UK Housing Bubble Pops: London Offers 20% Discounts On Luxury Apartments

UK Housing Bubble Pops: London Offers 20% Discounts On Luxury Apartments:

Another major city is experiencing a pullback in demand for its property – once again as a direct result of Government action to dampen the impact of foreign investment. In London, as Bloomberg reports, demand has slumped so badly that developers are offering discounts of up to 20% for their newly constructed homes. And just as the case was in Manhattan, it’s a result of the UK putting in a speed bump. The UK recently increased taxes on those deemed to be purchasing a second home, specifically designed to slow the pace of overseas investment.

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“Made Out Of Sand” – A Dramatic Look Inside A Newly Built Chinese Apartment Building

“Made Out Of Sand” – A Dramatic Look Inside A Newly Built Chinese Apartment:

While real estate is all about “location, location, location,” it appears there are sometimes more prescient factors that any prospective buyer should pay attention to. Amid yet another government-fueled housing bubble, it seems in their haste to fulfil a rapacious demand for property in which to gamble their hard-grafted assets, Chinese construction companies have cut a few corners. As the following stunning video shows, a “newly constructed apartment” crumbles before the owners’ eyes as the ‘concrete’ walls turn to sand

LiveLeak exposes, in the following video, just how poor the standards can be of so-called “new” properties. LiveLeak footage shows two men in a supposedly “new apartment building” in China where the concrete walls crumble like sand.

Housing Starts Plunge To 7-Month Lows As Rental Units Tumble

Housing Starts Plunge To 7-Month Lows As Rental Units Tumble:

With new and pending sales tumbling and lumber prices down, yesterday’s drop in homebuilders sentiment – from 10 year highs! – appears justified entirely now as Housing Starts collapsed 11% in October to the weakest level since March. This is the biggest miss (and MoM drop) since Feb. Multi-family  unit starts plunged 25.5% MoM as single-family dropped just 2.5%. Starts in The West and South plunged as The Midwest saw a 30.8% collapse in housing completions. Building Permits rose 4.1% after tumbling 4.8% in September but SAAR remains notably below the Q2 cycle peak levels (1.337mm) at around 1.15mm homes (with multi-family permits rising 6.8% MoM).

This “Unlivable $350,000 Shack” Is The Cheapest Home In San Francisco

This “Unlivable $350,000 Shack” Is The Cheapest Home In San Francisco:

According to the broker, it’s the cheapest home on the market in San Francisco, and it’s an unlivable shack.

As Fortune reports, it is a worn-down, decomposing wooden shack that was built in 1906, and the interior is unlivable in its current condition. The San Francisco house is also selling for $350,000.

According to Zillow, $350,000 would comfortably fetch a 1,500-square-foot, three-bedroom home in many smaller cities in the U.S., including Cincinnati, Ohio.

The Cheapest Home In San Francisco

Realtor Alexander Han, would definitely advise against moving in too soon.

“The house still needs a lot of work. I would not recommend anyone moving right in. The bathroom is not functioning. The kitchen needs a bit more work. The flooring has a couple of places that are little bit weaker, and needs to be reinforced.”

Existing Home Sales Extrapolation Surges To Highest Since Feb 2007

Existing Home Sales Extrapolation Surges To Highest Since Feb 2007 (ZeroHedge, Aug 20, 2015):

By the miracle of NAR extrapolation and seasonal adjustment, the SAAR Existing Home Sales data just printed 5.59mm units – the highest since Feb 2007. Sales were dominated by increases in The West and The South with The Northeast falling. We have two questions for NAR – where are the buyers coming from… and how long is this sustainable?

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In These 13 US Cities, Rents Are Skyrocketing

In These 13 US Cities, Rents Are Skyrocketing (ZeroHedge, July 26, 2015):

Seven years ago, the American homeownership “dream” was shattered when a housing bubble built on a decisively shaky foundation burst in spectacular fashion, bringing Wall Street and Main Street to their knees.

In the blink of an eye, the seemingly inexorable rise in the American homeownership rate abruptly reversed course, and by 2014, two decades of gains had disappeared and the ashes of Bill Clinton’s National Homeownership Strategy lay smoldering in the aftermath of the greatest financial collapse since the Great Depression.

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In short, decades of speculative excess driven by imprudence, greed, and financial engineering and financed by the world’s demand for GSE debt had come crashing down and in relatively short order, a nation of homeowners was transformed into a nation of renters.

