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Owners Were Advised They Should Expect To Take A Loss, But It Was Their Best Hope

A report from the LA Daily News. “The California Association of Realtors reported March’s statewide record $759,000 median sales price for an existing single-family house was up 24% in a year, the largest gain since 2013. Even crazier: It took about eight days for a listing to go into escrow, the fastest-selling speed ever. Similar fervor at the national level led Lawrence Yun, chief economist of the National Association of Realtors, to recently mock discussions of potential home-price problems in a LinkedIn post: ‘People are googling more about ‘housing bubble’. Yet, home prices in no risk of a decline due to lack of supply.'”

“Now, I could have authored a pithy rebuttal to Yun, who works at a trade group that obviously advocates homeownership. But somebody else crushed it so well, why try and top it? John Burns, founder of the respected homebuilder consultancy that bears his name: ‘No risk of a decline?’ None? I am reminded of former NAR Chief Economist David Lereah’s book in 2005 titled ‘Are You Missing the Real Estate Boom? Why Home Values and Other Real Estate Investments Will Climb Through the End of the Decade — and How to Profit from Them.’ Look it up on Amazon. Today looks much more to me like a ‘High Risk, High Reward’ market than a ‘no risk’ market.'”

From The Hill. “Experts say there’s no clear end in sight to the homebuying frenzy, but they don’t see the same red flags that preceded the collapse of the mid-2000s housing bubble. ‘A lot of the people who are buying today … are among the most creditworthy in the history of mortgage lending,’ said Reggie Edwards, an economist at Redfin. ‘They have the highest levels of savings, and they’re taking out loans that have the most equity off the bat because they’re putting so much cash upfront. I don’t think we have any concerns about if people can afford the homes that they’re buying right now, especially compared to 2006, 2007.'”

From DS News. “As of last Tuesday, 2.33 million, or 44% of homeowners, remain in COVID-related forbearance plans, including 2.6% of Fannie/Freddie loans; 7.8% of FHA/VA loans, and 5% of private and portfolio loans. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau reports that more homeowners are behind on their mortgages than at any time since 2010, the peak of the Great Recession. Nearly 1.7 million borrowers are scheduled to exit forbearance programs in September and the following months, with many a year or more behind on their mortgage payments.”

From Kiplinger. “Like ghosts in a haunted house, law firms are pursuing property owners, threatening them with the loss of their property for unpaid second mortgages — ‘zombie’ mortgages. Some people thought their mortgages were discharged in bankruptcy. Others wanted to pay on their mortgages but couldn’t because there was no longer anywhere to send their payments when their lenders disappeared during the mortgage crisis a few years back.”

“Hanford, Calif., real estate attorney Ron Jones is ‘far more familiar with these situations than I would like to be, as they are terrifying to people who are suddenly at risk of losing their home.’ ‘Zombie second mortgages step out of the past, haunting property owners, and threatening their ability to remain in their home or commercial building,’ Jones says. ‘Many property owners were under the impression that by including the second mortgage in a bankruptcy they were no longer responsible for it. They keep the first current, but stopped paying on the second. In reality, the lender still has a lien against the property. Mortgage debt (secured debt) generally is not dischargeable through bankruptcy. You do not own the home free and clear. You are not off the hook for the mortgage.'”

From Seattle PI in Washington. “Could Seattle’s downtown property market downturn be a good thing for buyers? Yes, if it means reduced prices — and right now, it does. The median sold home price, year-over-year, would normally be the most telling of a downturn, and in the case of Seattle’s downtown, that median sold price is down to $591,200, a 7.6 percent decline year-over-year. More striking though it the reversal in market demand for downtown properties: As of quarter one, downtown sales have declined 44.1% year-over-year, and those that did sell had to wait a long time to do so: the average days on the market for quarter one was 33, up 94.1% this year.”

“Downtown property developers have responded. For example, The Spire is a $350 million, 41-story luxury condominium tower in the heart of downtown Seattle. Now, Spire units can be yours for less than they were originally set to sell for, even though the tower hasn’t even been fully completed. ‘Spire is announcing limited-time price reductions (up to 10%) in advance of the building’s opening later this summer,’ a spokesperson for Spire told the Seattle P-I.”

“It’s not just luxury towers dropping prices either. 33 downtown Seattle homes have dropped their prices in the last 30 days, including everything from a one bedroom unit on Vine to a two-bedroom on Cedar.”

