Last weekend I read two terrific articles on Chinese real estate investment in the U.S. but they seemed seemed to conflict - check out the headlines: New York Times Chinese Cash Floods U.S. Real...
https://millersamuel.com/nyt-v-wsj-smogdown-status-of-chinese-investment-in-u-s-real-estate/
We published a slew of research today for Douglas Elliman Real Estate: Manhattan, Brooklyn & Queens Rentals Manhattan Rentals - Median rental price increased year-over-year for the 18th consecuti...
Source: WSJ Yesterday evening Josh Barbanel at WSJ posted a milestone piece on the current building boom: Construction in New York City Goes Through The Roof: New residential permits surge as dev...
https://millersamuel.com/most-nyc-building-permits-since-63-brooklyn-nearly-equals-rest-of-city/
Here's one way to look at it.
A little over a week ago the WSJ's Candace Taylor broke the story about 3 contiguous listings to be marketed together at the top of a 15-year old ground lease condo in Battery Park City for $118...
I really like the way this chart illustrates the 20 year decline in the homeownership rate. A few thoughts on what it shows: Under 35 - Lowest in 20 years - record student debt and tepid economy...
https://millersamuel.com/terrific-chart-on-homeownership-by-age/
According to the WSJ Real Time Economics Blog there are the record investment gains. This is good news/bad news...and: has worried some economists, because it makes the U.S. more vulnerable to ma...
https://millersamuel.com/new-record-of-foreign-owned-assets-in-the-united-states/
Last week I can across Sanette Tanaka's WSJ column "Spreadsheet" titled "Bless Our Happy Home Sale" that talked about the tradition regarding St. Joseph. I waited to blog about it until today si...
https://millersamuel.com/its-st-josephs-day-what-does-it-tell-us-about-housing-trends/
There's a good article in yesterday's WSJ "Adjustable-Rate Mortgages Make a Comeback" focusing on the rise in their use. In fact the title on the window bar is the web page is "ARM Loans-A Vesti...
https://millersamuel.com/with-plunge-in-loan-volume-lenders-push-arms-to-jumbo-borrowers/
Roughly 90% of the residential market has passed through Fannie and Freddie since the onset of the financial crisis. Reliance on these institutions was only around 50% before the crisis - and ar...
https://millersamuel.com/the-bi-partisan-fannie-and-freddie-solution-that-isnt-a-fix/
Jed Kolko does a nice job summarizing what the general housing market may look like in 2014 after the new home sales report came out today. My big takeaway was that any housing market improvement...
https://millersamuel.com/wsj-good-overview-on-2014-us-housing-expectations-jed-kolko-trulia/
The Wall Street Journal released an intriguing article about the use of glass curtain walls on new buildings: Study: Glass Condos Could Pose Health Threat Through Overheating: Hot Summer Could Ra...
https://millersamuel.com/group-claims-glass-curtain-walls-a-major-step-backward-environmentally/
Last week we saw a chorus of "appraisers are killing our deals" stories in some major publications: - When Appraisal Hassles Tank a Home Sale - When Appraisals Come in Low - Appraisals Scuttle ...
https://millersamuel.com/the-low-appraisal-hassle-is-a-symptom-of-a-broken-mortgage-process/
Check out this excellent interactive graphics post at the WSJ on the economy since the recession. My fave is above but there are others worth mentioning. Things are slowly improving but note tha...
https://millersamuel.com/cool-wsj-infographic-on-economic-recovery-since-end-of-recession/
I've inflation-adjusted housing in some of my charts over the years but it always felt like a double dip since housing is a huge component (42%) of the measurement of inflation. The issue came u...
https://millersamuel.com/should-we-adjust-housing-for-inflation/
Josh Barbanel at the Wall Street Journal took the results of our just released Elliman Report: The Manhattan Decade 2003-2012 and adjusted them for inflation - showing that housing prices are as ...
https://millersamuel.com/wsj-live-inflationwatch-why-manhattan-is-a-bargain/
I thought the chart created by the WSJ using our data nicely illustrated the end of year spike in sales and prices at the end of the 2012, influenced by the notion that taxes, whatever form they...
