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It’s Like A Tide, And At The Moment It’s Sinking All The Boats

A report from the Washington Post. “When Larry Frum listed his townhouse in Laurel, Md., this past August, his real estate agent assured him it would sell in three or four days. But that’s not what happened. ‘Three to four days became a week, and then it became two weeks, and then it became a month,’ he says. At two months, Frum reduced the price by $20,000. Peter Anderson is getting ready to sell his home in Coeur D’Alene, Idaho. ‘We needed a new roof, which we went and did this summer, and we had to buy a new heat pump in the spring,’ he says. ‘A year ago, we probably could have sold the house as-is and not had to do that.'”

“For one set of clients, Erika Levack, an agent with Compass in Austin says she approached the builder to say her buyers would have to back out ‘unless you guys do something.’ In return, the builder gave them $46,000 to buy down their rate. A year or two ago, Levack says the reaction would’ve been more along the lines of: ‘Fine, walk away. We’re going to sell this house for more money anyway.’ And now they are struggling to move their inventory and they’re offering all kinds of incentives.’ Levack currently has a listing in Austin with the same floor plan and finishes of a nearby home that sold for over $1 million last November. ‘We are in contract [for] way below that, and that’s just the nature of where things are,’ she says.”

The Columbian in Washington. “The average sale price for homes in Clark County fell 3.5 percent last month, from $605,300 in August to $584,000 in September, according to the MLS report. This downward price trend is unsurprising as the housing market continues to normalize, said Windermere Northwest Living broker Mike Lamb. ‘If there is inventory, it’s a much better environment to buy in now because there’s not this same level of competition there was,’ he said. ‘We were seeing houses sell for more than they were really worth.'”

The Belleville News Democrat in Illinois. “Median home sale prices in St. Clair County took a dive earlier this month when they stood at $220,000, according to Redfin. That downward trend has persisted throughout this month; median home sale price stood at $193,300 as of Oct. 10, Redfin county-metro data shows. An earlier peak for median home sale prices in St. Clair County reached $241,500 in July, and it’s been falling relatively steadily since cresting.”

“Median home sale prices in outlying Washington County, however, have been much more unstable in comparison. In Washington County, median home sale prices reached the Olympian height of $440,000 Oct. 3, Redfin’s data show. It’s since fallen off a cliff, precipitously dropping to $164,000 as of Oct. 10.”

ABC 7 in California. “According to one index, housing prices in the city by the Bay dropped faster in August than in any other city in America – a 4.3 percent decline since July. ‘A couple of months ago, it was academic. We heard that there were changes coming, but I’m sensing on the street that folks are feeling, okay, it’s here. It’s changed,’ said realtor John Yen Wong. ‘Given the market that we had before where they were 10, 15 offers for a property, that was sort of an unreal market.'”

2 Urban Girls in California. “The tide is turning as Inglewood homeowners are lowering prices on their homes as fears of a recession widen. With rising interest rates, coupled with higher fuel costs and a looming recession, homeowners have no choice but to reduce the asking price for their homes. Here are two we found in the 90305 zip code, which is the Morningside Park area of Inglewood, Calif. Two months ago this home located in the Renaissance hit the market with an asking price of $1.35 million. The price has now been reduced to $1,150,000.”

“This single-family home hit the market in early August with an asking price of $907,000. The home is located North of SoFi Stadium and is within walking distance to the venue. The home is now listed at the reduced price of $865,000.”

The Dallas Morning News. “Commercial real estate industry leaders are preparing for tougher times. ‘Inflation is at a decades high and the Fed is very aggressive,’ said Tim Wang, managing director of research for Clarion Partners, a major property owner in North Texas and nationwide. ‘The question is on timing, severity and recovery,’ he said. ‘Winter is coming.’ William Pattison, head of real estate research and strategy for MetLife Investment Management, said builders are being cut off from construction loans. ‘The largest banks stopped or significantly slowed lending back in June, and the smaller banks have pulled back pretty significantly,’ Pattison said.”

“‘It’s really unclear exactly what the values are,’ said Arthur Margon, partner with Rosen Consulting Group. ‘Everybody in this room who is not kidding themselves knows they are lower. The only question is how much lower?’ With fewer properties changing hands, that’s hard to gauge, he said. ‘There are not enough transactions to be statistically significant yet to show that there has been a break in pricing,’ Margon said. “Certainly, there has been in single-family housing. ‘You don’t have to be a genius to figure at 7% mortgages, people aren’t going to pay as much as they did at 2% to buy a house.'”

The New York Post. “The asking price of Greta Garbo’s former apartment in Midtown East has been slashed by $500,000, a handful of months after it hit the market. The aerie, located at 450 E. 52nd St., now asks $6.75 million — a drop from the $7.25 million it initially asked when it went up for sale in June.The current owners, publishing heir John McGraw and his wife already sought to offload the apartment at a loss before the price reduction, having spent $8.5 million for it in 2017. ‘The market is very different today than it was when they bought and lovingly upgraded the treasured residence,’ co-listing broker Brian K. Lewis, of Compass, told The Post.”

The Province in Canada. “Sales of condos and townhomes that won’t be delivered for several years have dramatically slowed to levels not seen in a decade. It comes as buyers in other markets are also sitting on the sidelines due to rising interest rates and economic uncertainty. Altus Analytics looked specifically at sales of new condos sold in the Toronto region for September and found an 89-per-cent year-on-year decline. One Surrey-based realtor said a lot of projects launched in the summer and didn’t do well, but she didn’t want to mention project names. She said that most are offering huge incentives, but they are still not selling briskly, so it makes sense to put a pause on project launches.”

