When You’re At The Very Tip-Top Of A Roller Coaster, There’s Nowhere Else To Go

1. ‘While we are seeing new inventory popping up all over the metro area, the problem is the price tag. Many of the new-build homes are not affordable for first-time home buyers, forcing many to sign a mortgage they can not afford and quickly relist the home back on the market’

   Sound lending!

   1. Due diligence, or gimme that commission?

   2. Every time I talk to someone remotely connected to real estate, they assure me there can’t be another crash because, sound lending!

      1. Even though it’s nonsense, give them the sound lending theory if they want it. And throw in the low inventory theory while you’re at it. Because at the end of the day it’s about affordability.

2. ‘The 10 costliest U.S. wildfires in insured losses all occurred in California, eight of them in just the last decade’

   The can’t do state.

   1. All worse than the Marshall Fire? Dang!

3. ‘It wasn’t just that China was the wrong theme. Everything in China fell. You were lucky to have not got sucked in and just been watching it’

   Dan:

   via GIPHY

   1. Paging AlbuquerqueDan…somebody needs to convince the world that it ain’t bad in China.

      It seems like just yesterday when we were arguing about whether Covid-19 would be contained to China (Dan said yes).

      1. Financial Times
         Chinese economy
         Sliding Beijing home prices spur alarm in China’s property sector
         Discrepancy between broker testimony and official data fuels fears authorities are playing down extent of crisis
         Residential buildings under construction in Beijing, China
         A drop in home prices in Beijing, where well-paid government workers have been protected from wider economic turmoil, has been particularly notable
         Sun Yu in Beijing
         December 20 2023

         House sellers in Beijing are cutting prices aggressively, according to brokers, despite official statistics that show the housing market in the Chinese capital remains buoyant.

         Interviews with more than two dozen real estate brokers across the capital, long one of China’s most desirable real estate markets, show transaction prices have fallen between 10 and 30 per cent from their peak in 2021.
         …

      2. Financial Times
         Chinese business & finance
         Foreign investors unwind $33bn bet on China growth rebound
         Almost 90% of money that flowed into Chinese stocks in 2023 has left amid concern about economy
         The liquidity crisis in the property sector and Beijing’s unwillingness to take action to boost the economy have prompted an outflow of investment
         Hudson Lockett and Cheng Leng in Hong Kong yesterday

         Nearly nine-tenths of the foreign money that flowed into China’s stock market in 2023 has already left, spurred by mounting doubts about Beijing’s willingness to take serious action to boost flagging growth.

         Since peaking at Rmb235bn ($33bn) in August, net foreign investment in China-listed shares this year has dropped 87 per cent to just Rmb30.7bn, according to Financial Times calculations based on data from Hong Kong’s Stock Connect trading scheme.

         Traders and analysts said the reversal reflected pessimism over the outlook for the world’s second-largest economy among global fund managers. International investors have been persistent net sellers since August, when missed bond payments by developer Country Garden revealed the severity of a liquidity crisis in the country’s property sector.

         “The confidence issue goes beyond real estate, although real estate is key,” said Wang Qi, chief investment officer for wealth management at UOB Kay Hian in Hong Kong. “I’m referring to consumer confidence, business confidence and investor confidence — both from domestic and foreign investors.”
         …

         1. “Since peaking at Rmb235bn ($33bn) in August, net foreign investment in China-listed shares this year has dropped 87 per cent to just Rmb30.7bn,…”

            Is $33bn alot…over seven months?

            Seems like a little-heralded race to the exits just hapened.

            1. Also, I have a cautionary tale for would-be China dip buyers. I tried bottom fishing Japanese stocks in the early 1990s, after their real estate led- economic collapse. Five years later I dumped my HODLings, which had gone absolutely nowhere.

            2. “…seven months?”

               12 – 8 = 4 months…

            3. The Chinese Great Depression has come about though real estate speculation rather than stocks…

4. ‘Jerome Powell risks clearing the way for Donald Trump to win the presidency in 2024 if he doesn’t immediately start cutting interest rates, a top progressive lawmaker claimed Wednesday. Ro Khanna, an outspoken California Democrat who has repeatedly blasted Powell over the Fed’s handling of inflation, once again took aim at the top central banker. ‘Powell should cut interest rates now given most of inflation was caused by supply shocks,’ wrote Khanna, a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. ‘If he doesn’t, he may be the person most responsible for the possible return of Trump’

   Wa happened to my 81 million voters Ro?

   1. It’s tough to be a national leader during a period of global central bank tightening.

      1. And the Winter of Death. He only needs to hold on for a few more months.

         1. Bidens regency will keep him alive on life support aka weekend at Bernie’s for as long as they can. Mark my words. They did it with Roosevelt and Reagan.

   2. “…most of inflation was caused by supply shocks…”

      Wuh about covid stimulus cash?

      1. And rock bottom interest rates?

      2. They all go together. Too little goods and way too much money chasing it.

      3. of inflation was caused by

         It’s really simple if you ignore the politicians. Inflation is caused by creating more money.

   3. Wa happened to my 81 million voters Ro?

      They’re going to need an even bigger ballot box stuffing machine this time.

      1. Why even bother stuffing the boxes when your people count the ballots? They’ll just declare a winner. Whose to stop them? The democrat Secretary of State in Maine just said Trump can’t be on the ballot, just did it like that.

5. Denver mayor calls on federal government to do more to help with migrant crisis (12/27/2023):

   “The federal government has pledged to reimburse Denver up to $9 million, but the city has spent $36 million helping more than 34,000 migrants over the past year. Johnston said the costs could quadruple next year.

   “We’re looking at about $160 million of potential costs going into next year’s budget. That’s almost 10% of our entire city budget. That’s a massive impact for us,” Johnston said.

   https://www.denver7.com/news/front-range/denver/denver-mayor-calls-on-federal-government-to-do-more-to-help-with-migrant-crisis

   $160 million is that a lot?

   1. I’m going to print up some flyers in Spanish to pass out with visual instructions, directing the “migrants” to any house that has a “hate has no home here” or “in this house, we believe” yard sign or any other display of virtue signals, pride flags, Ukraine flags, etc, that say COME HERE FOR FREE FOOD, FREE CLOTHES, FREE MONEY.

      1. I have to wonder if they don’t know that already. Whoever is shepherding in these migrants seems to have a pulse on the finer points of policy deadlines such as Title 42.

      2. “Los inmigrantes son bienvenidos aquí”

         Migrants welcome here

         1. I’ve been watching Mayor Adams closely. He is very careful to never say anything negative about anyone in particular now especially after Biden put the FBI on him. His main talking point now is, ‘people don’t realize that our hands are tied, we need money.’ He has mostly given up and is just accepting the situation now. Will the dumbocrats ever wake up and realize what they’ve done to themselves? Fools, all of them.

