The Pandemic Made Us Panic About House Prices

1. ‘This is not the time to push the price or to place a home on the market to see if you can obtain the price you hope to achieve’

   Wa happened to my shortage Libby?

2. You will own nothing.

   1. “Freedom is just another word for nothing left to lose.” —Janis Joplin

3. ‘I was eating out all the time… friends, drinks – usual things people do. But after that I decided to minimise my expenses a little bit, live cheap’

   Matt gets it – no eating winnahs!

   ‘Swift Mortgages negotiated a 6.8 percent interest rate for Simupande. ‘I am able to manage it OK, believe it or not but, of course, if interest rates go down then… that would help tremendously as well’

   We got another rate dater/knife catcher.

   1. “Matt gets it – no eating winnahs!”

      LMAO

      No soup for you!!

4. ‘The Fresno metropolitan area had a TRU unemployment rate of 31.1%, according to the Washington, D.C.-based economic research firm. That gives it the second-highest functional unemployment rate among the 100 largest U.S. cities, edged out by McAllen-Edinburg-Mission, TX with a TRU of 48%, which was unchanged from last year’

   And unchanged for as long as anyone cares to look back. This cluster of sh$tholes always has this kind of unemployment cuz illegals can come and go legally. That’s what open borders brings. And Fresno is right there with them. Muy rico!

5. ‘Commercial property owners right now are really struggling…So even though their properties are valuable, they’re not profitable’

   How do you like those 5% cap rates now Evan?

6. Demands?

   Group of migrants sends list of demands to Denver’s mayor (5/7/2024):

   “That group said if their demands are met, they will voluntarily stay in city-funded shelters and leave their encampment where families, including young children, still live in tents.

   The migrants have been lobbied by Denver Human Services to get off the street and into shelters — an offer that remains, according to city officials. But they are holding out and said the city has reneged on its deal with them, while the city maintains it will continue to offer services to migrants that choose shelter over encampments.

   “The camp as a collective came up with a list of demands,” V Reeves, a migrant advocate, said.

   That came after a petition by city officials to move people from an encampment near train tracks and under a bridge to indoor shelters funded by the city.

   “This morning, they sent buses to take people over without presenting that document and without having any kind of signature for accountability,” Reeves said.

   That is how the city responded instead of meeting their demands, according to Reeves.”

   https://kdvr.com/news/local/group-of-migrants-send-denver-mayor-list-of-demands/

   Meeting their demands?

   You are being replaced.

   1. They are actually demanding they be provided food from their cultures, though I think the ones doing the demanding are gringo activists

   2. “In all, the migrants presented 13 demands to the city of Denver. Messages shared with FOX31 show the demands are:

      1. Migrants will cook their own food with fresh, culturally appropriate ingredients provided by the City instead of premade meals – rice, chicken, flour, oil, butter, tomatoes, onions, etc… Also people will not be punished for bringing in & eating outside food.
      2. Shower access will be available without time limits & can be accessed whenever – we are not in the military, we’re civilians.
      3. Medical professional visits will happen regularly & referrals/connections for specialty care will be made as needed.
      4. All will receive the same housing support that has been offered to others. They cannot kick people out in 30 days without something stable established.
      5. There needs to be a clear, just process before exiting someone for any reason – including verbal, written & final warnings.
      6. All shelter residents will receive connection to employment support, including work permit applications for those who qualify.
      7. Consultations for each person/family with a free immigration lawyer must be arranged to discuss/progress their cases, & then the City will provide on-going legal support in the form of immigration document clinics & including transportation to relevant court dates.
      8. The City will provide privacy for families/individuals within the shelter.
      9. No more verbal or physical or mental abuse will be permitted from the staff, including no sheriff sleeping inside & monitoring 24/7 – we are not criminals & won’t be treated as such.
      10. Transportation for all children to & from their schools will be provided until they finish in 3 weeks.
      11. No separating families, regardless of if family members have children or not. The camp will stay together.
      12. The City must schedule a meeting with the Mayor & those directly involved in running the Newcomer program ASAP to discuss further improvements & ways to support migrants.
      13. The City must provide all residents with a document signed by a City official in English & Spanish with all of these demands that includes a number to call to report mistreatment.”

