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The General Belief That May Become The Guillotine

It’s Friday desk clearing time for this blogger. “Over the last five months, we’ve seen more inventory than we have in years previously. Mona Spencer, branch manager for John L. Scott’s Redmond office, said buyers may be able to do some negotiating on price and also secure more protections under the contract. ‘As more inventory enters the market, buyers have more options,’ she said. ‘Bidding wars are less likely and we are seeing some price reductions. This does not mean that houses are falling in value; it means that the rate of appreciation is decelerating.'”

“San Diego County home sales, following a national trend, recently hit one of its lowest points in more than a decade. Trulia said 26.4 percent of listings in the San Diego metropolitan area had at least one price reduction in August, the most of the 100 metros studied.”

“Question: Do you think San Diego County’s housing market is more vulnerable than other parts of the nation? Gary London, London Moeder Advisors – NO: Our housing market will continue in a perpetual state of supply/demand imbalance, a result of the scarcity of land, over regulation and the dearth of new homebuilding opportunities. This props up San Diego and other West Coast housing markets. However, it appears that we have now entered ‘post peak’ territory, which will impact both housing price increases and the pace of sales. Expect both to falter, especially as interest rates rise.”

“‘I see houses everywhere for sale,’ said Chatham County homeowner, Edwina Scarboro. Scarboro put their house on the market three years ago. She’s now accepting the reality that she is selling a lot that happens to have a home on it.”

“For the past few years in Sioux Falls, it’s been a seller’s market. However, that could soon be changing. Many economy observers say the end of 2018 could bring an end to the hot housing industry. That has area realtors getting creative. Sioux Falls Realtor Michael Gross decided to throw a broker open house featuring a food truck.”

“‘We want to invite all the realtors, the builders and the general public out to a house to market blitz a house to try to get it to sell,’ Gross said. ‘There’s the population of South Dakota that we’re so used to the winters that we don’t want to move during the winter. The only people we really have who are really looking for houses are people from California, Arizona, Denver.'”

“B.C.’s hot real estate market is expected to continue to slow over the next two years, according to new figures from the Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation. ‘If you were looking to buy a condo in the first quarter of 2018, you were competing sometimes against 10-12 offers,’ said Adil Dinani, a Coquitlam-based realtor with Royal LePage. ‘Now, you can probably approach that same property being the only offer on the table and… probably negotiating off the price a little bit instead of feeling like your back is off the wall.'”

“The slowing Korean economy has been shadowed by the possibility of a steep asset devaluation. A simultaneous fall in stock and real estate prices could see the country go through something similar to Japan’s ‘two lost decades’ spanning the 1990s and 2000s, economists here warn.”

“Lee Jong-woo, a researcher at IBK Investment and Securities, said asset prices had risen to an ‘abnormal level’ on the back of low interest rates over the past years, warning the bubble might be about to burst.”

“Soon-to-be-published research will show roughly 22 per cent of China’s urban housing stock is unoccupied, according to Professor Gan Li, who runs the main nationwide study. That adds up to more than 50 million empty homes, he said. ‘There’s no other single country with such a high vacancy rate,’ said Gan, of Chengdu’s Southwestern University of Finance and Economics. ‘Should any crack emerge in the property market, the homes to be offloaded will hit China like a flood.'”

“Last month, Qiu Baoxing, a former vice housing minister, said the rate is 10 to 20 per cent in Beijing. One example of a vacant home is a villa on the outskirts of Shanghai that 27-year-old Natalie Feng’s parents bought for her. The two-story residence was meant to be a weekend escape for the family of three. In reality, it’s empty most of the time, and Feng says it’s too much trouble to rent it out.”

“‘For every weekend we spend there, we need to drive for an hour first, and clean up for half a day,’ Feng said.”

“The exclusive harbour enclaves of the super-rich are no exception to the Sydney property downturn, with up to $500,000 being knocked off the value of homes. Last week, the Daily Telegraph reported prices across the city plummeted by as much as 14 per cent in the past year — the biggest annual drop in almost 30 years. And it seems the luxury market might just be the hardest hit.”

“Bankrupt former oil and gas magnate Jerry Ren was forced to wave goodbye to $500,000 when he sold his Warrawee mansion for the still princely sum of $11 million. He had bought the vast home, dubbed the Chilton Hilton, for $11.5 million eight years ago.”