From ABC News in Australia. “A plan to sell off the beleaguered Mascot Towers in Sydney’s south has been thrown into doubt following an intervention by retail businesses owners on the ground floor of the building. It’s been almost two years since large cracks appeared in the basement of the 10-storey building, forcing the evacuation of residents, who had been unable to return to their homes since.”

“Two weeks ago the building’s 132 apartment owners were told by the owners’ corporation it was no longer financially viable to fix the building and their best option was to cut their losses and sell to a developer. Now several retail businesses, which have been blocked from entering their premises since February, have made an application to the NSW Civil and Administrative Tribunal.”

“Owners were advised they should expect to take a loss of between 70 and 80 per cent, but it was their best hope of recouping any money. ‘We have to decide whether we are going to continue to lose money or try to recover some,’ Gary Deigan told a meeting of owners two weeks ago.”

“They also want the compulsory manager to authorise repairs to allow both residents and business owners to reoccupy the building. ‘They did that to stop the sale because … they don’t want to lose their spot,’ one owner, who wished to remain anonymous, told the ABC. ‘This is the last nail in the residents’ coffin. This will push everyone to bankruptcy.'”

From Good Returns in New Zealand. “The latest Property Market & Economic Report reveals mortgaged investors’ buying surged from 27% to a record-high 29% share of purchases, reinforcing the heated market, which led to the Government’s recent policies in an effort to dampen the housing market. CoreLogic chief property economist Kelvin Davidson says the figures in the report are a clear ‘line in the sand’ following the extension of the bright-line test and scrapping of mortgage interest tax deductibility.”

“Davidson says it’s now all about what happens next. ‘Household debt is high relative to income, and to some extent the debt has only been sustainable in recent years because of low mortgage rates,’ says Davidson. He says the recent strength of the property market was always going to be unsustainable and a slowdown is likely to occur in the second half of 2021 – ‘the Government changes just reinforce that.'”

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This Post Has 115 Comments

  1. ‘the recent strength of the property market was always going to be unsustainable’

    Everybody knew.

    ‘People are googling more about ‘housing bubble’. Yet, home prices in no risk of a decline due to lack of supply’

    Rocket go now.

    ‘more homeowners are behind on their mortgages than at any time since 2010’

    Oh, that!

  2. People are much more about the bubble this time bc they realize there is no free lunch. In 2006 people never fathomed they could lose. Then they did…Yet here we are

  3. that median sold price is down to $591,200, a 7.6 percent decline year-over-year…the average days on the market for quarter one was 33′

    Firstly, this is just a statistic. Could be more, could be less. But would you slash yer price instead of waiting 30 days? The SPI also regularly reports that they don’t count the hundreds/thousands of unsold developer units in any days on market, inventory etc.

  4. ‘This is the last nail in the residents’ coffin. This will push everyone to bankruptcy’

    Well it was cheaper than renting. Oh, right you haven’t been able to live there anyway. Wow, that sux for you.

  5. ‘Hanford, Calif., real estate attorney Ron Jones is ‘far more familiar with these situations than I would like to be, as they are terrifying to people who are suddenly at risk of losing their home’

    Wa? In California! But the gold nuggets in the dirt driveway? You can always sell? Thornberg!!

      1. Moral of the Story: “Mortgage debt (secured debt) generally is not dischargeable through bankruptcy.”

          2. If you’re lucky, it will be forgiven, and your time share will come for free, especially if you are are a person whose life matters to Democrats.

        2. Not exactly true. A better way to look at it is like this: After bankruptcy, the homeowner no longer owes the money, but the house still does. The house owes the money to the mortgage company even though the homeowner does not n

          1. The article is talking about second mortgages, which I think in this context refers to the separate loan for the down payment. 80% first mortgage + 20% second mortgage = no money down.

            Seconds appear to be treated differently than first loans: they can’t be modified, or they’re recourse loans in case of foreclosure, or they can’t be discharged, or similar. IIRC, there were issues with seconds in 2009-2010 too, where people got a mod for the mortgage but lost the house anyway because they couldn’t pay the second mortgage. That would make sense, because ISTM that a second mortgage is more like a personal loan for cash, not a house mortgage.