      If I want ANY ONE of those services, I have to work a job to pay for it.

      And yeah, this definitely looks gringo-written.

   3. Crazy, I thought they were here to wash dishes, pay taxes, and fund social security.

7. Heckova job, RBA.

   https://www.news.com.au/national/australians-skipping-meals-and-eating-out-of-bins-to-afford-housing/news-story/558efbabe0ac89ebc7a20ec6c1a4b88b

8. Japan has big problems

   Super-aged Japan now has 9 million vacant homes. And that’s a problem

   But more akiya are being seen in major cities, such as Tokyo and Kyoto, and that’s a problem for a government that’s already grappling with an aging population and an alarming fall in the number of children born each year.

   https://www.yahoo.com/news/why-too-many-homes-not-013641783.html

   1. doesnt the prefecture take over the house if the property tax is not paid.

      No problem!

      1. that’s a very very American thing. or, “only in America!”.

9. “They’re still delusional,’ Dani said of the California homeowners in Austin.”

   It’s hard to cure stupid.

10. Self-driving technology company Motional said on Tuesday it will pause robotaxi deployments with ride-hailing firms Uber Technologies UBER
    and Lyft, while it lays off staff as part of its restructuring process to focus on technology development.

    The development comes ahead of electric carmaker Tesla’s unveiling of its robotaxi, dubbed “Cybercab”, on Aug. 8 and as legacy automakers limit spending on expensive autonomous driving technology in the face of regulatory and safety hurdles.

    Motional said it has completed more than 100,000 autonomous rides in Las Vegas and food deliveries in Los Angeles.

    “Large-scale driverless deployment will not happen overnight. Driverless vehicles will enter the market when the technology has evolved and – just as importantly – when the business case for autonomous deployment is clear,” CEO Karl Iagnemma said in a blog post.

    Auto parts supplier Aptiv said last week it would sell its stake in Motional, its joint venture with Hyundai Motor , while the Korean automaker will fund the startup with additional $475-million.

    Last month, OpenAI and Khosla Ventures-backed Ghost Autonomy said it was winding down operations, citing an uncertain path to long-term profitability.

    As part of Motional’s restructuring process, the startup said it would reduce workforce, focus resources on developing and generalizing its driverless technology “while de-emphasizing near-term commercial deployments and ancillary activities”.

    The company declined to provide the numbers of employees to be laid off, but said roles across locations and functions were impacted.

    https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/international-business/article-motional-to-pause-robotaxi-deployments-with-uber-lyft/

11. Denver is among the cities most impacted by the arrival of migrants crossing the Southwestern border in the last two years. More than 40,000 have arrived, many on buses chartered by the governor of Texas. Denver provided shelter for thousands and other forms of help. That’s been expensive, and exhausting, and now the city has scaled its efforts back.

    When Rosbely Sira Linarez, her husband and newborn arrived here last year from Venezuela they got help from the state to move into an apartment.

    “They gave me a month’s help plus the deposit,” she said, in Spanish.

    They found a place. That lasted about 10 months. Her husband lost a job, they fell behind on rent and then were evicted.

    “I was there until they kicked me out,” Linarez said.

    Now they live in one of dozens of tents clustered under a north Denver street bridge, but not for too long. Police recently found this encampment and told residents they have to leave. Like Linarez, most here are newly arrived Venezuelan immigrants.

    “Lately everything has become complicated for us,” Linarez says.

    Since 2023 more than 8,000 people in Denver received help with housing, through a state fund that’s still available. But in March, the city started phasing out its short-term sheltering assistance. The problem for Linarez, and most migrants in Denver, is getting authorization to work so they can pay for their own housing.

