A report from Business Insider. “Boomtowns like Austin are seeing home prices drop, while fewer people are moving to the state. Samuel Cobb, an East Texas resident who’s looking to move out of the state, said the cost of living had ‘blown up’ since the pandemic. He and his wife hardly save anything, and are rarely even able to dine out at restaurants anymore, he added. ‘We were no longer able to live there, couldn’t get back there, couldn’t afford to get jobs there or anything else, so they just pushed us out,’ he said of Austin. His only problem is selling his home, which has been on the market for over two months. ‘We made a decision in August or July to move, and now we’re like, now what the crap we’re going to do? We want to get there. We’re tired of the Texas heat, tired of Texas politics,’ he said. ‘So we’re definitely feeling stuck right now.’”
“Median home prices in Texas have fallen around 7% from their highs in mid-2022, according to data from Redfin. In 2022, homes for sale in Texas were being scooped up in a matter of days, but it’s now taking months for sellers to find a buyer, according to James Willoughby, a real estate agent based in Austin. In some instances, Willoughby says he’s encouraged sellers to slash prices by 20%-30%. According to Redfin, more than a third of homes in Texas saw a price drop in August. ‘We had such an avalanche of buyers moving here from elsewhere and not that many people selling. That’s how we got into the craziness that we got into several years ago,’ he said of the Texas housing market during the pandemic, adding that he’s seen a ‘fair amount of people’ looking to move out of the state in the past year.”
“William Wheeler, an Amarillo-based real-estate agent, says the number of clients who are looking to move out of Texas is ‘pretty equal’ to the number of clients looking to move in. ‘We have done a lot of price reductions, more price reductions than normal,’ he added. Price cuts suggest that housing markets like Austin and Dallas are likely approaching a bottom, according to Redfin’s chief economist Daryl Fairweather, though she noted that the trend wasn’t uniform across the state. ‘The boom cycle’s kind of coming to a close,’ Fairweather said.’”
NBC Miami. “People living in several South Florida condo communities say they have been fighting for years to take back control of where they live. All telling NBC6 their property manager, hired by their boards, has been abusing his power and their money. ‘The biggest issue is that the owners have no rights in there,’ said Julian Londono, who owns a condo at the Cypress Gardens community in Hollywood. Owners from three different communities in both Miami-Dade and Broward say they all share the same property management company, BDM Property Management, and the same property manager, a man named Michael Curtis.”
“‘Water bills are not being paid,’ said Shelisa Anderson, an owner at the Windmill Lakes condo in Pembroke Pines. Manny Ferreira, who owns a property at the Three Horizons condo in North Miami, shared a similar concern. ‘$211,000 of water bill,’ he said, ‘I don’t understand how we still have water in this building. The pool’s been shut down for I think a little over two years now.’ Residents in other communities said they can’t access their pools either. The owners say for years, they have complained about mismanagement by Curtis and their boards of directors, who they say they never elected. ‘They just sign off on everything that he tells them to,’ Anderson said.”
“In September, DBPR revoked BDM’s and Curtis’ licenses, after filing eight administrative complaints against him in 2023. He was also ordered to pay more than $120,000 in fines and costs. The revocation order called Curtis a ‘true danger to the public’ for his conduct at another community, the Fairways of Sunrise. The order states Curtis didn’t contest the allegations against him, rather offered explanations the state said ‘appear disingenuous’ based on the evidence. ‘It’s great, but it’s also bittersweet because they have an appeal process,’ said owner Jenny Trujillo of Three Horizons, ‘So he’s trying to appeal his revocation.’ ‘Everybody’s afraid of them,’ Anderson added. ‘They use intimidation tactics for everything that they do.’”
“Just days after Curtis’ license was revoked, owners in several communities say they received the same letter, supposedly from their respective boards, saying BDM is licensed and appealing the ‘fraudulent’ case against them. It goes on to say Curtis is ‘actively suing every person who distributed false information about him…we advise the residents to refrain from putting yourselves in the same situation.’ ‘They’re doing whatever they want,’ Ferreira said. ‘And on top of it, they’re trying to threaten us.’ Condo owners shared a letter sent to them this week listing the company’s name, advising them that All Florida Rental is their new management firm and that it took over BDM’s phone number and office. ‘Everybody’s still scared they don’t know which way to turn,’ Anderson said. ‘Everybody’s just trying to figure out what we can do next. That’s why we need help.’”
