A report from Deseret News. “Real estate firms Redfin and Compass both announced significant layoffs Tuesday. ‘To all the departing people who put your faith in Redfin, I’m sorry we can’t keep our commitment to you,’ wrote Glenn Kelman, Redfin’s CEO.”
From Business Insider. “One economist said US mortgage applications are in a ‘meltdown’ as the threat to house prices mounts. ‘In the three months to May, applications fell at a 52% annualized rate, compared to the previous three months,’ Pantheon’s chief economist Ian Shepherdson said in a note.”
From Market Watch. “Just over a year ago, the monthly cost of owning and renting were practically identical, according to a blog post from John Burns Real Estate Consulting. ‘Now, owning a home costs $839 more per month than renting. This differential is almost $200 higher than at any time since the turn of the century,’ Danielle Nguyen, senior research manager at John Burns wrote.”
From Forbes. “At the offices of the Dobbs Ferry, New York-based Francie Malina Team, a Compass real estate franchise, the phone had been ringing off the hook for months, says Pamela Grunstein, a real estate agent with the group. Around Mother’s Day, ‘the market completely shifted,’ Grunstein says. Now the phone rings just a few times a day, and some open houses that once could expect dozens of visitors have had zero traffic.”
The Los Angeles Times. “‘The market is not the same as it was a month ago even,’ said Lindsay Katz, a Los Angeles agent at Redfin. On Covello Street in Van Nuys, the owner of a four-bedroom house recently cut the price by $50,000 to $949,900 after the 1950s tract home sat on the market for three weeks. Other homes in the area are listing even bigger price reductions: a $78,000 cut for a two-bedroom home, and a house with an accessory dwelling unit first listed at $1 million now for sale at $860,000 — a $140,000 price cut.”
“The share of homes listed for sale that took recent price cuts has more than doubled since last year. During the four weeks that ended June 5, 16.2% of listings in L.A. County had at least one price cut, up from 7.5% during the same period last year, Redfin data show. In Orange, Riverside and San Bernardino counties the share of price drops rose to more than 20% of listings, up from about 7% a year earlier. Nationwide, there haven’t been this many price cuts since 2019.”
“Carl Izbicki, a real estate agent at RE/MAX Estate Properties in Los Angeles, said homes that used to get about 15 to 25 offers now get three to five. When the market was on fire, one of Izbicki’s clients, a couple, lost out on about eight homes despite bidding well above the asking price. Last week, Izbicki sent them a list of properties that have been on the market for more than 30 days. ‘If they like one of these homes, we are going to offer less,’ he said.”
From CBC News in Canada. “It’s a sign the London market is beginning to return to balance and a far cry from the beginning of the year, according to Durgesh Tiwari, a real estate agent who’s been selling homes in the city for seven years. ‘In January, February and March, there were only 300 listings,’ said Tiwari. ‘People were panicking that, ‘Oh my goodness, there are no houses to buy,’ and people just paid $200,000 sometimes extra for a house, which is not healthy for any market.’”
“For investors who were hoping for a quick flip, or who bought when the market peaked, rising interest rates might be a harbinger of bad things to come. ‘There are people who have bought houses without assessing the saturation. They pour money into it thinking it’s going to grow more,’ he said. ‘The market is shifting downwards and everybody is afraid.’”
The Sydney Morning Herald in Australia. “Home buyers should expect higher interest rates, Reserve Bank Governor Philip Lowe has warned, as the bank will do whatever it takes to get inflation back within its target range. Lowe admitted in a rare interview that the RBA expects inflation to hit 7 per cent by December, well above the 6 per cent forecast by the bank just weeks ago. ‘We’ll do what’s necessary to get inflation back to 2-3 per cent,’ he said on ABC’s 7.30. ‘I think by the end of the year inflation will get too close to 7 per cent, and we need to chart a course to bring it back down.’ The last time inflation rose more than 7 per cent was in the mid-1990s.”
Stuff New Zealand. “New Zealand’s house prices fell at a faster pace last month, new data shows, and prices in one part of Auckland dropped almost 13% compared to a year earlier. Kiwibank economists said it was ‘another bloodbath in the housing market,’ noting the index recorded its six consecutive monthly fall and prices were 6% down from their peak before inflation.”
The Verdict. “Other industry stakeholders Verdict has spoken with share the sentiment. They believe a bloodbath is coming for the industry, but that the survivors of the crypto crash will come out stronger than ever. ‘The current market downturn signals further pain for crypto markets following the extended period of price consolidation since November, which has led to almost $2tn being wiped out from the total industry market cap,’ Sean Dickens, crypto analysts at exchange Kinesis Money, tells Verdict.”
“The volatility shaved off over $1tn from the crypto market’s value within the first weeks of 2022. For anyone keeping score, that’s a more dramatic drop than what was experienced during the market implosion that precipitated the Great Depression in the 1920s.”