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Where Some Percentage Of The Property Is Underwater, You Will See This Process Restart

A report from Moneywise. “Susan Apel and Keith Irwin purchased a four-bedroom house in Lebanon, New Hampshire, 24 years ago — and are now looking to downsize in their golden years. Apel finds it harder to climb up the stairs, while Irwin is tired of shoveling the snow and doing yard work. The couple estimated their current house is worth around $700,000 and had hoped the sale would help them snag a smaller place — they’re looking for a two-bedroom condo with a den — but they simply can’t find one within their budget. ‘We were very grateful to live in this lovely place and to have paid off our house,’ Apel said. ‘It never occurred to us that it didn’t give us the ability to move out of it.’ Apel told the Times one unit she and her husband recently saw cost $950,000 and needed some work, while even ‘tiny shoeboxes’ were selling for $600,000.”

The Times of San Diego. “Has San Diego County already built enough new housing to accommodate all the currently projected population growth through the year 2050? This is a stunning question to ask given the frenzied rhetoric about needing to build large numbers of new units of every type, everywhere to deal with what is widely perceived as a massive housing shortage by politicians, housing advocacy groups, and the public. But the answer, surprisingly, is ‘yes.’ A new demographic reality has become firmly established with each successive update of the 2050 population forecast for the county. The increase in population between 2010 and 2050 was originally forecast by SANDAG to be about 30% to almost 4.5 million people. But over time, the forecast for 2050 has steadily fallen as fertility rates continued to decline, increases in life expectancy stalled, and net migration into California turned negative starting in 2015.”

“The 2024 SANDAG forecast for 2050 calls for under 3.5 million people — not much more than the current population of San Diego County. In fact, San Diego County could see only another 125,000 new residents between now and 2050. In San Diego County the state’s legal mandate to provide housing units to accommodate projected growth has already been met — all the way through 2050. A frequently heard contention is there is a need to catch up on building because San Diego systematically underbuilt during the Great Recession. San Diego has caught up from that deficit because the county’s population has declined by almost 30,000 people since 2018, while construction continued at a brisk pace with building permits pulled for over 50,000 housing units.”

Action News Jax. “Abandoned homes, sometimes called ‘zombies,’ are infecting local neighborhoods. During the housing recession of 2008, many homes got stuck in foreclosure limbo. In Florida the process can take years and impact surrounding property value if the houses sit abandoned for long. Early forecasts show zombies could come back to life in Jacksonville. North of downtown Jacksonville, Jeanette Williams has seen the problem firsthand. She’s not worried about her house, but the one a few doors down. The zombie a few doors down has been empty ever since she moved in eight years ago. The Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office responded to the address 18 different times since Williams has lived down the street. JSO’s calls for service show everything from drug investigations, to trespassing, and even a call about a dead person.”

“A zombie home is when the owners are told their house is going into foreclosure, so they move out. The home slowly goes through Florida’s judicial foreclosure process and the banks often slow roll it hoping the value will increase, and they can sell the property for more money. When the property is less than what’s owed, the bank sometimes reverses the years-long process and gives it back to the original owner who is long gone. ‘Where some percentage of the property is underwater, you will see this process restart,’ said Jim Kowalski, the president of Jacksonville Area Legal Aid.”

“Action News Jax Investigates found foreclosures are again on the rise. Data from the Duval County Clerk of Courts shows 693 foreclosures have been filed so far this year. In 2020, there were 1,447. Besides a dip during COVID, that number has climbed year over year to 2,146 last year. Data from Redfin shows these homes stretch across the entire county and still don’t account for all the abandoned properties in Jacksonville. In April, JEA said there were 1,175 homes that haven’t had electricity for more than a year. While they are not necessarily ‘abandoned,’ it’s likely no one is living in them a representative for the utility said.”

National Mortgage Professional. “If 2022 was bad, more expenses, fewer sales, and thinner margins in 2023 makes 2024 a make-or-break year for many. Last week the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) released its Annual Mortgage Bankers Performance Report for 2023, showing 36% of reporting institutions posted positive net financial income, down from 53% in 2022. Of those firms reporting their figures to the MBA, the average production volume was $1.9 billion in 2023, down from $2.6 billion in 2022, and $4.8 billion in 2021. Pre-tax net financial income per reporting institution was a negative $2.3 million, down from an average gain of $382,000 in 2022 and $18 million in 2021. Reflecting the multi-decade-low in home sales last year, average loan origination count per reporting firm decreased to 6,021 loans in 2023, from 8,371 loans in 2022.”

Bisnow Washington DC. “A 50-year-old Georgetown office building is now in the hands of its lender. JPMorgan Chase cast the winning bid of $22.3M for The Foundry, a 256K SF building at 1055 Thomas Jefferson St. NW, at a foreclosure auction this month. JPMorgan’s credit bid was just over a third of the amount still left on the note, which was $58M, according to the foreclosure auction notice. The assessed property value is $74.4M, according to the trustee’s deed. In February, Bethesda-based JBG Smith said it had ceased putting capital into the property and didn’t expect any near-term cash flow, Bisnow first reported. The price JPMorgan paid is another indicator of how far office values have fallen in D.C. The deed transfer was for 28% of the building’s last sale price, a similar discount to other distress trades that have taken place in and around the District in recent months, like the January sale of 1101 14th St. NW for $18.2M, down 70% from its 2017 price of $62M.”

The Wall Street Journal. “Defaults are reaching historic levels in the office market. More than $38 billion of U.S. office buildings are threatened by defaults, foreclosures or other forms of distress, according to data firm MSCI. That is the highest amount since the fourth quarter of 2012 in the aftermath of the 2008-2009 financial crisis. As recently as 2021, more than 90% of office loans that were converted into commercial-mortgage-backed securities were paid off when they became due, according to Moody’s. Last year, that figure fell to 35%, the worst payoff rate in the history of the data, which goes back to 2007. Most of the mortgages that are coming due now were made when interest rates were much lower than now. In a normal office market, many landlords would be able to pay the higher rates. But since Covid-19, the office market has been far from normal.”