  6. ‘A lot of the people who are buying today … are among the most creditworthy in the history of mortgage lending,’ said Reggie Edwards, an economist at Redfin. ‘They have the highest levels of savings, and they’re taking out loans that have the most equity off the bat because they’re putting so much cash upfront. I don’t think we have any concerns about if people can afford the homes that they’re buying right now, especially compared to 2006, 2007′

    As I’ve said Reggie, I’m not letting this go:

    We’re Almost Back To 2007

    March 26, 2020

    “As America heads into a deep recession, the $11 trillion residential-mortgage market is in crisis. Investors who buy home loans packaged into bonds are dumping even those with federal backing because of panic that millions might not make their payments. Yet one risky sector had started to show cracks long before the coronavirus pandemic sparked the worst financial meltdown in 12 years: the federal government’s largest affordable-housing program, whose lenient terms are geared toward marginal borrowers.”

    “As real estate prices soared in recent years, working-class adults everywhere have increasingly relied on mortgages backed by the Federal Housing Administration — and U.S. taxpayers. Since 2007, the FHA’s portfolio has tripled in value to more than $1.2 trillion, almost 11% of the market. While private lenders make these loans, they are packaged into Ginnie Mae bonds, common in mutual funds and pensions.”

    “Before Covid-19 started roiling China, a November FHA report found that 27% of borrowers last year spent more than half their incomes on debt, a level it describes as ‘unprecedented.’ The share of FHA loans souring in their first six months has doubled over the last three years to almost 1%.”

    “Not long ago, Alex Castillo drove his shiny black Infiniti SUV through an office park north of the San Antonio airport, along a busy seven-mile stretch of highway that loan officers call ‘Mortgage Row’ because of its abundance of small independent mortgage companies that dominate FHA lending. Castillo, who has the words ‘The Dream Starts Here’ stitched into his jacket, works for Pennsylvania-based American Residential Lending. Oddly, amid the pandemic, his business is booming. His customers locked in FHA mortgages after interest rates plunged this month — adding to federally backed mortgage debt.”

    “‘If the government tells me you’re good enough to get a loan, I have to trust and believe in the government,’ Castillo said. ‘Then we just hope and pray that the client doesn’t get foreclosed on.’”

    “In downtown San Antonio, scores of investors stood on a parched lawn beside the city’s historic granite-and-red-sandstone courthouse. It was the first Tuesday of February, the day of the foreclosure auction. Matt Badders, a San Antonio lawyer who represents lenders, auctioned off two houses. The failed mortgages remind him of the run-up to the financial crisis 12 years ago, when lending to customers with spotty credit nearly brought down the world’s financial system. ‘We’re almost back to 2007, when mortgage originators are waking people up on park benches, saying sign here,’ Badders said.”

    “At the auction, the crowd bid on 338 homes, a third with FHA mortgages, according to Roddy’s Foreclosure Listing Service. One house had dual master bedrooms, a game room and granite kitchen counters. It sold for $202,000 — $52,000 less than the homeowner borrowed only two years ago. The taxpayer-backed FHA insurance fund will take a loss.”

    “Dave Stevens, FHA commissioner under President Barack Obama and former chief executive officer of the Mortgage Bankers Association, said a recession will expose hidden risks in home lending. ‘This should be an alarm bell to policymakers,’ Stevens said. ‘Sometimes you get blinded by a good economy and suddenly look at it and see a bubble of defaults coming.’”

    “The federal government has decided it doesn’t want to pursue — and has asked a judge to dismiss — a lawsuit against Utah-based Academy Mortgage Corp. The judge refused. The suit claims the company’s staff would repeatedly feed information into an automated federal underwriting system, manipulating it until the computer gave the green light. ‘Decline is a curse word,’ Plaintiff Gwen Thrower, a former underwriter, quoted a manager as saying. ‘We don’t use it.’”

    http://housingbubble.blog/?p=3070

    Reggie is a lion.

    1. Lets say he is right….It has no bearing on whether housing will decline a lot anyway. It may not be rampant foreclosures this time but you can be sure that values will in fact go down

      1. There’s already more foreclosures than last decade. Which was previously the highest in modern history. It’s like subprime. They just don’t call it that anymore. Are you fooled by piss on yer back they call rain?

        1. Well yes but they threw everything at it in the GFC and therefore tried to limit foreclosures. I don’t think they will do that this time.

    2. ‘A lot of the people who are buying today … are among the most creditworthy in the history of mortgage lending,’

      That must be why the FED is still buying up a huge swath of the MBS market. Nobody else wants the MBS (emphasis on the BS rather than the M) that is so historically credit worthy.

