The Wall Street Journal's Will Parker, Konrad Putzier and Shane Shifflett explain the fate of Jay Gajavelli, and investors like him across America, who are reeling after using low-interest rates to fund their investment empires. They write: Few investors rode the pandemic-era housing boom as high as Jay Gajavelli. Fewer still have fallen as far. Before Gajavelli found his real-estate career, the 61-year-old immigrant from India was just another information-technology worker, putting in 60-hour weeks for a middling job in Dallas. Last year, Gajavelli’s company owned more than $500 million … [Read more...]
Will Millennials Find Home in the Suburbs?
Analysts are anticipating a resurgence of interest in suburban housing from Millennials looking to buy cheaper homes with more space. Alexandra Scaggs reports in the Financial Times: US urban living is still losing its shine, three full years after Covid-19 shut down city centres. But apartment rents haven’t declined — yet. While the prospect of continued city flight has sent office-property valuations into a freefall, US rents are still up, with an 8.8-per-cent rise from last year, according to the Census Bureau’s inflation data. (The median Manhattan rent rose to a new record in March, … [Read more...]
Homebuilders Find Silver Lining in Higher Rates: Low Inventory
Homeowners enjoying the low-interest rates they locked in during the last decade aren't interested in selling their homes and taking on new higher rates, so homebuilders are enjoying a moment in which they are, for many buyers, the only option. Nicole Friedman reports in The Wall Street Journal: Last year’s rapid rise in mortgage rates made home purchasing far more expensive for most buyers, slowing home sales and pressuring the home-building industry. Home builders pulled back on land acquisition and new construction. Now, new single-family home sales are bouncing back with supply … [Read more...]
An 80% Decline in Value in Just 4-Years
You know why. The writing’s been on the wall for years. You and I think about this stuff all the time. The blue blob cities are a wreck. What a shame this is what San Francisco has turned into. The WSJ reports: Before the pandemic, San Francisco’s California Street was home to some of the world’s most valuable commercial real estate. The corridor runs through the heart of the city’s financial district and is lined with offices for banks and other companies that help fuel the global tech economy. One building, a 22-story glass and stone tower at 350 California Street, was worth around $300 … [Read more...]
Life Insurance Sours on Commercial Real Estate
Commercial real estate owners are finding it harder to get loans from life insurance companies as the insurers turn their backs on lending to the sector. Leslie Scism and Peter Grant report in The Wall Street Journal: Life insurance companies, until recently a reliable source of capital for commercial property developers, are turning their backs on office building owners as tens of billions of dollars in office loans come due this year. Many of these insurers have slowed or stopped making office loans, executives and analysts say, interrupting the sector’s decadelong expansion into … [Read more...]
Interest Rate Hikes Take a Toll on Hamptons Real Estate
Interest rate increases have slowed the demand for homes in the Hamptons, causing sale prices to fall 7.6% in the first quarter. Bloomberg's Misyrlena Egkolfopoulou reports: Buyers in the Hamptons are taking a pause. The median home sale price in the luxury Long Island enclave fell 7.6% in the first quarter, the first decline since 2019, while the total number of homes sold slumped 44% from the prior year to 424, according to data from Town & Country Real Estate. Fewer homes sold at all price points, but the high end of the market was hit particularly hard. The number of … [Read more...]
Mortgage Market Not Expected to Settle Down Soon
The collapse of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank has created volatility in mortgage markets, and according to Jennifer Hughes in the Financial Times, that volatility isn't expected to settle down overnight. She writes: The market volatility triggered by the failure of three banks in the past week has spooked traders in economically vital US mortgage-backed securities, leaving other lenders, usually important buyers, on the sidelines. The $11tn market for bundles of US home loans was already feeling the strain of last year’s soaring interest rates, which pushed up MBS spreads — the … [Read more...]
Is Commercial Real Estate About to Crash?
One chief executive of a large office building company says the market for commercial real estate is already in recession. Is the commercial real estate market about to suffer a crash? Peter Grant reports in The Wall Street Journal: The number of big office landlords defaulting on their loans is on the rise, fresh evidence that more developers believe that remote and hybrid work habits have permanently impaired the office market. The giant investment manager Brookfield Asset Management recently defaulted on a total of over $750 million in debt for a pair of 52-story towers in Los Angeles, … [Read more...]
Real Estate “Power Buyers” Suffering Glut of Inventory
Companies created to help buyers purchase homes are now stuck holding the bag on loads of inventory. Will Parker and Nicole Friedman report in The Wall Street Journal: Ribbon Home Inc. had a fast-growing business during the housing boom. The New York City-based startup purchased homes with cash on behalf of buyers. Then it sold the homes to the buyers at the same price, plus a fee, once the buyers got a mortgage. This approach made their clients’ offers more appealing, since sellers often prefer all-cash transactions that can close quickly and are considered more reliable. Ribbon has been … [Read more...]
Housing Market Dragging on China’s Economy
China's housing market has gone from growth driver to drag, pulling the economy down despite the country's post-COVID-19 lockdown reopening. Rebecca Feng and Cao Li report for The Wall Street Journal: China’s housing market flipped from being a growth driver to an economic drag in 2022, with sales slumping, prices falling and widespread job losses. The prognosis for this year isn’t much better, compounding Beijing’s efforts to get its economy back on firmer footing. Sales of new residential properties in the country tumbled 28% last year to the equivalent of $1.7 trillion in value terms, a … [Read more...]
- « Previous Page
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- …
- 23
- Next Page »