https://millersamuel.com/hampton-year-end-sales-and-price-spike-fiscal-cliff-style/
As a followup to my analysis of light on property values, I came across this fun way to look at the market. ...real-estate consulting firm Knight Frank looked at 14 warm-weather vacation spots a...
https://millersamuel.com/looking-that-ray-of-sunshine-knight-franks-sunshine-index/
A friend of mine shared this video with me, a speech by Pierre Poilievre, MP for Nepean-Carleton, on April 4, 2012, spoke on behalf of the Government on Budget 2012. He is incredibly eloquent, in...
https://millersamuel.com/housing-bubble-canada-is-following-us-lead/
In this week's WSJ Mansion section there was a nice write up by Alyssa Abkowitz about the appraisal process during a divorce: Appraisers in Splitsville. Our firm does a lot of this type of consul...
https://millersamuel.com/divorce-valuations-appraiserville-meets-splitsville/
Inspired by my analysis of yesterday's WSJ article, I thought I'd explore the effectiveness of low mortgage rates in getting the housing market going. I matched year-to-date sales volume where a ...
https://millersamuel.com/get-down-with-it-falling-mortgage-rates-are-not-creating-housing-sales/
In the WSJ, FNC reported that jumbo mortgages saw a larger year-over-year gain than conforming: Home sales using a jumbo mortgage had year-over-year growth of 7.9% through September, compared wit...
https://millersamuel.com/jumbos-fell-harder-now-rising-faster-but-off-low-base/
I wrote "The Decline In Inventory Right Now is NOT a Good Sign" back in February, but there has been a more refined discussion about low inventory recently. Back then my orientation was more abou...
https://millersamuel.com/low-housing-inventory-is-not-a-sign-of-housing-recovery/
Matthew Strozier over at WSJ with Column Five (a large producer of infographics) presented an interesting side by side of 8 national housing indices. All but one index shows a year over year decl...
https://millersamuel.com/wsj-the-crazy-8-comparing-results-of-national-home-price-indices/
The WSJ presented a series of charts on US distressed properties based on information from the St. Louis Fed (most proficient data generators of all Fed banks) and LPS. Here are the first and las...
https://millersamuel.com/visualizing-us-distressed-sales-katrina-edition/
Years ago, there was a Dunkin' Donuts commercial with the catch phrase "got time to make the donuts" which has remained one of my regular phrases. For the past few months I've talked a lot about ...
https://millersamuel.com/sweet-making-the-donuts-a-housing-market-theory/
For years I’ve watched Gary Shilling’s media interviews on the economy and read his columns in Forbes. I ran into him recently when we were both on Bloomberg Surveillance with Tom Keene and...
NAR released its May existing home sales report today. This was one of the most bizarre existing home sale reports I can recall. First of all, the expectation of a drop in sales activity was wid...
In today's WSJ there is a chart I made covering Manhattan absorption market wide by price segment - inspired by my monthly report series. The article sort of suggests that condos are doing bette...
https://millersamuel.com/the-assessor-the-differences-between-high-and-low-end-absorption/
For each week's Eye on Real Estate Show on WOR NewsTalk Radio 710, we include a segment called "The BlogCast" where I discuss several housing related (sometimes a stretch) posts from some of my f...
https://millersamuel.com/eye-on-real-estate-wor-newstalk-radio-710-june-5-2010/
NAR released its PHSI today and there were no surprises. The expiration of the federal tax credit for first time buyers and existing home owners (signed contract by April 30, close by June 30) s...