“An Kai Meng, director of the collapsed high-end Waitan restaurant in China Town, also lost half a million dollars when he sold his Castle Cove home off-market for $5.5 million. The grand six-bedroom residence had cost a little more than $6 million in 2011 and after adding in costs such as stamp duty on the purchase and estate agent commissions, Mr Meng’s losses would have been close to $1 million.”

“‘Sellers who are motivated and willing to meet the market essentially reset price points. So even if you’re a little stubborn as a seller and want to hold onto your price, unfortunately you are now at the mercy of others who are dropping prices to meet buyer demand,’ inner-west agent Matt Hayson said. ‘The market has certainly slipped faster than most forecast. It hasn’t been just the speed of the decline but also how far it has moved too.'”

“Agents in all parts of Sydney have witnessed huge drops in value — and it seems few places are immune.”

“Unfortunately, same as the Kenyan stock market which was promising the same and then collapsed, the real estate dream was hiding the same risks and dangers for those who irrationally jumped into this market, making investments without considering the risks, sustainability and capacity of the market.”

“It does not require for someone to be an expert analyst in order to understand that real estate market in Kenya cannot be sustainable at current levels of pricing.”

“The types of properties that developers and investors had preferred to invest over the last ten years were targeting the wrong group, representing only a small fraction of the current huge housing demand of the country. There was a fundamental issue with this market. Too many investors, but very few qualified users for the market supply.”

“Kenyans’ obsession for risky investments, the general belief that you cannot go wrong with land and property and the inability to understand investment risk may become the guillotine that will cut the head of her promising economy.”

“People have to be prepared to face losses. The sooner investors realise this, the better for the market. If investors do not face the reality now and fail to make the required correction moves, then panic and a possible irrational sale-offs could push the market to a collapsing point.”

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This Post Has 30 Comments

  1. The last article is worth reading in full.

    ‘Bidding wars are less likely and we are seeing some price reductions.’

    Whatever happened to that Redmond poster?

    3. “Whatever happened to that Redmond poster?”

      Still trying to figure why the takeoff on a garage re-roof is 3x the cost of skinning a new structure.

  2. Also from the San Diego link:

    Alan Gin, University of San Diego – “NO: The economy of San Diego is still very strong, with low unemployment and good job growth. That provides underlying strength to the housing market. One cause for the slowing real estate market is that prices have surged to levels that make it difficult for many people to buy houses. Prices may fall a little, but that would lead to buyers coming in as houses become more affordable. This provides a floor for housing prices and will prevent a steep crash.”

    David Ely, San Diego State University – “NO: After years of rapid appreciation, home price increases are slowing due to higher mortgage rates and rising inventories. However, the economy is still healthy, local new home construction has been modest and lenders have been more cautious in extending credit. In this economic environment, some home sellers will need to adjust their expectations and lower their asking price. However, these conditions do not seem likely to lead to a market collapse.”

    It’s hard to decide who has their head further up their ass. There was this:

    Kelly Cunningham, San Diego Institute for Economic Research – “YES: San Diego’s housing affordability ranking “sunk” to eighth lowest in the nation according to the latest (second quarter 2018) National Association of Home Builders report. Only 14.2 percent of homes sold in San Diego were affordable to median household income based on standard mortgage underwriting criteria. This is the lowest level since the fourth quarter of 2007, just before the last housing crash. Among the nation’s 20 least affordable metros for housing, 19 are in California.”

    Golly, such simple but ground breaking insight. It’s as if a child could understand it.

  3. ‘That adds up to more than 50 million empty homes’

    ‘the rate is 10 to 20 per cent in Beijing. One example of a vacant home is a villa on the outskirts of Shanghai that 27-year-old Natalie Feng’s parents bought for her. The two-story residence was meant to be a weekend escape for the family of three. In reality, it’s empty most of the time, and Feng says it’s too much trouble to rent it out’

    Wa? But we were assured the Chinese just build cities differently and that hordes of peasants would swarm these empty cities to live in.

    Guess that was all BS. I did say years ago this would be the outcome.

