing shortage in Georgia is likely to help keep prices at pre-pandemic levels, he added. ‘We had a housing shortage pre-pandemic — when we come out of this, I think we will still have a housing shortage and, therefore, the home prices expectation is nothing like 10 years ago with prices collapsing 30%,’ he said. ‘Home prices will remain stable, and one thing Realtors may want to do with their past clients is say, ‘Aren’t you glad you have a home where you are building equity, unlike the stock market with huge volatility.'”

“One big concern about post-pandemic home sales is if the lending industry follows the lead of JPMorgan, which increased the credit score requirement to 700. Along with a minimum down payment of 20%, some buyers might wait for the economy to even out. Yun said it is a bad decision on the part of lenders, who he believes are increasing credit score requirements because of the influx of refinance applications. ‘I think they should just hire more people to work through this process,’ he said.”

From Your Sun in Florida. “Jason Ester, Realtor with Re/Max Anchor in North Port, is fascinated with the market’s peculiarities, and hopeful, too, despite what he’s seeing in the North Port market. ‘I just had four sales that fell apart in the past week,’ Ester said. ‘Two lost their deposits. Buyers have really dried up.’ ‘Both (potential) buyers said, I’ll just hold off until this (pandemic) blows by and will get back to you,’ he said.”

“He said people trying to sell want to do it quickly but people are not visiting. He said a company that tracks showings said they have dropped off by 70-80 percent.”

“There are other concerns brewing in the lending world. ‘One of my buyers recently got a text from the VA about their pre-approval’ being reconsidered, Ester said. ‘For a VA loan, this is pretty scary. This is the first I’ve heard of it.’ She called it ‘scary.’ ‘I want to see this market on the upswing. I’m hoping we get some pent up demand after this is over,'” he said.”

“The National Association of Realtors issued an email newsletter on April 8. It address some concerns with passage of the CARES Act and regulatory actions underway. ‘Wild swings in mortgages rates have hampered many deals,’ according to NAR. ‘Initially, rates jumped hurting many transactions that were near closing.’ The Federal Reserve began buying mortgaged-backed securities March 20 to lower and stabilize rates. ‘However, many lenders continued to tighten requirements because of problems getting mortgage servicers to take on new mortgages, particularly on lower credit or higher debt-to-income loans,’ it said.”

The New York Times. “Four of the five cities most vulnerable to the financial impact of the coronavirus are in Ohio, where cities rely heavily on income tax, a Brookings Institution report found. In California, Los Angeles County is expected to lose $1 billion in sales tax revenue this fiscal year. And in New York City, where tourism and hotel tax revenue are among the losses, Mayor Bill de Blasio said the city faced a revenue shortfall of up to $10 billion.”

“Beyond the basics, what is a city without its public spaces — movie theaters, restaurants, concert halls? And why pay exorbitant prices to live somewhere if those disappear? ‘What was New York is gone,’ said Josh Dorf, a businessman who lives in Tribeca. ‘When I go outside here, it’s like a movie set downtown here. It’s empty and boarded up.'”

From Mansion Global on New York. “It seems two is the operative number in New York City these days. For the fourth week in a row—since New York’s Gov. Andrew Cuomo declared the city ‘on pause’—two luxury homes went into contract in Manhattan last week. According to Donna Olshan, author of the weekly Olshan Luxury Market Report, which tracks Manhattan homes asking $4 million and up, it’s the first time since the report started in 2010 that the exact same number of contracts was logged for four weeks in a row.”

“Reflecting life—and real estate—in the time of coronavirus, Ms. Olshan reported that in the last four weeks, the eight contracts have totaled $71.22 million in volume compared to 84 contracts totaling $675.5 million in the same four-week period in 2019.”

The Star Tribune in Minnesota. “The Twin Cities housing market enjoyed a robust start in March but stumbled under the weight of a pandemic economy and a government stay-at-home order that stopped showings in their tracks. For now at least, the pandemic is having the most profound effect on buyers who have the least — and most — amount of money to spend. Pending sales of houses priced at less than $190,000 were down by double-digit percentages while sales of houses priced at more than $1 million fell by nearly 40%.”

“‘Buyers in the luxury segments are far more susceptible to large swings in the stock market. Just think of someone who had a net worth of $3 million at the end of February could’ve been worth $2 million by late March,’ said Patrick Ruble, president of the St. Paul Area Association of Realtors. ‘Job losses in the leisure, hospitality and retail sectors have disproportionately affected buyers who would’ve purchased homes under $200,000.'”

The Aspen Daily News in Colorado. “The COVID-19 pandemic and the resulting national and local economic impact is likely to upset an otherwise strong year for the local real estate market. Economists from major investment bank are predicting, on average, that the U.S. economy will shrink in 2020 by 4.8% in the first quarter and 27.5% in the second quarter before rebounding by 13.5% and 12.5% in the third and fourth quarters, if the fight to suppress the COVID-19 pandemic is successful.”