“‘The problem you have in office is, in many instances, there is no cash flow at all,’ PNC Chief Executive Bill Demchak said on an earnings call. ‘It is really a unique animal at the moment.'”

The Toronto Star. “Developers are scrambling to sell units by offering reduced deposits and mortgage assistance as demand for preconstruction condominium units continues to plummet. In Toronto since mid-2022, 11,595 units over 29 projects have been delayed as interest rates remain high and confidence in the market weakens, according to Urbanation. Developers drastically reduced the number of new launches in the first quarter of 2024, with just four projects brought to market. ‘These incentives have become a key driver to help sell,’ said Simeon Papailias, managing partner of Royal LePage’s REC Canada. Developers have always offered incentives but it’s becoming more commonplace as there’s currently little demand for preconstruction units, he added. ‘People can’t expect consumers to be taking on all of the risk when there are such high interest rates,’ he said.”

“For a limited time, Toronto developer Camrost Felcorp offered to pay two years of the mortgage cost to a maximum of $90,000 for units priced at less than $1 million. Emblem Developments offered a reduced down payment of 10 per cent to be paid over two years, instead of the standard 15 to 20 per cent deposit upfront, to help buyers afford the unit sooner, Papailias said. ‘You’re also seeing developers offer increased commissions where they beef up the commission as high as 10 per cent to the buyer agent and then the agent distributes part of it to the buyer,’ said Daniel Foch, a Toronto-based realtor. ‘It almost acts as a de facto cashback system. They don’t want to lower the value of the unit because that would devalue the product,’ Foch added. ‘So this offers them another alternative to try to sell the unit.'”

The Investor. “Development Investment Construction JSC (DIC Corp), among Vietnam’s top real estate developers, incurred a loss of VND117.2 billion ($4.62 million) in the first quarter of this year, marking its largest quarterly loss since floating shares in 2009. DIC Corp recorded VND186 billion ($7.34 million) in sales and service revenues in Q1/2024. However, its net revenue plummeted to VND489 million ($19,294) after a significant portion of its products were returned, according to the firm’s consolidated financial statements.”

South China Morning Post. “Hongkongers are less willing to buy homes amid price increases at new launches by developers, analysts said after Great Eagle Holdings announced a new higher price list for another 150 units at its Onmantin project on Monday. ‘The main and only reason why homebuyers have been snapping up all units at recent project launches is the discounted prices developers have been offering,’ said Joseph Tsang, chairman of JLL in Hong Kong. ‘Once developers increase prices for subsequent units, the sales slow down,’ Tsang said. ‘[This is] because there is too much stock in the market.’ Buyers have many choices and there is, therefore, a lower acceptance of price increases, he added.”

“The price range for the first batch of Onmantin flats was more than 25 per cent cheaper than that of the nearby In One Above residential project, which was launched by Chinachem Group in May last year. It was also the lowest for the neighbourhood since 2016. CK Asset Holdings, Hong Kong tycoon Li Ka-shing’s flagship developer, sold 98 per cent of the 422 units it put up for sale at its Blue Coast project in Wong Chuk Hang during a first round of sales at the beginning of April, after pricing the project cheaper than all completed projects in the Southside residential neighbourhood. These flats were priced more than 20 per cent below cost, which means CK Asset will make a significant loss on this inaugural batch.”

From Reuters. “Amy Wang was counting on a 100,000 yuan ($13,800) subsidy promised by authorities in the eastern Chinese city of Weifang to fit and furnish an apartment she bought two years ago. Still waiting for the money, she is yet to move in. The 30-year-old now pays 6,000 yuan of her 8,000 monthly salary on the mortgage for the 1.1 million yuan apartment and another 1,800 yuan to rent another one, relying on her parents for other basic expenses. ‘I feel under a lot of pressure,’ said Wang, who works in electronics manufacturing, and bought the bare shell of her apartment, without floors, interior walls or other fittings – which is common in China.”

“Weifang, with a population of more than 9 million, and dozens of other Chinese cities, have promised subsidies and other incentives to homebuyers to prop up the ailing property sector. But the real estate downturn also affects the ability of cities to lease land to developers, a key revenue source. This meant some local governments were unable to raise funds to pay the promised subsidies, frustrating buyers and casting doubts over future support measures. ‘What’s underappreciated in China’s property market downturn is that the real implication falls upon local governments,’ said Logan Wright, a partner at research provider Rhodium Group.”

“Shangqiu civil servant Alan Liu, 30, says that some homebuyers in the city have received their subsidies, but he is still waiting for the promised 30,000 yuan, having bought a flat in a ‘prime location’ in June 2022. ‘It’s crucial for relevant departments to realise that this issue cannot be ignored for long and must be resolved, or it will affect the credibility of the government,’ said Liu.”

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This Post Has 65 Comments

  1. ‘Has San Diego County already built enough new housing to accommodate all the currently projected population growth through the year 2050? This is a stunning question to ask given the frenzied rhetoric about needing to build large numbers of new units of every type, everywhere to deal with what is widely perceived as a massive housing shortage by politicians, housing advocacy groups, and the public. But the answer, surprisingly, is ‘yes’

    Wa happened to my shortage San Diego?

    2. There’s a shortage of affordable housing. I’m sure there are plenty of Grade A+ El Luxo units available — likely intended for rich Chinese — that the developers and banks are unwilling to unload for fear of realizing losses.

      I just hope that the advocates don’t get any bright ideas of putting the homeless — or worse, illegal migrants — directly into those El Luxo units. Totally unfair to those who work for a living.

      1. ‘There’s a shortage of affordable housing’

        But they have plenty of shacks. This is where it gets entertaining.