            1. If he ever wants to be more than Mayor he has to toe the party line. And that line is that the border is under control and we are only allowing worthy and deserving refugees to enter the country,

   2. As buses of migrants continue to arrive in Denver, the city is running out of places to house them, according to Mayor Mike Johnston. Johnston, who appeared in a Wednesday news conference with the mayors of New York City and Chicago, said Denver has had more migrant arrivals per capita than any other city in the country. FOX31 confirmed Wednesday that Denver reached out to Wheat Ridge to discuss a potential migrant shelter at a Super 8 motel near Interstate 70 and Kipling Street. Those discussions ended last week after Denver officials decided the motel did not meet all of their criteria.

      On Wednesday night, more than 100 people attended a grassroots meeting at the Wheat Ridge Recreation Center to speak out against the proposal. “If Denver wants to be a sanctuary city, they need to do it themselves,” one man said.

      https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/denver-floats-housing-migrants-in-neighboring-cities/ar-AA1m88vS

   3. More local news.

      “As 2024 gets closer, the town of Carbondale is tapped.

      Normally, only 8-10 homeless people live in Carbondale, but the South American newcomers increased that number by 500-800%. Suddenly, 2% of the town’s population had no place to live.

      Day laborers told The Denver Gazette recently that the influx of immigrants has driven down the amount they can earn.

      Jesus Martinez said in Spanish, with an uncomfortable laugh, that he doesn’t want others to come “because there’s no more work.”

      Originally from Durango, Mexico, the 35-year-old has picked up a myriad of odd jobs — cleaning houses, construction, yard work — to earn money.

      “Many people are leaving (Denver) because they can’t find work,” Martinez said.

      https://denvergazette.com/homeless/immigration-destination-how-the-town-of-carbondale-fixed-its-immigration-problem/article_a35ec092-a4f2-11ee-875d-6b394dc4fea6.html

      “In the 12 months since 90 immigrants were dropped off downtown at Union Station last December, Denver has spent more than $33 million responding to the humanitarian crisis that has seen more than 31,000 immigrants cross the U.S. border with Mexico and arrive at Colorado’s most populous city.

      The cost to temporarily house, feed and transport the immigrants has largely fallen on Denver taxpayers, who have assumed roughly $6 out of every $10 spent.

      https://denvergazette.com/news/denver-sheltered-immigrants-number-surges/article_f60dc89a-9879-11ee-aa40-7bfc8b185799.html

      1. Horrah. All those in Denver can get high on that Rocky Mountain love. They pushed this agenda calling anyone who opposed it haters and racists. .

   4. Westword — Ten Resolutions for Downtown Denver in 2024 (12/27/2023):

      “Things might be getting better, but they’re not fixed yet — not by a long shot. There are still too many shootings, too many disturbances, too much chaos. People need to feel safe in their environment if you expect them to come downtown and stay a while. You can build all the patios you want, plant all the trees and put in a water feature or two — but if there’s a clearly disturbed shirtless guy swinging away with a metal signpost he picked up somewhere (as there was just the other day near the construction area at 16th and Champa streets), that’s not going to inspire anyone to stick around and have a coffee.

      We broke the news last spring that the Target store on the 16th Street Mall was forced to lock up its aluminum foil because fentanyl users were taking it to smoke — sometimes right there in the aisle. There’s only so much of that a store will abide before giving up and focusing on the suburban locations where it’s just the usual bored teens shoplifting shit. Denver needs to address the addiction issue so as not to exacerbate the closure of stores big and small all over downtown. (McDonald’s and TJ Maxx, we miss you.)

      Call it what it is: rampant homelessness in a population with very little choice left in the matter. It’s certainly not a leisure activity like camping. There won’t be s’mores and singing around a merry fire. The ghost stories are real ones, shades of people once known and now lost, either to the cold or exposure or who just plain went missing. Denver can’t afford euphemisms about its homeless problems. Stop the sweeps, stop the rhetoric, stop the endless planning that leads nowhere. Help people. It’s that simple.

      https://www.westword.com/news/10-resolutions-for-downtown-denver-in-2024-18595478

      I’m financially boycotting Denver. NO SALES TAX REVENUE FOR YOU! Let’s ACCELERATE the Doom Loop.

      1. I live next to Chicago, it’s
         The next town over, and everyone here avoids Chicago even though it’s right there.

   5. $160 million is that a lot?

      It’s $160 million Dumver doesn’t have. and thanks to TABOR they can’t just unilaterally raise taxes, voters will have to approve it. And speaking of TABOR, the refunds next year should total close to $4 billion. about $800 per adult That’s money Gov. Polis and Mayor
      Johnson would love to get their grubby, dirty hands on, which is why prop HH was on the ballot last month, and it went down in flames.

6. ‘The time to buy is when nobody wants it. The time to sell is when everybody wants it and this is the time when there are few buyers in the market and there’s some, I hate to say it, desperate sellers but there are’

   Everybody wants to live 5 feet above sea level Art!

7. ‘The warning came after a Los Angeles office building was sold on Tuesday for 52% less than its price in 2018. And just days earlier, the third tallest office high rise in LA was sold for 45% less than its price in 2014′

   How do those 5% cap rates look now?

   ‘So you’re going to see a lot more headlines like this with valuations being down more than 50%,’ Hill said. ‘I think you’re probably going to see some headlines that are even more severe than that’

   We’ve been seeing that for over a year now Rich.

8. Looking ahead to 2024, will US housing remain buoyant, even as China’s and Germany’s markets sink?

   All real estate is international these daze…

   1. German property prices plummet as housing bubble bursts
      22 December 2023 • 7:40pm
      Chancellor Olaf Scholz is contending with a German economy that is the worst performer in the G7 and the bursting of a house price bubble
      German house prices suffer record 10pc fall

      House prices in Germany dropped by a record 10.2pc in the third quarter in a further sign of the struggles faced by Europe’s largest economy since the pandemic.

      It was the fourth consecutive quarter of declines compared to the same time a year earlier, and the biggest since Germany’s statistics office began keeping records in the year 2000.

      The drop comes amid the biggest property crisis in decades in Europe’s largest economy.

      Konstantin Kholodilin of the German Institute for Economic Research said: “Until 2022, there was a speculative price bubble in Germany, one of the biggest in the last 50 years.

      “Prices have been falling ever since. The bubble has burst.”

      For years, the property sector in Germany and elsewhere in Europe boomed as interest rates were low and demand strong.

      But a sharp rise in rates and costs has put an end to the run, tipping developers into insolvency as bank financing dries up and deals freeze.

      It comes as official data showed Germany is the worst performing G7 economy since the pandemic, growing by just 0.3pc.