  7. SF Gate — I bought a house in the Bay Area’s hottest market. It was as wild as everyone said it would be (5/3/2021):

    “I’m still smarting from a beautiful adobe-style home we saw a week before. The price was right, the house was spacious and beautiful — and the electrical wiring was almost 100 years old and could burn the whole place down at any moment.

    After much debating and wringing of hands, we passed on the beautiful adobe, which ended up selling for almost $70,000 over asking price, an amount that, had we paid it, would have meant we had no money leftover to replace the electrical anyway.”

    https://www.sfgate.com/realestate/article/Vallejo-real-estate-Bay-Area-hottest-market-16139418.php

    100 years old?

    Just put a penny in the fuse box and walk away a winner!

    3. 100 years?

      Electrical is the least of their problems.

      Just wait when new owners discover that plumbing is fabricated from lead pipe.

      Wonder how that roof is doing?

      If the property has a basement, did escrow instructions stipulate a test for Radon gas?

      Many older, rural (in the 100 year ago time period) properties routinely stored gasoline in backyard storage tanks as the service station infrastructure was not yet built out. I am sure the savvy new owners stipulated in the escrow instructions that the site must be test for toxic waste.

      Nothing to see here, move along.

    4. Some of these real old houses don’t have fire-stops in the walls; it’s those short horizontal 2x4s or 2x6s between the studs. In a fire the walls act like a chimney flue, the hot air quickly rising to the attic, which acts to pull in cool outside air, the perfect ingredient for combustion. Within a few minutes these houses can be fully engulfed in flames!

      1. ire-stops in the walls; ”

        So that’s what those things are for ? Thanks for the info

      2. Not to mention it’s in the crime infested $hit-splattered streets of San Francisco.

      3. I suppose one good thing about a house this old is that it was built with full dimensioned lumber, meaning a 2×4 really measured 2″x4″ and a 2×6 really measured 2″x6″.

        Add to the list termites, an out of level foundation, (a certainty after 100 years). The list just goes on and on.

        The only practical way to deal with so many of these 100+ year old structures is to disassemble carefully, salvaging as much as possible. (ie vintage glass, fixtures, fully dimensioned lumber, etc. , level the lot and start over using modern building techniques.

        One interesting problem I have run into on some of these very old houses is that the doors were all made to non-standard dimensions (’cause there weren’t any standards) are are often way to small and would never pass code today. Why? Because people 100 years ago were noticeably smaller! 5’2″ or thereabouts was normal for a full grown male.

        2. Oh, I forgot to add 1 thing: Lead paint. I challenge anyone to find an original build residential home 70+ years old not covered in lead paint.

          Of course, deconstruction, lead paint remediation can all be done with enough budget $$$.

          But hey, real estate only goes up. To the moon Alice. Who will be first to list a $10mm stucco style tract house? We are all going to be rich, rich, rich.

          1. There’s nothing to salvage. An excavator and 30CY boxes is how demo is done. It’s on the ground by noon and in the boxes and down the road by quitting time.

          2. “…An excavator and 30CY boxes is how demo is done….”

            Sad but true for the majority. However, some structures contain large dimension old growth timbers, solid oak flooring and materials that are simply unobtainable any other way.. So deconstruction can be justified.. Downside, more $$$$

          3. Beams and columns are readily available. Wide flange, glue-lams, etc. So is hardwood flooring.

            Sounds like coveting because “it’s different”. It is different. Wood columns are weaker and generally more costly than steel.

          4. Not to mention period finishes like turned hand-turned turned staircases, fine woodwook built-ins, stained glass, claw-foot tubs*, gingerbread trim, or solid wood doors. But those are only on period houses. Post-war tract homes, just rip it down.

            ————
            *which make no sense to me at all. Those things are frickin’ dangerous, even for the young and spry.

  8. Summary: An NBER paper claims the foreclosure crisis was caused primarily by prime borrowers, and that LTV was the best predictor of foreclosure. During the housing bubble of 2000-2008, average subprime LTVs increased to 85 percent. Today, the median LTV is 95 percent. This suggests to me the market is under more strain than is commonly thought. A recent JP Morgan report claims the opposite, that market is on solid footing.