    3. There certainly is a shortage of houses to buy or rent here at affordable monthly cost. I don’t claim to understand what keeps prices aloft, with citizens moving away in droves…’tis a puzzlement.

  2. ‘DIC Corp, among Vietnam’s top real estate developers, incurred a loss of VND117.2 billion ($4.62 million) in the first quarter of this year, marking its largest quarterly loss since floating shares in 2009. DIC Corp recorded VND186 billion ($7.34 million) in sales and service revenues in Q1/2024. However, its net revenue plummeted to VND489 million ($19,294) after a significant portion of its products were returned’

    A couple of guys with lawnmowers and an F-150 could have better revenue that that.

    1. unless that 1Fiddy truck has “Hualing” in white paint on weathered plywood sides, it ‘aint legit.

      “so you better go back to your bars.
      your temples.
      your massage parlors
      I get my kicks above the waistline.
      sunshine”

      ONiB

  3. ‘The zombie a few doors down has been empty ever since she moved in eight years ago. The Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office responded to the address 18 different times since Williams has lived down the street. JSO’s calls for service show everything from drug investigations, to trespassing, and even a call about a dead person. A zombie home is when the owners are told their house is going into foreclosure, so they move out. The home slowly goes through Florida’s judicial foreclosure process and the banks often slow roll it hoping the value will increase, and they can sell the property for more money. When the property is less than what’s owed, the bank sometimes reverses the years-long process and gives it back to the original owner who is long gone’

    They don’t give it back, they just don’t take title. AKA shadow inventory.

    ‘Where some percentage of the property is underwater, you will see this process restart’

    Jim is saying lenders are doing the shadow inventory thing again in Florida. More important foreclosures are up because people are underwater: it’s good money after bad. They paid too much. The globalist scum media avoids this truth like the plague.

    1. “More important foreclosures are up because people are underwater:”

      Being underwater does not *cause* a foreclosure as long as the FB can still make the payments.

      That said, this would be easily solved if the FB had put 20% down. The bank could sell quick and still make a little profit. Or what if banks had to go back to mark-to-market and eat the loss on the current balance sheet instead of slow-rolling the foreclosure?

  4. ‘Alan Liu, 30, says that some homebuyers in the city have received their subsidies, but he is still waiting for the promised 30,000 yuan, having bought a flat in a ‘prime location’ in June 2022. ‘It’s crucial for relevant departments to realise that this issue cannot be ignored for long and must be resolved, or it will affect the credibility of the government’

    You got schlonged Alan.

  5. ‘The price JPMorgan paid is another indicator of how far office values have fallen in D.C. The deed transfer was for 28% of the building’s last sale price, a similar discount to other distress trades that have taken place in and around the District in recent months, like the January sale of 1101 14th St. NW for $18.2M, down 70% from its 2017 price of $62M’

    Note that the bank didn’t pay anything, it was a credit bid. So it’s just a part of the a$$ pounding they already received.

    ‘The problem you have in office is, in many instances, there is no cash flow at all’

    What’s with all this concern about cash flow all of a sudden Bill? Wework never made a dime and they are still around.

    ‘In a normal office market, many landlords would be able to pay the higher rates. But since Covid-19, the office market has been far from normal’

    Yes, the minor respitory illness took down all these giant sh$thole cities. I said this was going to happen at the time they were doing it.

  6. Last week the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) released its Annual Mortgage Bankers Performance Report for 2023, showing 36% of reporting institutions posted positive net financial income, down from 53% in 2022.

    I’m guessing honest audits would show all kinds of fraud & mark-to-fantasy accounting in those financial statements.

  7. They don’t want to lower the value of the unit because that would devalue the product,’ Foch added. ‘So this offers them another alternative to try to sell the unit.’”

    True price discovery is going to lay waste to your fictitious valuations, so might as well get to sawin’ and slashin’ like the villain in a Jamie Lee Curtis movie, developers & FBs.

  8. It’s going to be comedy gold when all the crypto cultists and HODLers of scam digital gambling tokens realize at roughly the same time that the supply of Greater Fools has suddenly dried up, and the panicked stampede for the exits begins in earnest. Got popcorn?

    https://www.cnbc.com/cryptocurrency/

    1. I sometimes equate the True Believer crypto bros to those 1950s-era lost Japanese soldiers who hid out on some island in the Pacific, still fighting the war to the last man. As long as he lived, the war was not over.

      As long as there is a single Satoshi living on a thumb drive in a coffee can in somebody’s basement, then Bitcoin will rule the world! (someday…) I fully expect these bros to sell to each other until all the Bitcoin is eventually owned by Saylor, Keiser, and possibly Bukele.

  10. In a bold and polarizing move, the Arizona Republican Party has passed a resolution that declares COVID-19 injections as biological and technological weapons. The resolution, known as “Ban the Jab,” garnered overwhelming support with a 95.62% vote during the Arizona Republican Presidential Nominating Convention. Proposed by Dan Schultz, a prominent figure within the Arizona Republican Party, the resolution calls for an immediate halt to the distribution of COVID-19 vaccines and urges the state’s governor to take decisive action. However, this resolution has ignited a firestorm of controversy, drawing criticism from health organizations and experts who maintain that COVID-19 vaccines are safe and effective tools in combating the virus.

    The “Ban the Jab” resolution represents a stark stance taken by the Arizona GOP against the use of COVID-19 vaccines. It reflects growing skepticism and distrust among certain segments of the population regarding the safety and efficacy of these vaccines. Despite widespread scientific consensus and data supporting the effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccines in preventing severe illness and death, the resolution casts doubt on their utility, labeling them as weapons rather than life-saving medical interventions.