      Britain slipped back behind France to be the next worst performer after downward revisions to growth left the UK on the brink of recession.
      …
      https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2023/12/22/ftse-100-markets-latest-uk-recession-gdp-us-inflation/

      1. I wonder how German housing prices looked a few months before the recent collapse?

         1. Society Germany
            Germany: Housing is almost unaffordable
            Sabine Kinkartz
            August 3, 2023
            More and more people are desperately searching for accommodation across the country. The supply is too low, rents are rising and incomes are often no longer sufficient. An explosive situation.
            https://p.dw.com/p/4Uk4K
            A protest against high rents by the Brandenburg Gate in September 2021
            For several years, people in Berlin have been demonstrating against high rents
            Image: Christophe Gateau/dpa/picture alliance

            Germany is traditionally a nation of tenants. While across Europe around 70% of the population own the house or apartment they live in, only 46% of people living in Germany do so. In major cities, that ratio is even lower.

            If you want to rent a nice apartment in a good location in Berlin, you need a lot of money. A “wonderfully spacious 4-room apartment” in Berlin’s upmarket Charlottenburg district: 182 square meters, furnished, the rent is €8,190 ($8,947) per month. Plus heating, electricity and other incidental costs, that amounts to over €50 per square meter.
            …
            https://www.dw.com/en/germany-housing-is-almost-unaffordable/a-66432276

            1. 1) To answer my question, Germany’s prices were way out of control shortly before sliding into the CR8R. Perhaps the US is just a little bit of a laggard this time around?

               2) It seems like Germany mostly sat out Housing Bubble 1.0 (roughly 1996-2007). I guess ZIRP and NIRP helped ensure that didn’t happen again.

               3) $8,947 per month for a four bedroom apartment in Berlin makes me feel much better facing rents above $4000 for a 3+br SFR in San Diego.

9. The 2024 Election Year Variant.

   New York Times (via Archive) — JN.1 Now Accounts for Nearly Half of U.S. Covid Cases (12/27/2023):

   “JN.1, which emerged from the variant BA.2.86 and was first detected in the United States in September, accounted for 44 percent of Covid cases nationwide by mid-December, up from about 7 percent in late November, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

   To some extent, this jump is to be expected. “Variants take some time to get going,” said Dr. William Schaffner, an infectious disease specialist at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. “Then they speed up, they spread widely, and just when they’re doing that, after several months, a new variant crops up.”

   JN.1’s momentum this month suggests that it may be more transmissible or better at evading our immune systems than other variants currently circulating, according to a C.D.C. report published Dec. 22. The agency said that Covid remains “a serious public health threat”

   https://archive.is/DzWEg

   1. Does anyone have any doubts now about the One World Order plot to take over the planet?
      Nothing else explains the madness that we have been subjected to.
      Get your Covid Booster, because you will be more likely to get Covid, or get a heart attack or die.
      Dr McCullough and others are calling for these fake vaccines to be taken off market immediately.
      They won’t take this failed gene therapy off market and they plan to put it in more products.
      Extortion/ blackmail and bribery is the main method this Cult used to take over Politicans, institutions, UN and WHO, medical system, you name it.
      Climate Change and viruses as fake grounds to alter planet into humanity enslaved by this smaller group of psychopathic weirdos and depopulationist.
      And they want to exalt Robots and AI as the great replacement for humans in their plans . They want to make the human race useless eaters, worthy of elimination.
      The most absurd fraud is that co2 needs to be eliminated or the planet is doomed.
      King Charles says the Climate Change threat is dire. What a crock . The bought off news pushing Climate Change fraud and fake killer vaccines. SHOCKING, but true attack on humanity.

   2. more transmissible

      So, how transmissible are we now? So we catch it from a mile away instead of a half mile away?

      1. There are still people wearing a mask while driving alone in Denver. I saw a chick wearing a mask while riding a bike on Broadway up in Baker last week (migrants please go to Baker, all your needs will be met there).

         #MassFormationPsychosis

         1. Don’t see many masks around San Diego any more outside the Asian subpopulation.

            For a good while during the height of the pandemic, our church required them, but some prominent families steadfastly refused to comply. You could have cut the resulting tension with a knife. One very fancy lady showed up weekly wearing a clear plastc mask that neither hid her attractive features nor blocked whatever respiratory microbes she was exhaling from entering the shared air in the room.

            Orchestras got very weird, with string sections subjected mask mandates and wind sections exempt, as it is impossible to blow a horn with a mask on. The rules were all about virtue signalling, not much about preventing the spread of disease.

   3. Pft! Far more people are catching the common cold. I know plenty of people with the sniffles, but no one with Covid.

      1. Have all those people actually gone to a clinic or doctor and been tested? Not only for Covid-19, but for Flu A, Flu B, and RSV? I was under the weather recently and it turned out to be RSV.

         1. Most of the people I know are getting tested. They are still paranoid about COVID and are immensely relieved when they are told they just have a cold.

         2. I had two respiratory colds back-to-back. Stuffy nose only, maybe a little upper back soreness, no throat issues or fever. Lived on Sudafed for a month. Coulda been COVID, coulda been RSV, coulda been a mild case of flu (I did get the flu shot). I didn’t bother to get tested because I didn’t want to get stuck quarantining.

            1. I have not ingested a Sudafed, other over-the-counter cold remedy, or antibiotic since the early 2000s, including when I had Covid two Decembers back. My infectuous disease immunity generally improved since swearing off antibiotics, and after surviving a bout of Covid, I have not become reinfected, despite multiple documented first-hand exposures.

               Perhaps the fact that my ancestors survived the black death, typhus, cholera, measles, mumps, Spanish (Kansas) flu, polio, etc. in the absence of modern medicine, antibiotics or vaccinations has worked out in my favor?

      2. In Portland Oregon more people are catching Shigella, which is transmitted thru fecal contact, than the flu. Try not to laugh out loud:

         https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jpt8SdZvRg8

      3. A large number of people in my personal circle have tested positive for Covid over the past year, in some cases multiple times, and several of them exposed me to it while they most likely were contagious. Fortunately their cases have generally been mild, unlike what I had in late 2021, around the time when some personal acquaintances died with severe Covid.

