Anyone Else Notice This Exact Same Story (With Slight Variations) Is Occurring With Seemingly Every County In The World Right Now?

A weekend topic starting with the Dallas Business Journal in Texas. “Collin County’s 75454 ZIP code is one of the hottest housing markets in the Dallas-Fort Worth metro. It’s a bit of a surprise. The ZIP code, which is home to more than 16,000 residents, is in the quaint city of Melissa. During the third quarter the average sale price in 75454 during that time was nearly $514,000, compared with an average list price of $543,000. Among the top 10 hottest ZIP codes in Business Journals analysis, the average home sold for $1.2 million in the third quarter after spending 98 days on the market. In those 10 ZIP codes, home prices on average more than doubled from 2019 to 2024, surging 154%.”

Fox 5 in Texas. “The city of Dallas is considering selling an old hospital site it bought to house the homeless for $6.5 million at a loss after community pushback. One of the options is putting the money from the sale into another project, like the one on Independence Drive. ‘We literally kicked out people and made them homeless to create housing for people who are homeless, and nobody lives there,’ said Councilmember Cara Mendelsohn. ‘It is absolutely shocking. We are on year 2.5, almost 3.'”

Dayton Beach News Journal. “Like many communities across Florida and nationwide, Palm Coast is considering regulations on how short-term rentals are operated within the city’s borders. At the Dec. 3 meeting residents spoke out during the public comment period. ‘We don’t know our neighbors,’ said Debora Alexander who lives in Palm Coast’s ‘C’ section. ‘We live in the middle of a commercial nightmare.’ Jennifer Davisson, an Airbnb operator who lives in town, told the council that Airbnb already runs its own regular background checks on guests and that additional fees would affect her financial viability, especially since many of her guests book within 24 hours of their stay, which would prohibit a background check being returned within that time frame. ‘Ninety percent of my business would be gone if I had to do background checks,’ Davisson said.”

The Park Record in Utah. “As ski towns like Park City, Vail and Jackson Hole continue to grow while real estate values climb ever higher, there’s a simple, stubborn reality that likely won’t ever go away: Beautiful places with great skiing, amazing views and year-round outdoor recreational opportunities will always attract those able to afford a second (or third or fourth) home they may only occupy a few weeks a year. It’s a particular irony that, amid a shortage of worker housing, so many dwellings are vacant for much of the year. In Park City, for example, the report shows 8,585 total housing units — with 52% being vacant or seasonal and only 24% owner occupied. ‘We don’t have a housing problem. We have a housing utilization problem,’ said Margaret Bowes, executive director of the Colorado Association of Ski Towns (CAST). ‘There are plenty of units. They just sit empty.'”

Fox 13 in Utah. “David Ibarra looks out his window every day and sees people camping outside his business. ‘People sleeping in tents, drug use on this side of the building over here,’ the downtown businessman told FOX 13 News. He’s one of nine plaintiffs in a lawsuit against Salt Lake City arguing that the city itself has created a ‘nuisance’ by not enforcing anti-camping laws. Outside of the courtroom, people experiencing homelessness across Salt Lake City offered their own perspectives. Ozzy — a 41-year-old told FOX 13 News that he’s been homeless for around three years and prefers to camp. He recognizes the significant impacts encampments can have on businesses, neighbors and public spaces – especially when there’s drug use and violence. ‘There is that aspect,’ he said. ‘There is that piece of the whole that is rotten.'”

The Los Angeles Times. “Everyone wanted to come to California — that was the generational backdrop of my parents and grandparents. Then, in the 1950s, housing was so abundant that a family of rural Norwegian immigrants could scrape together $8,500 to buy (yes, buy, not rent) the bungalow in Glendale where I spent much of my childhood. Now, according to Zillow, that house would probably fetch $1.5 million. For 1,800 square feet. In Glendale. This is insane, so people are leaving — for other states, yes, but also just far enough inland within California to find affordable housing.”

Times of San Diego in California. “Thanks to technology and COVID-19, the work-from-home model upended how business is done. Office buildings are suffering unprecedented vacancy rates. The New York Times reported that bottom-feeding investors are buying them at discounts up to 70 percent. Meanwhile, in cities across the country, homeless populations are growing. In San Diego, the number falling into homelessness exceeds the number finding shelter on a regular basis. How can local governments strike a balance? To start, ensure a clean and safe environment. In effect, ‘take back our downtowns’ from growing crime and homelessness and unsanitary conditions.”