    ————

    I saw the JP Morgan report about housing on Zerohedge which said lending quality is strong. They blame “affordability products” for the housing market implosion. Affordability products meaning: “The affordability products were inherently risky because they effectively required home prices to keep rising and lending standards to remain accommodative so that homeowners could refinance before their monthly payment became unaffordable. When home prices stopped climbing, these mortgages reset to payments that borrowers could not make, leading to delinquency and foreclosure. As foreclosures and the subsequent distressed sales piled up, home prices fell further, creating a vicious cycle.Affordability products made up almost 40% of all first lien mortgages from 2004 to 2006. Today their share is down to 2%.” source: https://www.zerohedge.com/economics/time-indeed-different-why-morgan-stanley-sees-no-housing-bubble

    However, there was an NBER paper in 2015 ( https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w21261/w21261.pdf ) that found that the housing market crash was a prime phemonenon, not a subprime phenomenon noted, “Current [ed. not just origination] LTV is a powerful predictor of home loss, regardless of borrower type. … Controlling flexibly for current LTV almost fully explains the spike and continued elevated rate of foreclosures and short sales by prime borrowers during the housing bust.” (page 4).

    But, the NBER paper claims, “However, subprime loans comprise a relatively small share of the complete housing market–about 15% in our data and never more than 21% in agiven year.” The JP Morgan report states that 40% of the mortgages made from 2004 to 2006 had an affordability product. The NBER paper looks at 1997 to 2012 data (in the abstract, p2).

    The paper also states, ” Subprime borrower average initial LTVs did increase from about 81% to 85% as the boom built in the mid-2000s. There is a more modest increase in Prime borrower initial LTVs over the same time period. Thus, there was not a dramatic surge in initial leverage ratios for the typical borrower in any sector of the mortgage market while the long boom in house prices built.”

    Page 15 of this Urban Institute report has buyer strength charts – FICO, LTV and DTI. LTV at origination today is typically 95%. As long as prices are increasing, LTV drops: https://www.urban.org/research/publication/housing-finance-glance-monthly-chartbook-march-2021/view/full_report

    Ultimately, the paper might have been a cover for the bailouts (p.28 numbered, 30 actual): “Our findings also can help inform homeowner bailout policy. We are not able to provide a definitive recommendation one way or another, but we can rule out one noteworthy reason offered for not aiding homeowners—namely, that the crisis was mostly about irresponsible subprime sector actors (both lenders and borrowers) who were undeserving of transfers. Of course, this is not to say that there was no such behavior. The evidence from other research and serious journalists is that there was. However, it is clear from the passage of time (and the accumulation and analysis of new data that provides) that the problem was much more widespread and systemic. That is the meaning of a common factor playing such an influential role in determining foreclosure losses across all types of borrowers. That knowledge may or may not have affected policy makers’ and the public’s perspectives on bailouts. What we do know is that significant distress in the housing market which dramatically weakened household sector balance sheets had very large negative macroeconomic effects (Mian and Sufi (2014)).”

    Who knows.
    ————

  9. A nation of dummies …

    “Some people thought their mortgages were discharged in bankruptcy.”

    Bahahahahahahahaha … some people are not in on the joke.

    “Zombie second mortgages step out of the past, haunting property owners, and threatening their ability to remain in their home or commercial building,”

    Say it ain’t so.

    “Many property owners were under the impression …”

    “Under the impression”, more like under the delusion.

    “… that by including the second mortgage in a bankruptcy they were no longer responsible for it.”

    Bahahahahahahahahaha.

    “They keep the first current, but stopped paying on the second.”

    Bahahahahaha … in the meantime the interest on the second keeps right on accumulating. Tick, tick, tick …

    “In reality, the lender still has a lien against the property. Mortgage debt (secured debt) generally is not dischargeable through bankruptcy. You do not own the home free and clear. You are not off the hook for the mortgage.”

    Surprise! Surprise! Surprise!

    1. In layman’s terms, The house owes the money after a bankruptcy, not the borrower.

  10. The craziness has gone beyond home sales in Austin, but it’s taken over the rental market.

    As I mentioned, my landlord asked us to move out at the end of May.

    We started looking at rentals and the market is wild.

    We submitted an application to a home. They received 8 other offers the same day. The owner went with someone else even though we offered 6 months of rent up front. Someone else offered $200 over.

    Every home I’ve tried to get into is either pending or has received multiple applicants. I have not been able to secure a home.