“In addition, the unemployment rate is skyrocketing to levels of potentially 15-20% or more — levels not seen since the Great Depression. What could all of this mean for the Aspen-Snowmass real estate market over the next year or two? The first likely outcome is a significant drop in the number of transactions and overall volume. If we look back to the 2008-09 Great Recession, the U.S. GDP declined just 2.2% from the first quarter of 2008 to the beginning of third-quarter 2009, when the recession ended. During that period of time, the Aspen-Snowmass real estate market ­experienced a 48% decline in total sales and sales volume. It’s very likely that the local real estate market will repeat that pattern in the next year or two.”

“The second likely outcome is a decline in values. During the Great Recession, property values declined 25-36% from the market peak at the end of 2007 to the market bottom in the fall of 2009. If the volume of sales declines dramatically as it did during the Great Recession, it’s also likely the market could experience a decline in values on the same scale as we saw during the Great Recession.”

The Great Falls Tribune in Montana. “Spring has (almost) sprung, and all across Great Falls, contractors are sifting through the last of the snow to uncover job sites and get to work. But when they abandoned last year’s projects for the winter, they never imagined that the coronavirus would drive the whole world indoors. While some construction businesses and contractors have taken hits, many have been able to continue working or make adjustments to stay busy.”

“General contractor Munroe Enterprises, Inc., has seen a drastic slowdown in business. Owner Mark Munroe said the company has had some of its larger jobs pushed back and has had to resort to smaller residential work to keep busy. ‘To stay alive, we’ll just pick up anything we can,’ he said.”

From Mansion Global on California. “A Spanish Colonial home newly built on the former estate of Georgia Frontiere-a prior owner of the NFL team Los Angeles Rams-in the Bel Air neighborhood of Los Angeles, has changed hands for $43.3 million, listing records show. The 1.68-acre property with a 20,000-square-foot house was listed in October 2019 for $75 million. The price dropped to $68 million in January and went into contract April 13. The sale closed the following day for $43.3 million, according to listing history on Zillow.”

“Dubbed Bellagio Estate, the home was designed by Don Ziebell of Oz Architects and took three years to build, having been complete in 2019, according to the previous listing. The seller, a limited liability company which could not be immediately reached for comment, bought the property for $38 million in 2015, per property records.”

From News West 9 in Texas. “Thanks to the oil bust combined with COVID-19 running through the country, it seems that more people are trying to get out of the Permian Basin. All Star Moving Laborers in Midland has noticed that people are hiring them to either load up their belongings into storage units or to move their belongings from apartment to apartment in the search for cheaper housing. But they’ve seen almost nobody moving to Midland in the last month.”

“‘I can say probably out of 50 moves in general, maybe one person or one family came in. We are having a large exodus of people leaving the Midland-Odessa area,’ Monica Mauldin, Owner of All Star Moving Laborers said. Combine the oil bust and COVID-19 with some of the highest rent in the state, Mauldin understands why people would want to get out. ‘I also think that Midland is just too expensive to live in right now if they are not gonna get their jobs back after the bust recovers,’ Mauldin said.”

“Losing a job is something that’s becoming a little more common right now. ‘I think the dismay is there and people, I don’t know if they’re gonna come back again. But I know that they want to get out of here, and so it’s pulverizing for us,’ Mauldin said.”

“While people continue to move out at this time for any number of reasons, Mauldin expects even more people to leave this area once the virus loosens its grip on the country. ‘Right now, I think people are just waiting for that moment when the country opens back up so that they can go ahead and leave because they don’t wanna be exposed to anything. You know, they’re really trying to stay in their home. They don’t wanna even be exposed to us,’ Mauldin said.”

“But Mauldin believes there is an upside to all of this. She believes that by having a large number of people leave, businesses could actually benefit by being able to staff more employees. She also thinks that it might be easier for people to afford housing in the area.”

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This Post Has 127 Comments

  1. ‘Home prices will remain stable, and one thing Realtors may want to do with their past clients is say, ‘Aren’t you glad you have a home where you are building equity’

    ‘changed hands for $43.3 million. The 1.68-acre property with a 20,000-square-foot house was listed in October 2019 for $75 million. The price dropped to $68 million in January and went into contract April 13. The sale closed the following day for $43.3 million’

    ‘took three years to build, having been complete in 2019, according to the previous listing. The seller, a limited liability company which could not be immediately reached for comment, bought the property for $38 million in 2015, per property records’

    How many millions did this shack owner lose Larry?

  2. ‘During the Great Recession, property values declined 25-36% from the market peak at the end of 2007 to the market bottom in the fall of 2009. If the volume of sales declines dramatically as it did during the Great Recession, it’s also likely the market could experience a decline in values on the same scale as we saw during the Great Recession’

    These are brokers saying this.

  3. ‘One of my buyers recently got a text from the VA about their pre-approval’ being reconsidered, Ester said. ‘For a VA loan, this is pretty scary. This is the first I’ve heard of it.’

    Every day now, lending is tightening up.

  4. ‘I also think that Midland is just too expensive to live in right now if they are not gonna get their jobs back after the bust recovers’

    When the Midland shack median went over 300k, I said they were going to regret it.