CTV News in Canada. “It’s uncertain financial times for many Canadians as inflation has already taken a big bite out of family budgets. ‘Where it’s really affecting people with these interest rate hikes is with variable mortgages,’ said Tony Zarsadias, CEO of Island Realm Real Estate. Zarsadias says if you’re on a variable mortgage, you’ve already seen your payments increase and they will again after Wednesday’s announcement. ‘There are certainly people in jeopardy of not being able to qualify and I sadly expect people being under pressure for foreclosure,’ said Zarsadias.”

From Market Place. “The Brits typically fix their mortgage interest rates for much shorter terms than Americans. Twenty-six-year-old Alex Nunn knows that only too well. He’s buying his first home just north of London on a $280,000 mortgage, with an interest rate of just over 3% fixed for two years. That term is due to expire early next year, and Nunn was expecting to refinance at a moderately higher rate. Suddenly, Nunn faced the possibility of his mortgage repayments almost doubling.”

“‘We could be in a position where we can’t afford to pay our mortgage,’ he said. ‘That’s why it’s so worrying at the moment. It’s the not knowing, it’s the uncertainty of what’s to come. Of course, when you take out a loan like this, you know there is the potential for the rates to go up — but not to this level.'”

“Thirty-four-year-old Bianka Hamdaoui is also concerned. Her two-year fixed-rate mortgage expires next year, and she could face paying well over double what she pays now. ‘Since the mini-budget, my mind has been in overdrive,’ she said in an interview with the BBC. ‘I don’t know what I will do. I have been thinking about extreme situations, such as moving back to my parents and letting my place out so that I can keep it. I’m just running out of options.'”

Vietnam Investment Review. “Nguyen Hung, a director from a private real estate developer, said that over the last five months, his sales revenue had been almost zero. This caused construction-related activities to stop and he cannot pay salaries. The bank will not give loans, and products remain unsold, all adding to the company’s misery. ‘Currently, I have to pay more than VND30 billion ($1.3 million) for office leasing and salaries per month, but we do not have money left in our pocket,’ Hung told VIR.”

“Statistics from listed real estate businesses show that the number of days of inventory is skyrocketing to an alarming level. The average number of days of inventory has nearly reached 1,500, meaning it takes more than four years to sell out inventory. This number has increased sharply compared to the end of 2021 and approximately doubled compared to the 2019-2020 period. Dr. Can Van Luc, a member of the National Fiscal and Monetary Policy Advisory Council, said that the recent phenomenon of stagnation of capital for businesses was painful, with excess supply, excess resources, and a lack of capital.”

From Domain News in Australia. “Sydney property values have tumbled more than 10 per cent since the market peaked, new figures show, while values in Melbourne and Brisbane have fallen more than 6 per cent and experts predict further falls ahead. Rising interest rates hit Sydney and Melbourne first, said NAB chief economist Alan Oster, but all markets would be affected. ‘It’s basically like a tide, it either strands all boats or sinks all boats, and at the moment it’s sinking all the boats,’ he said.”

From Reuters. “For more than a decade since the global financial crisis, central bankers pumped trillions of dollars of cheap money into the financial system to keep the economy afloat. Now that largesse is coming back to haunt them – and taxpayers. The Federal Reserve and its European peers must make huge interest payments to commercial banks on deposits the institutions themselves created via massive bond purchases and cheap loans.”

“The optics of this are dire enough at a time when millions of citizens struggle with a cost-of-living crisis. Worse, it means they will have little or no money to pay into the governments’ coffers and some central banks in Europe might even need taxpayer help. ‘The Fed won’t be bankrupt financially but it could be politically,’ said Derek Tang, an economist at LH Meyer, a research firm.”

“Ironically, the central banks of the most fiscally prudent countries – the Netherlands, Germany and, to a lesser extent, Belgium – will be the hardest-hit because they warehouse a larger share of bank deposits and the bonds they bought on the ECB’s behalf yield zero or less. They have all warned of upcoming losses and the Dutch central bank openly said it risked needing a bailout.”

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This Post Has 105 Comments

  2. ‘In Washington County, median home sale prices reached the Olympian height of $440,000 Oct. 3, Redfin’s data show. It’s since fallen off a cliff, precipitously dropping to $164,000 as of Oct. 10’

    It’s a good thing everybody put 75% down!

  3. ‘The Federal Reserve and its European peers must make huge interest payments to commercial banks on deposits the institutions themselves created via massive bond purchases and cheap loans’

    Jerry broke it off in his own a$$?

    1. Can the Fed afford to keep running Quantitative Easing if its balance sheet is bleeding red and inflation isn’t coming down?

      It almost seems like the cheerleaders are already on the bus.

      1. We are seeing a massive, coordinated central bank intervention in the debt market to artificially drive down bond rates using created-out-of-thin-air Yellen Bux to buy up EU & US debt sane investors won’t touch. This is going to be massively inflationary. #FJB

      2. The central banks are going to fail and dump all their rubbish debt holdings on the public treasuries.

  4. ‘she approached the builder to say her buyers would have to back out ‘unless you guys do something.’ In return, the builder gave them $46,000 to buy down their rate’

    That’s the spirit Erika!

    ‘Levack currently has a listing in Austin with the same floor plan and finishes of a nearby home that sold for over $1 million last November. ‘We are in contract [for] way below that’

    Anotha winnah!

    1. What that builder did is what we call artificially propping up the market. Keeps them from dropping prices and ruining comps. Happens at the beginning of every bust. Only works for so long until the free fall is apparent to all.

      1. You remind me of the ‘free’ car giveaways by builders in the 2007-2009 bust. I recall questioning the legality of financing cars on a mortgage loan.