10. Finance ·Real estate
    2023 ushered in a new American era of housing haves and have-nots, and it’s unlikely to change next year
    BYAlena Botros
    December 28, 2023 at 3:45 AM PST
    2023 was the year the housing market split.
    Photo illustration by Fortune; original photo via Getty Images

    2023 was the year the housing market cracked: The stark divisions between housing haves and have-nots became more visible than ever before, even in America’s already-unequal society. How you made out in this upheaval likely comes down to whether you bought a home before or during the pandemic. If you did, you skipped the pain and craze of this year’s market, locked in a (fairly) low mortgage rate, and maybe saw your home value appreciate; if you didn’t, you might feel like you never will.
    …
    https://fortune.com/2023/12/28/housing-market-new-era-haves-have-nots-winners-losers-mortgage-rates-home-prices-home-sales/

    1. Do the benefits of home ownership seem too good to be true?

       There just might be a slight degree of exaggeration in such reporting…

       1. The benefits of Home Ownership…as the owner of several SFR properties I am enjoying the bene’s of home ownership. 40% of my residents don’t know how to clear a kitchen drain, or how to even change the HVAC filters. And these are the people benefiting with the luxury of higher learning. When I attempt to schedule a maintenance time, I am told the time conflicts with their pickle ball time or a luncheon time with friends. And yet, they want to freeze their rental rate despite the raise they just got. And No, the state law does not require the owner to repaint every three years or change the carpeting every 5 years. The $700 p/m car payment plus the monthly rent they pay me for housing could be used to buy their own house, but that would require too much effort and time on their part. In 2046 when my Great-grandchild graduates, He or she will start their adult life with a fully paid off house, thanks to the renters who have made their monthly rental payments allowing me to pay off the mortgages. Of course, in 2046 I will be 103 years of age , laying on the beach under an umbrella and enjoying an adult beverage. LIFE IS SWEET !!! TTFN

          1. “When I attempt to schedule a maintenance time, I am told the time conflicts with their pickle ball time or a luncheon time with friends.”

             You signed up for dealing with PITA tenants. But it’s lucky for them that you are willing and able to take care of them.

             1. Luck? Being a landlord who rents makes maintenance a REQUIREMENT.
                He degrades his tenants as stupid for not maintaining his property with extras like HVAC filters. That is why they pay rent, for HIM TO DO IT.
                And no, they are not required to be available at his beckon and call. MUTUAL is the term.

          2. You seem like a decent accommodating landlord. I’m renting a condo and do simple maintenance such as changing air/fridge filters, I’ve replaced a shower head, I know how to unclog a sink or toilet, etc. But what I can’t do is fix a shower drain leak that has dripped onto the ceiling of my downstairs neighbor. I stopped using the shower when the leak was discovered (since I have 2 bathrooms), but the neighbor has grown increasingly frustrated about the lack of attention from my landlord. I get it, but nothing I can do. It’s been 2 months and a plumber has yet to be sent out. I’m usually home, but will be away on business last week in February. Which probably means that’s when a plumber will finally be scheduled… (Not a fan of work being done when I’m not home.)

             1. The LL clearly disdains you and you clearly do not know or exercise your legal rights.

             2. “The LL clearly disdains you and you clearly do not know or exercise your legal rights.”

                I’m in FL. My experience since moving here is LLs disdain all their tenants…or at least feel like they can treat them like garbage. I don’t make waves because I don’t want to move anywhere else in this god forsaken state. Just keep my head down, pay my rent, and count the days until I can move back to PA. Only here for son’s college tuition.

             3. “…in this god forsaken state.”

                LOL

       2. …and the next time the housing market crashes, millions of underwater mortgage borrowers can’t afford to pay off their mortgages with the proceeds of selling their homes, and housing market victims clamor for bailouts, nobody who writes for the MSM will connect the dots to the present period when homeowners overwhelmingly are the haves and renters are the have nots. Real journalists will number themselves among the housing market’s victims, too preoccupied with their misfortunes in the unfolding crisis to recognize their own complicity.

       3. Renting vs. buying a house: The good option for your wallet got even better this year
          Swapna Venugopal Ramaswamy
          USA TODAY

          If you are debating whether to rent or buy your first home: it is cheaper to rent. In fact, it’s gotten even cheaper since last year.

          Steep home prices, high mortgage rates and marginally declining rental costs are making renting a studio-to -two bedroom apartment nearly $1,200 ($1,183) less expensive per month than buying a starter home in 47 out of the top 50 metros in the U.S., according to an analysis by Realtor.com.
          …
          https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2023/09/27/renting-cheaper-than-buying-a-house/70974358007/

    2. Saw a great meme from the younger set recently, it said:

       “Instead of learning to walk in the 90’s I should have been buying a house.”

       The frog is starting to notice that it’s being boiled.

11. Government intervention caused the housing crisis by forcing banks to lend to unqualified borrowers in the name of “fairness.” When will they learn that the free market reigns supreme? We need less government meddling in the housing industry, not more. I say let the banks decide who they lend to, and let the free market correct itself!

    1. One of the main reasons I have rented over the years is to avoid competing with low income homeowners who get a leg up in the market through the government’s various affordable housing programs. I figure the effect of these programs is to push up housing prices above fundamental market value, making it more expensive to own than to rent. And when the economy crashes and the low income owners get wiped out, housing market values can quickly get hammered back to fundamental levels, as happened in the post-2009 period.

       Wherher I would have bought in 2012 if I knew then that the Fed was going to step in to prop up housing valuations with Quantitative Easing targeted at mortgage backed securities is a moot question today. Nobody could have seen it coming!

       1. If I had realized back in 2011 that I might want to settle in Las Vegas, and had bought near the bottom, my mortgage, etc. payment would be at least 50% less than my current rent.

       2. Your perspective is incomplete, particularly for San Diego and the west in general. Immigration, both legal and illegal, is the main issue not ‘low income competition’. I’ll spare you a long post with data etc but the influx of foreign nationals into San Diego is massive. That is who you are really competing against. Furthermore, it isn’t just ‘mexicans’, it is throngs of people from everywhere. If you could see the real numbers your jaw would drop.

          1. An out of state relative is visiting. One of the first things she noticed is that just about everyone in my little burg is white, which to her feels “weird”. Just goes to show how most Americans have reconciled with and accepted the great replacement, which is going into overdrive now.

             We have have had a population influx in my little burg since I moved here. Some of it is white flight from Denver. We also get a lot of people here from the Dakotas, Nebraska, etc.

             Curiously, Hispanics seem less common here than before. I think many left during the great recession, as the need for roofers, framers, painters and drywallers vanished.

             1. Do these new immigrants even need to work? The gov appears to put them on the dole on Day 1. If they’re being fed gov cheese then they won’t even know there’s a recession going on.

             2. Do these new immigrants even need to work? The gov appears to put them on the dole on Day 1.

                More and more are living in tents and eating in soup kitchens. A lot of the free cheese is funded locally, and budgets are exhausted, as seen in many places. I think for the invaders timing was everything. The early ones got lots of free cheese. The later arrivals not so much.

             3. Your one relative is not “most Americans”

             4. I think most Americans have accepted that they are being replaced, but they know there is nothing anyone can do about it. Your government hates you.

             5. Your one relative is not “most Americans”

                I have had other out of state visitors, both family and friends express the same sentiment: “Wow, everyone here is white”.

                Another memory was a lunch stop at chipotle. The remark was “Whoa! Everyone working here is white! Back home they would all be black or Hispanic”

                And I will confess that when I go out of state it feels weird to see so many vibrants, especially blacks. I recall going to a pizza joint in North Carolina and the entire staff was black. You do see vibrants in Dumver, in part because of the invaders.

                I hear out of state friends tell me about their neighbors: the Ethiopian guy, the Iranian guy, the Colombian, the guy from Senegal, plus the usual cast of vibrants. IIRC, Hispanics not outnumber whites in Texas.