    1. As one builder conceded, “If you paid more than $50 per square foot for a house, you got ripped off.”

      Name of this builder please.

      1. There is a builder just south of Raleigh who advertises $59/sq ft under roof. Up from $56/sq ft earlier in the year.

      2. Name of this builder please.

        Surely you know by now he spews sound bites and non sequiturs. He wants you to reply.

        Just install the Joshua Tree extension and you can filter out his posts (and those of any other poster you find to be useless)

  6. “…Lawrence Yun, chief economist for the National Association of Realtors….”

    This guy is a major piece of work.

    Still talking about housing shortages.

    Maybe Lawrence needs to open his office window and take a look outside once in a while.

    1. ‘I think they should just hire more people to work through this process,’ he said.”
      Yeah, and spend a ton of money training them on the system, getting them ready to be productive and then, damn!, rates go up and you have to lay everyone off which of course is not good for morale. Not too mention that Mortgage Underwriters are hard to find and NOT cheap. Neither are processors. I think YUN has NO clue what the mortgage business is all about.

      1. Lenders are snake bit. They don’t want to make loans and are stripping off the risk layering they added for years.

        1. Risk layering
          First heard that as a concern in 2004. I guess some things change never change because “we” don’t learn from our screw ups.

      2. not good for morale

        They’re looking at a real estate market in free fall. They should be moving all their office furniture to the third floor, not hiring loan officers.

    3. Or, actually close real estate transactions for a living and see what’s under the hood. Or give FHA a ring.

      1. There is a glut of rentals around Bellingham, WA where my daughter is at WWU since the campus is on-line this quarter, and nothing is clear yet regarding next Fall. And with the 3-month eviction moratorium in place the area’s landlords are asking for 6-months rent to move in. I wouldn’t sign a 1-yr lease right now because you don’t know if the CRE landlord will survive this downturn. It’s too bad the wait for “blood in the streets” takes so long.

    4. Lawrence Yun, about as creditable as this administration. The guy is a spin doctor/cheerleader for the real estate industry, calling him an economist is an insult to other less bias legit economists out there. We could have another 2008 or worse tomorrow and he will still be point at housing shortage cause sellers are pulling out of the market. 20% unemployment? no problem, still a housing shortage to justify a crapshack in heated markets asking 3-4x over its fair market value.

  7. Wow$er$!, too much $tuff & eye’$ knot just talkin’ ‘ bout black.gold.oil$

    (Fascinating article iffin’ ya climb over the pay.monie$ firewall$.)

    Money $tuff:

    There’s Nowhere to Put the Oil

    Also PPP loans, trading from home, dividends and masks.

    Bloomberg /By Matt Levine / April 20, 2020

    In ordinary economic$, things do not have negative price$: If nobody want$ a thing, if you’d have to pay them to take the thing, you just don’t make it. Oil is a little weird—it is hard to shut in and then restart an oil well, and there are all sorts of weird cartel$ and game theory involved in oil pricing and production—but the other thing going on here is that a global pandemic is pretty weird for commodity price$. The price of oil is not approaching zero because nobody needs oil; you can look into the future—or at futures prices—and see that, in fact, there is demand for oil. But right now, with the world economy closed, people need much less oil than they’ve got. If you have a thing that lots of people want, but that no one wants right now, it is hard to put a normal price on it.

    1. ‘Energy traders bailed out of the expiring May U.S. oil futures contract in a frenzy on Monday, as the contract dropped by more than 70% to less than $5 a barrel and opening the widest gap ever between it and the next contract with storage rapidly filling. Available storage space is dropping fast at the Cushing, Oklahoma hub, where physical delivery of U.S. oil barrels bought in the futures market takes place. Four weeks ago, the storage hub was half full – now it is 69% full, according to U.S. Energy Department data.’

      “It’s clear that Cushing is going to fill and it will stay full for the next several months,” said Andy Lipow of Lipow Oil Associates. “Because producers have been lagging in their production cuts we’re seeing an overwhelming amount of crude oil looking for a place to go around the world.”

      https://www.reuters.com/article/us-global-oil-contracts/traders-play-hot-potato-with-us-oil-contract-as-it-crashes-50-idUSKBN2221TS

          3. What is the value of oil continuously being pumped at the point when storage is running out? How high will marginal storage costs per barrel go before oil prices go to negative? How close to full utilization of all storage capacity will the glut get before the rate of extraction equilibrates with the rate of consumption under the quarantine situation?

          5. The baffons at CNBC are now saying that it was a short-term imbalance – and that if the Govt provides enough $s, everything will be find

            Argg … it is like housing. Heads i win, Tails, the middle class tax payer bails me out

            Perhaps i need to go on a whisky and fried chicken bender for the next 5-10 years and then go on welfare.

            —————–
            U.S. crude prices dropped more than 100% and turned negative for the first time in history on Monday as traders continue to fret over a slump in demand due to the coronavirus pandemic. The price of the nearest oil futures contract, which expires Tuesday, was the hardest hit, detaching from later month futures contracts, which continued to trade above $20 per barrel.