It wasn’t difficult to predict what would happen next.

Read moreIn These 13 US Cities, Rents Are Skyrocketing

Why The Record Drop In Chinese House Prices Suggests Beijing Is Already In A Recession

Why The Record Drop In Chinese House Prices Suggests Beijing Is Already In A Recession (ZeroHedge, April 18, 2015):

If one compares the history of the Chinese and US housing bubbles, one observes that it was when US housing had dropped by about 6% following their all time highs in November 2005, that the US entered a recession. This is precisely where China is now: a 6.1% drop following the all time high peak in January of 2014. If the last US recession is any indication, the Chinese economy is now contracting! So much for hopes of 7% GDP growth this year.

UK Housing Bubble Bursts: Sales Of Luxury Homes Crash By 80%; “Waves Of Wealthy People Are Leaving”

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From the article:

As the FT reports, “sales of homes worth more than £2m have dropped by 80 per cent in the past year.”… “It is like the 1970s again, when waves of wealthy people left Britain and it was a disaster.”


UK Housing Bubble Bursts: Sales Of Luxury Homes Crash By 80%; “Waves Of Wealthy People Are Leaving” (ZeroHedge, April 12, 2015):

About a year ago, when the Chinese housing bubble had just begun to burst (as a reminder Chinese house prices are now crashing at a faster pace than in the US after Lehman) and forcing the real estate bubble blowers to consider a different venue, namely the stock market, another housing bubble several thousand miles away was in full blown escape velocity mode – that of the UK. In fact, as we showed in the following table from last June, the appreciation in UK home prices had surpassed that of China as recently as 10 months ago.

Read moreUK Housing Bubble Bursts: Sales Of Luxury Homes Crash By 80%; “Waves Of Wealthy People Are Leaving”

Broke? You May Now Be Entitled To A Free Home

Broke? You May Now Be Entitled To a Free Home (ZeroHedge, March 30, 2015):

It’s been seven years since the epic collapse of the US housing market, and there’s never been a better time to buy your first home. In Denmark for instance, the bank will tax depositors in order to pay you to take out a home loan. But before you move to a European country operating in NIRP-dom, consider Florida and New Jersey first because as Susan Rudolfi recently discovered, you can actually get a house for free by simply not making your mortgage payments.

Here’s more via NY Times:

She is like a ghost of the housing market’s painful past, one of thousands of Americans who have skipped years of mortgage payments and are still living in their homes.

Now a legal quirk could bring a surreal ending to her foreclosure case and many others around the country: They may get to keep their homes without ever having to pay another dime.

Read moreBroke? You May Now Be Entitled To A Free Home

The Canadian Housing Bubble Has Begun To Burst

The Canadian Housing Bubble Has Begun To Burst (ZeroHedge, March 24, 2015):

Energy accounts for 10% of Canadian GDP and around 25% of exports and the swift fall in oil prices is having a profound effect in the nation’s oil producing regions where home sales are collapsing by as much as 65%.

 

Crash Landing: China Home Prices Plunge At Fastest Pace On Record, Surpass Post-Lehman Collapse

Crash Landing: China Home Prices Plunge At Fastest Pace On Record, Surpass Post-Lehman Collapse (ZeroHedge, March 18, 2015):

Less than three weeks ago, when the PBOC proceeded with its latest “surprise” rate cut, we showed a chart that should scare everyone who is hoping that China will avoid a hard-landing would prefer would never have been revealed: the annual collapse in Chinese home prices is now so sharp and so widespread, that it has surpassed the housing collapse in the aftermath of the Lehman collapse.” Overnight things went from bad to worse, when China’s National Bureau of Statistics reported that contrary to hopes for a modest rebound, China’s average new home prices fell at the fastest pace on record in February from a year earlier.

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Existing Home Sales Plunge (and Don’t Blame The Weather)

Existing Home Sales Plunge (and Don’t Blame The Weather) (ZeroHedge, Feb 23, 2015):

With homebuilder sentiment slipping,blamed on the weather (despite improvement in the Northeast), Architecture billings down, and lumber prices down, it should not be totally surprising that existing home sales collapsed in January (-4.9% against expectations of -1.8% to a worse than expected 4.82 million SAAR). This is the lowest existing home sales since April. Oh – and before the talking heads blame the weather – the biggest drop in home sales was in The West (with its warm, dry, sunny home-buying climate). Considering that existing home sales most recent peak in 2014 failed to take out the previous government-sponsored peak in 2013 and remains 30% or more below the 2005 peak, and claims that the housing recovery is in tact are greatly exaggerated.