    2. Sorry. I reported last week on some friends’ experience there with a recent purchase (offers falling through due to bid wars, waived inspection, etc.). Seems just like the California housing market…and that’s where many of your rival house hunters are from. We saw the same thing happen in our Midwest community during the early 1990s, when many of the big new homes on the west side of town were snapped up by outmigrating California refugees.

    3. We submitted an application to a home. They received 8 other offers the same day. The owner went with someone else even though we offered 6 months of rent up front. Someone else offered $200 over. ”

      Equity locusts affect even the rental market .

    1. Timberrrrrrrrr

      “The so-called stumpage fee, or what lumber companies pay to land owners for trees, for Louisiana pine sawtimber on March 31 was $22.75 per short ton, according to the latest data from price provider TimberMart-South. That’s the lowest since 2011.”

    3. my stump fee…

      $22.75 per short ton

      I bought some standing black cherry trees on Saturday in PA. Beautiful 24 in diameter logs. I paid a little less than that pine price and the landowner was happy to drag the logs out of the woods for me.

      The casino markets don’t match the real world.

      1. and the landowner was happy to drag the logs out of the woods for me

        Probably because they didn’t want you(someone other than them) to tear up the place getting the trees out?

        1. Probably because a friend of a friend helps to facilitate things, and it was the short path to him having the money.

  13. “They have the highest levels of savings, and they’re taking out loans that have the most equity off the bat because they’re putting so much cash upfront.”

    I read all the time that people who put in large cash downpayments are going to somehow protect the market against losses. But then I read about the myriad low- or zero-downpayment loans to make homes affordable for those with no savings.

    If the latter group is a significant fraction of home purchases, then those making the large downpayments are at risk of losing them if it turns out the current crazy price spike and inventory shrinkage are the parabolic death throes of Housing Bubble 2.0. Those making small downpayments can walk away from underwater mortgages with little damage, while thems who made large downpayments got stucco.

    1. How to buy a house with no credit: First-time home buyers’ guide
      Erik Sherman
      The Mortgage Reports contributor
      March 12, 2021 – 10 min read
      Can you buy a house with no credit?

      First-time home buyers often face challenges more experienced home buyers do not.

      One big difference is that first-timers are less likely to have credit history. If you haven’t borrowed much or used credit cards in the past, your credit report might have little or no information. This is known as a ‘thin file’ in the industry.

      Fortunately, a thin file shouldn’t stop you from buying a home.

      Multiple loan programs today will accept buyers with no credit score at all, as long as they can afford the upfront cost and monthly mortgage payments. Here’s how to get approved.
      …

  14. Neighbors just sold a house for $200,000 more than they paid for it 22 months ago.
    That can be counted as profit or getting paid $30,000 to live in a house for less than 2 years (after monthly charges, commission and costs).

  15. Does the prospect of a 10% stonk market correction worry you?

    Not to worry. If it happens, just BTFD. And if not, buy stonks anyway. The stonk market always goes up, in the long run.

  17. Supply chain disruption?

    Why now? Nobody’s talking about it 6 months ago….not even 3 months ago. Why now? Is covid dead in us? Is this the next crisis?

    1. Nobody’s talking about it 6 months ago

      I heard from people who were having to wait months and months to get a new fridge.

          1. Not running out. With the supply chain disruptions, Macy’s wanted 26 weeks for an order. A used family room sofa is just gross.

      2. “…to wait months and months to get a new fridge.”

        Recently purchased new appliances, a dish washer and a front load washer and dryer set. Basically, you buy what’s “in stock” at the warehouse or line-up in the queue.

    1. WTF is that?? A Minimalist Millenial Gray reno, in Beverly Hills?!? For that price they need to do better.

  20. “Experts say there’s no clear end in sight to the homebuying frenzy, but they don’t see the same red flags that preceded the collapse of the mid-2000s housing bubble.”

    When have the “experts” seen red flags before a bubble collapses?
    They didn’t in 2007.

    And I can easily see conditions changing very quickly, leading to a bubble collapse in Silicon Valley; note that rents, which are a better indication than median house prices, are still down.

  21. I nominate this douchebag as the next FED chairman, he obviously perfected Goebbels’ propaganda method.

    “Similar fervor at the national level led Lawrence Yun, chief economist of the National Association of Realtors, to recently mock discussions of potential home-price problems in a LinkedIn post: ‘People are googling more about ‘housing bubble’. Yet, home prices in no risk of a decline due to lack of supply.’”