        1. I remember when scalping tickets on Ebay was illegal. So instead you bought a hat and it came with free tickets.

  5. ‘Statistics from listed real estate businesses show that the number of days of inventory is skyrocketing to an alarming level. The average number of days of inventory has nearly reached 1,500, meaning it takes more than four years to sell out inventory’

    Now that’s a shortage right there.

  6. ‘it’s a much better environment to buy in now because there’s not this same level of competition there was,’ he said. ‘We were seeing houses sell for more than they were really worth’

    Sound lending!

  7. Re: Inflation is at a decades high and the Fed is very aggressive,

    Translation: Crime is at a decades high and Al Capone is very aggressive,

  8. “It’s Like A Tide, And At The Moment It’s Sinking All The Boats”

    The Japanese call this kind of tide a tsunami, and they accompany earthquakes, like the one currently shaking up the housing market.

    1. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) pressured U.S. regulators to clear COVID-19 boosters without clinical trial data, according to newly released emails.

      CDC officials relayed to counterparts at the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in early August 2021 that they wanted authorization for Moderna and Pfizer boosters as data began showing that the vaccines weren’t working as well as initially promoted.

      The conversation took place on a call that was described by Dr. Phil Krause, a top FDA official, to several other FDA workers.

      “Take a deep breath before reading this next paragraph. On that call, the CDC evidently stated that they will assemble all the data they are aware of on third dosing in this setting and send it to us in the hope that we will (very soon) authorize the third dose for immunocompromised as part of the EUA,” Krause wrote in the Aug. 5, 2021, email (pdf).

      EUA stands for emergency use authorization. All of the COVID-19 vaccines were authorized under emergency conditions at that time. No boosters had been authorized and no clinical data were available for the boosters.

      The emails show that “the CDC wanted the booster approved without a trial,” Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, a professor of medicine at Stanford University, wrote on Twitter.

      https://www.theepochtimes.com/cdc-pushed-for-covid-19-boosters-without-clinical-trials-emails_4821710.html

      1. COVID “vaccines” are not vaccines they are deadly experimental mRNA poison designed and intended to kill you.

      2. “Remember the old roller coaster simulation?”

        I’d love to see one of these for the Silicon Valley area.

  11. The Aussie sheeple elected globalist Quislings. Now they’re getting what they voted for, good & hard. Suffer, Bitchez!

    Peter Dutton’s extraordinary warning about power bills

    https://www.news.com.au/finance/money/costs/peter-duttons-extraordinary-warning-about-power-bills/news-story/2420848f025404928cbc100d12594af0

    Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has claimed people will have to choose between “eating and heating”, with gas and electricity bills set to skyrocket in the next few months.

  12. C’mon in, terrorists! Since the Brandon regime is letting in huge numbers of criminals as part of our “fundamental transformation” orchestrated by the DNC’s globalist bankrollers and puppetmasters, we don’t want y’all to feel excluded! Forward!

    Federal Data Quietly Reveals 100 Terror Suspects Caught At Southern Border

    https://summit.news/2022/10/26/federal-data-quietly-reveals-100-terror-suspects-caught-at-southern-border/

    Newly published federal data reveals that close to a hundred individuals listed on the FBI terror watchlist have been apprehended at the Southern border in the last year, a record high and a huge uptick in recent months.

    1. I can remember after Katrina, lots of job ads in NYC come to New Orlean rebuild our city starting wages were double minimum wage free Fema housing, MUST speak Spanish

      Looks like the local vibrants in the 9th ward didn’t want to work, yet they should be the first to demand the wall be built and restrict immigration

      1. I knew a missionary that Haiti after the Quake in 2010. He finally had enough of watching the locals sitting curbside while he was swinging hammer. Came back to the U.S.

          1. just like there was no such thing as white flight, parents saw the next generation of kids on a jail track not a college one and moved and so did black families who cared about their kids, so who was left, the vibrants

    2. That’s 100 more than they’ve ever caught making people take off their shoes, go through x-ray body scanners, and get molested at airports.

  14. A reader sent these in:

    Housing market activity is now near Great Financial Crisis lows, the damage has already been done.

    https://twitter.com/DonMiami3/status/1585352031212285952

    Lots of new listings hitting the Melbourne property market. Once supply overwhelms demand and unemployment rockets then we see 50 to 70% drops across the board.

    https://twitter.com/great_martis/status/1585429886914932736

    AirBnBust! How Desperate AirBnB Sellers Will Pull The Housing Market Down

    https://twitter.com/menlobear/status/1585305590670053381

    Faceplant (Meta) after hours, gives back seven years of gains. They need to change the name again. How about CrapBook?

    https://twitter.com/SuburbanDrone/status/1585366588769054720

    $META – 17% ah…makes me say a prayer for all the equity perma bulltards like Mark D and many others…RIP brothers…🙏

    https://twitter.com/INArteCarloDoss/status/1585391846498660352

    To all the “We’re not in a 2008 style real-estate bubble” people. Most of these people own multiple homes and financed them based on their Airbnb income. What could go wrong 🤣

    https://twitter.com/FinanceLancelot/status/1517928839283945477

    Banks: ‘I lent money to people with FICOs above 700, so my loan book will do well in this recession.’ Not so fast, says @DiMartinoBooth. There’s massive FICO inflation as lenders substituted traditional income verification w/ stimulus payment check

    https://twitter.com/ForwardGuidance/status/1585312418627919888

    Received this message in my DMs with permission to share:

    “My wife and I run an Airbnb in Austin and we have at least 4 other couples we know that do the same. Everything has dramatically slowed down. We’ve all had to lower our prices significantly to stay competitive”

    https://twitter.com/texasrunnerDFW/status/1585304329929752577

    1. Not so fast, says @DiMartinoBooth

      After the excrement settles, people will be coming back to this 1m4s video clip.