The Center Square on California. “Los Angeles City council voted to pass a $30 minimum wage for hotel and airport workers, along with an additional healthcare benefit starting at $8.35 per hour for employees of businesses that do not provide health insurance. The impact to Hotel Angeleno will be over $850,000 per year, said Mark Beccaria, a partner and owner representative for the upscale hotel in Brentwood in opposition to the measure. ‘Common sense says you cannot raise wages over 30% in less than a year when revenue is flat. If this increase in labor costs passes, we will be forced by the City to consider converting this hotel in the heart of residential Brentwood into a homeless shelter.'”

The Fresno Bee in California. “When the city of Fresno enacted new laws earlier this year to ban camping by the homeless on public and private property, Mayor Jerry Dyer said the intention was to target people who refuse to move along when asked by police or decline offers of shelter or services. As an example, Dyer cited efforts earlier in his mayoral tenure to clear homeless people from living along freeways running through Fresno. ‘We had 650 people (living along the freeways) — 80% went to shelters, 20% got displaced,’ he said. But that may not necessarily be a bad thing, Dyer said. ‘We know there’s going to be a displacement effect that occurs, and part of that displacement equals disruption,’ Dyer said. ‘And just like when we dealt with the Bulldog (street gang), when you disrupt their lifestyle and arrest them, pretty soon they drop out or they change their lifestyle.'”

“Along with the mayor, City Council members have voiced a similar ‘tough love’ approach to homelessness, regardless of the availability of shelter beds. ‘The city doesn’t have a legal obligation to provide people free housing, free utilities and free food for life,’ Council member Miguel Arias said in September. ‘What I would ask folks for, if you’ve been unsheltered in the city of Fresno … refusing the help that we’ve offered, then you need to go and seek help with your own family, or in another city, because our patience has run out. Our resources are limited, and they’ve also run out.'”

Bay Today in Canada. “The Ontario government Is introducing legislation today that will give municipalities and police new resources and enforcement power to address the growing problem of homeless encampments and crack down on illegal drug use in parks and public spaces. ‘Mayors and residents from communities across Ontario have been clear that enough is enough when it comes to encampments and illegal drug use in our parks and public spaces,’ said Premier Doug Ford. ‘Families deserve to enjoy their local parks and playgrounds without fearing for their kids. People facing homelessness or addiction and mental health challenges should be supported in the right settings. The federal government’s approach of legalizing dangerous drugs for use in our communities has failed and it needs to end.'”

“‘Using illegal drugs in public is unacceptable,’ says Solicitor General Michael Kerzner. ‘Everyone should feel safe when going to a park, riding transit, or walking through their neighbourhoods.'”

The Los Angeles Times. “Canada long sold itself as a beacon for immigrants, who were widely viewed as key to economic growth in a vast nation with a small and rapidly aging workforce. But in recent months, Canada has changed course. For the first time in a quarter-century, a majority of Canadians say there is too much immigration. Hate crimes are on the rise, along with rhetoric blaming newcomers for the country’s economic woes. The abrupt about-face has scrambled life for hundreds of thousands of migrants who came here and planned to stay. Chris Woodcock, 75, and Sandy Furloch, 70, were debating a topic that comes up frequently these days: immigration. ‘There’s just too many of them,’ Woodcock, a retired factory worker, said of immigrants. ‘It’s not really fair to the people who are born and raised here.'”

“Enrique García and his family moved from Mexico City to Toronto this year so that his wife could enroll in an MBA program. Tuition ate up much of the couple’s savings, but they saw it as an investment in Canadian citizenship. Then overnight, the rules had changed — and international students no longer had an easy track to citizenship. A weak economy has made things harder. In four months, García, who worked as an insurance agent in Mexico, has applied to more than 100 jobs. But not even McDonald’s has called him, and his wife’s part-time gig washing dishes in a restaurant barely covers the $2,500 they pay each month in rent for an apartment infested with bedbugs. On a recent chilly morning, as he stood in line for groceries at a food bank, he seemed dejected. ‘It’s been a lot more complicated than I thought,’ he said.”