            West Texas Intermediate crude for May delivery fell more than 100% to settle at negative $37.63 per barrel. Meanwhile international benchmark, Brent crude, which has already rolled to the June contract, traded 8.9% lower at $25.58 per barrel. The June WTI contract, which expires on May 19, fell about 18% to trade at $20.43 per barrel. The July contract was roughly 11% lower at $26.18 per barrel.

            The front part of the oil futures ‘curve,’ which is the May contract that expires on Tuesday, was hit the hardest since it applies to fuel that’s set to be delivered while most of the country remains on lockdown thanks to the coronavirus. The only buyers of oil futures for that contract are entities that want to physically take the delivery like a refinery or an airline. But storage tanks are filled so they don’t need it

          1. At that kind of price they should be pouring oil down every old well and fracking hole, if that’s technically possible.

          2. No we are never ever that smart must wait so the FAIR Politically correct market PRICE of $55 a barell is achieved to buy.

  8. ‘For decades, bodegas have served customers in neighborhoods where supermarkets are scarce—or nonexistent. Often immigrant-owned, they are businesses that serve working class customers at working class prices. Before coronavirus, many bodegas were open 24 hours a day. As business has slowed, most, but not all, have cut back on hours.’

    “We are going through something like we have never experienced,” said Frank Marte, head of the Bodegas and Small Business Association, a group that Marte said represents over 5,000 bodegas and small groceries citywide. “Some businesses, they’ve been doing okay, but a lot of businesses, they’ve been doing very badly—they’ve lost 30-40 percent of their business. Some people even more.”

    ‘Like many New Yorkers, bodegas are struggling to pay the rent. The lights were off at Park Pleasant Deli, at Central Park West and 100th Street, which has temporarily closed. “Shit,” a woman wearing a mask muttered, in disbelief. The normally bustling Andy’s Deli on 74th and Amsterdam has been closed too.’

    ‘Late at night, the Upper West Side is profoundly silent. The streets are empty, so empty, that one may walk up the middle of Columbus Avenue for blocks without encountering a car, or another human being. The sound of garbage trucks may be heard from blocks away, and ambulances, though less frequent than in previous weeks, echo across the empty city canyons.’

    https://www.westsiderag.com/2020/04/19/bodega-sales-slump-but-many-owners-vow-to-stay-open-i-take-care-of-my-customers-and-they-take-care-of-me

    1. Most of these “Bodegas” are corrupt. The manipulate sales tax revenues, scam the lottery, and make most of their income cashing checks and wire-transferring money overseas. Not to mention kiosks set up for fraudulent tax return filings.

      1. “Most of these “Bodega$” are corrupt.”

        Compare tho$e “Evil” worrie$ to:

        6+ Trillion$ … +(0%) a$ in Zero + “UNLIMITED! 👀

        💰💲💰💲💰💰💲💰💲💰💲💰💲💰💲💰💲💰💲💰💲💰💲💰💲💰💲💰💲💰💲💰💲💰

        🙊🙉🙈

    2. I wonder how that name came to be used in NYC. In Spanish, “bodega” means warehouse. Mexicans have various terms for such corner shops: changarros, estanquillos, miscelaneas, etc. but during my years in Mexico City I never saw them referred to as bodegas.

      Must be a Puerto Rican thing.

        1. I guess that works in English, but the word for store in Spanish is “tienda”, or for the verb store would be “guardar”

          1. My dictionary said it’s from the same Greek word that apothecary comes from!

            English speaking people screw up all foreign words, especially French ones. My home town was named by the French as Beau Fleu. The English came along and said Aha, it’s Buffalo.

  10. AEI flash housing market indicators — week of April 13–April 17, 2020

    ‘With the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, we observe important share shifts in the market.’

    ‘Highest quality borrowers are either dropping out of the market or are unable to get non-conforming jumbo loans. At the same time, FHA, VA, and Rural Housing Service borrowers with FICO score below 640 are increasingly unable to get mortgages as lenders tighten up on lending standards.’

    https://www.aei.org/research-products/report/aei-flash-housing-market-indicators-week-of-april-13-april-17-2020/?mkt_tok=eyJpIjoiWkRReVl6RmtaVEE0WWpBMSIsInQiOiJENk9UbUFjN2dLOUdiZ1QwXC9mRG9iUWFmWlNjTGFSd0E2NnNzb1lCRWFWc3FCY0pyVHZkSFkrNkQ3engya0pZWU05UEVvMjIrNVBNUjVLSThWRjVDK2c4QUdUbFRzQ1ZWaklMTmZYNmFLXC9vK1FPdms1aHZVYkJFbWVHVERWVkRrIn0%3D

    Check out the San Francisco chart on page 11.

  12. Parts of Texas will go back to the 80’s during the last oil bust….Houston, Midland and many others will be in a depression.

      1. Would love to see these clowns riding camels and flat broke and us GTFO of the middle east and spend our money here!

        1. “…GTFO of the middle east and spend our money here!”

          +1 Agreed.