  15. Peter Anderson is getting ready to sell his home in Coeur D’Alene, Idaho. ‘We needed a new roof, which we went and did this summer, and we had to buy a new heat pump in the spring,’ he says.

    Well Pete…. That’s called depreciation. And it costs you $4 per square foot every year whether you pretend it’s there or not and no matter how much you spent on “the materials!”….. better known as pay me now or pay me later. And it’s that thing the housing crime syndicate operators (realtors, mortgage salesmen) deliberately omit to get you to believe renting from the bank is less costly than renting on the open market… all in order to get you to fork over the borrowed money. Come to think of it….. isn’t that considered fraud too?

    Gotta love DonkeyMath

    Bend, OR Housing Prices Crater 15% YOY On Soaring Mortgage Defaults And Collapsing Demand

    https://www.movoto.com/bend-or/market-trends/

  16. Clutch those pearls harder, globalists sh*tbags. Keep poking the bear and see what happens.

    Politico — How Christian Nationalism Is Taking Root Across the World (10/27/2022):

    “These are dangerous times. Elections are, once again, bringing far-right nationalist leaders to power around the world.

    The current surge of MAGA Republicans running for Congress and Donald Trump’s likely 2024 bid to reclaim the White House are part of this trend.

    But to better understand the rise of the global far right, look to the two most recent elections involving Christian nationalist candidates: the presidential and congressional elections in Brazil and the parliamentary election in Italy. In both, far-right leaders have effectively appealed to ethnicity — particularly religion — and used largely unregulated social media platforms to amplify propaganda and “fake news” that further normalizes extreme ideas and the demand to establish discriminatory policies.

    The far right is today a transnational network, so it is not surprising that similar tactics to lure people into a sense of empowerment based on the oppression of others are now at work in American politics.

    Moreover, the Biden administration has not substantially improved the living conditions of the majority in the face of stiff conservative resistance and its own reluctance to act boldly. An economy marked by high inflation has people in a sour mood that could lead to a Democratic wipeout in the midterms. Meanwhile, the Federal Reserve seems increasingly eager to fuel a recession, meaning things could get even worse for ordinary Americans.

    With fear and anxiety about their livelihoods and positions in society, people are more likely to turn to Trumpism and its Christian nationalist politics. If Democrats are unable to deliver immediate economic relief and deep reforms that can increase the wellbeing and sense of security for the public, the far-right resurgence across the globe could soon hit the United States.”

    https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2022/10/27/global-far-right-christian-nationalists-00063400

    “Far right” = anything to the right of Marxist globalist tyranny.

    This is the launch of a new Crusades, not to conquer or liberate foreign territory, but to purge these Marxists from their host nations.

    Warrior Jesus, because “turn the other cheek” is over, globalists.

    1. Talk of a recession is meaningless. Everybody is working, right?

      The cost of money keeps going up, but house prices are leveling off. Better lock in now.

      Price declines are irrelevant because most people buying a cheaper house are also selling a cheaper house.

      House prices are poised to go up once people realize that the rate of rate increases is leveled off!

      This guy is a genius.

      1. “This guy is a genius.”
        Definitely in his own mind. Can’t get much more factually incorrect than that.
        Hey, for anyone interested, I found this guy’s videos on a recent reddit thread. He does an excellent job explaining how screwed we all are, though I think his housing price drops are far too rosy:

        https://www.youtube.com/c/EPBMacroResearch

  18. Barron’s
    Federal Reserve
    Tightening Monetary Policy Will Put a Hole in the Fed’s Balance Sheet
    COMMENTARY
    By Leslie Lipschitz
    Oct. 23, 2022 3:00 am ET
    A U.S. Federal Reserve flag flies outside the Federal Reserve building in Washington, D.C., U.S., on Tuesday, Aug. 18, 2020.
    Erin Scott/Bloomberg
    About the author: Leslie Lipschitz is former director of the IMF Institute, has taught at Johns Hopkins University and Bowdoin College, been a guest scholar at the Brookings Institution, and an advisor at Investec Asset Management.

    The Federal Reserve and other central banks began purchasing large quantities of government bonds and other securities in 2008 to address the consequences of the global financial crisis. That effort was renewed in March 2020 as the pandemic took hold.

    For savvy monetary theorists, the advent of quantitative easing, or QE, and the huge expansion of central bank balance sheets seemed bold, brave, and, perhaps, a little risky. Difficult questions have lingered since the launch of QE. By how much and for how long could this balance sheet expansion continue? Was there, or would there come to be, an element of fiscal dominance involved—that is, central banks being required to buy and hold huge quantities of government paper to finance government deficits and growing debt? Would a long period of very low interest rates lead to overinvestment and a misallocation of capital? Could a problem of financial dominance emerge, in which central banks might be disinclined to tighten monetary conditions for fear of sparking a financial crisis? And, if and when an unwinding of QE through security sales (quantitative tightening or QT) became necessary, might this wipe out central bank capital?
    …
    https://www.barrons.com/articles/fed-balance-sheet-rate-hikes-51666468799?noredirect=y

      1. “Guest commentaries like this one are written by authors outside the Barron’s and MarketWatch newsroom.”

        Yup, that was a tough read, a real slog for me.

    2. “Tightening Monetary Policy Will Put a Hole in the Fed’s Balance Sheet”

      I didn’t read it, but just going by the title. So is the answer ‘expanding monetary’ policy to fill that hole?

      1. I convinced a co-worker who is in his mid 30s to vote for the first time ever this year.

        Joe O’Dea could have a chance but I’m not getting my hopes too high.

    2. How many mail-in ballots have been sent out in AZ?
      That will decide the race.

      Looks like PA has sent 240,000 ‘unverified’ ballots which will undoubtedly decide the ‘race’ there. I expect the same in many states.