    Many migrants who landed in Denver took bus tickets the city’s been offering to other cities for the last couple of years. Some, like Linarez, stuck around.

    After Congress rejected a measure in February that would have sent money to help cities like Denver, Mayor Mike Johnston announced he had to cut $45 million from other departments to address the needs of people arriving.

    In April, Denver started sending city staffers to Texas, to tell would-be travelers that there are now few resources available if they do decide to come here.

    https://www.boisestatepublicradio.org/2024-05-08/migrant-arrivals-stretched-denvers-budget-now-the-city-is-scaling-back-aid

    1. Denver is a failed city.

    2. The Democrat run city of Denver is encouraging residents to host migrant families in their homes and has even set up a hotline so people can volunteer to take in illegals who have no where else to go.

       https://modernity.news/2024/05/08/denver-sets-up-host-migrants-in-your-home-hotline/

       FOX31 Denver reports that a charity calling itself ‘Hope Has No Borders’ “began pairing migrant workers and their families with hosts in Colorado in late 2023. Now, with help from the United Way, getting paired up is a simple phone call away by dialing 211.”

       A news segment details how one resident happily took in a family of four migrants after seeing that they are camping out in airports and on the streets because all the shelters are full.

       The woman, Erin Lennon, is “a single mom with a spare bedroom,” according to the report.

       Not a rich liberal with an eight bedroom house then.

       Imagine our shock.

       The report notes that Lennon’s young son “was nervous at first about the idea of taking in strangers,” but she states “Some of the greatest things that, you know, that you do or have done, has been involved with some risk.”

       As we previously highlighted, this kind of thing is happening in several cities nationwide.

       Some people are treating it like it’s a way of getting a free servant:

       [A short video appears here …]

       The state of Michigan is even offering $500 per month to residents who agree to house illegal immigrants in their homes.

       [There is a lot of stuff here. I suggest readers access the link to get the entire scoop.]

    3. So Dumber is finally telling illegals that there’s no room at the inn?

       1. See the list of demands above: shelter, *fresh* food, medical care (including specialists), legal help, school and school buses, even a hotline for tattle-telling.

          Even if Denver gave in to this extortion, they will run out of money very quickly.

          1. Dumber is already out of money

    4. They found a place. That lasted about 10 months. Her husband lost a job, they fell behind on rent and then were evicted.

       Bienvenidos a los estados unidos, amigo.

12. “Renters there pay 99% less in rent than in mortgage payments”

    There are so many delusional housing proponents who if rents dropped to zero they’d still say you’re throwing your money away.

    1. If I wanted to buy in my area, after putting down $100,000, my costs compared to rent would increase approximately 55%. That does not include maintenance. I’d love a yard and a workshop, but I love money and financial freedom more.

       I’m throwing that extra 55% into Treasuries and High-Yield Savings. My down payment is invested and growing.

       No equity, but my net worth grows every two weeks and I’m debt free.

13. Do you feel a growing sense of alarm about Blackstone’s BREIT?

    1. DISCOURSE FINANCE
       Blackstone’s big gamble
       Has the world’s largest private-equity firm built a $114 billion house of cards?

       Hand reaching to pull a card labeled ‘Blackstone’ from a house of cards
       Getty Images; Alyssa Powell