    1. Interesting price history on this recent sale in Chestnut Hill, a leafy affluent suburb close to Boston:

      https://www.zillow.com/homes/recently_sold/house,condo,apartment_duplex,townhouse_type/56574000_zpid/1-_baths/3000000-10500000_price/12570-43996_mp/0-500_hoa/globalrelevanceex_sort/42.477794,-71.009961,42.317558,-71.257153_rect/11_zm/

      11/1/2018 Sold $3,641,625 -7.8%
      9/6/2018 Listing removed $3,950,000 —
      6/18/2018 Price change $3,950,000 -7.1%
      4/30/2018 Price change $4,250,000 -7.6%
      9/12/2017 Listed for sale $4,599,000 -2.1%
      1/14/2013 Listing removed $4,699,995 —
      6/13/2012 Price change $4,699,995 -5.9%
      1/27/2011 Listed for sale $4,995,000 +13.5%
      1/16/2008 Sold $4,400,000 +115.7%
      9/5/1990 Sold $2,040,000 —

  5. “Bankrupt former oil and gas magnate Jerry Ren was forced to wave goodbye to $500,000 when he sold his Warrawee mansion for the still princely sum of $11 million. He had bought the vast home, dubbed the Chilton Hilton, for $11.5 million eight years ago.”

    “An Kai Meng, director of the collapsed high-end Waitan restaurant in China Town, also lost half a million dollars when he sold his Castle Cove home off-market for $5.5 million. The grand six-bedroom residence had cost a little more than $6 million in 2011 and after adding in costs such as stamp duty on the purchase and estate agent commissions, Mr Meng’s losses would have been close to $1 million.”

    And these idiots brought in 2010 and 2011. Whats gonna happened to the idiots (mostly foreigners) that brought in 2018, 2017, 2016, 2015, etc….when “bidding wars” were everywhere? 8 years of fantasy bubble appreciation wiped out in just a few months. Hey, at least it was cheaper than renting!

  6. This tower of airboxes is slated for the same downtown site where the Trump Tower Tampa was to be built. I’d thought that opulent condo launch parties were so 2005 — back then, we had one here that was almost Cirque de Soleil, with acrobats and everything — but maybe not.
    _____________________________________/

    “Even before tonight’s formal opening of an opulent sales center, prospective buyers had placed deposits on condos valued at nearly $70 million. And 20 percent of those buyers reserved two units with the idea of joining them into one 4,000-square-foot-plus condo.

    …

    The sales center also contains a small version of what will be the tower’s lobby, designed by Thom Filicia of TV’s Queer Eye for the Straight Guy. It will have a concierge desk partially covered in leather, soaring stone walls with a distinctive grain and large, and cream-colored floor tiles with inlaid strips of brass instead of grout.

    “I want the lobby to feel modern and simple and clean but also so it will age well,” said Filicia, who bustled about hanging photos and setting out dishes of pistachios in the hours before guests arrived.

    Why pistachios and not almonds? someone asked. “Because people won’t eat them,” Filicia said. “They don’t want to open the shells.”

    http://www.tampabay.com/news/business/Bye-bye-offices-hello-more-condos-in-Tampa-s-50-plus-story-Riverwalk-Place-_173362366

  7. ur housing market will continue in a perpetual state of supply/demand imbalance, a result of the scarcity of land, over regulation and the dearth of new homebuilding opportunities.

    Um, yeah…as the productive portion of the population flees the state while illegals flood in and the social parasite population grows exponentially, you might want to rethink those assumptions. California is paradise lost.

    1. I-10 in Southern California is the only place in the country I’ve ever seen barbed wire protecting the highway overpass signs from graffiti.

  8. “‘We want to invite all the realtors, the builders and the general public out to a house to market blitz a house to try to get it to sell,’ Gross said.

    Serious buyers don’t require pathetic stunts like food trucks. So it would seem your open house “blitz” is only attracting freeloaders and tire kickers.

  11. Caitlyn Jenner’s Malibu home has reportedly been destroyed by wildfires. TMZ reported on Friday that the reality star’s home burned down on Friday after being engulfed by the devastating Southern California wildfires that have forced Malibu into a mandatory evacuation.

  13. “‘We want to invite all the realtors, the builders and the general public out to a house to market blitz a house to try to get it to sell,’ Gross said. ‘There’s the population of South Dakota that we’re so used to the winters that we don’t want to move during the winter. The only people we really have who are really looking for houses are people from California, Arizona, Denver.’”
    ________________________________________/

    I don’t know what’s dumber, the fact that California real estate speculators are descending on South Dakota, or the statement that “we’re so used to the winters that we don’t want to move during the winter.”

  14. “…it appears that we have now entered ‘post peak’ territory, which will impact both housing price increases and the pace of sales. Expect both to falter, especially as interest rates rise.”

    Fall?

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