      1. If Fetterman is elected there will be no doubt that PA was stolen. At this point nothing will surprise me. I expect the Dems to go all in with the ballot box stuffing.

        1. “At this point nothing will surprise me”

          Yep. As a rule of thumb, I expect the worst from dems, neocons, the fed, wallstreet, and multinationals. They never fail to disappoint.

    1. Was VC Andreessen Really Wrong to Go ‘All In’ as Crypto Winter Hit?
      By PYMNTS
      Posted on October 27, 2022

      Venture capital (VC) firm Andreessen Horowitz got into blockchain and cryptocurrency early, making large investments in a wide range of fields, just as it did while building itself into a giant during the internet boom of the late 1990s and early 2000s.

      But as the crypto winter’s temperature keeps dropping, the firm’s Crypto Funds I-IV, which have raised a total of $7.6 billion, have come down with a bad cold. Its flagship Crypto Venture Fund I was down 40% in the first half of the year The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported Wednesday (Oct. 26).

      And it’s almost certainly down more since then, as the cryptocurrency market capitalization dropped more than one quarter, from $1.3 trillion to $1 trillion, in that time. That’s from an all-time high of $3 trillion at the market’s peak in November.

      With the firm having launched its fourth crypto fund at the end of May, raising a staggering $4.5 billion, WSJ argued that “Andreessen Horowitz went all in on crypto at the worst possible time.”

      It’s not a hard argument to make. One of its best investments, Coinbase, has lost 80% of its value this year, WSJ pointed out prominently.
      …
      https://www.pymnts.com/news/investment-tracker/2022/was-venture-capitalist-andreessen-horowitz-really-wrong-go-all-in-crypto-winter/

  21. A woman’s right to choose.

    Many women will have to choose whether they feed their family, buy gas to get to work or heat their house this winter.

    1. As Heating Costs Increase, New Hampshire Senate Race Tightens

      October 25, 2022

      New Hampshire is a must-win state for Democrats in their campaign to keep control of the Senate. Sen. Maggie Hassan narrowly won her last race in 2016 by 1,017 votes. Recent polls show her ahead in the contest against GOP nominee Don Bolduc, a retired Army brigadier general. But with inflation and energy costs top of mind for voters in the purple state, both candidates are expecting the race to be close.

      https://www.npr.org/2022/10/25/1131418994/as-heating-costs-increase-new-hampshire-senate-race-tightens

      The New Hampshire Food Bank

      Heat or Eat

      What would you choose? Would you pay the bill to keep the heat on and go hungry? Or would you use what little money you have left to buy food for your hungry children? No one should have to make that decision, but the lower the temperatures drop the higher heating costs go and the harder it gets for families to put food on the table.

      https://nhfoodbank.org/heatoreat/

    2. “Many women will have to choose whether they feed their family, buy gas to get to work or heat their house this winter.”

      Two of the above have subsidy programs in place that are paid for by ratepayers so that the desperate won’t perish.

      1. Heating costs forecast to soar this winter
        Chris Isidore

        By Chris Isidore, CNN Business
        Published 2:50 PM EDT, Wed October 12, 2022

        New York
        CNN Business
        —
        No matter how you heat your home, the cost of that heat is likely to soar, according to a forecast Wednesday from the Energy Information Administration.

        Based on current estimates for fuel prices if, as forecast, there’s a slightly colder winter ahead, the EIA estimates that heating a home with natural gas heating costs will rise about $200 on average, or 28% to $931 for the winter.

        Still, that’s not as bad as heating oil costs, which are forecast to jump $1,200, or 27% to $2,354. Electric heating costs could rise $123, or 10%, to $1,359, while propane heating costs are expected to rise $80, or 5%, to $1,688.

        https://www.cnn.com/2022/10/12/energy/heating-costs

  22. Pennsylvania Republicans move to impeach Philadelphia district attorney:

    “Pennsylvania House Republicans filed articles of impeachment against Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner on Wednesday.

    The two articles were filed for negligence of duty, with House Republicans citing an uptick in various crimes as justification for filing the articles. Pennsylvania’s House Majority Leader Kerry Benninghoff (R) claimed that there have been almost 1,000 homicides in Philadelphia in the last 22 months in addition to “over 1,000 carjackings since the beginning of the year,” according to the Philadelphia Tribune.

    “We know that the policies of the current Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner are directly correlated to the breakdown of law and order,” said Benninghoff. “Due to his failed vision of criminal justice, crime is allowed to wage war on the good people in Philadelphia.

    https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/pennsylvania-house-republicans-move-impeach-district-attorney

    The article does not mention who purchased Larry Krasner.

    His name is George Soros.

    George Soros purchased Larry Krasner.

  24. I was just looking through home listings since I’ve been watching them closely.

    One can now get an approximately 1,900 square foot new build for less than a similarly sized used home.

    We’re talking $314,000 vs. $390,000 respectively.

    I do not compute.

    1. Apparently, if you drop two houses from the top of the Empire State Building, the new one hits the ground before the used one. Works in Florida too!

      1. And if you made a statement of fact that the sum of the 3 angles of all triangles is always 180 degrees, some dummy will make the profound declaration about the different color triangles.

      3. LOL.
        Seems builders have just a bit more pricing ability than your average already-underwater home-moaner.
        Now for the layoffs…

    2. What’s not computing? Builders, unlike used home sellers, unemotionally dump rapidly depreciating assets.

    3. well some of it is because the new home isn’t finished. no landscaping, (back yard is almost certainly just dirt). no window coverings (which can get outrageously expensive) and it’s cheap crappy builder’s grade materials which you’ll have to redo in 5 years anyway.