    One of the primary concerns raised by the resolution is the safety of COVID-19 vaccines. Proponents of the resolution argue that the vaccines have not undergone sufficient testing and that their potential long-term effects are unknown. They point to reports of adverse reactions and vaccine-related injuries as evidence of the risks associated with vaccination. Additionally, the resolution calls for a forensic analysis of the vaccine vials to determine their contents and potential impact on public health. This demand for further investigation underscores the deep-seated skepticism and mistrust surrounding COVID-19 vaccines within certain political circles.

    https://chestermtam.substack.com/p/the-arizona-gops-ban-the-jab-resolution

    1. The Republican base needs to bilge every last one of the RINO sellouts and neocon traitors, then elect representatives who will actually fight for their constituents instead of serving as errand boys for their corporate and oligarch donors.

    3. ” immediate halt to the distribution of COVID-19 vaccines”

      I think a better compromise would be have been to offer these vaccines *by prescription only.* That would allow doctors to prescribe it for the elderly if the doc feels COVID itself is more of a risk than the vaccine, and allowed anyone else to choose to get it too. But prescription-only would have kept away any mandates. It also would have kept it out of the schools.

      1. Service call last week in a nursing home on clot shot day, all these olds were lining up for it.

    4. Some of us didn’t need a “ban the jab” law in order not to subject ourselves to an experimental treatment to a non-existent coof.

      Those that did are simply victims of natural selection by way of a lack of intelligence.

  11. Does The CIA Run America?

    https://www.zerohedge.com/political/does-cia-run-america

    We’ve all surely had dark thoughts that the CIA is really running the United States, including many media venues. Maybe that’s been true for decades and we just didn’t know it. If so, let’s just say that it would explain a tremendous amount of what has otherwise been clouded in secrecy.

    How would this be possible? Knowledge is power while secret knowledge is full control. Even fake knowledge means power and control, such as we found out in the phony Russiagate investigation early in Trump’s term. They hounded the new administration for years under a completely fake scenario in which Russia somehow got Donald Trump elected.

    Yes, that was an intelligence operation all along, one directly designed to overthrow an election, a “color revolution” on our own soil.

    How dare an agency not elected by the people, and evading oversight and public accountability, put itself ahead of the Constitution and the rule of law? It’s been going on for many decades as the agencies have gained ever more power, even to the point of forcing a full lockdown of America and even the world under false pretense.

    None of this is verifiable precisely because of the secrecy involved. It’s not as if the intelligence community is going to send out a press release: “Democracy in America is an illusion. We know because we control nearly everything, plus we aspire to control even more.”

    The incredulous among us will shoot back: look at what you are saying! Your conspiracy theory is non-falsifiable. The less evidence you have for it, the more you believe it. How in the world can we argue with you? Your position is not really plausible but there is nothing we can do to convince you otherwise.

    Let’s grant the point. Still, let’s not dismiss the theory completely. Based on a New York Times (NYT) piece that appeared last week, it contains more than a grain of truth. The article is titled: “Campaign Puts Trump and the Spy Agencies on a Collision Course.”

    Quote: “Even as president, Donald J. Trump flaunted his animosity for intelligence officials, portraying them as part of a politicized ‘deep state’ out to get him. And since he left office, that distrust has grown into outright hostility, with potentially serious implications for national security should he be elected again.”

    Ok, let’s be clear. If the intelligence community led by the CIA is not the “deep state,” what is?

    Further, it is proven many times over that the Deep State is in fact out to get him. This is not even controversial. Indeed, there is no reason for these journalists to write the above as if Donald Trump is somehow consumed by some kind of baseless paranoia.

    Let’s keep going here: “Trump is now on a possible collision course with the intelligence community …. The result is a complicated and possibly destabilizing situation the United States has never seen before: deep-seated suspicion and disdain on the part of a former and perhaps future president toward the very people he would be relying on for the most sensitive information he would need to perform his role if elected again.”

    Wait just a moment. You are telling us that all previous presidents have had a happy relationship with the CIA? That’s rather interesting to know. And deeply troubling too, since the CIA has been managing regime change the world over for a very long time, and is now directly involved in U.S. politics at the most intimate level.

    Any president worth his salt should absolutely have a hostile relationship with such an agency, if only to establish clear civilian control over the government, without which it’s not possible to say that we live in a Constitutional republic.

    And now, according to the NYT, we have one seeking the Presidency who does not defer to the agency and that this is destabilizing and deeply problematic. Who does that suggest really rules this country?

    Is the NYT itself guilty of the most extreme conspiracy theory imaginable, or is it just stating facts as we know them? I’m going to guess that it is the latter. In this case, every single American should be deeply alarmed.

    Crazy huh? As for the phrase “never seen before,” we have to push back. What about George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson, James Polk, and Calvin Coolidge? They were all previous presidents, according to the history books that people once read.

    There was no CIA back then. If you doubt this, I’m pretty sure that your favorite AI engine will confirm it.

    One must suppose that when the NYT says “never seen before,” it means in the post-war period. And that very well might be true. John F. Kennedy defied them. We know that for certain. The mysteries surrounding his murder won’t be solved fully until we get the documents. But the consensus is growing that this murder was really a coup by the CIA, a message sent as a lesson to every successor in that office.

    Think of that: we live in a country today where most people readily admit that the CIA probably killed the president. Amazing.

    It’s intriguing to know at this late date that the Watergate “scandal” was not what it appeared to be, namely an intrepid media holding government to account. Even astute observers at the time believed the mainstream narrative. Now we have plenty of evidence that this too was nothing but a deep state attack on a president who had lost patience with it and provoked another coup.

    All credit to my brilliant father who speculated along these lines at the time. I was very young with only the vaguest clue about what was happening. But I recall very well that he was convinced that Richard Nixon was set up in a trap and unfairly hounded out of office not for the bad things he was doing but for standing up to the Deep State.

    If my own father, not a particularly political person, knew this for certain at the time, this must have been a strong perception even then.

    You hear the rap that these agencies—the CIA is one but there are many adjacent others—are not allowed by law to intervene in domestic politics. At this point and after so much experience, this comes across to me like something of a joke. We know from vast evidence and personal testimony that the CIA has been manipulating political figures, narratives, and outcomes for a very long time.

