Our Drunken Sailors Splurge on Services, Fixed Investment Surges. But Much-Worse Imports Drag Bigly on GDP. And there’s a Blip in Government Spending by Wolf Richter • Apr 25, 2024 • 69 Comments Re-accelerating inflation in Q1 hit “real” GDP growth. “Current-dollar” GDP growth only a hair slower than in Q4.
Biggest Landlords Pile into “Build-to-Rent” Single-Family Houses, but Sell Older Houses into this Overpriced Market by Wolf Richter • Apr 24, 2024 • 81 Comments American Homes 4 Rent and Invitation Homes sold over 3,000 older single-family houses in 2023.
How It’ll Take Years to Clean Up the Office CRE Mess, with Losses Spread Far and Wide by Wolf Richter • Apr 24, 2024 • 78 Comments The Manhattan office tower Blackstone had bought for $605 million in 2014 and walked away from 2 years ago finally changed hands for $200 million, which paves the way for a complex new beginning.
Prices of New Houses v. Existing Houses: Why New-House Sales Held Up as Existing-House Sales Plunged by Wolf Richter • Apr 23, 2024 • 82 Comments Here’s why: New house prices -18% from peak, back to Nov 2021, further sweetened by mortgage-rate buydowns.
Brick-and-Mortar Meltdown Fells Express. Simon Property & Brookfield, to Avert Vacant Stores and Bad Leases at their Malls, to Buy the Brands and 435 Stores out of Bankruptcy by Wolf Richter • Apr 22, 2024 • 98 Comments This Has Been Years in the Making.
Nvidia, Supermicro Make Huge Mess of AI-Semiconductor Mania, Netflix Plunges, Big Tech Follows by Wolf Richter • Apr 19, 2024 • 211 Comments Nasdaq fell 2.05%, back to where it had been in September 2021. We have some new WTF Charts of the Year.
Fed’s Liabilities and QT: as ON RRPs Plunge toward Zero, Operating Losses Begin to Decline by Wolf Richter • Apr 19, 2024 • 87 Comments After ON RRPs go to zero, reserves will decline, further reducing the Fed’s interest expenses and losses. But it’s not straightforward.
Home Sales Clobbered by Mortgage Rates. New Listings & Active Listings Surge. Most Price Reductions for any March in Years by Wolf Richter • Apr 18, 2024 • 159 Comments Price reductions of existing homes jump to 31.7% of active listings, highest since 2017.
Mortgage Rates over 7% and Heading Higher, Housing Market Still Frozen, Lots of Buyers on Strike as Prices Still Too High by Wolf Richter • Apr 17, 2024 • 180 Comments All that makes sense, but why are there still any cash-out refis when people could take cash out via HELOCs, without losing a 3% mortgage?
Yen Drops to 155 against USD. Currency Collapse at Work, -32% against USD since 2021, -50% since 2012 by Wolf Richter • Apr 16, 2024 • 180 Comments Turns out, collapse of the currency is the price Japan is now paying for years of crazed monetary policies.