Real Estate Prices to Come Way Down?

Wish I Was Wrong About This

In the U.S. right now, 650K homes are for sale, but there are 12M empty single-family homes in America.

You might want to read that again. There are 12 MILLION single-family homes empty in this country.

I predict (and hope I am wrong) that 1 in 5 homes will be up for sale a year from now. With not many buying.

Some cash buyers may come into the market, if prices tank 35%, which many analysts are predicting. More borrowers will trickle in if the Fed finally pivots, and starts lowering interest rates.

We have just experienced 12 interest rate hikes since Feb 2021 (unprecedented) and Powell says he wants to do 2 more this year.

And he has vowed repeatedly this year that he will not decrease interest rates through at least 2024.

So why are RE prices holding steady?

First of all, because the impact of interest rate hikes mostly don’t hit, until a year or 18 months later. We’re now hitting 18 months after interest rates began increasing.

Second, inventory has been low as interest rates increase, because everyone with a 2% interest rate is holding for dear life and doesn’t want to sell.

The supply matches the demand. Demand is low, but so is supply. So prices nationwide have come down very little.

But that is changing fast.

What about those 12M empty single-family homes?

On my street there’s a new listing every week. A lot of my neighbors own a beach home as a second home.

A month ago, there was one home listed on my street of 40 homes. Now there are five.

A ton of the empty houses are short-term rentals (VRBO, AirBnB) and that industry is in the tank.

Now you can get a VRBO for 3 days. And their prices are down as much as 50% versus last year.

What happens when those property owners aren’t getting enough rent to even make their payments?

What happens when they realize this is happening en masse, so they better be early, out there, listing?

This is the dumbest time in history to be a BUYER.

Just wait. I predict 35% lower real estate valuations and prices in 1-2 years.

That’s when you buy.

And buy only if you can stomach the high cost of property taxes and insurance. My condo I sold here in FL last year — our friends there say their homeowners’ insurance just TRIPLED.

Frankly it’s a great time to be a renter.

Many renters have rent controls. If their landlord had an ARM (adjustable rate) loan or if they bought in 2021+ … they may be walking away from that property soon enough.

And by next year, many will be paying their rent to a BANK.

Feel free to come back and jeer at me a year from now, if I’m wrong about all this. I wish I was. I hope I am.

Another thing to watch for: in every recession, the weakest and newest of everyone in real estate and RE services/finance will be plowed under. I personally believe we’ve been in recession at least a year, even if the government and media won’t admit it.

Our economy has already experienced many layoffs in the finance and real estate industry.

Over a year ago, I wrote a blog post about why I no longer consider real estate a good investment. I stand by everything I said back then, even more now.

There’s a war on. It’s against private property ownership.

The IMF (central bank of central banks) has a clear written intent to tokenize real estate and all assets on the blockchain.

This isn’t a conspiracy theory; they’re openly saying it. They know we are mostly sheep and will do as we’re told. (And will we have any choice?)

But if they succeed, “you will own nothing and be happy” will be really clear to you. I wonder if the people who’ve slept through everything thus far, will even NOTICE that they own nothing? Because it all happened so gradually?

But then, suddenly.

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