                And what is also funny is when I talk to Hispanics in my Mexico City accented Spanish. They look at me and from their expressions I see “does not compute” on their faces. They often just talk back to me in English, even though I know they speak Spanish

             6. I think most Americans have accepted that they are being replaced

                I perceive that as well. Many do realize there is an invasion going on, but either feel that stopping it is hopeless or are struggling so much holding everything together that they just ignore what is happening. Sure, some do care and let their representatives know they are unhappy.

                I find it very interesting that the Dems have refused to close the border in exchange for more money for Ukraine and Israel. It shows the the Great Replacement is their top priority now.

          2. They are everywhere. I made the mistake of going into a Ross Dress for Less last week and I was the only white person, and I was taller than everyone else in the store. I’m the minority in the Chicago suburbs.

             1. I made the mistake of going into a Ross Dress for Less last week and I was the only white person

                I can’t say that I shop at places like Ross, but I wouldn’t be surprised if the ones in Dumver are like that.

12. Vivek Ramaswamy

    @VivekGRamaswamy
    If you’d have told me nearly 3 years ago when I was just a CEO that Jan. 6 was an inside job, I would’ve said that’s crazy talk. It’s not. There is now clear evidence that there was at the very least entrapment of peaceful protestors, similar to the fake Gretchen Whitmer kidnapping plot & countless other cases. The FBI won’t admit how many undercover officers were in the field on Jan 6, Capitol police on one hand fired rubber bullets & explosives into a peaceful crowd who they then willingly later allowed to enter the Capitol. That doesn’t add up & the actual evidence turns the prior narrative upside down: if the deep state is willing to manufacture an “insurrection” to take down its political opponents, they can do anything. Once you see it, you can’t unsee it.

    https://x.com/VivekGRamaswamy/status/1740079766911303712?s=20

    1. Manufactured narratives are the name of the game now. You can’t believe anything .
       But, they are so obvious in their fake narratives and their ongoing lies.
       They want to accomplish all their goals by 2030, which includes reducing co2 carbons by 43%. If done, that would create a disaster of epic proportions according to real Scientist. Just like the vaccines were a murderous disaster, so are their Climate Change BS solutions.
       THEY ARE MAKING THIS SHIT UP .

13. Ukraine may have to delay salaries, pensions without foreign aid – FT

    Reuters
    Wed, Dec 27, 2023

    KYIV, Dec 27 (Reuters) – Ukraine’s government faces the prospect of delaying pensions and salaries for public servants if crucial Western financial aid is not approved soon, deputy prime minister Yulia Svyrydenko told the Financial Times on Wednesday.

    https://finance.yahoo.com/news/ukraine-may-delay-salaries-pensions-154417260.html

    1. Ukraine may have to delay salaries, pensions without foreign aid – FT

       Ohhhhh Myyyyy!

       1. salaries, pensions

          That’s called military aid.

14. Your tax dollars are paying for the ‘rights for migrants’ legal scam

    By Betsy McCaughey
    Published Dec. 26, 2023

    As a record number of migrants invade the United States, wreaking pain on New York City and other communities, one group is winning big-time: the public advocacy lawyers.

    Their business is to constantly sue to win more so-called rights for migrants.

    Rights to shelter, rights to meals, rights to health care, and even the right to vote in local elections.

    Who pays the bills on both sides of these lawsuits? You do.

    https://nypost.com/2023/12/26/opinion/your-tax-dollars-fund-us-border-crisis-and-rights-for-migrants/

15. Your tax dollars used to defeat, harm and murder you. The Governments are aiding and abetting a insurrection by a Cult of devil people , that have evil sinister intent for populations of the World.

    1. Fact check: true.

16. Real Estate
    California’s exodus continues, with population dropping for the third year in a row, putting its political influence at risk
    Alia Shoaib
    Dec 23, 2023, 8:02 AM PST
    Overview of Los Angeles, California.
    Neal Pritchard Photography

    – California’s population has dropped for the third year in a row.

    – The high-cost of living and an increase in remote work are likely driving factors.

    – Some fear the demographic changes could cause the state to lose political clout.
    …
    https://www.businessinsider.com/california-exodus-population-drops-again-political-muscle-at-risk-2023-12

    1. California homebuying crashed to record low sales in 2023. What’s next?
       42% drop in sales follows the Fed rapidly boosting mortgage rates
       By Jonathan Lansner | Orange County Register
       PUBLISHED: December 27, 2023 at 7:24 a.m. | UPDATED: December 27, 2023 at 11:33 a.m.
       …
       https://www.ocregister.com/2023/12/27/california-homebuying-crashed-in-2023-whats-next/

    2. And every single fleeing one I have met by any casual association is now a registered democrat in my state.

17. What do I most remember from freshman economics class?

    “There is no such thing as a free lunch.”

    1. Opinion
       Guest Essay
       The Fed Has Put Our Housing Market in Jeopardy
       Nov. 14, 2023
       An illustration of a bald eagle sitting on a block of ice containing a house.
       Credit…Albert Tercero
       By Daniel Alpert
       Mr. Alpert is the managing partner of the Westwood Capital investment bank.

       The Federal Reserve’s relentless attack on inflation is jeopardizing our housing market. The resulting damage is not only having an impact on a critical engine of economic growth but is also, ironically, undermining the war against inflation as well.

       Resolving an unusual problem requires an unusual solution. The Fed should immediately reverse course and buy mortgage securities to help moderate consumer mortgage rates. It can keep selling Treasury bonds if it so chooses. This will allow the Fed to raise non-housing interest rates, if necessary, while also allowing the housing market to resume functioning normally again.

       As fears of Covid waned and the engines of the economy restarted with a bang, concerns about runaway inflation prompted the Fed to embark on one of the most extreme changes in prevailing interest rates in history. The central bank raised its key federal funds policy interest rate to a level about 22 times what it was previously in less than 18 months. Only during the rapid inflation of the late 1970s, when the Fed under its chairman Paul Volcker raised the effective federal funds rate to nearly 20 percent in 1980, has an increase come even close. (And that Fed only roughly doubled rates, not increased them 22-fold.)

       In normal times, higher Treasury rates, which make mortgages more expensive, divert household income to mortgage payments and away from other purchases, dampen home buyer demand and, ultimately, lower home prices. Lower home prices reduce homeowners’ wealth, further lowering their spending. And home purchases are such a powerful component of the overall economy — think of everything a new homeowner might need — that making it harder to buy homes helps cool off the rest of our $27.6 trillion economy.

       Advertisement
       SKIP ADVERTISEMENT

       The problem is, these aren’t normal times. Recently, the average interest cost on a 30-year, fixed-rate mortgage neared 8 percent. Less than two years ago, it was about 3 percent, and most homeowners refinanced then or at earlier lows around 2016. The jump in rates has been so unusually large and came on so unusually fast that many homeowners who may want to move suddenly cannot do so because even downsizing could result in a substantially higher monthly mortgage payment. As a result, the U.S. owner-occupied housing market is now experiencing both a mobility and an inventory crisis.