       Bethany McLean is a special correspondent at Insider and a contributing editor at Vanity Fair. She’s the co-host, along with University of Chicago economist Luigi Zingales, of the podcast Capitalisn’t. Previously, she was an editor-at-large at Fortune Magazine. She is the co-author with Peter Elkind of the “Smartest Guys in the Room: The Amazing Rise and Scandalous Fall of Enron.” A documentary based on the book was nominated for an Academy Award in 2006. In 2010, she co-authored “All the Devils are Here: The Hidden History of the Financial Crisis” with New York Times columnist Joe Nocera. In 2015, Columbia Global Reports published her mini book “Shaky Ground: The Strange Saga of the US Mortgage Giants,” and in the fall of 2018, CGR published “Saudi America: The Truth About Fracking and How It’s Changing the World.” Her newest book, which she is also co-authoring with Joe Nocera, is titled “The Big Fail: What the Pandemic Revealed About Who America Helps and Who it Leaves Behind.” Her 2016 Vanity Fair story on disgraced pharmaceutical company Valeant was used as the basis for Netflix’s “Dirty Money” episode about the drugmaker. She has also been a contributor to Slate and to Yahoo Finance, and is currently a contributor to CNBC. Her previous podcast, Making a Killing, was available on Luminary. She also serves on the board of the Stigler Center at the University of Chicago. McLean graduated from Williams College in 1992 with a double major in math and English, and from 1992 to 1995 she worked as an investment banking analyst at Goldman Sachs.
       Bethany McLean
       May 7, 2024, 2:32 AM PDT

       In 2017, Blackstone — the world’s largest private-equity firm, which usually caters to big institutions and the very wealthy — decided to give ordinary investors an opportunity to get in on the firm’s magic. It created BREIT, a private fund that buys commercial real estate like warehouses and apartment buildings, and marketed it to everyday investors as an “all-weather strategy to build long-term wealth across market cycles.”

       And it was magic: By offering an annual dividend of about 4% in a world where interest rates were close to zero, BREIT quickly became a giant. At its peak in 2021, the fund was attracting as much as $3 billion a month in new investments. Today, BREIT boasts assets of $114 billion — about 8% of Blackstone’s entire fee-earning assets — and has generated over $5 billion in management and performance fees.

       But over the past two years, some investors have grown suspicious that BREIT isn’t the rock-solid investment Blackstone claims it is. Since its inception, the fund says it has delivered an annualized net return of 10.5% — almost double an index of publicly traded REITs. Even as commercial real estate has been battered in the wake of the pandemic, BREIT has somehow managed to defy gravity, outperforming comparable funds by seemingly fantastic margins. In the fall of 2022, after the Fed’s interest-rate increases began to shake the commercial real-estate market, investors began asking for their money back — more than $15 billion to date. Faced with a run on the fund, Blackstone cited a provision that allowed it to take its time refunding antsy investors — a decision that only served to further alarm the market. Shares in Blackstone tumbled by nearly 20%. Last year, BREIT failed to generate enough cash to cover its annual dividend.

       In recent months, the fund has appeared to recover from the debacle. BREIT announced it was able to fulfill 100% of the repurchase requests it received in February, which had slowed to just under $1 billion. Amid the promise of a rebound, Blackstone’s stock has regained almost 50% from its lows. “I believe we’ll look back at 2023 as the cyclical bottom for our firm,” Steve Schwarzman, Blackstone’s CEO, told analysts at an earnings call in January.

       Investors in Blackstone’s real-estate fund asked for their money back in droves — more than $15 billion to date. Jeenah Moon/Reuters
       But the rosy picture that Blackstone paints may not tell the whole story. In recent months I’ve spoken with veteran analysts, accountants, and investors who have come to believe that BREIT is essentially a house of cards. That’s because the returns the fund claims it has delivered depend almost entirely on BREIT’s own estimates, which skeptics believe are wildly inflated. What’s more, when BREIT faced a flood of redemption requests from investors, it only fulfilled all those requests after raising cash from new investors — including one that received a sweetheart deal from Blackstone to invest in BREIT. “It is the absolute definition of a Ponzi scheme,” said Nate Koppikar, who runs a hedge fund called Orso Partners that has shorted Blackstone’s stock because of concerns over BREIT. Unless the real-estate market comes roaring back, analysts warn, BREIT could end up shrinking to a fraction of its current size, leaving the fund’s investors holding the bag.