          The U.S. will not find a better crisis with such low interest rates to employ its own citizens and rebuild our infrastructure, but it all depends on the middle-east and Israel’s safety.

        2. There is definitely an upside to watching the Saudis lie down in the bed they made for themselves.

          2. What does that bottom chart with the three lines (large traders, small traders, commercial hedgers) indicate about current market conditions?

      4. “Another future could be the $audi’s will go back to riding camels.”

        Yet another po$$ible $audi prediction🔮: NO 👑 crown.jewel$ poli$hing for “$pecial boy.child” mB$. … $ad.

  14. “One big concern about post-pandemic home sales is if the lending industry follows the lead of JPMorgan, which increased the credit score requirement to 700. Along with a minimum down payment of 20%, some buyers might wait for the economy to even out. Yun said it is a bad decision on the part of lenders, who he believes are increasing credit score requirements because of the influx of refinance applications. ‘I think they should just hire more people to work through this process,’ he said.”

    Lets ignore the trillions and trillions of new debt. Cash is KING

    1. “Bad decision on the part of lenders…”

      It’s hilarious because it’s only a bad decision for HIM and his NAR clique. It’s a good decision businesswise, and may be the only decision some of these lenders have to remain solvent.

  15. Oh dear!

    Richard Branson offers his island as collateral as Virgin Atlantic and Virgin Australia face collapse

    Virgin Atlantic and Virgin Australia will need government support if they’re to survive the economic crisis triggered by the coronavirus pandemic.

    Billionaire founder Richard Branson said Monday that the airlines need money from the UK and Australian governments to keep going “in the face of the severe uncertainty surrounding travel today,” including the lack of clarity over how long planes will have to remain grounded.
    …
    While US airlines will receive tens of billions of dollars in support as part of the country’s $2 trillion stimulus package, governments in Europe have not promised wholesale bailouts to their carriers. Instead, individual airlines are tapping government support to pay staff salaries and raise debt.
    …

    Lufthansa (DLAKY), one of Europe’s biggest airline groups, is permanently reducing the size of its fleet and shutting down one of its low-cost carriers, warning that the aviation sector will take years to recover from the crisis.

    As the Brits might say, a lot of older jets are going to the knackers.

      1. “…Oh muh gawd, not the Island!..”

        Is that the one that got blown over [a few years ago] by a Hurricane?

        1. It was. The news said that he and some friends weathered the storm in a wine cellar. “Wine cellar” my butt. That was almost certainly a prepper bunker stocked to the brim with supplies.

    1. Market close for May delivery of WTI negative $37.63 a barrel.

      June contract is $21 a barrel, down 15% for the day.

        1. I suppose it depends on how much I’m being paid. If it’s enough to cover the carrying costs, and I don’t spend the loan money on anything …

          But your point is well taken. The current incentives on cars will not entice me to spend my savings, much less take out a loan, on a new car. And the automakers know this, which is why they quickly shuttered their factories and they remain closed. I do wonder what kind of inventory automakers have. The local dealers are bursting at the seams with cars and I’m sure the automakers also have warehoused cars, which may sit unsold for many months. I doubt many will run out to buy a new car when the lock downs end. I also expect many with expiring leases to return the car and not replace it.

          Anyone here seen a new car with the ubiquitous temporary tags? I sure haven’t.

      2. Who knew that the price would go to negative once storage ran out?

        The Financial Times
        Markets Briefing Oil
        US oil trades at negative prices for first time in history
        Benchmark collapses to unprecedented low as traders try to rid themselves of unwanted crude
        David Sheppard, Myles McCormick and Derek Brower in London and Hudson Lockett in Hong Kong 19 minutes ago

        Benchmark US oil prices crashed into negative territory for the first time in history as the evaporation of demand caused by the coronavirus pandemic leaves the world awash with oil and not enough storage capacity — meaning producers are paying buyers to take it off their hands.

        West Texas Intermediate, the US marker, lost more than 250 per cent on Monday to trade as low as -$40.32 a barrel in a day of chaos in oil markets. Traders capitulated in the face of limited access to storage capacity across the US, including the country’s main delivery point of Cushing, Oklahoma.
        …

        1. Oil is the lifeblood of modern civilization. Wish I could buy the rest of my lifes consumption right now at these prices.

          I imagine there arent too many greenies patting themselves on the back now while charging their tesla nowadays.

    2. Market Extra
      Why the oil market just crashed into negative territory — 4 things investors need to know
      Published: April 20, 2020 at 4:06 p.m. ET
      By William Watts
      Referenced Symbols
      CL.1
      -272.96%
      CLK20
      -272.96%
      CLM20
      -15.74%
      CLZ20
      -2.48%
      RB.1
      -5.91%

      Oil just did something that made even market veterans shake their heads in wonder — the soon-to-expire May contract for West Texas Intermediate crude on the New York Mercantile Exchange traded, and closed, in negative territory.

      “I’m not sure how to react to that other than say that nobody, whether they’re 120 years old or whether they’re 20 months old, has ever seen an oil price lower than this,” Tom Kloza, a 40-year market veteran and head of global market analysis for Oil Price Information Service, told MarketWatch just minutes before the market closed on Monday.