Why Housing Is Dead: First-Time Buyers Collapse To 27-Year Lows

Why Housing Is Dead: First-Time Buyers Collapse To 27-Year Lows (ZeroHedge, Nov 3, 2014):

The Millennials (one of the biggest generations in US history) are just not getting with the status quo program. As we detailed previously, with lower credit scores, less disposable income, and a soaring number of people living with their parents; so it should be no surprise that The National Association of Realtors (NAR) today admitted that first-time homebuyers plunged to the lowest level in 27 years. The blame – of course – rather than low/no-growth fiscal policies, student debt servitude, and inequality-driving cheap-funding monetary policy, is price comnpettion from ‘investors’ and too “stringent credit standards,” perfectly mirroring FHFA’s Mel Watt’s Einsteinian insanity desire to dramatically ease lending standards and slash minimum down-payments (as we noted previously). Perhaps NAR accidentally stumbles on the biggest reason no one is buying in their profiling: the typical first-time buyer was 31-years-old, while the typical repeat buyer was 53 – smack in the middle of the Millennial collapse.

This Has Never Happened Before Without A Massive Bubble Bursting

This Has Never Happened Before Without A Massive Bubble Bursting (ZeroHedge, Oct 28, 2014):

Back in June we first observed that “America’s Most Important Housing Market Signals A Red Alert For Housing Bubble Watchers” and showed the following chart:

California Leads Housing Slowdown As Case-Shiller Home Prices Decline For 4 Months In A Row

California Leads Housing Slowdown As Case-Shiller Home Prices Decline For 4 Months In A Row (ZeroHedge, Oct 27, 2014):

Following misses in yesterday’s Markit Service PMI, Existing Home Sales and the Dallas Fed report, and today’s Durable Goods numbers, we just made it a pentafecta for misses in US econ data, when the just released August Case-Shiller data for August confirmed once again that US housing is rapidly slowing down, when the Top 20 Composite Index (Seasonally Adjusted) posted another decline in August, its fourth in a row, declining by -0.15% and missing expectations of a modest 0.2% rebound (following last month’s -0.5%) decline. The best summary of the situation came from S&P’s David Blitzer: “The deceleration in home prices continues… The Sun Belt region reported its worst annual returns since 2012, led by weakness in all three California cities — Los Angeles, San Francisco and San Diego.” But who cares what the birth (and death) place of every housing bubble is doing, right?

Burst Chinese Housing Bubble Leads To First Annual Price Decline Since 2012; Prices Drop In Record 69 Cities

Burst Chinese Housing Bubble Leads To First Annual Price Decline Since 2012; Prices Drop In Record 69 Cities (ZeroHedge, Oct 24, 2014):

 It has been over six months since the Chinese housing bubble has popped. What’s worse, as overnight housing numbers out of China confirmed, the government has so far failed to contain the fallout, and according to the National Bureau of Statistics, which is anything but, after a fifth straight monthly decline, Chinese home prices have now wiped out all price gains in the past year. This was immediately spun as bullish by media outlets and sellside experts as “raising expectations the government will have to implement more economic support measures to cushion the blow.” I.e., buy stocks because central banks will push risk prices artificially higher yet again. In other words, bad is still good and failure continues to be success.

The Housing Recovery Has Been Canceled Due To Data Revisions

The Housing Recovery Has Been Canceled Due To Data Revisions (ZeroHedge, Oct 24, 2014):

It is now beyond stupid: the euphoric, consensus-beating data for every single month since May has been revised lower, by on average 6% and as much as 9%. Perhaps finally people will realize that there is only one number that matters in the Census bureau’s monthly new home sales report: the ±15.7 90% confidence interval. Well, people maybe, but not algos, who only care about one thing: whether the data beat or missed.