  22. Are you concerned that euphoria might result in overvalued stonk prices, leading to subpar future returns to those currently buying?

    1. Yeah, we want our spies to have anxiety disorder.

      The collapse can’t be far off.

      1. The country has already collapsed. We have an illegal coup in charge and they’re desperately trying to paper over everything. Just drive around. I have never seen so many businesses closed down and homeless/unemployed everywhere.

        1. Jeremiah Babe has been showing his viewers the 1%er’s Ferraris and Porsches juxtaposed against “out of business” restaurants and store fronts around Palm Desert, CA.

  24. This is the top voted comment on a Reddit thread about Florida Governor Ron DeSantis banning vaccine passports and lifting all restrictions:

    “The time is coming when the country will be divided between those who are vaccinated and those who are not. If I am running a restaurant or theme park or other high traffic business and I want to advertise a safe COVID free environment I am going to advertise that business as completely safe due to requiring proof of vaccination. It makes sense that more and more businesses will go this route. If I can require shirts and shoes and masks I can require proof of vaccinations. Personally I don’t care if people are stupid enough to endanger their own lives but I will not allow them to hold back my business by endangering my customers lives. Imagine the feeling of freedom and safety upon entering an environment where you can go maskless with no worries. Not being vaccinated should have a price. That decision has real world consequences. Willful ignorance should have a price. Endangering the lives of innocent people should have a price. Ultimately it will be the free market that will decide this issue.”

    Yeah, even if I got vaccinated I’ll go spend my money somewhere else without colored people drinking fountains.

    1. Tucker ran a couple of Shut up and take your jab you racist CNN spots tonight. Not to mention a creepy video of “Hi it’s Barrack” Obama telling kids to get their shot so they can see Grandma and go to Social Justice sporting events again.

      https://youtu.be/XVSRm80WzZk

    2. Endangering the lives of innocent people

      We have a surplus of idiots. If the vaccines protect you, there is no danger from an unvaccinated. If that’s not a reality, then neither is the “vaccine”.

      1. Agree. This new narrative: “If you’re not vaccinated, you could spread this to another person who’s not vaccinated” is total BS.
        Well, why isn’t that other person vaccinated? I see unfilled appointments all over the place, so it’s not like they’re waiting for supply. We’re coming VERY close to the time where unvaccinated people can be considered Refusers. At that point, it’s on them. They should be free to spread it to each other.

        My middle ground would be to require a either vax card OR proof of antibodies. (cards only, NEVER a phone app.) That is, getting and recovering from COVID is as good as a vax. Presumably, most of the refusers will get COVID eventually, so they can get an antibody card in lieu of a vax card. After 1-2 years, cases will be down so much that businesses probably won’t need either. (FYI cases in Israel are down to 75/day.)

        1. “They should be free to spread it to each other.”

          As a scientist, aren’t you concerned about a large pool of Refusers creating an ecological niche for the rapid development of COVID-19 mutant strains not covered by the vaccine?

          Plus the possibility that COVID-19 is never eradicated, due to the societal absence of herd immunity?

          1. I’m not as concerned about new variants. This virus mutates pretty slowly, and it appears that fewer and fewer of the mutations are viable. Even the Indian variant is just a combination of two existing mutations. Plus it appears that boosters are pretty easy to make. Eradication will be a lot easier if vaccines last for a long time.

          2. As a scientist

            Chemist. Small molecules behave predictably. Viruses and living organisms not so much.

            Refusers creating

            Some experts are saying the acquiescers are driving the variants.

            societal absence of herd immunity

            Sounds like fear-mongering fake news.

          3. In case you haven’t noticed, a handful of red states are done with COVID and doing just fine. Find Laura Ingraham’s town hall from last Thursday night.

        2. Please show me the RCTs showing that the “vaccines” reduce infection and transmission? AFAIK, the RCTs only show reduced severity of disease.

          1. Moderna did some studies that showed vaccinated people — the ones who did have any virus in them — had 75% less virus level. I believe that’s below the level of contagiousness; i.e., no spread. No symptoms either. If you want to label some virus but no symptoms and no spread as “infected at reduced severity,” then good for you. It’s a free country. You can make up whatever definitions you want.

          2. You can make up whatever definitions you want.

            I’m not making up definitions. I’m using their clinical trial endpoints.