      The negative finish means the holder of a long position would be required to pay someone to take that contract off of their hands. Negative oil prices would seem to be a foreboding sign about the outlook for an economy kicked in the teeth by the COVID-19 pandemic. It would also seem, at first glance, to point to ever-cheaper gasoline prices at the pump — a potential positive for hard-hit consumers.
      …

  17. “The country is much better positioned to rebound from the current recession than in the Great Recession, according to Lawrence Yun, chief economist for the National Association of Realtors.

    All of these NAR bozos were totally discredited during Housing Bubble Bust 1.0, yet they’re still being quoted in the MSM as if they’re some kind of authorities on the housing market instead of complete charlatans?

    1. quoted in the MSM as if they’re some kind of authorities on the housing market instead of complete charlatans?

      Therefore you have to conclude that the MSM is in on the scam/con.

  18. ‘Home prices will remain stable, and one thing Realtors may want to do with their past clients is say, ‘Aren’t you glad you have a home where you are building equity, unlike the stock market with huge volatility.’”

    Once realtors close, they couldn’t care less about what happens to their “clients.”

  19. Yun said it is a bad decision on the part of lenders, who he believes are increasing credit score requirements because of the influx of refinance applications. ‘I think they should just hire more people to work through this process,’ he said.”

    You can’t make this stuff up.

  20. ‘I want to see this market on the upswing. I’m hoping we get some pent up demand after this is over,’” he said.”

    Mr. Market doesn’t give a rat’s ass what you want, Realtor Boy. And the only thing pent up with be rage.

  21. Pending sales of houses priced at less than $190,000 were down by double-digit percentages while sales of houses priced at more than $1 million fell by nearly 40%.”

    Is that a lot?

    1. As long as it’s just the volume of sales that is falling and not prices, it’s all good for housing HODLers.

  22. “The country is much better positioned to rebound from the current recession than in the Great Recession, according to Lawrence Yun, chief economist for the National Association of Realtors.

    Remember when the NAR used to say ‘Buy now or be priced out forever!’ Or after the bubble burst, I’d go to open houses and realtors would say ‘it’s a good time to buy because interest rates are going up soon.’ To which I say, ‘what does it matter what the interest rates are?’ As of the average mortgage can get higher than what wages can support.

    1. What is Simpleton Young saying.
      Will we soufflé like the last correction?
      We dropped 50-75%

  23. Just think of someone who had a net worth of $3 million at the end of February could’ve been worth $2 million by late March,’ said Patrick Ruble, president of the St. Paul Area Association of Realtors.

    It was only Yellen Bux, Patrick.

  24. Remember we were promised we would be be selling off our childrens’ and grandchildren’ futures and making the U.S. a declining power to help SMALL business. But that was never going to happen.

    https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/20/business/stock-market-live-trading-coronavirus.html?type=styln-live-updates&label=markets&index=0&action=click&module=Spotlight&pgtype=Homepage#link-42781eec

    “Small-business owners have accused some of the country’s largest banks of unfairly prioritizing applications from their wealthiest clients for aid under the government’s $349 billion stimulus.”

    “Customers of JPMorgan Chase and Wells Fargo have sued the banks in federal court, saying data provided by the Small Business Administration on the average size of the loans shows they doled out funds to larger customers first.”

    “The S.B.A., which is administering the stimulus program, known as the Paycheck Protection Program, required the banks to handle applications on a first-come, first-served basis, but they had wide latitude on whose applications to accept.”

    “The lawsuits — two against Chase and one against Wells Fargo — say that the banks chose which applications to accept first, and smaller customers were not given the chance to apply as quickly as larger ones in some cases. In other instances, the lawsuits say, the banks sat on some smaller customers’ applications instead of immediately submitting them to the S.B.A. for approval.”

    We could have let everyone go bankrupt, and then rebooted after all the paper wealth stolen in the past 40 years went “poof.” We had that chance twice. Instead, we opted for permanent oligopoly and indentured servitude.

  25. We are having a large exodus of people leaving the Midland-Odessa area,’ Monica Mauldin, Owner of All Star Moving Laborers said. Combine the oil bust and COVID-19 with some of the highest rent in the state, Mauldin understands why people would want to get out.

    The price of oil just went negative for the first time ever. Better start sawin’ and slashin’ like you mean it, greedhead landlords and FBs.

  26. But I know that they want to get out of here, and so it’s pulverizing for us,’ Mauldin said.”

    Once shacks crater and apartments become affordable, maybe some of those people will come back.

  27. You know, they’re really trying to stay in their home.

    It’s not their home, Monica, until the final mortgage check clears.

  28. If you see a Realtor in your neighborhood, lock the door and call the authorities immediately.

        1. not campbells way too much salt as are most anything canned, i use Himalayan pink salt has a nice robust flavor

  29. Here is a great anti-regulation, pro-free-market trade.

    https://www.marketwatch.com/story/us-oils-may-contract-skids-about-20-at-nadir-as-crudes-woes-continue-2020-04-19?mod=home-page

    “West Texas Intermediate crude for May delivery CLK20, -304.98% CL.1, -304.98% finished down $55.90, or 306%, at negative $37.63 a barrel. The May contract expires on Tuesday.”