Putting An End To Any Debate About The State Of The US Housing Market

Wells Q3 Mortgage Pipeline

Mortgage Application Pipeline At America’s Largest Mortgage Lender Drops To Lowest Since Lehman (ZeroHedge, Oct 14, 2014):

So much for the much hyped, if quite negligible, second quarter rebound in mortgage activity. After rates tumbled, and continued to tumble, there was some hope that at least the offset to the bond market screaming contraction and deflation (something even stocks have realized in recent days), would be more American’s buying homes, which naturally means applying for mortgages. Well, that dead cat bounce has come and gone. As America’s biggest mortgage lender, Wells Fargo, reported moments ago when it once again magically managed to report EPS and revenues which came right in line with expectations (of $2.11 and $21.2 billion), the US housing picture is once again the worst it has ever been (excluding those days around the Lehman bankruptcy when all of finance died for a few weeks).

Case in point: according to Wells Q3 Earnings Supplement, while Mortgage Applications declined from a transitory one year high of $72 billion in Q2 to $64 billion, this number is going far lower. The reason: Wells’ Morgage Application Pipeline just tumbled back to $25 billion, matching the lowest number since Lehman, and putting an end to any debate about the state of the US housing market.

In short: the only people buying houses in the US now are foreigners laundering their illegal, tax-exempt profits (ever fewer) and those as close to the Fed’s ZIRP as possible, and, of course, paying all cash. Everyone else: not so much.

China Housing Bubble Bursts: Q3 Land Sales Crater 50%

China Housing Bubble Bursts: Q3 Land Sales Crater 50% (ZeroHedge, Sep 29, 2014):

China may be doing everything in its power to divert attention from the simple fact that its housing bubble, the largest in the world in terms of both assets comprising it as well as divergence from fair value, has burst. But while there is no clear threshold of what constitutes a bursting bubble when it comes to housing, the latest data out of Soufun, China’s largest real-estate website, which said that land sales have dropped a massive 22% to 1.7 trillion Yuan in 2014 so far, is likely as clear an indication as any that Beijing is about to panic.

And if that was not enough Bloomberg adds that land sales in 300 cites followed by Soufun fell almost 50% Y/Y to 415.9 billion yuan in 3Q, while residential land sales declined more than 50% to 265.3b yuan in 3Q.

Read moreChina Housing Bubble Bursts: Q3 Land Sales Crater 50%

Goldman’s Former Head Of Housing Research Predicts Housing Crash, Recession Within Three Years

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Goldman’s Former Head Of Housing Research Predicts Housing Crash, Recession Within Three Years (ZeroHedge, Sep 17, 2014):

When a former Goldman executive and the prior head of its housing research team comes out with a shocking analysis so contrary to what the same individual would do in his “former life” when he would be extolling the “inevitable” rise of home prices from here to eternity and beyond, and also throw in an open letter to none other than president Obama, predicting at least a 15% crash in home prices in the next three years, a move which would without debt catalyze the next US recession, it is time to pay attention. Meet Joshua Pollard, who in February 2009 took over coverage of US Housing at Goldman Sachs.  His point, in short: “House prices are 12% overvalued today. They have already started to decline. Today’s misvaluation matches the excess of 2006-07, just before the Great Recession… 5 of the last 7 US recessions were led by a weakening housing market… I am lamentably confident that home prices will fall by 15% within three years.” Or, as some may call it, crash.

14 Reasons Why The U.S. Economy’s Bubble Of False Prosperity May Be About To Burst

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14 Reasons Why The U.S. Economy’s Bubble Of False Prosperity May Be About To Burst (Economic Collapse, Aug 14, 2014):

Did you know that a major event just happened in the financial markets that we have not seen since the financial crisis of 2008?  If you rely on the mainstream media for your news, you probably didn’t even hear about it.  Just prior to the last stock market crash, a massive amount of money was pulled out of junk bonds.  Now it is happening again.  In fact, as you will read about below, the market for high yield bonds just experienced “a 6-sigma event”.  But this is not the only indication that the U.S. economy could be on the verge of very hard times.  Retail sales are extremely disappointing, mortgage applications are at a 14 year low and growing geopolitical storms around the world have investors spooked.  For a long time now, we have been enjoying a period of relative economic stability even though our underlying economic fundamentals continue to get even worse.  Unfortunately, there are now a bunch of signs that this period of relative stability is about to end.

The following are 14 reasons why the U.S. economy’s bubble of false prosperity may be about to burst:

Read more14 Reasons Why The U.S. Economy’s Bubble Of False Prosperity May Be About To Burst