It’s Friday desk clearing time for this blogger. “A blazing-hot housing market has chilled in Northeast Colorado. ‘We’re getting more creative,’ said Wendy Jerman, Realtor at Town Square Realty in Sterling.. ‘More agents are sending out email blasts about reduced pricing – the new term is price improvement. We haven’t had to market in the past. Now, we must.’ ‘There’s more new listings and they’re staying on market longer,’ said Stacey Martindale, a Realtor at Cornerstone Brokers. ‘We are not seeing homes go under contract as fast. You put homes on the market and hope someone will go see it to make an offer for the seller.’”
“The number of single-family homes sold in the Pioneer Valley fell 20% last month. ‘The market has definitely slowed,’ said Dan Moriarty, CEO of Monson Savings Bank. ‘We are in a different environment. It’s not like you can list a house and two days later have 40 or 50 people interested. Those days are over.’ ‘Many homeowners are waiting until market conditions improve to sell their home, while other sellers are increasingly cutting prices and offering concessions to attract a greater number of buyers,’ the state association said.”
“Spokane County’s housing market continued to cool off in October. The median closing price for homes and condos on less than 1 acre was $395,000 in October, a 6.8% increase over October 2021’s median of $370,000, according to the Realtors association. The median price, however, has dropped considerably from the all-time high of $450,000 recorded in May. Ken Sax, a broker who oversees about 770 licensees in Washington, agreed that interest rates are impacting the local housing market. ‘We are definitely not where we were eight to nine months ago with 10 offers on a house,’ Sax said. ‘Sellers right now are having to realize that they aren’t going to get what they’ve gotten eight to nine months ago.’”
“The latest data from the Austin Board of Realtors shows a continuing trend of stabilizing home prices and supply in Round Rock, Pflugerville and Hutto. According to the ABoR’s monthly report for October, the median price of a home sold across the three cities in October was $457,876. While a slight increase over September’s median price of $450,000, that price is still lower than the prior two months—$475,000 in August and $476,458 in July. ‘The 2021 housing market numbers we saw were an anomaly compared to previous years, so anything different from those numbers can appear significant,’ said Jim Gaines, an economist at the Texas Real Estate Research Center. ‘Homes that are coming on the market are not staying active for long, but they are also not flying off the shelves or going into a bidding war like they used to.’”
“According to a report from the North State Building Industry Association, Yuba County continued to sell more new homes for the month of October while Sutter County actually reported negative sales. Officials with the building association said the negative sales for Sutter County were reported because of ‘more previous transactions being canceled than new sales reported during the month.’”
“To find places where home prices are dropping the most, GOBankingRates used Zillow’s May and August 2022 median sale data prices for the 100 largest metro areas to find the numerical and percent change in median sale prices over those three months. All cities identified have had a -5% or more change in home sale prices, which, sometimes, adds up to more than $100,000. Stockton, California : 3-month change in sale price ($): -$27,000. 3-month change in sale price (%): -5.07%.”
“Seattle is known as one of the most expensive places to live in the U.S. However, home prices have recently dropped over 7%. Although buying a home in San Francisco will take some pretty deep pockets, sale prices there have dropped almost 10% as of late. San Jose is hard to beat for other reasons. But it’s not cheap to live there, even with the recent decrease in home sale prices of almost 9.9% — amounting to a $150k discount. Winston-Salem, North Carolina: This city of approximately 250,000 is unique in that it straddles the line between hometown friendliness and international appeal. What’s more is that its previously affordable home prices have recently dropped more than 10%.”
“799 College St., No. 205, Toronto: This July, agent Robin Pope expected this one-bedroom unit might be difficult to sell, especially with other vacancies in the same six-storey building. The reality was even worse – the unit was almost completely ignored. ‘After being on the market for two weeks, there hadn’t been a showing, which was unusual,’ said Mr. Pope. ‘But the market was changing. Buyers were not motivated to pull the trigger.’ The price was lowered from $649,990 to $619,900 and then to $599,990 over about three weeks in August. Then, an offer came through on the first day of September for the full, reduced price.”
“‘It didn’t matter whether you’re priced at yesterday’s price or today’s price, so many buyers are still making offers much lower than asking,’ Mr. Pope said.”
“For 14 years, Muhammad Azam has been waiting for construction to start on a five-bedroom luxury villa he bought on the largest — but least developed — of Dubai’s famous palm-shaped artificial islands that jut out into the Persian Gulf. An unexpected email from Nakheel PJSC in September confirmed it never would. Dubai’s real estate regulator apparently had decided months earlier to cancel the project on Palm Jebel Ali, and the government-backed developer told him they would refund less than a quarter of what Azam had paid for the villa in the secondary market shortly before construction had got off the ground.”
“Cypriot businessman Azam, 44, wasn’t alone. He’s among hundreds of investors who bought homes on Palm Jebel Ali that have never been built. Saudi resident Mahmoud, who works in the oil and gas industry, says he also bought a Signature Villa for 6.7 million dirhams in 2005. He says he paid 2.7 million dirhams worth of installments to Nakheel and 1 million dirhams directly to the seller. Nakheel, he says, is now offering him a 2.7 million refund or a 4 million dirham credit note. ‘Contracts in Dubai aren’t worth the ink they’re written with,’ he said. ‘What’s the value of a contract if it can be cancelled without even informing us?’”
“A property expert has offered a grim prediction for The Block’s last remaining unsold house. Real estate pro Chris Bellesini says it’s highly unlikely Jenny Heath and Dylan Adams’ home will find a buyer willing to come close to its $4.08million reserve. Bellesini told Now to Love the show’s producers ‘lost touch with reality’ when they set the reserves so high. Dylan and Jenny’s house is currently listed on the Domain website for just $1.63million, which is less than half its reserve.”
“Mr Bellesini said the three homes that sold at auction two weeks ago ‘were at inflated prices’, and their sales did not reflect actual market behaviour. ‘These sales weren’t real. Three were sold to Danny [Wallis] for his ego and the fourth to Adrian [Portelli in a post-auction sale] to promote his business ventures,’ he said. ‘It just comes down to at what point in time will Channel Nine and the vendors be happy to cut their loses and accept a price well below what they originally wanted,’ he added. Dylan and Jenny are said to be ‘battling’ to offload their home after becoming the only couple who couldn’t find a buyer either on or after auction day.”
“The dominoes continue to fall, triggered by this FTX saga. Major crypto lender Genesis Capital suspended withdrawals on its lending business yesterday. If there is one thing that crypto investors know by now, it is this: once that fateful decision to suspend withdrawals is taken, the jig is up. This is a big deal. Genesis had $2.8 billion of active loans as of Q3 in 2022, while it originated $8.4 billion over the course of the quarter. That’s a hefty chunk of change.”
“The firms join BlockFi in suspending withdrawals, yet another crypto lender in desperation mode following the FTX collapse. The firm is reportedly ready to layoff workers and file for bankruptcy. There is a big difference between what is happening at all these companies and FTX, however. Sure, all the firms are employing reckless risk management, a complete lack of diversification and have been asking for all this mayhem.”
“As Sam said in one of his stream-of-consciousness tweet threads (which have only served to throw gasoline on all this fire), ‘that risk was correlated – with the other collateral, and with the platform. And then the crash came…and at the same time there was a run on the bank.’”
“Riddle me this, Sam. How does an entity that is not a bank suffer from a run on the bank? I keep saying FTX was an exchange because it is vitally important. Customers should deposit cash to exchanges, before either leaving it there as cash, or buying crypto assets. Then, when they go to withdraw, it should just be…there.”