    How involved is the CIA in journalism today? Well, as a traditionally liberal paper, you might suppose that the NYT itself would be highly skeptical of the CIA. But these days, they have published a long string of aggressively defensive articles with titles like “It Turns Out that the Deep State Is Awesome” and “Government Surveillance Keeps Us Safe.” We can add this last piece to the list.

    So let’s just say it: the NYT is CIA. So too is Mother Jones, Rolling Stone, Slate, Salon, and many other mainstream publications, including major tech companies like Google and Microsoft. The tentacles are everywhere and ever more obvious. Operation Mockingbird was just the beginning. The network is everywhere and the practice of manipulating the news is wholly normalized.

    Once you start developing the ability to see the markings, you simply cannot unsee them, which is why people who think and write about this can come across as crackpot crazy after a while.

    Have you considered that maybe the crackpots are exactly right? If so, shouldn’t we, at bare minimum, seek to support a Presidential candidate with a hostile relationship to the intelligence community?

    Indeed, that ought to be a bare minimum standard of qualification. There is simply no way we can restore civilian control of government and constitutional government until this agency can be thoroughly reigned in or abolished completely.

    1. Tonight in New Orleans it’s Creole Pepper Steak

      There’s a great Corned Beef sandwich at 7th and 55th

      In Chicago a Porterhouse Steak a perfect medium rare

      But in New Guinea, Uncle Bosie, is what’s for dinner.

  13. Anyone buying at these prices with a 7 plus percent is immediately underwater. Feels like 2007…

      1. More likely they will conjure the money. The resulting inflation will hurt everyone, especially the poor. In a way it will be a hidden tax, but you won’t have to be a taxpayer to pay it

    2. I just watched a house in my neighborhood go on the market.
      50 grand more than it sold for in 2019. Under contract in 3 days.
      at 7.5% avg mortgage.

      It’s a nice house, but it’s not a good location, corner of a busy street. Move that house 1 block in and it’s a much better house. (location, location, location). But under contract in 3days, to live on a busy street. (well busy for here).

      and pursuing the listings today I see someone RAISED their listing price 10 grand (which is 100 grand more than it sold for in 2021).

      Are people not getting the memo?

  14. Saturday morning a crew was stripping my neighbor’s roof, a noisy morning for sure. Anyway, it got quiet about 10:30 am so I thought we were on to putting down underlayment, a much quieter process for sure. That was until about 11:45 am when there was a pounding on my front door, when I opened the door there were about five or six “Newcomers” wearing bright orange shirts with one who had a smile on his face and was holding his phone out for me to take it and read what was on it.

    The screen read… We’re sorry to bother you but some of the shingles landed in your yard, would it be ok if we went in your backyard and picked them up?

    1. No comprende of Google Translate?

      I have used that on jobsites before because no habla.

  15. A reader sent these in:

    Wow. Miami to Palm Beach County. Evictions trending well over pre-Covid averages.

    https://twitter.com/TrishaFLsun/status/1784258932250124339

    The new Tesla Dumpster® is a game changer.

    https://twitter.com/RudyHavenstein/status/1784750503735292379

    WeWork has announced that it is closing its corporate headquarters

    https://twitter.com/MacroEdgeRes/status/1784969950261575899

    Meta is reportedly gearing up for more layoffs as job cuts continue with fervor in the tech space

    https://twitter.com/MacroEdgeRes/status/1784951266323431654

    Wells College in NY is shutting down, which will result in 289 job cuts

    https://twitter.com/MacroEdgeRes/status/1784989892990120381

    Getir is shutting down in the United States – it is leaving FreshDirect operating – but around 2,800 jobs will be cut outside of the FreshDirect organization.

    https://twitter.com/MacroEdgeRes/status/1785003228217725344

    The biggest companies on the planet gapping up or down by over 10% with hundred of billions in market cap either wiped out or created in an instant is something to behold.

    https://twitter.com/NorthmanTrader/status/1784975986745889274

    Someone asked me a good question (that seemed obvious to me)

    “Why are dealership margins compressing?”

    My response:

    • Higher interest rates rates
    • Cooling consumer demand (for most brands, not all)
    • Growing new car inventories
    • Dwindling consumer savings

    What’d I miss?

    https://twitter.com/GuyDealership/status/1784931311162908796

    Auto insurance premiums are *casually* up 22% year-over-year and the world remains silent.

    Three core reasons for this rise:

    1) Elevated new car prices:

    On average, new car prices are still up over 15% vs March 2021.

    Higher new car prices = Higher cost to replace your totaled vehicle

    2) Car repairs are more expensive:

    Vehicle maintenance and repair costs rose 8.2% over the past year.

    Fun fact:

    The average repair order at an auto body shop has crossed $1,000 for the first time ever.

    3) Insurance companies are playing catch-up:

    It takes time for insurance companies to adjust their rate application filings in order to meet regulatory compliance.

    Basically, lagging price increases.

    So does that means premiums will eventually come down?

    Uhhh.. Here’s a question for you:

    When was the last time your insurance premium dropped?

    Tick tock… never.

    Inflation may subside, but insurance premium increases are extremely “sticky”.

    God bless us all.

    https://twitter.com/GuyDealership/status/1784652177878729024

    Overheard from a subprime dealer:

    “If the customer has no down payment, we tell them they can have Option A, Option B or Option EV”

    The EV tax credit working wonders.

    https://twitter.com/GuyDealership/status/1784589073253831040

    Spoke to a title officer today here in Austin.

    The number of sellers that are not only losing money on their home sales but completely underwater and having to put up cash at close has increased massively in the last 6 months.