      But most of it is because the developers want OUT and don’t want to get stuck and their banks are screaming at them to get out. Where the homeowners don’t really have that pressure YET. but it’s coming.

      1. “well some of it is because the new home isn’t finished. no landscaping, (back yard is almost certainly just dirt). no window coverings (which can get outrageously expensive) and it’s cheap crappy builder’s grade materials which you’ll have to redo in 5 years anyway.”

        Priceless.

        What’s not finished? How do you know the site work isn’t complete? What are “builders grade materials”?

        I’m closing in on $8 million in work since May 2021, half that in materials and not once was I presented with a choice between the materials I procured and “builders grade materials”.

        1. All windows and doors come in builders grade and then on up in quality. All HVAC come in 80% efficient (for furnaces) which is called builder’s grade. I”m sure the same exists in A/C. Locksets and knobs all come in builders grade and then on up.

          big developments never do the backyards (just rough grade) and the front is always like 1 tree, 3 shrubs, some sod and a 1 or 2 zone sprinkler system.

          1. developments never do the backyards

            That’s what weekends are for and it isn’t worth much.

            Besides, the used house is built with “what builders build with” too, it’s just used and worn now. I can’t remember a single house I ever bought that the “window
            treatments” didn’t get thrown out and replaced, by the spouse or later her daughters. Replacing that crap was always factored in.

          2. Besides, the used house is built with “what builders build with” too, it’s just used and worn now.

            Or maybe replaced. Roofs, flooring, cabinets, countertops, plumbing fixtures, etc., get replaced. Here in the Centennial State, because of expansive soils windows often jam and are replaced.

            Trees and shrubs don’t get replaced, but at least out here they can be pricey: $300-500 a tree is not unusual, and by tree I mean 7-8 ft saplings. Aspens are cheaper for some reason.

          3. $300-500 a tree is not unusual

            That’s a shame. Around here trees spring up like weeds. Just cut down the ones you don’t want. My squirrel neighbors plant walnuts all over the place and the maples plant themselves. Move them if you please.

            Four to six foot fruit trees are $15 in the spring.

    4. It does compute.

      Used homes have owner-occupants who believe that someone owes them last year’s purchase price and underwater mortgages that need to be paid off.

      New homes have to sell for a price that covers construction costs in order to pencil out. I’m guessing this typically is far below last year’s insane peak bubble valuations.

  25. “In Washington County, median home sale prices reached the Olympian height of $440,000 Oct. 3, Redfin’s data show. It’s since fallen off a cliff, precipitously dropping to $164,000 as of Oct. 10.

    Read more at: https://www.bnd.com/news/local/article267840077.html#storylink=cpy”

    It’s out in Middle of Nowhere, Illinois, yet somehow the tsunami tide of Quantitative Easing-fueled real estate investment lifted prices by sn insane amount relative to local incomes.

    And now the tide is receding.

    1-164/440 = 62.7% drop, so far.

      1. So yer saying it’s the mix. Anyhoo, I’m the last RE bull standing. Everybody else has run fer the hills.

        1. I’m saying that a 67% drop sounds pretty outlandish in just a few months (the article actually says from “October 3 to October 10”, so what in one week!?), and a quick check of Redfin itself shows that that county never got close to a 440K median price.

          So no I’m not saying it’s the mix. I’m saying the reporter got their numbers all jumbled, and Redfin confirms that.

      2. “Gotta stay objective, can’t let the permabearishness block common sense and actual thinking:”

        I’m a long-term bull, though I have to say this bubble is dragging on for much longer than I imagined it would.

        If the current housing bust culminates with the end of the bubble and housing reverts from a financial risk asset to a place to live in, I promise to change my blog nom de plume to Professor Bull.

  28. “A South Bay man accepted hundreds of offers from open houses. But the homes weren’t for sale”

    https://www.yahoo.com/news/south-bay-man-accepted-hundreds-120021095.html

    (snip)

    Like any legitimate real estate and escrow agents in the red-hot Southern California housing market, Adolfo Schoneke and his sister, Bianca Gonzalez, held open houses and accepted bids on multiple homes.

    The siblings and others operated real estate companies in Cerritos, La Palma and Long Beach.

    But there was a problem: The homes they showed were not for sale.

    In reality, the houses were a front for a scheme that resulted in the loss of more than $6 million for hundreds of victims, federal prosecutors said this week.

    Now, Schoneke, Gonzalez and co-conspirators face federal prison time for the scheme.

    Schoneke, 45, of Torrance was sentenced Monday to nine years in prison after pleading guilty in May to one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, according to the U.S. attorney’s office for the Central District of California.

    Gonzalez, 39, pleaded guilty in April to her role in wire fraud and is set to be sentenced in May.

    “Playing on the dream of home ownership and seemingly out of reach home prices, [Schoneke] figured out a way to ‘sell’ homes that he did not own and had no business in listing for sale,” prosecutors wrote in a sentencing memorandum.

    According to prosecutors, Schoneke and others found properties to list for sale — regardless of whether the owners intended to sell or not — and listed them on real estate websites, marketing them as short-sale opportunities.

    “In some cases, the homes were marketed through open houses arranged by tricking homeowners or occupants into allowing their homes to be used,” prosecutors said.

    Multiple offers were accepted for the properties, but each would-be buyer was told that their offer was the only one accepted.

    Each “purchase” was delayed, sometimes for years, as buyers were told the sales required approval.

    “Office workers opened bank accounts to hide the co-conspirators’ involvement in the fraud,” prosecutors said.

    Buyers would transfer payments into the accounts, in some cases for the full purported purchase price.

    “The co-conspirators directed the office workers to withdraw large amounts of cash from these accounts, which made the proceeds harder to trace,” prosecutors said.