       “Surveying some of the ways that Blackstone has misled investors over the past five months, we are more convinced than ever that BREIT is a bad investment created for the benefit of Blackstone,” Craig McCann, a financial analyst who served as an economist at the Securities Exchange Commission, wrote last year. “Investors should not accept anything Blackstone and BREIT state as truthful.”
       …
       https://www.businessinsider.com/blackstone-breit-commercial-real-estate-fund-misled-investors-private-equity-2024-5

       1. Blackstone is shady AF and they are openly anti white. Blackstone is one of the many tiny hat entities that is openly trying to ruin America for white people. This is not conjecture, I have insider knowledge.

14. They did not require that the millions of illegal border invaders take the vaccines for Covid.
    That should show you that the Biden Administration could of cared less about millions of unvaccinated crossing the Border.

15. “That’s ’81M votes’ not 81m voters.”

    1. The 2020 election was stolen.

16. But experts said the oversupply is a short-term issue.

    These “experts” all collect paychecks from the REIC, and shill with the same shamelessness as MSM hack “journalists.”

17. Governor Maura Healey’s $4 billion housing bond bill, the state’s biggest-ever investment in its residential stock, includes a provision allowing cities to impose a transfer fee of 0.5% to 2% on property sales exceeding $1 million.

    First they came for the property owners with shack valuations exceeding $1 million, and I did not speak up because I was not a $1M shack owner….

    1. me for the property owners with shack valuations exceeding $1 million, and I did not speak up because I was not a $1M shack owner….

       AFAIK the Federal income tax has a similar origin story.

18. “A prominent Des Moines gastroenterologist has filed a lawsuit in Polk County alleging Orton Homes President Rob Orton and jailed Johnston developer Daniel Pettit failed to repay him $850,000.

    Every time housing speculator scum get defrauded, an angel gets its wings.

19. ” ‘The current oversupply of apartments is just another chapter in the supply-demand extremes initiated during the COVID pandemic.’””

    The supply extreme came from 1% interest rates, not the pandemic. I visited Nashville and counted 20+ construction cranes downtown. This was in late 2019, pre-pandemic. The supply extreme came from 1% interest rates, not the pandemic.

20. Kaeti knows….

    https://twitter.com/realdefender45/status/1788009915073642655

21. NYC Boomer libtard vacationing in Florida sees truck with Trump bumper sticker, is overcome with TDS, and keys the vehicle. Learns that the criminal justice system in Florida, unlike hug-a-thug Soros DAs in NYC, take malicious vandalism seriously and will hold the perps accountable. 

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-J99s_UsX3s&t=72s

    1. “is overcome with TDS, and keys the vehicle. Learns that the criminal justice system in Florida:

       Thank you so much for posting.

       I savored every minute of that video.

22. ” the new suit is the first to name Orton, CEO of the American Group LLC, a holding company for roughly 20 real estate companies that also includes RE/MAX Precision in Clive. ”

    The GI doc has a smart lawyer. The low-level developer who stole the money is broke, so they’re going after the umbrella company with the deeper pockets.

23. ‘Since 2014, more than 181,000 apartments have been built — a whopping 35.5% increase in a huge market, according to RealPage. Another roughly 35,000 apartments are under construction, and developers are proposing more than 80,000 additional units, according to the MRI data’

    ‘The oversupply is a trend MRI is seeing not just in Dallas but in other major Sun Belt cities — like Atlanta, Orlando, Houston, Austin, Nashville and San Antonio. ‘It’s just bad timing for the moment,’ said Bruce McClenny, an industry principal at MRI ApartmentData. ‘The current oversupply of apartments is just another chapter in the supply-demand extremes initiated during the COVID pandemic’

    ‘It’s just bad timing for the moment’

    Bruce was reserved from his usual comments at Bisnow. Apartments in Texas are dropping like flies. Real big, medium, you name it. The ‘bad timing’ has produced a lot of jingle mail already, these guys are just walking out. Which is sound lending of course.

