A report from Mansion Global. “Q: For those who don’t have context, where was the Greenwich market before the pandemic began in March 2020? Greenwich, Connecticut-based developer Steve Schacter: The market was fairly down, especially the high-end part of the market, with properties sitting. I know somebody who had a $10 million home, and his feeling was that if he could get $5 million or $6 million, that was going to be a lot, and I think that was fairly difficult. The pricing was down easily 30-40%. As fast as they’re going now, they were sitting then.”
“Q: Do you hear a lot of people saying they want to sell? SS: It’s drawing out sellers, in particular empty nesters who felt like before, in their minds, marking to market was not something they were going to want to do. Now, this is their ‘get out of jail free’ card.”
From Habitat Magazine in New York. “It sounded like a good idea at the time: build a bunch of luxury condominium towers in downtown Manhattan so people who work in the booming Financial District could walk to work. The late, lamented boom in luxury-condo construction has saddled the Financial District with the most unsold inventory of any neighborhood in New York City, Crain’s reports. Some of those units haven’t even come to market yet. For anyone seeking a home in the Financial District, there’s plenty to choose from. The neighborhood has 1,433 newly developed, unsold condos, more than half of which haven’t yet been listed for sale, according to Marketproof.”
From ABC 7 in California. “In 2020, a year dominated by the pandemic, California’s population fell by 182,083. It’s the first time in California’s recorded history, that the state’s year-over-year population dropped. Randy White moved his family from Mountain View, CA to Tulsa, Oklahoma five months ago. ‘From my personal experience, actually moving, it was like the wild west, there were U-Hauls everywhere leaving the state.’”
From Socket Site in California. “Having undergone an extensive renovation by The Wiseman Group back in 2006, the nearly 9,000-square-foot mansion at 2590 Green Street, on the border of Cow Hollow and Pacific Heights, returned to the market priced at $32 million in October of 2019. And having been reduced to $28.8 million in mid-2020 and then re-listed for $22.4 million a month ago, the sale of 2590 Green street has just closed escrow with a contract price of $19.5 million (and ‘only 32 days on the market’ according to all industry stats and aggregate market reports).”
The Los Angeles Times in California. “In Brentwood, Tobey Maguire just hauled in $10.75 million for a 1-acre patch of dirt. Maguire barely pulled off a profit after paying $10 million for the property in 2008. Records show he first tried to sell it for $14.25 million in 2018 before eventually trimming the price down to $11 million last summer.”
From Bisnow on Texas. “The 40-story Bryan Tower in Downtown Dallas is up for foreclosure auction a year after its owners first tried to put it up for sale, according to a report from the Dallas Morning News. The paper reported Monday that the skyscraper’s owners defaulted on a $70M debt to lenders and the building is slated for foreclosure auction sale on June 1. The 1.1M SF office tower has a vacancy rate of 55.5%, according to CoStar Group. That is almost double what it was in the first quarter of 2019 when the vacancy rate stood at 26.9%, and the first quarter of last year when it came in at 28.9%, CoStar said.”
The Kansas City Star. “At one point, Westley on Broadway Apartments offered to cut rent by half for six months in an effort to induce people to sign leases at the new Westport complex. The 256-unit Westley now offers the more standard one month free with the signing of a new lease as the wider Kansas City rental market has begun to limit promotions and specials. ‘The big problem on the sale side is the lack of inventory, the lack of supply, whereas on the rental side that’s not a problem,’ said Lisa Parks, an agent with Boveri Realty. ‘There’s plenty of supply. In fact, there’s an oversupply.’”
The Calgary Herald in Canada. “Calgary’s real estate market may appear to be booming once again, but new data on average pricing shows the market continues to recover with lower priced homes leading the way. And the numbers reveal that most areas have yet to surpass prices from five years ago. Lauren Haw, CEO and broker of record at Zoocasa notes higher-price communities have actually seen prices slide recently. Average prices in Britannia and Elboya, for instance, declined two per cent to $736,567 on average, and remain 15 per cent below the average price from five years ago.”
“Haw says higher priced homes typically experience the most downward price pressure in difficult markets and take longer to recover in upswings, while the most affordable segments slide less in price and recover more quickly, as the figures illustrate. ‘The overall story is the city’s market is recovering,’ Haw adds. ‘It’s just not fully back yet.’”
The Standard Freeholder in Canada. “Cornwall’s skyward housing prices may be confirming the age-old saying: what goes up, must come down, according to a local real estate salesman. March’s continuation of the month-over-month gains seen almost continuously throughout 2020-21 seemed to cement the idea the City of Cornwall was in for huge change. While that change has happened, there are new signs it may not continue. ‘We’ve been starting to see some early signs of it for a little bit, and I was on call with 200 or 300 other agents and they’re seeing it slow down a little,’ said Derek Bissonnette, a sales representative from Royal LePage.”
“Royal LePage analyzes market trends each month, and Bissonnette said all the signals point to a coming cool-down period. In the last two weeks of April, there were 33 sales in Cornwall, with over half selling at or below asking price. This is in stark contrast to the almost-daily stories of homes selling well above asking prices across the country. Three of Bissonnette’s properties sold for $4,000 to $30,000 less than what the owners had listed.”
“In addition to the lower offers, buyers are have resumed adding conditions to their purchases, which were uncommon in the hot market. ‘For a while it was a cash-or-nothing type thing,’ said Bissonnette. People are now adding finance options or inspection conditions to their contracts. ‘Before it was ‘there are this many offers, you’re buying it as-is, no inspection, nothing,’ said Bissonnette.”
“There were 39 new properties for sale in Cornwall in October, 40 in November, and 58 in December. ‘In April we had 77 new properties, and in March we had 90, to compare that to January, we had 27,’ said Bissonnette. The increases in the last two months have paved the way for more options, better prices, and more bargaining power for buyers. ‘We’re seeing almost double the number of properties come on the market than we were seeing before,’ he said.”
From ABC News in Australia. “If you are trying to enter the Canberra property market and feel it is getting much harder, much quicker — you are right. Disappointed buyers will find little solace in holding off on a purchase, with fewer rental properties on the market as investors sell up. Real Estate Institute ACT director, Craig Bright said 75 per cent of investors were ‘mum and dad investors’ who were barely making their payments as it was — and the ‘seller’s market’ had given them a chance to get out.”
From Bloomberg on India. “Sunteck Realty Ltd. was the first to spot a business opportunity a decade ago, when it snapped up land in Mumbai’s upcoming financial district and built homes for wealthy bankers. Now, as a fallout of a prolonged cash squeeze and the pandemic, it sees a bargain brewing once again. Land is selling at 20% to 30% discounts in India’s most expensive property market, according to the homebuilder. It acquired about 9 million square feet last year, and is in talks to purchase more in 2021.”
“‘Bargain deals have been available during the pandemic; we did three major acquisitions which were among the largest in the last seven years,’ Chairman Kamal Khetan said in a phone interview. ‘Landowners are desperate now, they are chasing developers. This is a buyer’s market.’”
“Rapid development in Mumbai — such as BKC — fueled prices together with easy access to cash from shadow lenders. Since a couple of years though, these financiers have been in crisis and the pandemic worsened the blow to the real estate market, offering an opportunity for companies with low debt, strong cashflows and a proven project-completion record to consolidate.”