    I think we’re in for some mega real estate pain

    https://twitter.com/anothercohen/status/1784998493800615972

    If the Fed was a person

    https://twitter.com/ignatiusreilyj/status/1785055844675309792

    $TSLA’s driverless FSD technology HAS NOT BEEN APPROVED IN CHINA (that requires a completely different license which $TSLA did not get). All those saying otherwise (which is nearly everyone) are completely wrong. Why? Well, TSLA will likely…

    https://twitter.com/GordonJohnson19/status/1785012316754375163

    How is this not fraud?

    https://twitter.com/InvestRoiss/status/1785080835848216849

    Before the Powell Fed, “Quantitative Tightening” was selling securities off the balance sheet. Now it’s letting some runoff and not replacing all of them.

    Tomorrow Chief Wall Street Puppet Powell plans to taper even the runoff. Because all they care about is keeping stonks high.

    https://twitter.com/FixTheFed/status/1785027407814201768

    The CEO of HSBC bank to resign

    https://twitter.com/MacroEdgeRes/status/1785159687593156669

    And we wonder why there’s no rate cuts

    “Stock prices are about 72% higher than they were five years ago.Home values soared 58% from the end of 2018 through 2023, according to the Fed.

    Americans’ wealth has ballooned from $98 trillion at the end of 2018 to $147 trillion in 2023”

    https://twitter.com/StealthQE4/status/1785053155752923322

    Nobody saw this coming . . .

    https://twitter.com/Mayhem4Markets/status/1785021288500605342

    Real estate is completely collapsing. There is no question. Don’t let anybody lie to you.

    This is South Padre Island, Texas. I lived there for more than a decade.

    I have never seen even 1/10 of this number of units available at once.

    284 houses for sale at the same time.

    https://twitter.com/his_eminence_j/status/1785015898757271638

    I have a house on the Fingers in Port Isabel and used to sell real estate there. A lot of people bought properties during covid thinking they would make great money renting. The Airbnb/rental market right now has slowed considerably.

    https://twitter.com/pv_daddy66/status/1785020149159838116

    … so far. I’m telling you, this number of houses just showed up in like the last 30 or 40 days. I watch this area regularly. You’re lucky to see 50 houses total on the island at any given time. This was a massive dump all of a sudden.

    They’re not dropping prices… YET.

    https://twitter.com/his_eminence_j/status/1785139723125555389

    I bet you, a ton of Airbnb are going belly up right now. A huge number.

    That also says a lot about how bad the economy is doing, when people aren’t vacationing, even in the cheap spots like SPI.

    https://twitter.com/his_eminence_j/status/1785018061277614326

    Houses in my city in southern california/la metro are getting listed at pace i have not seen in a long time. Feels like people are trying to cash out.

    https://twitter.com/Madcuzbad6/status/1785078328611024961

    Fisker is laying off hundreds of its remaining employees to preserve capital amid a looming bankruptcy

    https://twitter.com/MacroEdgeRes/status/1785016529677115444

    Treasury expects to borrow $243 billion this quarter and $847 billion in Q3, at which point we’ll be back to borrowing nearly $1 trillion every 100 days:

    https://twitter.com/RealEJAntoni/status/1785027626333298741

    You can’t make this up:

    The number of articles mentioning “stagflation” just spiked to the highest level since June 2022.

    News stories on Bloomberg citing “stagflation” reached more than 600 on Thursday.

    This came after US GDP growth for Q1 2024 GDP came in at 1.6%, well below the 3.4% growth rate in Q4 2023.

    Then, the PCE Price Index came in at 3.7% and PCE inflation jumped for its 2nd straight month.

    A weaker economy with persistent inflation, also known as stagflation, is the worst case scenario for the Fed.

    Has the era of stagflation officially begun?

    https://twitter.com/KobeissiLetter/status/1785014459737456837

    Millions stuck in their house. Pick the color that describes people you know. Let’s try green. The person has a $500,000 mortgage at 3% and pays $2,108.

    Job transfer, new baby, looking for a better school? No. To keep the payment at ~$2,100, the lender will only lend $300,000.

    https://twitter.com/JeffWeniger/status/1785100754962788383

    Let’s check in on our completely functional housing market.

    https://twitter.com/JeffWeniger/status/1785053319037137104

    TESLA 1Q SALES FELL 7.8% IN CALIFORNIA, CAR DEALER GROUP SAYS

    https://twitter.com/DeItaone/status/1785005907019010049

    As 90% of FinTwit are men, let’s have some weekend fun.

    What’s the most beautiful and iconic car ever built? I will start.

    https://twitter.com/MichaelAArouet/status/1784249637488021617

    1. Wells College in NY is shutting down, which will result in 289 job cuts

      More jobs than there are families in the town.

    2. “The biggest companies on the planet gapping up or down by over 10% with hundred of billions in market cap either wiped out or created in an instant is something to behold”

      Somebody said feels like 2007?

      Feels like September 2008 post Lehman collapse.

      “This sucker could go down” — George W. Bush

    3. “Higher new car prices = Higher cost to replace your totaled vehicle”

      It doesn’t take much to “total” today’s flimsy cars.

  16. The Subway coupon for a 6 inch sandwich just went up for the second time in the last six months here in CA. It’s gone from 3.99 to 5.99 in six months. Where’s my 3% inflation?

  17. Riley Gaines
    @Riley_Gaines_

    🚨🚨FIVE middle school female athletes in West Virginia refuse to throw shot put against male, Becky Pepper-Jackson.

    This comes just 2 days after the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals blocked the WV law that says you must compete in the category that matches your sex.

    It’s a sad day when 13-14yr old girls have to be the adults in the room, but I couldn’t be more inspired by and proud of these girls.