The Globe and Mail in Canada. “In the B.C. housing market, there’s good news for renters and bad news for investors in the year ahead. David Hutniak, chief executive officer of the advocacy group Landlord BC, said they’ve seen a ‘softening of rents, particularly at the higher end.’ Landlords who catered to international students have been affected, due to the federal government reducing the numbers of foreign students. Some purpose-built rental building owners have offered incentives such as amenity bonuses, one-month free rent and gift cards to help fill suites, said Mr. Hutniak. Investor owners of condo units were impacted by short-term rental legislation that made it difficult to rent their properties on platforms like Airbnb, for much higher rents than a long-term renter could pay. Those owners had attempted to charge high rents but have had to ‘lower their expectations to fill the units,’ said Mr. Hutniak. ‘I suspect it’s a tough pill for many of them to swallow, because many, if not most, were over-leveraged and of those many, if not most, had variable rate mortgages. So it’s kind of a double whammy for them.'”

“And as thousands of new purpose-built rental units get built, the downward pressure on rents will continue. And now that foreign and domestic investor money has fallen off, the small investor condos that have been built aren’t desirable to non-investors. Businessman Ross McCredie notes that downtown luxury towers and the massive Oakridge project are a concern for the market because there is a lot of unsold inventory. ‘To my mind – and I have worked a lot around the world – I think of Vancouver as a resort market, and it’s getting so more and more. You are going to have people who are very wealthy, who have places here, [who] don’t care about property taxes [because] it is what it is. But for people who want to live and work here, young families, it will become more and more expensive; more difficult to justify.'”

“‘We have had policies in place in B.C. for the last 25 years where we simply didn’t care,’ he said. ‘It was more about, just, ‘More and more – bring people in, especially wealthy people.’ And that drove our economy, that was the mandate. And I question the thought process on that. We were addicted to immigration and foreign dollars, and now we have shut that valve off.'”

ABC News in Australia. “‘We’re not trying to bring down house prices,’ Housing Minister Clare O’Neil declared on ABC’s youth radio station. ‘That may be the view of young people, [but] it’s not the view of our government.’ Instead, she insisted the federal government wanted ‘sustainable price growth.’ ‘We don’t want to see some of the growth we’ve seen in some parts of the country where you’re getting double-digit increases in house prices year-on-year.’ The interview aired last month, but it has found a new life online this week. The ABC asked Ms O’Neil office what she meant by ‘sustainable’ growth, but they did not provide a response.”

“Stephen Smith, partner at Deloitte Access Economics, said he was not surprised by the minister’s remarks and agreed that no government would want house prices to fall dramatically. But he said if prices continued to rise much faster than incomes, that would equally be an issue. ‘That’s not a strategy that’s good for social cohesion or the economy more broadly,’ he said. ‘Property has got to a situation in Australia where it’s moved beyond prices that mean that it’s accessible as a fundamental basic human right,’ Mr Smith said. ‘It’s become a vehicle for investment and to make money. Unfortunately, that’s pushed prices up beyond where they reasonably should be when you think about prices relative to incomes.'”

From News.com.au. “A video explaining ‘why life in Australia has become impossible’ has gone viral online, but many viewers have pointed out that the same situation is playing out ‘all across the western world.’ The 16-minute video by Dutch YouTube channel Hindsight, published on November 30, gives a rundown of the housing crisis that has pushed the Australian dream out of reach for a growing proportion of the population, leading to a rapidly growing divide between the haves and have-nots. ‘The Australian dream is about owning a house, but that ideal is now increasingly getting out of reach,’ the description reads.”

“None of the information will come as news to Australians — the fact that it now costs more than 10 times the average income to buy a home with Sydney and Melbourne being ranked among the least affordable cities in the world. The video has struck a chord online, racking up 1.5 million views and attracting thousands of comments. ‘It isn’t limited to Australia, and I’m truly beginning to consider that politicians worldwide are merely doing their masters’ bidding,’ one person wrote.”

“Another said, ‘This is all over the western world. This is all by design.’ ‘Dear Australia, we have the same problem. Signed Canada,’ a third added. A fourth asked, ‘Anyone else notice this exact same story (with slight variations) is occurring with seemingly every county in the world right now?’ Many Australians chimed in to share their despair at the state of the country. ‘I was born here 61 years ago … Australia has turned into an over-priced corporate s**t hole,’ one wrote. Another recalled how ‘when I was a kid in Australia, a person on one wage was able to pay off a house, live comfortably and take the family on holidays. Now it takes at least two wages and most times that is not enough. So wrong,’ they said.”