       In September, the pace of existing-home sales fell below four million on an annualized basis to a level unseen since the early 1990s, other than during the Great Recession and the pandemic lockdowns. With so few homes being put on the market for sale, the normal effect of higher interest rates — a gradual reduction in home prices and dampening of associated inflation — is simply not able to happen.

       There’s more: When owner-occupied homes aren’t made available for sale, and prices therefore can’t adjust downward, more people are forced to rent. And with more households dumped into the rental market, rental prices rise — which is what they have been doing in recent months, defeating the Fed’s effort to beat inflation.

       With residential rent making up approximately 33 percent of total and 42 percent of core Consumer Price Index inflation, excluding volatile food and energy prices, the cost of housing has been driving inflation for nearly all of 2023 (and remains potent regardless of what Tuesday’s Consumer Price Index data for October may suggest). In September, if housing prices had not risen, core inflation for the month would have been zero.
       …
       https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/14/opinion/federal-reserve-housing-market.html

       1. “The Fed should immediately reverse course and buy mortgage securities to help moderate consumer mortgage rates.”

          The hair-of-the-dog hangover cure never goes out of style.

          1. The Fed should immediately stop interfering in the economy by buying MBS’s or anything else.

             1. I think this is why the effect of long understood economic rules is going to be delayed. Housing prices everywhere should be in free fall, but it still feels like the pregame show.

             2. “Housing prices everywhere should be in free fall, but it still feels like the pregame show.”

                We are presently in the denial phase of the housing bubble stages of grief.

                Schadenfreude is still several years out at this stage, as well as opportunity for anyone with the good sense to stand by and stand back during the CR8R formation process.

    2. The bond market is in charge now and behaving ‘almost like a meme stock,’ equity strategist says
       Aruni Soni
       Dec 28, 2023, 9:40 AM PST
       Detail of a golden bull breaking through the finance section of a newspaper – stock photo
       Caspar Benson/Getty Images

       – The bond market is in charge and reacting like a meme stock, an equity strategist told Bloomberg TV.

       – The comment came as US Treasury yields have seen big swings in recent weeks.

       – “The Fed has obviously set itself up for a bit of a tête-à-tête with the bond market.”

       Stocks are taking cues from bonds as the sharp drop in yields over the last two months has ignited a rally in the S&P 500 and Nasdaq.

       In fact, US Treasury yields have seen big day-to-day swings recently, and it says something about the state of the market, according to Richard Kneller, US equities desk strategist at Stifel.

       “The bond market is in charge, as far as I’m concerned,” he told Bloomberg TV on Thursday. “I mean, the bond market is reacting almost like a meme stock.”

       Meme stocks boomed in 2021, when communities of retail investors organized on social media platforms like Reddit to send GameStop, AMC, and others soaring.

       For its part, the bond market has witnessed sudden spikes and plunges in recent months as investors react to prospects for Federal Reserve policy.

       In particular, fresh data on inflation have changed the odds on Fed rate hikes or cuts, putting yields in motion. In addition, strong or weak demand in recent Treasury auctions has also swung yields wildly.

       “The equity market is going to take the cue from the bond market, which of course is now thinking that it’s taken the reins in some respects from the Fed,” Kneller said. “The Fed has obviously set itself up for a bit of a tête-à-tête with the bond market.”
       …
       https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/bonds/bond-market-meme-stock-us-treasury-yield-fed-rate-cuts-2023-12

    3. “There is no such thing as a free lunch.”

       Tell that to the Free Sh!t Army

18. The Guardian (via Archive) — Biden mulls border crackdown in face of Trump’s migrant-bashing rhetoric (12/28/2023):

    “Exceptionally high levels of migration at the southern border with Mexico – and withering Republican attacks on the president’s response – have vaulted immigration to the fore. A bipartisan group of Senate lawmakers have been engaged in talks with the White House over a border deal that would unlock aid to Ukraine and Israel.

    But for many Democratic officials, immigration activists and progressive leaders, the dramatic changes Biden is considering to asylum law and border enforcement are nearly indistinguishable from the policies his predecessor. They argue that the US has a humanitarian responsibility to provide refuge to the millions of migrants fleeing violence, poverty and natural disasters.”

    https://archive.is/KO026

    Responsibility to provide refuge to the millions?

    The United States is not an all you can eat buffet for the citizens of every failed, socialist (redundant, I know) regime.

    1. Responsibility to provide refuge to the millions?

       Billions.It’s simply impossible.

       But that’s not what it’s about. All these Nuevos Americanos are being weaponized. They are being told they will be able to join the Free Sh!t Army once they arrive, but it isn’t happening. Their plight will be blamed on “deplorables” and we will get another Summer of Love as they become fed up with sleeping in tents and eating food they don’t like in soup kitchens.

       1. It’s another hill too far for them to die on, like the 40 genders thing. It’s already an historic cluster fook.

          1. I posted yesterday that the corners near the Squeegee Boys’ corners have been taken over by the ladies, straight up begging.

             Some of them will be turning tricks soon enough. Who cares if they’re minors either, Mayor Johnston doesn’t.

             1. And this is still the pregame show. Once these people have spent a freezing winter in tents and eating in soup kitchens they will be furious and livid, because this is not what they were promised. They were told by activists they would get free housing, SNAP, healthcare, etc. once they crossed the border and not tents and soup kitchens.

                The Mexican media has many reports of their defiance. When the Mexicans tried to close their southern border with Guatemala the invaders knocked the gates open and swarmed into Mexico. When Mexican police told them to get off the trains the invaders told the police to eff off. The Mexican railroads stopped running for a few days but the invaders stayed put and once the trains started rolling again they completed their journeys

       2. There’s a guy who owns an auto shop in NYC and his youtube channel used to be about various auto shop topics. It has recently pivoted to the large group of invaders who have taken up living in his semi trailer and his cars. He did not invite them to do this.

19. Today’s chill spot: 82F pool and blue sky.

    1. We’d all pay a few million $ for that, right?

       1. Some stupidly do. We don’t.

20. ‘It’ll be business as usual and the insurance companies win,’ said Bob Burns, an automotive business consultant who moved from Boulder Creek, where his house survived the fire, to a home down Highway 9 in Felton where he could only get FAIR Plan coverage. ‘It’s blackmail at this point — you have to pay them’

    You really should write a letter to the editor Bob.

21. ‘The hope was that consumers finally freed from lockdown would celebrate with a spending boom. They did, briefly—but since then the country has fallen into deflation and economic malaise…’It wasn’t just that China was the wrong theme. Everything in China fell. You were lucky to have not got sucked in and just been watching it’

    That CCP virus really blew up in yer face Xitler.