Source: Extraordinary Observations In a newly discovered blog, Extraordinary Observations by Rob Pitingolo (ht: WSJ/Real Time Economics), I found a refreshing look at a key economic resource: "p...
https://millersamuel.com/college-degree-sprawl-san-francisco-and-nyc-are-bastions-of-smart-people/
For each week's Eye on Real Estate Show on WOR NewsTalk Radio 710, we include a segment called "Jonathan Miller's BlogCast" where I discuss several housing related posts from some of my favorite ...
https://millersamuel.com/eye-on-real-estate-wor-newstalk-radio-710-may-22-2010/
For a housing market obsessed by real estate coverage, residents of New York City are like drug addicts being given heroin (or like an appraiser being giving perfect sales comps) by the sheer vol...
https://millersamuel.com/newspaper-wars-appraisers-finally-get-editorial-recognition/
In today's WSJ has an article that was on the front page of the online edition (not sure about the print version) called "How to Appraise Home Appraisers" The core idea behind the article was tha...
https://millersamuel.com/wsj-appraisal-professional-appraiser-stereotypes-proliferate/
(courtesy: CS Monitor) Admittedly I am getting annoyed about the lack of closure on this credit crunch thing. Can't we simply point fingers, have someone apologize but indirectly deny responsibil...
https://millersamuel.com/im-sorry-but-dont-blame-me-im-neutral/
This week's Wall Street Journal introduces a Greater New York section that focuses on, among other things, regional real estate. They's staffed up have been the talk of the real estate community...
https://millersamuel.com/the-assessor-new-wsj-column-includes-well-an-appraiser-also-hamptons-data/
I'm a big fan of Michael Lewis' writings starting with Liar's Poker (think onion cheeseburgers for breakfast and traders owning more speed boats than suits) and much of his other work including M...
https://millersamuel.com/cdo-the-big-short-meets-harvard-graduate-thesis-paper/
Note to readers - Matrix was hacked and we moved to a new host. Lost some of the graphics as a result - will get back on track shortly. The Wall Street bonus pool rose 17% and average bonus per ...
https://millersamuel.com/wall-street-bonus-money-flows-like-molasses/
This report sort of blew me away. When I think of unemployment I usually see it as an across the board phenomenon. I'm not sure why I would see it that way since housing markets don't behave tha...
https://millersamuel.com/everyone-unemployment-is-not-equal/
Ok, so I have long said that sales lead housing prices, but what about rents? The rental market leads the sales market. Its pretty logical since rents respond more quickly to employment trends th...
One of the by-products of the credit crunch has been the rise in shadow inventory. Within my own market stats, I consider shadow inventory all units that are complete or under construction but n...
https://millersamuel.com/not-really-counted-1-7m-units-in-shadow-housing-inventory/
My often quoted colleague and friend Dan Alpert at Westwood Capital had a great take on the recently released Case Shiller Index that he shared with me. Dan looked at the number of cities within...
https://millersamuel.com/looks-fishy-case-shiller-20-city-home-price-index-is-spoiling/
The National Association of Realtors released their October 2009 Existing Home Sale Report and the news was positive and kind of weird. >Driven by the first-time buyer tax credit, existing-home s...
https://millersamuel.com/tax-credit-existing-home-sales-up-10-1-m-o-m-23-5-y-o-y/
Because we can't let an obvious economic trend pass me by - and it has nothing to do with being a Yankee fan. After all, I pride myself on my neutrality in housing market coverage - 26 World Seri...
Not surprisingly, existing home sales jumped this month. Here's NAR's existing home sales release and the data. > including single-family, townhomes, condominiums and co-ops – jumped 9.4 perce...
https://millersamuel.com/nar-existing-home-sales-surge-94-45-are-first-time-buyers/
Council on Foreign Relations has a very interesting chart on who financed the massive amounts of debt that the U.S. government issued in the first half of 2009.- it is divided by "official buyers...
https://millersamuel.com/weening-off-quantitative-easing-but-who-buys-gse-debt/
source: Calculated Risk On Thursday (in about an hour) we are releasing our 3Q 2009 Manhattan Rental Market Overview. In the meantime, the REIS report is a wake up call to the economic realities...
https://millersamuel.com/reis-report-us-apartment-vacancy-rate-78-23-year-high/
The WSJ has an interesting article today on the new financial product designed to repackage a bad loan into (sounds like tranches) into good and bad loans so they can have more favored capitaliza...