    Enough is enough. The tide is turning! 🌊

    Apr 18, 2024
    ·
    https://x.com/Riley_Gaines_/status/1781150007858470913

    1. Lia Thomas is currently fighting to get on the women’s Olympic swimming team.

      While Riley Gaines is the one with all the air-time, the woman to listen to is Paula Scanlan. Riley went to Kentucky and only competed against Lia that one time. Paula attended Penn with Lia and practiced with him daily, and so knows a lot more. Paula related the story: when she was her starting sophomore year, Lia came to an early team meeting and basically said: “Hi ladies, I’m going to join the women’s team, but I need to take one year of hormone blockers first. So, bye for now, see you in a year.” Sure enough, one year later he shows up for the women’s team, all tucked in and testosterone blocked, and beats them all.

      It’s obvious to me that Lia is not mentally ill or vulnerable, nor was he convinced by some virtue signaler that he had gender dysphoria. This was a calculated move on his part, with the ultimate goal of winning Olympic gold medals and raking in endorsement money.

      He belongs in the dunk tank, not the pool.

  18. Put in a chair lift and hire someone go shovel the snow.
    3-6 months average HOA would pay for 12 months of household and yard help.

    “… their golden years. Apel finds it harder to climb up the stairs, while Irwin is tired of shoveling the snow and doing yard work. The couple estimated their current house is worth around $700,000 and had hoped the sale would help them snag a smaller place — they’re looking for a two-bedroom condo with a den — but“

    1. We’ve seen this couple before. They are 71 y.o. and have $700K in equity. They could rent for the rest of their lives, anywhere. Not sorry for them at all.

  19. Eric Schmitt
    @Eric_Schmitt

    Not only did the “Foreign Aid” package do nothing to secure our own border it included $3.5 Billion to supercharge mass migration from the Middle East.

    Quote
    Ian Miles Cheong
    @stillgray
    ·
    Apr 24

    Open borders? No problem. The Biden administration is setting up two new international field offices in Qatar and Turkey to facilitate the mass migration of refugees and economic migrants from the Middle East and the near-Middle East to resettle them throughout American cities.…

    https://x.com/Eric_Schmitt/status/1783147866476925170

  20. Exposing John Finlay’s $150K Rental Scam
    Mark Turcotte

    2 hours ago

    In this shocking video, we delve into the scandalous world of rental scams as we uncover how John Finlay owes a staggering $150,000 in rent. Join us as we expose his abusive behavior towards the system and shed light on the consequences of his actions. Stay tuned to learn more about this outrageous situation!

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dIyeAGL0LbA

    11:28. K-da.

  21. Record Number of VACANT HOMES, Bank Sales Increase AGAIN, 2024 Canadian Real Estate Market
    Jon Flynn Broker of Record, Flynn Real Estate Inc.

    3 hours ago

    After a viral post on X about renting vs owning a home I analyze the data and monthly payment to show how unaffordable home ownership in Canada has become. We’re now 2nd worst in the world for housing affordability. This weeks data includes new bank sale data and vacant home data from the Toronto Real Estate Boards and 20 other boards in Ontario.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kCbRE2s0mNg

    11:38.

  22. ‘‘We were very grateful to live in this lovely place and to have paid off our house,’ Apel said. ‘It never occurred to us that it didn’t give us the ability to move out of it.’ Apel told the Times one unit she and her husband recently saw cost $950,000 and needed some work, while even ‘tiny shoeboxes’ were selling for $600,000’

    They call it downsizing cuz it sounds better Susan.

  23. ‘These incentives have become a key driver to help sell…People can’t expect consumers to be taking on all of the risk when there are such high interest rates’

    That’s the spirit Simeon, use any angle to haggle for more crater!

  24. ‘The 30-year-old now pays 6,000 yuan of her 8,000 monthly salary on the mortgage for the 1.1 million yuan apartment and another 1,800 yuan to rent another one, relying on her parents for other basic expenses. ‘I feel under a lot of pressure,’ said Wang, who works in electronics manufacturing, and bought the bare shell of her apartment, without floors, interior walls or other fittings – which is common in China’

    It is still cheaper than renting Amy.

    ‘Weifang, with a population of more than 9 million, and dozens of other Chinese cities, have promised subsidies and other incentives to homebuyers to prop up the ailing property sector. But the real estate downturn also affects the ability of cities to lease land to developers, a key revenue source. This meant some local governments were unable to raise funds to pay the promised subsidies, frustrating buyers and casting doubts over future support measures. ‘What’s underappreciated in China’s property market downturn is that the real implication falls upon local governments’

    This situation is one of many in China’s bursting bubble: only there could they have a subsidy to get people to borrow and then pull the subsidy out from under the FB’s. And globalist scum media blame it on not being able to sell land!

  25. The Toronto Market Has Changed (Toronto Real Estate Market Update)
    Team Sessa Real Estate

    24 minutes ago

    In this episode we take a look at the current Toronto Real Estate Market specifically the detached home prices and market trends for week ending April 24, 2024. We also discuss how sellers and their expectations are now getting disappointed in certain circumstances.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5OY-47G2LU4

    19:48.

  27. The Times of San Diego. “Has San Diego County already built enough new housing to accommodate all the currently projected population growth through the year 2050? This is a stunning question to ask given the frenzied rhetoric about needing to build large numbers of new units of every type, everywhere to deal with what is widely perceived as a massive housing shortage by politicians, housing advocacy groups, and the public. But the answer, surprisingly, is ‘yes.’

    \\

    Exhibit A
    https://data.census.gov/table/ACSDT1Y2022.B25004?t=Vacancy&d=ACS%201-Year%20Estimates%20Detailed%20Tables
    2022: ACS 1-Year Estimates Detailed Tables
    B25004 Vacancy Status
    United States Estimate 13,901,967
    United States Margin of Error +/- 141,204

    Exhibit B
    https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/EVACANTUSQ176N
    Housing Inventory Estimate: Vacant Housing Units in the United States (EVACANTUSQ176N)
    Observation:
    Q1 2024: 15,283 Updated: Apr 30, 2024 9:51 AM CDT
    [15,283,000]
    Units: Thousands of Units,
    Not Seasonally Adjusted (NSA)
    Frequency: Quarterly

    \\

    – But, “shortage”… It’s a nice narrative though for some, but the numbers say otherwise.
    – It’s an affordable housing crisis.
    – Low inventory driven by housing being treated as a speculative investment. Encouraged by ultra-low rates, easy lending, outright mortgage fraud.
    – Investors (speculators) buying up much of and essentially removing the available inventory. This includes multiple rentals, vaca homes, STRs, etc. Not to mention, but I will, those locked into sub 3% mortgages who don’t want to sell and reset their mortgage payment to 7.51% (current 30 yr. fixed rate). I don’t think I could screw up the U.S. housing market more if I tried.