The Oregonian. “Last September, the newsroom found that amid an ongoing housing crisis, Portland’s much-hyped effort to regulate short-term rentals had devolved into chaos. Unlicensed rentals proliferated. Unprocessed permitting paperwork swamped regulators, whose enforcement program was understaffed and lax. And the city was yet again at loggerheads over what data needed to be shared by Airbnb, the online rental giant that dominates the business. City officials say Airbnb still isn’t complying with Portland’s fundamental legal requirement for short-term rental platforms: checking that hosts who list properties on its site have a valid permit number on the city’s short-term rental registry before Airbnb starts taking bookings and related fees.”
“Some hosts are still using transparently fake permit numbers on the site, often on multiple properties, according to the newsroom’s analysis of the listing data. Other haven’t bothered to renew their permits or failed to ever complete the process after filing an application. Still others have relisted their properties after being booted off the platform at the city’s request, only to reclaim existing bookings – another unsolved point of city contention with the platform. Take Hayden Laverty. The 31-year-old entrepreneur said he started small, helping manage a couple short-term rentals owned by a friend when he graduated from college. Today, he, partners and investors have over 200 Airbnb listings in Portland and boast on their website of having $20 million in investor funds under management.”
“In an interview, Laverty said much of his business involves converting existing single-family homes and duplexes in commercially zoned neighborhoods into short-term rentals, effectively converting them into hotels. Laverty has been renting his units on Airbnb, first claiming the properties were ‘exempt,’ then using a single tax identification number for more than 100 listings. When the city, acting on a third-party complaint, asked Airbnb to remove dozens of those listings in July, Laverty and his brother began relisting them using permit numbers from other properties.”
“‘So this confirms what we thought,’ Mike Liefeld, the city’s code enforcement program manager, told other city officials in an Aug. 1 email. Even though city officials can ‘request Airbnb to remove listings, there is nothing that stops hosts from creating a brand-new illegal listing the very next day.’ Laverty said he’s not trying to hide anything. ‘I’ve been transparent with them about the fact that I’m relisting,’ he said. ‘It’s kind of a turning a blind eye response.’”
From The LAist. “One thing that’s jumped out to some readers about the unfolding civil fraud allegations tied to public funds directed by Orange County Supervisor Andrew Do: What (or really, how little) $1 million buys you here in Southern California. Or as one commenter on our Instagram post regarding the recent account of the home’s purchase by the supervisor’s daughter, Rhiannon Do, said: ‘I can’t believe that’s a million-dollar house.’ To which another person responded: ‘That’s the real crime here.’ One of our readers asked: ‘Which is more disgusting: the [alleged] fraud or the fact that a starter home is costing 1 million these days?’”
“According to a Harvard University report from the summer, homes in L.A. and Orange counties are now 10 times more than the median family income of the region. ‘Because I’m a real estate person, I’m always looking at what real estate costs.’ said Lexi Newman, a realtor with Compass, who recently took a trip to Michigan. ‘We were driving around in Detroit, and we saw the biggest mansion I’ve seen in my life. It was an old Abbey. It was just this gorgeous, insane, like, 12 bedrooms, eight baths. It was the most beautiful home I’ve seen.’ The selling price? A measly $1.3 million.”
Silicon Valley in California. “Most Bay Area residents are finding it harder to afford necessities such as groceries, gas, child care, housing, and home insurance, according to a new poll by the Bay Area News Group and Joint Venture Silicon Valley, with seven in 10 respondents agreeing the region’s quality of life has gotten worse in recent years. For many Bay Area residents, the most challenging monthly cost is housing. Homeowners in the poll also said the state’s home insurance meltdown is hitting their finances. But the starkest disparity was between Biden and Trump voters in the 2020 election. Fifty-one percent of Biden voters said the Bay Area is on the wrong track, compared to 93% of Trump voters.”
“‘Look at the four years under Trump. Look at what the price of gas was, interest rates, inflation — look at what they were his last two weeks in office and look at what they are now. It’s outrageous,’ said poll respondent Richard Brown, 61, a self-described independent and Trump voter. Brown, of Alameda, said some of the most shocking price hikes are at the grocery store. ‘I’ll buy a twelve-pack of paper towels that’s like $16,’ he said. ‘What the heck?’ Respondent Jorge Ruiz, 41, of Danville, plans to vote for Proposition 36. He said a consignment store and cosmetic shop in his neighborhood have been burglarized multiple times over the past year and stricter penalties would help crack down on property crime. ‘I go on Nextdoor, and people think it’s like the wild, wild West now,’ Ruiz said.”