    Mario Gonzalez, 51 — no relation to Bianca Gonzalez — pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud in a related case in 2019 and is scheduled to be sentenced in April.

    In total, Schoneke and the others collected nearly $12 million from approximately 750 victims.

    Some of the victims were paid back, but nearly 400 people ultimately lost more than $6 million in the scheme. A restitution hearing for Schoneke is set for December.

  29. I’m waiting for that spoiled brat female spitter to get hauled in.

    Penn State student charged following protest surrounding Proud Boys founder speech

    BY BRET PALLOTTO OCTOBER 27, 2022 9:58 AM

    A Penn State student was charged Wednesday with three misdemeanors after university police alleged he ignored about 10 requests from four uniformed officers to leave the protest that prompted the cancellation of a speech that featured the Proud Boys founder.

    Bram C. Woolley, 23, is the only known person to be charged as of Thursday in connection with the protest that thrust Pennsylvania’s flagship university into the national spotlight.

    No defense lawyer was listed. Woolley, a student in the College of Earth Mineral Sciences, did not immediately respond Thursday to a request for comment. He is in his seventh semester at Penn State, a university spokesperson wrote in an email.

    https://www.centredaily.com/news/local/crime/article267907237.html

    Spitting mad: Penn State protester hocks loogie at right-wing provocateur Alex Stein

    By Lee Brown
    October 25, 2022

    Shocking video footage caught an enraged woman spitting at right-wing provocateur Alex Stein as he mocked the protests that shut down his show at Penn State University.

    The BlazeTV personality caught the vile moment as he mingled with those rallying to stop the Uncensored America event also featuring Gavin McInnes, a co-founder of both the Proud Boys and the Vice media empire.

    https://nypost.com/2022/10/25/penn-state-protester-spits-at-right-wing-provocateur-alex-stein/

  30. This is a stupid question but because Americans are such dummies it had to be asked …

    “Should You Pay Off Your Credit Card Balance Every Month?”

    https://www.yahoo.com/finance/news/pay-off-credit-card-balance-110028410.html

    (a fun snip)

    GOBankingRates survey shows that 37% of Americans say they handle their credit card debt by paying it off completely every month. In addition, 19% say they pay more than the minimum but never the full balance, while 11.8% pay just the minimum and 5% have a set amount they pay each month.

    (another fun snip)

    To put this into context, it’s important to know that the average interest rate is 18.38% — the highest since 1992, according to Ted Rossman, a senior industry analyst at CreditCards.com.

    “I think it’s really important to pay your credit card balance in full each month,” Rossman said. “If you only make minimum payments at 18.38% toward $5,270 — the average credit card balance, according to TransUnion — you’ll be in debt for 195 months and will owe $6,687 in interest. It’s hard to build wealth when you’re paying that much to the credit card company.”

    1. you’ll be in debt for 195 months and will owe $6,687 in interest

      Sorry, if you’re a debt donkey you will keep rolling over the principle and after 195 months you will have paid $15k+ in interest and still not have paid for whatever you bought.

  32. Moneybox
    The Reason Home Prices Are Finally Dropping
    But not everywhere.
    By Timothy B. Lee
    Oct 27, 2022 11:00 AM
    House on a red background casting a downward arrow shadow.
    Photo illustration by Slate. Photo by Sittidhet Joollasawok/Getty Images Plus.
    This article is from Full Stack Economics, a newsletter about the economy, technology, and public policy.

    In March 2021, a woman in the D.C. area put her house on the market and got 88 bids—including 76 all-cash offers and 15 from people who hadn’t bothered to visit the property in person.

    “The offers just kept coming,” she told CNN at the time. “I’m thinking, ‘This is just out of control.’ ”

    That frothy, oozing-over-the-top market has been over for a few months now, and new data suggest that we might be entering a very different type of housing market.

    Home prices in the United States fell by 1.1 percent between July and August, according to new data from the Case-Shiller index. That’s by far the biggest monthly decline since the last housing crash hit bottom in 2012.

    Another widely used index of housing prices, the Zillow Home Value Index, doesn’t yet show an outright decline. But it shows that home prices have been flat in recent months after two years of strong price appreciation.
    A chart showing rising home values since January 2020. They’ve been declining since this summer.

    Experts are becoming increasingly worried that we’re heading for a major housing correction.
    A modest decline in home prices would be benign—even welcome, given how expensive housing has gotten in recent years. But a sharp decline in home prices could have some negative effects on the broader economy. Homebuilders might react by dramatically cutting back new home construction, which would not only throw thousands of people out of work but would worsen our long-term housing shortage.

    A sharp decline in home prices could also trigger a wave of destabilizing defaults and foreclosures. And some experts think a big decline like that is a real possibility.

    “My base case is something like a 10 percent drop in home prices relative to the peak,” said Arpit Gupta, a finance professor at New York University. But he said things could get much worse than that.
    …
    https://slate.com/business/2022/10/housing-prices-real-estate-interest-rates-federal-reserve-california.html

    1. “Home prices in the United States fell by 1.1 percent between July and August, according to new data from the Case-Shiller index. That’s by far the biggest monthly decline since the last housing crash hit bottom in 2012.”

      Annualized rate of decline is 1-(1-1.1/100)^12 = 12.4 percent…more than Professor Gupta’s base case.

      And mortgage rates have gone up ALOT since August, with no ceiling in sight.

      1. Your Money
        Buying a home gets even harder as mortgage rates top 7%
        October 27, 2022 11:22 AM ET
        Chris Arnold
        Mortgage rates keep rising, making home ownership unaffordable for millions of Americans. Since the start of the year higher rates have added about $1,000 to the monthly payment to buy a typical house.
        John Raoux/AP

        The average rate for a 30-year fixed rate mortgage has topped 7% for the first time in 20 years.