    You form an LLC. You “buy” the oil. You get a bunch of those tanker trucks that aren’t working because no one is using gasoline. You take the to the water supply of cities throughout the Southwest, and open the spigots, taking advantage of the fact that the oil industry was exempted from the Clean Water Act back in the Bush II administration.

    No only are you paid to dump the oil, but you could probably get the various cities to pay you to stop dumping the oil. Then extract the money from the LLC, and let it go bankrupt, and you are the kind of business executive that has been the most successful and admired for the past 40 years. Just be sure and throw around some campaign contributions just in case.

  32. $till the “Happie$t.Place.On.Earth!” . … e$pecially iffin’$ yer an executive on $alary!

    BUSINE$$:

    Di$ney stop$ paying 100,000 worker$; cuts mean $500 million a month in saving$.

    Disney is suspending pay for thousands of so-called ca$t member$ at Disneyland in Anaheim and its other park$.

    The deci$ion leaves Di$ney $taff reliant on $tate benefit$ — public $upport that could run to hundred$ of million$ of dollar$ over coming months — even as the company protect$ executive-bonu$ scheme$ and a $1.5-billion dividend payment$ due in July.

    San Diego Tribune | By ANNA NICOLAOU AND ALEX BARKER
    FINANCIAL TIMES | APRIL 20, 2020

    He cautions, however, that Disney is probably braced for a “very prolonged shutdown.” Disney made nearly $7 billion in operating income from its parks, experiences and products business last year, making up nearly half of all operating profits. Shares in Disney have fallen by a quarter since the outbreak of the virus.

    “With labor accounting for approximately 45% of operating expenses and 33% of total expenses, we assume notable savings,” said JPMorgan’s Alexia Quadrani, who estimates the furloughs, alongside other cost cuts, will save Disney about $500 million a month.

    Disney will provide full healthcare benefits for staff placed on unpaid leave. From April 19 onward, it urged employees to apply for the extra $600 a week of federal $upport available through the $2-trillion$ coronaviru$ $timulu$ package.

    (HAPPY.CAMPER$.IN.FLORIDA!)🎉

    In Orlando, home to more than 70,000 Di$ney ca$t members, Florida offers unemployment payment$ of up to $275 a week for 12 week$ — among the lowe$t rates in the U.$.

    1. Today’s corporate Disney is a grotesque caricature of the vision Walt Disney created all those decades ago.

  33. United reported losing $2.1B in it’s quarterly announcement. How much will they lose next quarter? $4B? $6B? Or did they perhaps pull forward every future expense they could?

    There’s gonna be a lot of cheap airplanes for sale world wide.

    1. “…lot of cheap airplanes for sale world wide….”

      Craigslist ad in a couple of months:

      Posted by United Airlines

      ‘ Take our low air-frame hours 757 off our hands and we will throw in $250,000 cash and a coupon good for 10,000 barrels of crude oil.’

      Question for HBB readers: Could the same concept be applied to SFR mortgages?

      Me thinks a lot of people are going to try to get rid of a lot of *very* expensive paper in the upcoming months.

      1. Take our low air-frame hours 757

        Is there such a thing? The last one was built in 2004.

        A colleague who used to work at Boeing said that in his opinion the 757 was the best airliner Boeing ever made. “Most over engineered” were his words . Boeing made 1000 of them since 1983 and over 600 were still in service last month. But this could be the farewell to the 757, which are thirsty and pretty old.

    2. Good thing Boeing employees are slated to go back to work soon.

      Maybe they could make flying humane again? 40% of the population is obese but the seats are designed for Auschwitz survivors. Before all this I read that one airline, I think it was Quantas, was testing Sydney to New York. Flight time was maybe 25 hours? Of course that wont be happening anytime soon but who wants to spend 25 straight hours in one of those torture chambers?

      1. 40% of the population is obese but the seats are designed for Auschwitz survivors.

        Well, for a fee, you can upgrade to bigger seats. But it will cost you, pilgrim.

        And it doesn’t matter how wide they make the fuselage, airlines will just cram in more seats.

        I have to admit, I get a kick out of watching old travel videos where passengers are well dressed (suits and ties for the gents, nice dresses for the ladies) and the 707 or DC-8 has just 4 very wide seats across. And none of the passengers is fat.

        The last time I flew, last December, people were taking huge dogs with them into the cabin. I won’t bother to describe my fellow travelers, you already know what they’re like.

      2. “Flight time was maybe 25 hours?”

        It’s an incredible feat of engineering since these jumbo jets must also lift-off with that fuel load. By contrast, some of the large bombers used in Desert Storm were so loaded with munitions that they had to be fueled to capacity by “air-to-air” tankers once they were aloft.

        1. I thought that sounded too long so I looked it up. According to google the Quantas tests took about 19 hours. My flights between SFO and China always fell within 10-14 depending on wind speed and direction.