      2. I think acting like this is just your normal roll out of a vaccine is false. Its a new technology that didn’t have the benefit of long term testing. I think if they were using the old technology people wouldn’t be as reluctant to be part of this Big Pharmacy just take the jab and don’t ask questions. Its the right to weigh risk.

        Then there is the issue of vaccination of segments of the population that are not at risk of death or even getting bad symptoms from the disease. Do we make everyone take heart medication because people die from heart attacks yearly? No.

        And the real evidence shows that lock downs and masks were not effective in stopping this flu. The suppression of medications that treated it was obvious early on and the whole push was the vaccine solution of vaccination for 70 % of the globe over something actually affecting under 1%.

        And in theory , if you get the vaccine your protected, so why should you demand that everyone take the vaccine . And in a climate of censorship of dispute to the narrative of just take the vaccine, where suppression of news on adverse reactions is evident, why force people to take a risk they aren’t comfortable taking.
        But its also not just taking these 2 shots. Its take the booster for variants/mutant strains , and forever taking as many vaccines as they deem necessary forever more. Its accepting gene therapy when maybe that’s just to experimental to accept without question .
        And maybe Government agencies have proven that they aren’t being protective of the populations but rather they have been corrupted to push the agendas of Big Pharmacy Industry .
        Emergency Pandemic declared to get untested vaccines approved for mass distribution is obvious here. Lockdowns that ended up padding the pockets of Big Monopolies while it destroyed the competition of small business is evident if you follow the money.
        So, nothing adds up as this being done to saves lives on a justified Pandemic by any stretch of the imagination. You will never be normal again is true if you accept this medical tyranny by what is a profit making entity that funds Fake news.
        They want to do more than just jab you whenever they want. They have plans to control all aspects of your life, including what you get to eat , what resources you get, if you take serious what the agendas are of these powerful entities are, rejecting their agendas is sane if you value your life and your freedoms.
        So, its not just a issue of the right to not be vaccinated, it concerns all rights that they want to take, in a World where Monopolies want World domination. You already know that they don’t care about the destruction or damage they cause. You judge something by the fruit it bears, and this is a rotten apple.
        Be happy that there are people who reject the narratives because they might be saving the compliant in the long run.

        1. not at risk of death or even getting bad symptoms from the disease.

          More young people are getting long-haul COVID than have died from vaccines. Or did we forget about long-haul COVID?

      3. Add to that: your immune system can’t handle this “novel” virus on its own, you need the “vaccine.”

        1. 3,235,304 people disagree with you. Shall I multiply that by 10? I hear adverse effects are underreported.

    1. Best comment I’ve seen so fair: She wanted 90% depopulation. He wanted 98%.

    1. Realtors are liars. Zillow are fraudsters.

      It’s no mystery why the airwaves and internet are filled with the braying of Koolade drunk debt donkeys.

    1. The Financial Times
      The Big Read Special purpose acquisition companies
      A reckoning for Spacs: will regulators deflate the boom?
      The SEC is concerned about the market for ‘blank-cheque’ companies, including optimistic projections and celebrity endorsements
      Involvement of stars such as Jennifer Lopez and Alex Rodriguez and excitement around new technology such as hydrogen trucks boosted the Spacs market
      Miles Kruppa in San Francisco and Ortenca Aliaj in New York yesterday

      At the beginning of this year, the space transportation start-up Momentus thought it would be well on its way towards its stated mission of “revolutionising space infrastructure and the space economy”. Instead, regulators intervened.

      Three months after Momentus announced a $1.2bn merger with a special purpose acquisition company, Stable Road Acquisition Corp, the Securities and Exchange Commission told the companies they were under investigation for statements made about the transaction, according to filings made public last month.

      The merger, which would make Momentus one of the few publicly traded space companies, had been billed in October as a “unique and compelling opportunity” for investors. Momentus projected it would reach more than $4bn in revenues in 2027, including almost $670m in sales from a fleet of robotic vehicles designed to serve large spacecraft.

      Those plans are on hold. Because of the ongoing investigation, the SEC has yet to approve filings for the merger proposal. Shareholders will vote on Thursday on whether to give the Spac a three-month extension to complete the transaction, failing which the merger will probably fall through. Momentus declined to comment and Stable Road did not respond to a request for comment.

      Momentus could soon be joined in limbo. Spacs, which raise money from investors to search for a company, complete a merger and take it public, have suddenly lost their lustre — not least in the eyes of regulators.
      …

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