22. Hall & Oates — Back Together Again:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jVuFF8RX04I

    1. Cheryl Lynn — Got To Be Real:

       https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GLUCCewe_4c

       1. Parliament — Come In Out Of The Rain:

          https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PsP3rHs3oUI

23. What Do We Owe Other People? Ayn Rand Answers
    Ayn Rand Institute
    4 days ago

    This was Ayn Rand’s answer to a question after a speech on the subject of the morality of altruism in 1961.

    Question: Under Objectivism, what would be your social responsibility toward other people?

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oP0D24sXUCg

    2:47.

    1. I’m coming back tomorrow to watch that again.

24. Is There a Beat Generation? A live lecture by Jack Kerouac 1958
    Klact
    8 months ago
    A live lecture by Kerouac to students of Hunter College in Manhattan, New York on November 6, 1958.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ElVfb-7JHMU

    13:24.

    1. I read a lot of Kerouac in college for my own pleasure. Authors like him don’t exist any more. At best, they make video games.

25. Illegal Alien from Mexico Accused of Raping Unconscious 15-Year-Old Girl

    JOHN BINDER
    28 Dec 2023

    An illegal alien, whom police thought had fled to Mexico, is now accused of raping a young girl in Hamilton County, Tennessee.

    This month, 21-year-old illegal alien Erik Santillan of Mexico has been arrested and charged with aggravated rape after allegedly raping a 15-year-old girl while she was at a friend’s house in 2022.

    According to police, on June 20, 2022, the girl went to stay at a friend’s house where Santillan was as well. The girl, her friend, and Santillan, police said, went to buy alcohol and Santillan proceeded to chug beers they had bought.

    The girl eventually felt dizzy, according to police, and laid down on a bed alongside her friend. When the girl woke up, she realized she had injuries consistent with sexual assault. The girl’s friend later told police she woke up to find Santillan raping the girl.

    While the girl sought help from the friend’s mother, she said she was ignored because she was concerned about involving the police. The girl told her parents of the sexual assault, and they quickly reported the incident to police.

    Police assumed Santillan had fled to Mexico when they were unable to locate him. This month, though, officers found him living in Orlando, Florida. Sometime after locating him, officers were able to arrest him.

    Santillan remains in Hamilton County Jail on a $500,000 bail.

    https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2023/12/28/illegal-alien-from-mexico-accused-of-raping-unconscious-15-year-old-girl/

26. Legendary investor Jim Rogers sees an epic market bubble and looming economic disaster. He hopes to short the ‘Magnificent 7′ stocks when the time is right.
    Theron Mohamed
    Dec 28, 2023, 6:53 AM PST
    REUTERS/Bobby Yip

    – Jim Rogers expects a multi-asset bubble to burst and the American economy to run into trouble.

    – George Soros’ cofounder hopes to profit by shorting the “Magnificent Seven” stocks at the right time.

    – Rogers touted gold and silver, warned the inflation threat isn’t over, and slammed the Fed.

    Jim Rogers expects asset prices to plunge and economic disaster to strike — and he plans to profit by betting against stock-market darlings like Tesla and Nvidia when the time is right.

    “Bonds are a bubble, property in many countries is a bubble, stocks are getting ready for a bubble,” the veteran investor and travel author told Soar Financially in a recent interview.

    Rogers has dumped many of his stocks and bonds in anticipation of a painful slump, but he’s “not shorting yet because often at the end there’s a blowoff and things get really crazy,” he said.

    He flagged “warning signs” of an approaching collapse, including a handful of stocks dragging the major indices higher this year, and newbie investors boasting to all of their friends about how easy it is to make money trading stocks.

    The markets guru, best known for cofounding the Quantum Fund and Soros Fund Management with George Soros, said he’s itching to bet against the “Magnificent Seven” stocks — Apple, Alphabet, Amazon, Microsoft, Meta, Tesla, and Nvidia.

    “When the market comes to an end, the last high flyers are the best shorts,” he said. “The stocks that have done extremely well and are very expensive — that, I hope, is where I’m smart enough to short next time around.”

    Rogers, 81, also predicted the US economy would run into trouble soon as a result of its ballooning debt pile.

    “I would suspect that next year things are not going to look as happy,” he said. Rogers noted he wasn’t sure if a recession or mild downturn lies ahead, but he’s “worried” that there hasn’t been a prolonged economic slump since the 2008 financial crisis, and global debt loads have ballooned since then.

    “The next problem has to be the worst in my lifetime because the debt is just unbelievable,” he said.

    Rogers advised people to own precious metals, which tend to retain their value better than other assets during periods of panic.

    “Everybody should have some silver and gold under the bed,” he said. “Look, all of us peasants know, when there’s a serious catastrophe, you better have some gold and silver in the closet, so I do.”

    The “Adventure Capitalist” author also predicted inflation, which has cooled significantly in the past year, would reaccelerate to painful levels. Moreover, he accused the Federal Reserve of having no idea what it’s doing, and dismissed all but a couple of the central bank’s leaders over the last century as clueless “bureaucrats and academics.”
    …
    https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/stocks/jim-rogers-magnificent-short-stock-market-outlook-bubble-crash-recession-2023-12

27. All those houses and other properties corporate America bought 20% in excess of market price will all get government reimbursements for market prices as they are sold to the government to house illegals.

    No market has dropped yet.
    All are at all time highs. Still on the massive spike protruding way above the bubble.

    Houses went up 100 to 500% and you clowns cheer about a 10 or 17% drop from the all time high? Laughable.

    1. The fat lady is just warming up at this point…

    2. Housing is now overvalued in 88% of the U.S., says ratings agency Fitch
       Last Updated: Dec. 23, 2023 at 7:41 a.m. ET
       First Published: Dec. 21, 2023 at 12:42 p.m. ET
       By Aarthi Swaminathan
       The metropolitan areas where homes are most overvalued are in South Carolina, Texas and New Jersey, according to Fitch
       U.S. home prices have remained high even with mortgage rates doubling since this time in 2021.
       Getty Images

       The housing market is overvalued in 88% of U.S. metropolitan areas, according to a new report by Fitch Ratings.

       The ratings agency said Wednesday that housing was overvalued by 9.4%, nationally, in the second quarter of 2023. The agency said it expects prices to remain elevated, with prices having climbed further in the third quarter.
       …
       https://www.marketwatch.com/story/home-prices-are-overvalued-in-88-of-the-u-s-fitch-says-fb43cdb3

28. Hotel California — The Eagles

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=BciS5krYL80

    More spot on now than ever…

29. Was recession avoided entirely, or just postponed? I guess the debate can continue until at least one of these three doors is entered:

    1) recession begins
    2) inflation drops below 2%
    3) the Treasury yield curve normalizes

    1. Yahoo
       Yahoo Finance
       Why the most widely anticipated recession in history never came
       Josh Schafer
       Thu, December 28, 2023 at 7:57 AM PST·7 min read

       In the final Federal Reserve press conference of 2023, Fed chair Jerome Powell took a victory lap of sorts.

