A report from The Real Deal. “For New York’s condo market, recent developments in China may simply confirm what has been common knowledge for some time — the once-booming market for mainland Chinese buyers has long died down, amid tight capital controls and trade tensions. Asked if coronavirus had led to a noticeable decline in buyers from China, Sotheby’s International Realty broker Kevin Brown said, ‘No, because they weren’t here’ to begin with, due to geopolitical issues.”
The Wall Street Journal on New York. “New York City landlords widely predicted that the new state law, which makes it much harder for landlords to upgrade and convert rent-stabilized units to more profitable market-rate apartments, would dull interest in these properties. After the law was enacted in June, values on these apartment buildings in New York City fell by about 25% on average, brokers and investors say. Some property owners have fallen behind on their loan payments.”
“That has made many of these buildings cheap enough to lure back buyers who feel at these reduced prices they can turn a profit with cheap mortgages and stable cash flow. Rents are pretty good where they are now, they wager, and the high demand for housing makes buildings a safe long-term investment.”
The New Canaanite in Connecticut. “Home sales in New Canaan declined 24% year-over-year in January, according to new data. In addition to the overall decrease in single-family home sales, from 17 to 13, the median price dropped 13% in the period, from $1,355,000 to $1,175,000, according to data from the New Canaan Board of Realtors.”
The Sun Sentinel in Florida. “DJ Khaled recently lowered the price of his 6,697-square-foot Aventura home by $600,000, the second price drop since he put it on the market in December 2018. It’s now listed for $5,999,999. He purchased the three-story waterfront mansion, at 3914 Island Estates Drive, in December 2015 for $3.84 million. Khaled spent more than $2.5 million remodeling the five-bedroom, seven-bath Mediterranean estate.”
The Capital Journal on South Dakota. “In 2015, permits were issued for 23 new single family home constructions with a total estimated value of $5.7 million. That compares with only eight new homes in 2019 with a total value of about $2.7 million, Eric Booth, planning director for Hughes County told the Capital Journal. The average value of the homes went from $247,826 in 2015 to $337,500 in 2019, he said. There have been other issues involved.”
“‘I’ve had a realtor, who has been in real estate for a lot of years, tell me that the last year has been more of a buyers’ market than any time in (their) past history,’ County Commissioner Norm Weaver told the Capital Journal. A buyer’s market means there is a plentiful supply of homes on the market and not so much demand, which is not an encouragement to builders to build, he said. ‘If your house is worth $200,000 and you sell it for $178,000, you are not going to get your money to replace that home with a new one,’ Weaver said. ‘So you are just not selling it.’”
The Greater Baton Rouge Business Report in Louisiana. “While there may be a glut of million-dollar homes for sale in Baton Rouge, there’s not an oversupply of multimillion dollar homes in pristine, move-in condition, and there are enough buyers looking for those truly top-of-the-line properties to drive the prices up. Another reason is that there are more million-dollar properties spread throughout the market in developments that either didn’t exist in the past or would not have had homes with such steep asking prices.”
“While sales price data suggest the high-end segment of the market is as strong as ever, there are currently more than 90 homes for sale with price tags of $1 million or more. That’s a three-year supply of inventory, which, also, is unheard of in this market. ‘I think when you’re looking at that record inventory of $1 million homes, you’re looking at the good, the bad and the ugly,’ says Quita Cutrer, of Burns and Co., who sold several of the most expensive homes on the list last year. ‘You have to look at where houses are located and realize that if someone built a $2 million home in a $500,000 neighborhood it’s going to take longer to sell than if it were in Bocage.’”
The Denver Post in Colorado. “After declining in the final months of 2019, the number of new listings hitting the market surged 89.3% in January, according to a report Wednesday from the Denver Metro Association of Realtors. Buyers, starved after months of falling inventory, voraciously consumed the new supply. Sellers, missing in action for months, listed 4,853 homes and condos for sale in January, up from the paltry 2,564 they provided in December.”
“The surge in activity didn’t show up yet in closed sales, which were down 34.2% from December and up 0.8% from January of last year. But that’s primarily a timing issue. The number of pending sales or homes under contract surged 43% from December and is up 24.2% from January 2019. Sales completed in February should surge based on the contracts reached in January.”
“Demand was so strong that even with the big jump in listings, the inventory of homes and condos available for sale at the end of the month fell to 4,941, a 1.91% decline from December and 16% drop from January 2019.”
Fromm Curbed San Francisco in California. “Whatever happened to predictability? Despite its exterior being famous around the world, the so-called ‘Full House house’ at 1709 Broderick Street is, thus far, finding its latest sales bid a bust, as it returns to the market this week with another price cut. Originally listed for $6 million even in May, the four-bed, four-bath, 3,728-square-foot Victorian chiseled off a quarter million from its asking price in September, then briefly vanished from sales listings at the beginning of 2020. Now it’s back—and the asking price has dropped to just less than $5.5 million.”
From Bravo TV on California. “Prior to her divorce, Alexis Bellino lived in a stunning San Juan Capistrano, California mansion that looks like something straight out of Architectural Digest. The Real Housewives of Orange County alum’s property boasts 8,600 square feet of living spaces. The house was first listed about a year ago for $7.99 million, and received a $1.5 price cut last spring. As of 10 days ago, however, the price has changed again — drastically. Today the house is at auction, with bidding starting at $3.5 million… which is less than what Alexis paid for the house back in 2016!”
“What’s it mean for a house to be at auction? Typically it points to the homeowners not paying the balance they owed on the home, resulting in the lender (aka the bank) forcing the homeowners out for nonpayment and putting the home up for auction. The shocking part here is that the home hasn’t sold!”