“When it comes to the tech sector, 75% of respondents said the industry wields too much power, and 69% said it’s lost its moral compass. Eighty-one percent agreed it’s the driving force behind the region’s high housing costs. After a rash of recent layoffs and more than a decade of scandals over data privacy, children’s mental health and outright fraud, fewer residents appear to believe the region’s economic powerhouse is following through on its initial promise to make the world a better place. ‘Now people feel like the sector might be filled with villains,’ said Russell Hancock, CEO of Joint Venture Silicon Valley, a regional think tank.”
Business in Vancouver in Canada. “B.C.’s housing market remained mired in its slump in August despite Bank of Canada rate cuts. On a monthly basis, seasonally adjusted MLS home sales in B.C. fell 2.3 per cent in August to reach 5,934 units, marking a steeper decline than the 1.1-per-cent dip in July. On a year-over-year basis, sales declined by 7.4 per cent as the downward trend in year-over-year home purchases persisted. Potential buyers may be postponing home purchases in advance of further rate cuts. The average home price in B.C. fell 1.2 per cent to reach $973,053. This is down 8.8 per cent from a peak in February 2022, and down year over year by 1.6 per cent. Home prices also moved down by one per cent monthly in Kamloops and the Kootenay, and by 2.6 per cent in Chilliwack.”
Radio New Zealand. “Property coach Steve Goodey says the time is right to buy a house – but not everyone is as convinced. Goodey asked his social media followers this week what they were waiting for. ‘I can get 5.59 percent for three years even if the floating rate is still in the 8s. Auckland house prices are by average now under $1 million for the first time since 2020… Mortgage brokers round the country are recording a massive upswing in activity with investors and first-home buyers alike getting pre-approvals. Will you wait for the average price to exceed the old peak of two years ago? I’m actually interested to know what reason people have for not feeling like this is the bottom of the market and good times are ahead.’”
“He told RNZ the market had ‘most definitely’ bottomed out. ‘I think if someone wanted to be perfectly counter-cyclical and wanted to time it perfectly for growth and gains and cashflow and the rest of it now is a really good time. Now is a great time to get in because the average taxi driver or uber driver is not talking about the latest house he bought. Once he is, it’s too late, you’ve missed it.’ He said the recovery of house prices could be slower in some areas where there had been a lot of building. ‘In certain locations there’s an oversupply – townhouses in Lower Hutt, Christchurch, South Auckland – there’s certainly no shortage.’”
The Daily Telegraph in Australia. “A spate of unfinished homes have been streaming onto the market for sale after the owners abandoned construction and renovation projects in the midst of skyrocketing building costs. The unusual sales, including properties near completion as well as structural shells without windows or walls, have come as the building industry grapples with labour shortages and skyrocketing materials prices. There was also a doubling in construction company insolvencies over the past financial year – the most recent of which was Victorian construction company Grandeur Homes, which collapsed leaving more than 100 homeowner projects on hold.”
“Louise Stewart, founder of construction technology group ProjectPay, said the insolvencies contributed significantly to incomplete homes being listed. ‘Homeowners can’t even claim on home warranty insurance. They’re left stuck – and there is nothing they can do,’ she said. Many homeowners are left losing hundreds of thousands of dollars to the insolvency process, according to Ms Stewart, with homeowner’s left with no other option but to sell. ‘The way it goes when these companies collapse is it gives the homeowner’s power away and steals their life savings. When the builder enters into administration (homeowners) can claim on insurance but it’s a very small amount, when this is likely the biggest investment in their lifetime. All these poor homeowners having to sell these half built homes, they don’t have the extra money to complete the build,’ Ms Stewart said.’”
“Among the incomplete homes listed for sale in NSW was a luxury Connells Point build that had the majority of the structure complete yet was set to sell at auction on Tuesday October 8. A Hill Top property has been ‘drastically reduced to sell,’ listed with a guide of $970,000- $1.02m so close to being completed with floorboards, tiles, tapware and appliances already fitted. In Guildford, a shell of a structure missing windows, doors and a roof, sold in June for $1.255m. An Annandale warehouse had been completely gutted exposing beautiful sandstone walls and timber floorboards, selling with a DA approved plans for a four bedroom home for $2.75m.”