https://millersamuel.com/remics-rating-agencies-enable-bad-bonds-to-be-made-good/
Here's the summary: >The S&P/Case-Shiller 20-city home-price index, a closely watched gauge of U.S. home prices, rose 1.6% in July from June in the third straight monthly increase, but prices re...
https://millersamuel.com/case-shiller-20-city-index-july-2009-down-133-y-o-y-up-12-m-o-m/
After four consecutive months of seasonally adjusted gains, the NAR existing home sales stats show a decline that was something unexpected happens. The salient points: * July 09 to August 09 sal...
https://millersamuel.com/existing-home-sales-unexpectedly-drop-27/
I feel like Moody's, in their report on the housing recovery, is overreaching. They suggest that housing won't recover for a decade. >Moody's Investors Service threw cold water on optimistic proj...
https://millersamuel.com/moodys-over-corrects-10-years-to-go-before-housing-recovery/
In a WSJ piece called No Easy Exit for Government as Housing Market's Savior ...the article notes that >After a year of extraordinary interventions in the economy, the federal government is start...
https://millersamuel.com/the-housing-market-is-workingfor-the-government/
Confidence is more right here and now. Sentiment is more forward looking (it gives a snapshot of whether consumers feel like spending money.) (a lame appraisal analogy would be estimated market v...
https://millersamuel.com/sentiment-versus-confidence-dow-jones-sentiment-index-shows-improvement/
Many consumers seem to be feeling better about the economy (not good, just better than earlier this year). Well so do the central bankers - a la The Fed - at their annual Jackson Hole summer retr...
https://millersamuel.com/over-coffee-morning-quote-too-big-to-feed/
One of the most glaring housing issues that hasn't been resolved is loan modifications. There are multiple owners of the mortgage, the servicers aren't incentivized to move forward. There was an ...
https://millersamuel.com/slicing-the-way-we-thinking-about-loan-modifications/
Had a nice conversation with Connell McShane and Jenna Lee about the false message being relayed through national housing reports and how this could actually damage housing further. On YouTube th...
The May 2009 20-City Case-Shiller Composite Home Price Index fell 17.1% from May 2008, the fourth month in a row that the y-o-y rate of decline for the index gotten smaller. 17.1% is still a shar...
https://millersamuel.com/case-shiller-index-181-becomes-171-but-m-o-m-is-more-positive/
Source: Tim Iacono-Seeking Alpha After last week's NAR June existing home sale release and the always interesting press release that goes with it. >Resales of U.S. single-family homes and condos...
https://millersamuel.com/existing-home-sales-3-in-a-row-is-not-a-trend/
Everyone is out there talking about where we are and where we seem to be going. One thing that is rather striking is the lack of spin relative to a few years ago - surprisingly refreshing. Here's...
Did a lot of boating this weekend and there seemed to be a lot of boats still under "wraps." So today I saw an interesting article in The Real Deal/Miami (hat tip to WSJ Developments Blog) Forecl...
https://millersamuel.com/wrapping-up-foreclosure-properties-literally/
Here's a cool WSJ interactive map on the results and here is the official CSI press release. The general media coverage focus on the April S&P Case Shiller numbers talks a lot about the 3rd conse...
https://millersamuel.com/case-shiller-index-187-becomes-181-market-falling-just-not-as-much/
The lending business has a love-hate relationship with appraisers - now appraisers seemed to be blamed for preventing the housing recovery. The following WSJ article from about a week ago has bee...
https://millersamuel.com/now-appraisals-are-obstacles-talking-out-of-both-sides-of-our-mouths/
The Irish economy has ground to a halt, yet: >A new appraisal more than doubles the value of U.S. Sen. Christopher Dodd's Irish cottage, a vacation home that is the subject of an ethics complaint...
https://millersamuel.com/appraiser-senator-dodds-cottage-cold-windy-and-draughty/
Guest Appraiser Columnist: Martin Tessler, CRE Fee Simplistic is a regular post by Martin Tessler, CRE whom after 30 years of commercial fee appraiser-related experience, gets to the bottom of re...