          1. I was under the impression that those super long flights would be on extended range 787 and A350’s

            The thought of being cooped up in a coach class seat for almost 20 hours gives me the heebie jeebies. It’s bad enough being on a jet for 9 hours. But I guess if you’re in a hurry …

          2. You are correct, my recall was bad – although maybe with boarding time and deplaning it will be closer to 25 🙁

            Ive flown SF to Sydney back in the day, that was 14. Tack on 5 to NY and youre at 19. That’s painful. I did HNL to NY last fall, brutal.

  34. Grizzlies gonna growl…

    ‘The world is more screwed up’ than the stock market is currently reflecting, warns billionaire investor
    Published: April 20, 2020 at 2:29 p.m. ET
    By Shawn Langlois
    Howard Marks, co-founder at Oaktree Capital Group LLC Bloomberg News/Landov

    ‘We’re only down 15% from the all-time high of Feb. 19… it seems to me the world is more than 15% screwed up.’

    That’s Howard Marks, the billionaire founder of Oaktree Capital, commenting in a CNBC interview Monday on what he sees as a huge disconnect between what the coronavirus pandemic is doing to the global economy and what we’re seeing in the stock market.

    “It took seven years to get back to the 2000 highs in 2007. It took 5½ years to get back to the 2007 highs in late 2012,” Marks explained. “So, is it really appropriate that, given all the bad news in the world today, we should get back to the highs in only three months? That seems inappropriately positive.”

    Separately, he echoed that bearishness in a recent memo, saying that the chances are high that the Dow, S&P and the Nasdaq Composite Index will all slip below those recent nadirs.
    …

    1. Market Extra
      Mark Mobius says stock market could suffer another coronavirus hit, but be ready to snap up ‘incredible bargains’
      Published: April 20, 2020 at 12:52 p.m. ET
      By William Watts
      Emerging-markets pioneer says ESG principles will return to spotlight as result of coronavirus crisis
      Mark Mobius Bloomberg

      Mark Mobius, the emerging-markets investing pioneer, is confident the world economy will bounce back from the COVID-19 pandemic and offer investors a round of bargains—but sees the potential for another round of pain.

      In an interview via a Zoom conference call from his hotel room in Durban, South Africa, where the co-founder of Mobius Capital Partners has been stuck for two weeks thanks to travel restrictions, Mobius said he suspects the stock market will see a W-shaped recovery. That means the rebound off the March lows will likely be followed by a retest of those levels before finally proceeding back to the previous highs and beyond.

      That is in contrast with investors who have argued that the severe economic pain from lockdowns put in place to contain the pandemic will be short-lived and that the historic monetary and fiscal stimulus being pumped into economies around the world will foster a V-shaped bounce for both the global economy and equities.
      …

      1. be ready to snap up ‘incredible bargains’

        Like oil? Turns out most incredible bargains only happen if almost nobody can take advantage of them…that’s the only reason they become incredible bargains. Won’t happen as long as people are licking their chops waiting for them. Those people have to get wiped out first, too.

        1. I was seriously considering $50k of Boeing shares a few months ago, but my engineering background taught me to respect the inherent risk in the things that I had little experience. That would have hurt more than falling off of my road bicycle at speed on a chip seal surface.

        2. “Turns out most incredible bargains only happen if almost nobody can take advantage of them…that’s the only reason they become incredible bargains.”

          Great in$ight! Seems like the folks with access to the Fed’s special low-rate crisis lending programs are usually well positioned to snap up assets at such fire sale moments.

          1. Seems like the folks with access to the Fed’s special low-rate crisis lending programs are usually well positioned to snap up assets at such fire sale moments.

            Yes. But even they can’t conjure oil tankers and giant salt caves out of thin air at will. Dollars on the other hand…

    2. “So, is it really appropriate that, given all the bad news in the world today, we should get back to the highs in only three months? That seems inappropriately positive.”

      Yeah, looks an awful lot like one of those 1929 charts with the arrow pointing to the top of the second hump in the rollercoaster saying “you are here”. But luckily our Fed isn’t hobbled by all those old timey expectations of doing what’s best for the country in the long run like they used to be.

      I remember when people used to refer to the last recession before 1929 that hardly anyone talks about now. I think of it every time somebody refers to 2009 as a major event.

  35. I didn’t even realize we had lost Mr. Drucker

    Rest in peace Eb

    Tom Lester

    Tom Lester was the last surviving cast member of the classic sitcom “Green Acres.” He starred as Eb, the wisecracking farmhand for Mr. and Mrs. Douglas.

    1. There are many tragedies in this life, Jeff.

      George Harrison died in November 2001 but despite the aftermath of 9/11 and the fog of impending war, Time Magazine still gave him a cover.

  37. “The second likely outcome is a decline in values. During the Great Recession, property values declined 25-36% from the market peak at the end of 2007 to the market bottom in the fall of 2009. If the volume of sales declines dramatically as it did during the Great Recession, it’s also likely the market could experience a decline in values on the same scale as we saw during the Great Recession.”

    I have this hanging on my wall.

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