    ”Since 2014, more than 181,000 apartments have been built — a whopping 35.5% increase in a huge market, according to RealPage. Another roughly 35,000 apartments are under construction, and developers are proposing more than 80,000 additional units’

    But there’s a shortage of airboxes in Big D.

24. ‘On the same call, HPP announced it bought out its partner in 1455 Market St., a 1M SF Mid-Market office tower that once housed some of the country’s biggest names in finance and technology, for $43.5M — a fraction of its peak value’

    So they’ve started not giving out the crater number.

25. ‘Unless the real-estate market comes roaring back, analysts warn, BREIT could end up shrinking to a fraction of its current size, leaving the fund’s investors holding the bag’

    That’s really terrible news!

26. Making A Bad Situation Even Worse (GTA Condo Real Estate Market Update)
    Team Sessa Real Estate

    46 minutes ago

    In this episode we take a look at the current GTA Condo Markets – Toronto, York Region & Peel Region for week ending May 1, 2024. We also discuss why it’s important to communicate any potential problems that could arise when it’s comes to closing on a property.

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

    15:13.

27. ‘I can’t believe this is happening in Canada. There is no fairness in this system and so many people are in severe stress, both financially and mentally, because of it,’ Ajeely said. ‘The government of Ontario must put an end to this misery because landlords can’t suffer forever. It’s not just the landlords but also tenants simultaneously. Both bodies are suffering and struggling because of this delay. The bank will not wait for me to make my payments. This person living for free has no one who can stop him and he is living for free — why would he bother to pay?’

    Have you considered cutting out expensive food Nazar?

28. ‘‘We moved out from London to somewhere very pretty and rural in the South West and it’s a been a terrible decision, for me personally. Left a house in an area we’d lived in happily for eight years, for a lovely looking, larger one in a pretty looking rural village and ever since we moved I’ve struggled. I think the root issue is we left because we thought we should, not because we wanted to, and didn’t think hard enough about the realities because the pandemic made us panic about house prices’

    The important thing is that you never threw cash in the trash writer,

29. ‘German commercial property prices fell 9.6% in the first three months of 2024 compared with a year earlier, the VDP banking association said on Wednesday, as the nation’s property industry suffers its worst crisis in decades. The continuing decline in values of commercial real estate follows a 10.2% drop for all of 2023. The latest drop is less severe than the 12.1% drop for the fourth quarter, which was the biggest ever. ‘Prices for commercial property show no sign of bottoming out’

    It was brexit that did it Jens.

30. SW FLORIDA’S RENTAL MARKET MELTDOWN
    Ben Grieco

    39 minutes ago

    Mulit-Family Vacancies are skyrocketing across Southwest Florida as asking rents continue to decline. Areas from Sarasota to Naples are seeing alarming price drops as vacant units pile up, leading many to wonder if the rental market is about to crash?

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkW7ugIzEQM

    10:13.

31. Are mortgage rates set to drop any day now?

    1. Bill Hwang lost $35 billion. Now, prosecutors will try to prove it was a crime.

       Home Personal Finance Real Estate
       Americans expect mortgage rates to rise to nearly 10% in the next three years, New York Fed housing survey finds
       Published: May 6, 2024 at 11:10 a.m. ET
       By Aarthi Swaminathan
       Americans expect home prices to keep rising, the New York Fed survey says
       Consumers expect home prices and mortgage rates to rise, according to a new survey by the New York Federal Reserve.
       Brandon Bell/Getty Images

       U.S. consumers expect mortgage rates to approach double digits over the next three years, according to a new survey by the New York Federal Reserve.

       Households have a gloomy view of mortgage rates. Consumers on average said that over the next year, they expect the 30-year mortgage rate to rise to 8.7%, and in three years, to 9.7%, “both of which are series highs,” the NY Fed said.
       …
       https://www.marketwatch.com/story/americans-expect-mortgage-rates-to-rise-to-nearly-10-in-the-next-three-years-new-york-fed-housing-survey-finds-73e269ad

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