Posted by Jonathan J. Miller -Thursday, February 16, 2012, 12:18 PM 2 Comments
I was originally going to call this post: When Pundits Have No Idea What They Are Talking About but changed it to be more direct.
I have been a long time reader of City Journal and have been a fan of Nicole Gelinas’ writing. That’s why I was surprised to read a slanted rant-fest in the Winter 2012 edition called: The Rental Mania That Wasn’t. It’s inaccurate real estate stereotyping at its worst.
Gelinas demonstrates a lack of understanding with the Manhattan rental market, inconsistent with her long established writing credentials. She pontificates that the article was hyperbole and concludes the housing (rental) market has peaked because the New York Times said there was plenty of room to go:
If the Times thinks there’s no ceiling in sight, you can almost bet that the ceiling has already been reached. The paper of record has a track record on this. In 2005, the Times Sunday magazine ran a nearly 9,000-word story on the nation’s real-estate boom.
Well the rental market still has plenty of wiggle room if we are talking peak. We are currently 27% below the inflation adjusted rental peak reached at the end of 2006. In other words we are not in uncharted territory as a rental market.
The Manhattan sales market didn’t peak until mid-2008. And the reference to Bob Toll confuses the national housing market with Manhattan market. The national market peaked in mid-2006, 2 years before Manhattan did.
The rental market is up 9.5% year over year and continues to rise. Why? Because credit remains tight and likely will remain tight for the next several years driving many people to rent rather than purchase.
And then there is the issue of “froth”:
Toy further notes that “to compete for top rents, some landlords are undertaking expensive apartment renovations in older rental buildings. Even 10-year-old properties are being subjected to face-lifts.” That points to landlord worry, not complacency. You don’t plunk down tens of thousands of dollars in free cash flow to overhaul an apartment unless you’re nervous that newly built apartments are going to pose a threat. In a sizzling rental market, nobody insists on a washing machine or a hardwood floor.
This logic also shows a lack of understanding with the current dynamics of the market. The renovations are being done because the cost of renovations are far less than the resulting increase in achievable rent. There is a premium on upgraded space. You can see it in the market.
And the closing snipe is hypocritical since Ms. Gelinas is held to the same standard as Ms. Toy.
Neither Toy nor the Times editors did their job here—unless their job is to sell real-estate advertising.
My recommendation to Ms. Gelinas is to be more responsible with your platform and actually understand the issue you are writing about. I live and breath housing metrics every day and was offended by the inaccuracy and mischaracterization of your writing.
The Rental Mania That Wasn’t [City Journal
For Rentals, No Ceiling in Sight [NY Times]
Posted by Jonathan J. Miller -Thursday, February 16, 2012, 9:31 AM 1 Comment
After a reprieve in 2011, and a key reason why prognostications of a US housing market bottom is misguided, RealtyTrac reported that foreclosure filings were up 3% in January, month-over-month. Notice of defaults, however, are still depressed, down 22% from a year ago and unchanged from the prior month.
The 3% is statistically insignificant and I am not being an alarmist, but it represents the beginning of the distressed sale ramp-up now that the mortgage servicing settlement has finally been hammered out (actually the increase occurred before the agreement was final).
Daren Blomquist with RealtyTrac said increased foreclosure activity in key judicial foreclosure states is the likely result of lenders gaining some certainty over foreclosure processing issues, court decisions and regulations impacting the default process. He also points to the $25 billion mortgage servicing settlement that financial firms reached with state attorneys general over robo-signing and foreclosure issues.
On the surface, filings are still 19% below year ago levels, but the year ago level was artificially low just after the “robo-signing” scandal at the end of 2010.
“It’s a bit surprising that we are seeing this increase in January before the settlement was even announced,” Blomquist said. “It may be that lenders were ramping up (foreclosure activity) with the expectation of the settlement happening.”
RealtyTrac reports foreclosure filings rise 3% in January [Housingwire]
Posted by Jonathan J. Miller -Thursday, February 16, 2012, 8:30 AM No Comments
I was invited to keynote the February 2012 dinner meeting for the Appraisal Institute: Long Island Chapter in Westbury, Long Island to talk about the Long Island, regional and US housing markets, the problem with housing finance, misdirection in the market etc. with an extended Q&A session. …90 minutes of valuation discussion bliss.
