Thank you. She must know her stuff. Interesting about the potash and phosphate. What does she think about the future of the residential real estate market?

 

I’m not familiar with the idea of selling a lease. Could you please explain a bit?

 

Another dealer took possession of the car and paid off the loan. The reason I didn't sell it to one of my local MB dealers is because they seem to give really low offers because you aren't buying anything from them. The company I used was like a middle-man.

 

Thanks!

 

Let me try and paraphrase without screwing it up: Inflationary pressure is not going away soon and the Fed is going to continue hiking rates. Once we do get on the back side of inflation, it will take time to lower rates to more moderate levels. Lower rates helping affordability are off the table in the near term.

A correction must still occur and has begun; pricing has stagnated or dropped in many areas, and one or both will continue. Way too much typing to explain it all, a tldr would be to expect prices to remain flat and/or slowly decline throughout this year.

 

The world has changed once again. For the fabulous last 13 years we had QE which was an illusion. Now on to to paying for it with QT. We are now realizing in the real world we can't afford some of this stuff. I hope the contagion stops after SVB and first FTX but things look a bit grime. 5.5% TBills look great to me and no more expensive stuff unless you pay cash.

 

Do you have any concerns about tbills given the threats in congress about defaulting.

 

I'm in the residential real estate business, and this is highly localized. Our market here is insane, its every bit as competitive for buyers as it was last year with 5-15 offers on listings and escalations over 10% above asking. This is throughout the area too at all price points spanning from $250k to $2M. The issue is lack of inventory, we just do not have enough housing inventory to meet the demand here in the DC area. There really isn't any such thing as a "national real estate market", its local market to local market. Last week one of my agents lost in competition, there were 28 offers on a house priced at $1.175M and he escalated to $1.475M and lost, the house sold for over $1.5M. Thats happening all over the place, I don't see that ending unless we have a dramatic shift in supply vs demand.

 

Long term all will be fine. The next 2-3 years or more could be an issue. After all, QE went on for 13 years fueling assets. It's pay back time, so buy accordingly.

 

Ironically the lock-up in the market is due in part to the interest increase. Folks that got lower interest mortgages cannot afford to sell.

 

They can afford to sell, they can’t afford to buy or it makes no sense to buy, but you are totally correct.

The result of that however is not going to be a decrease in home values…

 

That's one market; here, closed sales are down almost 19% despite active listings increasing by 83%. In desirable areas you can still see bidding wars but that's the exception now, not the rule, as it had been last summer. Doesn't matter; neither this market nor that market is an economy, which is what she is looking at as a whole. Nationwide the market is stagnating and in some areas is retreating, this is a correction. While marginal buyers are doing their part to hold up pricing they have help; you have people who are priced out or are waiting for more favorable conditions, last year alone billions in dwellings have been picked off by private investment firms, etc.

This is going to continue. There is no relief coming in terms of increased supply, lower rates, or any other meaningful factor. Demand will prevent collapse but it cant stop the already ongoing correction; eventually sellers and buyers have to meet somewhere and the only way for the to happen when buyers are priced out is for real wages to increase or actual costs to decline. Real wages are increasing at a rate lower than inflation. Interest rates will not go down soon, and that leaves pricing with nowhere to go when buyers are priced out. Keep in mind here I'm not talking about million plus dollar apartments in a superheated market, I'm talking all sales. Little people don't buy Dupont Circle lofts at 4.5 but they do buy most of the houses sold.

I'd expect more of the same. Overall pricing will continue to decline until such time as buyer and seller can meet. The have's will continue to buy because they can

 

Like I said, local markets are different. What happens in my market isn't what happens in your market, etc. I am with a nationwide company and I see the market statistics across a wide variety of markets, and some markets are down and some markets are up, my market is not an anomaly though, nor is yours.

Here the strong market driven by lack of inventory is present at all price points, we have multiple offers with 10% escalations on $300,000 townhomes as well. It has to do with the affordability of any local market. Certainly some buyers are priced out, but if there are more than enough buyers who are not priced out to meet the supply...that doesn't really have an impact on home values.

I don't see how we are going to see declines in markets like mine because you have a fundamental mismatch between supply and demand. Prices can't decline when every home that sells has competition and sees a price hold or an escalation, you would have to see a fundamental swap where there becomes more supply than demand. Its not as simple as saying nationwide you will see "prices do X or Y" because that average doesn't mean anything to someone in their specific local market.

 

If this becomes a house-selling discussion, you might want to move this into the off-topic section...

 

It's about to tank far worse than 2008. The economy is not as good as the Biden bunch want you to think or believe. You cannot sustain the rise in our debt ($36 Trillion) and get away with it. Our infrastructure alone is going to be 30% of our problems along with printing worthless money. Just my opinion but I've seen it coming.

 

People have literally been saying that the sky is falling forever, and its yet to come to pass. I'll believe it when I see it.

 

You obviously weren't there the day the VHS player ate The Little Mermaid. Trust me, that was Armageddon!

This relates to the OP in that the player was in a house with a garage that had a car in it that was leased.

 

Hahahahaha, I'm lucky that my kids are young now when stuff like that is impossible!

LOL very smooth!

 

US infrastructure is not a future problem but a 'clear and present' one! It is not coming but has already arrived.

As a civil engineer myself, the infrastructure is one area that is of my concern.
American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) assesses the infrastructure on a national scale in a 4-5 year cycle. The latest report card was released in 2021, where the overall score (for all infrastructures in the US) was a 'C-'. This is a slight improvement over the precious report which got a score of 'D+'.

A 3-minute read of the ASCE assessment is here:-
https://www.asce.org/publications-an...investment-gap

A summary of the 2021 report card is here:- (move your mouse over a category and you will see the score)
https://infrastructurereportcard.org/

For the "I-am-too-lazy-to-read" folks, this pic sums it up:-



Personally, I think some scores were a bit too optimistic.
Take the best score 'B' of the Rail category, the condition of the tracks is really in poor shape. There were about 1500 derailments per year from 2005 to 2021. This is serious!
The media often only reports derailments involving radioactive/chemical/biological spills as these cannot be hidden away. Even those reports put the focus at the spill and not the rail/track.
In reality, the overall pic is not so rosy.

The worst grade is the 'D-' of the Transit. The high speed train age has come quite some time ago. Yet Amtrak is still running choo choo trains.
And look at the California High Speed Rail connecting SF and LA. Years and years of delay and the budget keeps increasing exponentially. The design was completed long ago. Then, the politicians wanted to divert the route so that the train will pass through their own towns. This whole thing is a political game for them to grab as much money and self interests as possible.

President Biden might sign a bill of billions to improve infrastructure. But this is just money on a piece of paper. How much money will go to the pockets of his contractor friends and his election sponsors and how much will become asphalt on the road?

Apologize for the off topic.

 

NO! The safest fixed income asset in the world regardless those idiots playing political games.

 

Enough already! If I want pontifications on the economy I can easily read my WSJ or NYT or listen to the countless talking heads on the tube. I come to this forum to discuss my passion for the S class. Please get back on topic!!

 

We can discuss how bad roads with potholes can affect the ride quality of the S-Class. Then, we can discuss both the infrastructure and the S-Class. 😁

 

Just unsubscribe from the thread...

 

So, we are driving S class cars and *****ing about our economy.....sad !
Sorry, but I'm with him....WSJ , NYT and may others are probably the right ones to read.....if necessary !

 

I'd like to be able to continue driving an S class lol