    Option 1
    Remove the incentives to speculate (.gov, GSEs, the Fed, buy to rent, etc.) and there will “suddenly” be plenty of inventory. Tax the sh!t out of 2nd, 3rd, etc. homes, remove other rental property tax incentives. STRs are illegal, so ban them outright. Unfortunately, this option isn’t likely as the REIC system is geared towards constantly increasing prices, which of course isn’t sustainable, but makes for a nice narrative. 🤡 🌏

    Option 2
    .gov, including GSEs and the Fed, blew another massive asset bubble in stonks and housing after the GFC of 2008-2009, aka “The Everything Bubble,” aka “The Central Bank Bubble,” including current Housing Bubble 2.0 in the U.S. This is now deflating. Inventory will “magically” appear like mushrooms as speculators find the need to sell. FOMO becomes OH NO! Asset bubbles always burst; an inconvenient truth. 🔥 Ample supply of 🍿 & 🍺 recommended as the slow-motion train wreck continues. The bigger the boom, the bigger the bust.

    – Thanks Ben for providing a forum for tracking, documenting, commenting on this latest version of housing insanity. No one could have seen this coming.
    – Have a nice day. 🙂

  28. How are Blackstone’s real estate investments holding up in the face of higher-for-longer rates? Is CR8R in their future?

    A man can hope.

    1. Blackstone Ratchets Up Housing Investment With $10 Billion Apartments Deal
      Private-Equity Giant Agrees To Buy Denver-Based Aimco Spinoff
      Investment giant Blackstone has reached a deal for its largest apartment portfolio purchase. (Getty Images)
      Investment giant Blackstone has reached a deal for its largest apartment portfolio purchase. (Getty Images)
      By Jon Leckie
      CoStar News
      April 8, 2024 | 3:55 P.M.

      In its largest multifamily deal to date, Blackstone agreed to buy Apartment Income REIT, known as AIR Communities, for roughly $10 billion in the latest sign of the private-equity giant’s push into the property type after pausing investments for much of 2023 due to higher interest rates.

      The all-cash deal will see the Blackstone fund Blackstone Real Estate Partners X acquire all outstanding shares of AIR Communities for $39.12 per share, 25% more than Friday’s closing price. Along with the $10 billion purchase, including assumed debt, New York-based Blackstone plans to invest another $400 million to improve the AIR Communities properties and may spend more to boost growth.

      “AIR Communities represents the highest quality, large scale apartment portfolio we have ever acquired, and is located in markets where multifamily fundamentals are strong,” Nadeem Meghji, global co-head of Blackstone Real Estate, said in a statement.
      …
      https://www.costar.com/article/258136028/blackstone-ratchets-up-housing-investment-with-10-billion-apartments-deal

      1. I would love to see these rate daters get their assets handed to them at a time when no too-big-to-fail bailouts are available.

    2. Financial Times
      Blackstone Real Estate Income Trust
      Blackstone’s liability to University of California doubles on property fund losses
      Breit has failed to deliver return promised to university in exchange for shoring up real estate fund
      Sather Gate on the University of California at Berkeley campus
      Blackstone offered the University of California an 11.25% annual return to secure its $4.5bn investment in the struggling Breit
      Antoine Gara in New York
      February 26 2024

      Blackstone owes the University of California twice as much as it did last quarter as part of a complex transaction to shore up its flagship real estate fund.

      The world’s largest alternative asset manager promised UC an 11.25 per cent annual return from the property fund, called Blackstone Real Estate Income Trust, or Breit, as part of a deal to draw $4.5bn in new investment. But as the fund lost value last year, Blackstone’s liability to UC has grown to $560mn.

      It underscores the financial risk Blackstone assumed to draw UC’s investment by promising high returns on property investments hit by rising interest rates.

      In late December 2022 and January 2023, Blackstone received a $4.5bn investment from UC that helped Breit meet a spate of redemption requests from other investors and shore up its liquidity. The new cash helped Breit avert a fire sale to meet the requests.

      To entice UC, Blackstone made a promise that Breit would achieve 11.25 per cent annualised returns over six years. The US private capital group pledged $1.1bn in Breit shares it owned to guarantee some of those returns. Since the UC investment, Breit’s redemption requests have dropped by about 80 per cent.

      But Blackstone has had to record a liability to UC based on how far Breit has fallen below its return promises. In the fourth quarter, Blackstone more than doubled its liability to UC, raising it from $260mn at the end of the third quarter to $560mn by the end of 2023, according to a securities filing.

      Breit recorded a 0.5 per cent loss in 2023, its first annual loss since its launch in 2017, putting Blackstone significantly behind on its promised return. Breit’s value fell as Blackstone marked down some property investments. In addition, some interest rate hedges that had gained substantially in value lost ground amid rising expectations of interest rate cuts from the US Federal Reserve.

      The annual losses in turn caused Blackstone’s liability to UC to increase. Though it is an accounting entry and no cash or assets are changing hands, the liability reflects the increased risk Blackstone may eventually have to forfeit some Breit shares it owns to the California-based endowment. If Breit’s performance soars in coming years, the liability could reverse or even turn into an asset.
      …

  29. Summer Of Love 2024 happening now.

    Columbia, UCLA, all roads lead to Chicago DNC in August.

    “Fiery but mostly peaceful”

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