       Economists — including those on the Fed’s own staff — had widely expected a recession this year as the central bank raised interest rates to bring down persistently high inflation.

       The economic downturn never came, though.

       “A very high proportion of forecasters predicted very weak growth or a recession,” Powell said. “Not only did that not happen, we actually had a very strong year.”

       While that’s good news for businesses, consumers, and investors alike, the unexpected turn of events raises a question: How did forecasters get it so wildly wrong this time?

       The answer lies in the unprecedented nature of the COVID pandemic and the historic $5 trillion fiscal stimulus the US government pumped into the economy in response, economists told Yahoo Finance in interviews.

       “It’s been a tremendous challenge,” Deutsche Bank chief US economist Matthew Luzzetti said. “The nature of forecasting is that often you look back to history, either through your models, or through looking for historical parallels, and [try] to gauge how similar or different are things to the past and get historical average responses. … And when you don’t have an analogous period to look back to, it makes things incredibly difficult.”
       …
       https://finance.yahoo.com/news/why-the-most-widely-anticipated-recession-in-history-never-came-155724207.html

    2. Consumer Price Index Summary
       Transmission of material in this release is embargoed until
       8:30 a.m. (ET) Tuesday, December 12, 2023 USDL-23-2563

       Technical information: (202) 691-7000 * cpi_info@bls.gov * http://www.bls.gov/cpi
       Media contact: (202) 691-5902 * PressOffice@bls.gov

       CONSUMER PRICE INDEX – NOVEMBER 2023

       The Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U) increased 0.1 percent in November on a
       seasonally adjusted basis, after being unchanged in October, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
       reported today. Over the last 12 months, the all items index increased 3.1 percent before seasonal
       adjustment.

       The index for shelter continued to rise in November, offsetting a decline in the gasoline index. The
       energy index fell 2.3 percent over the month as a 6.0-percent decline in the gasoline index more than
       offset increases in other energy component indexes. The food index increased 0.2 percent in November,
       after rising 0.3 percent in October. The index for food at home increased 0.1 percent over the month
       and the index for food away from home rose 0.4 percent.

       The index for all items less food and energy rose 0.3 percent in November, after rising 0.2 percent in
       October. Indexes which increased in November include rent, owners’ equivalent rent, medical care, and
       motor vehicle insurance. The indexes for apparel, household furnishings and operations, communication,
       and recreation were among those that decreased over the month.

       The all items index rose 3.1 percent for the 12 months ending November, a smaller increase than the
       3.2-percent increase for the 12 months ending October.
       …
       https://www.bls.gov/news.release/cpi.nr0.htm

       1. “The index for shelter continued to rise in November, offsetting a decline in the gasoline index.”

          Too big of a number to mention it?

          1. The Wall Street Journal
             The Outlook
             Despite Record Home Prices, Housing Is About to Drag Inflation Down
             Driving the dichotomy are the lagged effect of slowing rents and the mechanics of how inflation is calculated
             By Gabriel T. Rubin
             Dec. 16, 2023 5:30 am ET
             Cooling rents should keep putting downward pressure on inflation next year.
             Photo: Loren Elliott/Bloomberg News

             Home buyers keeling over from sticker shock might think it crazy that housing could deliver significant relief on inflation. Yet that is economists’ base case for 2024.

             The fight against inflation has reached its proverbial “last mile,” and the biggest remaining obstacle is shelter.

             Consumer prices rose 3.1% in November from last year. That was helped by declining prices for some long-lasting goods like used cars, furniture and electronics over the past year. That has raised optimism that some measures of inflation could return to the Federal Reserve’s target of 2% early in 2024.

             The single most important factor standing in the way is shelter: it rose 6.5% in the year through November. And because it makes up 35% of the CPI, it has an outsize impact. Without shelter, inflation in that period would have been just 1.4%.

             (The Fed targets a measure, the personal-consumption expenditures index, which weighs prices differently and has been running somewhat below CPI inflation.)

             Home prices rose 3.4% in October from a year earlier, hitting a record for that month, according to the National Association of Realtors, though that is well down from a comparable 25.2% gain in May 2021.

             Watch home rents, not home prices

             So it might seem strange that shelter inflation is expected to slow. But shelter inflation is based on rents, not housing prices, and rent growth over the past year has fallen to 3.3% through November, according to Zillow, lower than the average during 2018-19.

             Moreover, this slowing takes time to show up in the CPI. Most tenants’ rents change just once a year and thus lag what tenants pay on new leases. To capture what the typical tenant experiences, the CPI measure of tenant rent includes new and existing leases, and therefore will tend to lag behind measures of new leases only.

             The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics surveys cohorts of properties at six-month intervals, then calculates the price change using a six-month moving average, adding to the lag in data.
             …
             https://www.wsj.com/economy/housing/despite-record-home-prices-housing-is-about-to-drag-inflation-down-53f196dd

             1. “And because it makes up 35% of the CPI, it has an outsize impact. ”

                I would have to check, but it seems like that number was around 28% in the early 1990s, before the Housing Bubble inflated.

                Also, for those who are womdering, 35% is 25% higher than 28%.

    3. The Motley Fool
       The Bond Market Just Sounded Its Most Severe Alarm in 50 Years. It Could Signal a Big Move in the Stock Market in 2024
       By Trevor Jennewine – Dec 25, 2023 at 6:55AM

       Key Points

       – The yield spread between the 10-year and 3-month Treasuries reached -1.89% this year, marking the steepest yield-curve inversion in decades.

       – The S&P 500 fell an average of 31% in past recessions. The index typically rebounds several months before recessions end.

       The shape of the U.S. Treasury yield curve has been an accurate indicator of recession for more than seven decades.

       Recent signs of economic resilience have more and more investors giving credence to the “soft landing” narrative, a scenario in which the Federal Reserve successfully tames inflation without causing a recession. This growing conviction in this rather rare outcome helped propel the three major U.S. financial indexes higher in 2023.

       Year to date, the blue-chip Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 13% and set new all-time highs, the broad-based S&P 500 (^GSPC 0.04%) increased 23%, and the technology-heavy Nasdaq Composite soared 42%.

       Yet, analysts at JPMorgan Chase and Deutsche Bank, among other financial institutions, still see a recession as a distinct possibility in the next 12-18 months. They are concerned that the impact of higher interest rates has yet to fully make its way through the economy, and consumers have propped up the economy so far with outsized spending that is depleting savings and causing many to take on added debt. Some analysts argue that an economic downturn is possible (or even probable) as those situations evolve.

       A potential confirmation of the analysts’ fears can be seen in the bond market, which is sounding its most severe recession alarm in decades.
       …
       https://www.fool.com/investing/2023/12/25/bond-market-alarm-signal-big-move-stock-market/

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