        Rates have more than doubled since the start of the year, making it much harder for would be homebuyers. The pace of home sales has declined for 8 consecutive months as frustrated buyers give up, unable to afford higher payments.

        The weekly average for a 30-year fixed rate loan is now 7.08%. That’s the highest level since April 2002 and it is “leading to greater stagnation in the housing market,” according to the mortgage giant Freddie Mac.

        Rising rates have also slammed the lid on home prices, which have declined 1%, according to the latest reading of a closely watched home price index. Prices though were still up 13% compared to a year ago.

        Where prices go next is matter of debate among economists.

        “Our forecast is for about flat home price growth in ’23 and ’24,” said Joel Kan with the Mortgage Bankers Association. “But if you have flat home price growth for the country you’re going to have lots of geographies that see outright declines.”

        Moody’s Analytics is predicting an overall year-over year price decline of 6% nationally, and about a 10% fall from the price peak this past June.

        Most analysts agree that a nationwide housing shortage, combined with the fact that most homeowners are in fixed rate loans they can afford, will prevent a real crash in home prices.
        …
        https://www.npr.org/2022/10/27/1131875793/buying-a-home-gets-even-harder-as-mortgage-rates-top-7

  33. The Financial Times
    Markets Briefing Equities
    US stocks and bond yields drop after GDP rebounds
    Shares in Meta slide more than 24% after Facebook owner reports another quarter of declining revenues
    A trader at the New York Stock Exchange
    Data released on Thursday showed the US economy had expanded in the third quarter © Michael M Santiago/Getty Images
    George Steer and Harriet Clarfelt in London and Kate Duguid in New York 6 hours ago

    US stocks and Treasury bond yields dipped on Thursday as investors juggled weak earnings reports with data that showed the US economy expanded in the third quarter.

    The S&P 500 fell 0.6 per cent, erasing earlier gains, while the technology-heavy Nasdaq Composite fell 1.6 per cent.

    Those moves came after data showed the world’s largest economy grew in the third quarter, having contracted for the first six months of the year. Gross domestic product increased 2.6 per cent on an annualised basis between July and September, compared with economists’ expectations of a rise of 2.4 per cent. But the headline figure masked weaker domestic consumer demand, which suggests a slowing economy.

    Investors were also watching the latest flurry of quarterly corporate earnings for signs of strain from rapid price growth and rising borrowing costs, against an increasingly challenging economic backdrop.

    Shares in Facebook owner Meta tumbled 24.6 per cent on Thursday after it reported another quarter of declining revenues, joining other Big Tech groups in warning this week that a slowdown was hitting its advertising businesses.

    After the bell, Amazon reported weaker-than-forecast sales, dropping 18 per cent in after-hours trading.

    The two-year Treasury yield, which moves with interest rate expectations, reached its lowest level in two weeks, down 0.1 percentage points at 4.3 per cent. The 10- and 30-year Treasury yields fell to their lowest levels in more than a week.

    The Federal Reserve has raised interest rates aggressively this year in an attempt to curb inflation, with extra-large increases of 0.75 percentage points at each of its past three meetings — taking its target range to between 3 per cent and 3.25 per cent. A fourth consecutive 0.75 percentage point increase is expected at the US central bank’s meeting next week.

    Concerns have intensified that the Fed and its international peers will turn the screws on monetary policy into a protracted slowdown.
    …

  34. The Financial Times
    Updated 32 minutes ago
    Live news updates: IMF cuts Asia growth forecasts on higher rates and China slowdown
    William Langley
    32 minutes ago
    IMF cuts Asia growth forecasts on higher rates and China slowdown
    William Langley in Hong Kong

    The IMF cut its growth forecast for Asia on Friday, citing the effects of tighter monetary policy, the war in Ukraine and a “sharp and uncharacteristic” slowdown in the Chinese economy.

    The international lender now expects Asia’s economies to grow 4 per cent this year and 4.3 per cent next year, compared with previous forecasts in April of 4.9 per cent and 4.8 per cent growth, respectively.

    “Asia’s strong economic rebound early this year is losing momentum, with a weaker-than-expected second quarter,” Krishna Srinivasan, director of the IMF’s Asia and Pacific department said, adding that the new forecasts were well below the 5.5 per cent average over the last two decades.

    In its regional economic update, the organisation noted that the war in Ukraine was affecting Asian economies by pushing up commodity prices.

    “Most — but not all — countries in Asia have seen a deterioration of their terms of trade,” it said.

    The IMF noted that Asia was now the world’s biggest debtor and flagged risks of distress as monetary tightening and a stronger dollar further increase borrowing costs.

    On China, the fund said that the country’s strict zero-Covid policy and property sector slowdown had spilled over to other regional economies. It downgraded its growth forecast for the world’s second-largest economy to 3.2 per cent this year, from 4.4 per cent in its April projection.
    …

  35. U.S. to scrap sea-launched nuclear missile despite military backing

    By Idrees Ali and Phil Stewart

    October 27, 2022

    WASHINGTON, Oct 27 (Reuters) – The United States will stop developing nuclear-armed sea launched cruise missiles, Pentagon documents released on Thursday said, despite senior military officials publicly recommending keeping it.

    The decision to cancel the submarine-launched cruise missile could help President Joe Biden address calls from fellow Democrats to scale back America’s nuclear arsenal without sacrificing major components of its nuclear “triad” of nuclear-tipped ground-based inter-continental ballistic missiles, nuclear-capable bomber aircraft and submarine-launched nuclear arms.

    https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-scrap-sea-launched-nuclear-missile-despite-military-backing-2022-10-27/

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