Ok, so I admit, I do wonder about the "tan" and how Mozilo (not to be confused with Mozilla) was able to maintain it 365/24/7. But more important issues are front and center in his life right now...
Empirical evidence says that the myriad of alphabet soup regulatory agencies didn't work to prevent the systemic breakdown of the financial system on a global scale, stemming from CMBC activity. ...
https://millersamuel.com/no-occ-ots-in-t-e-a-m-reducing-banking-regulatory-clutter/
This week, I have a conversation with economist Dr. Kevin Gillen, Vice President of Econsult and is affiliated with the University of Pennsylvania as a Research Fellow in its Institute for Urban...
https://millersamuel.com/interview-economist-kevin-gillen-phd-econsult-wharton/
You've got to admire people that go out on a limb and call a market as a contrarian and turn out to be right. It's a lucrative opportunity for those that are able to monetize it. There is a lot o...
https://millersamuel.com/wondering-if-the-negative-gravy-train-has-left-the-station/
Guest Appraiser Columnist: Martin Tessler, CRE Fee Simplistic is a regular post by Martin Tessler, CRE whom after more than 30 years of commercial fee appraiser-related experience, gets to the bo...
https://millersamuel.com/vortex-fee-simplistic-staying-ahead-of-the-curve-whats-next/
The Federal Open Market Committee cut the federal funds rate another 25 basis points to 2%. The WSJ breaks out the announcment FOMC statement in a feature called Parsing The Fed. >Information rec...
https://millersamuel.com/fomc-parse-nowhere-to-go-although-badness-troughs/
The weather is improving and I'm feeling the "this time of year optimism" where we get out of our log cabins after a long cold winter and admire the greenery around us. The first thing you notice...
https://millersamuel.com/pretty-vacant-shoots-of-green-are-blossoming-in-the-metaphor-business/
This week I reflect on the media explosion over Manhattan’s housing woes (A1 NYT version) and Nightly Business Report and some of the remaining gatekeeper thinking. While London is falling d...
https://millersamuel.com/a-lot-of-professionals-are-crackpots/
The rich have lost 1/4 of their wealth or 10 trillion dollars. Thats more than the stimulus plans, backstops and bailouts combined ($8T). The current issue of the economist addresses the issue of...
https://millersamuel.com/framing-without-studs-the-great-compression-of-high-net-worth/
Last week, Dan Gross at Newsweek wrote a fun piece on Slate/Newsweek called "Jump" (not a a correlation with the old Van Halen song). Basically he says that nothing the government can do will fix...
https://millersamuel.com/risk-as-a-bonus-us-treasury-makes-another-attempt-to-fix-economy-housing/
The future of condo new development sales activity across the US appears in serious trouble, yet it doesn't have to be that way - and its all due to a new government agency, Fannie Mae. Back in S...
https://millersamuel.com/seeing-only-70-of-the-risk-fannie-mae-crushed-condo-new-development-sales/
Play the clip I've been a bit video-centric as of late. It's simply amazing to think that the US Treasury Secretary can be parodied on SNL and most people get the humor. Geithner has gotten a pa...
We used to ignore bubbles, explaining them away because they were scary. Now we see them as a clearer conduit to clarity when illustrating a point related to mortgages. Not housing. Remember, we ...
https://millersamuel.com/1-in-5-underwater-so-bubbles-are-a-great-way-to-illustrate/
Like the Starbucks logo that steers you to a warm tall -not small casi cielo (my fav), the recovery needs a brand. Brand, brand, brand. WSJ's Real Time Economics Blog caught my attention. >The lo...
https://millersamuel.com/recovery-signage-its-all-about-branding/
One of the most perplexing things I have not been able to get my arms around in the aftermath of the mortgage securitization/CDO collapse is: how did some many smart people get it so wrong? Felix...
https://millersamuel.com/real-estate-quant-the-formula-that-killed-wall-street-housing/