It was great to see friends and acquaintances, let alone be invited to speak on issues I am so passionate about. I generally rail quite a bit about our profession, but I am speaking about the 80%, largely enabled by the AMC industry. The 20% was represented by the meeting attendees who have local market knowledge and are striving to improve their craft.
It became apparent to me from attendee feedback that:
AMCs account for most residential mortgage lending
AMCs provide terrible quality valuations but bank staff are mandated to use them from above
The industry is aging – not much new blood is entering the profession (of course I am excluding AMC “form-filler” types called “appraisers” in name only but don’t actually appraise in my view
The expectation of 3-5 more years of current conditions was consensus
Banks are looking to expand but are not going to be easing credit anytime soon
Many appraisers there were busy working on distressed and refinance property assignments, not sales
A lot has been made about the “class warfare” sniping between presidential hopefuls in the current campaign. It’s unfortunate, but as it relates to housing, the disparity is somewhat alarming.
For this week’s New York Times real estate cover story, For Sellers, High End Is Hot, I was asked to back up my statement:
“There is a greater disconnect between the very top of the market and everything else than I have ever seen in my 25 years in the business,” said Jonathan J. Miller, the president of the appraisal firm Miller Samuel.
I sliced up the Manhattan apartment market in 20 (5%) equal segments for 1991, 2001 and 2011 by median sales price and compared the top 5% with the bottom 5% after adjusting for inflation.
And guess what? The spread between the top 5% and the bottom 5% is getting wider, a lot wider:
10 years (2001-2011) +12.5%
10 years (1991-2011) +66.2%
20 years (1991-2011) +87%
The data shows that the gap expanded more significantly during the Dotcom-related housing boom of the late 1990s and then continued in the aughts (00’s) with the credit boom. In many metro area markets and affluent suburban towns across the US, this same phenomena can be seen.
An advertisement for Powerball “Yeah, That Kind of Rich” on a phone booth (now that’s a weird contradiction) that I photographed (to the right) says it all. At least we can all aspire to own a Porsche Panamera – by itself in left lane – love that car!).
After the collapse of Lehman in 2008 and the collapse of the secondary mortgage market for jumbo (non-conforming) loans, there was great concern over the health of the high end of the market. Less access to financing or more difficult mortgage underwriting for jumbo mortgages became the norm because jumbo lenders had to hold these loans in their own portfolio instead of offloading them to investors representing the Icelandic banking system or Wisconsin school districts.
And there should have been concern. The credit crunch has adversely impacted the high end luxury market.
However I am not talking about the high end or luxury market in this analysis. I am speaking to the market that is above it.
I am really talking about the “super” or “luxe” or “ultra” (or insert your own hyperbole) high end market and the top few percentage points of markets they represent. Trophy properties are in demand right now. The buyers are paying cash and demand is high.
Meanwhile the balance of the housing market is mundane, sliding or stabilizing, grappling with bad lending decisions during a period where everyone lost their rationale mind.
Right now is an exciting time to be “trophy-hunting”, housing-wise.
Posted by Jonathan J. Miller -Tuesday, February 14, 2012, 6:00 AM 1 Comment
[click for full analysis]
Brookings provides a good overview of the basic economic metrics over the past 5 quarters. There’s much more on the site.
I love short succinct visuals – sort of like spark line charts in Excel. Memo to self: While I give a 5 quarter breakdown in my reports, I need to do this with my report releases.
Posted by Jonathan J. Miller -Monday, February 13, 2012, 9:25 PM 1 Comment
This video has some spicy language, not for the faint of heart, it but c’mon, this is riveting economics humor by Yoram Bauman, the first and only stand-up economist. This new video delves into the theory of why S*** happens.
Posted by Jonathan J. Miller -Monday, February 13, 2012, 6:00 AM 12 Comments
There was a 21.2% decline in listing inventory from December 2010 to December 2011.
Relying on typical housing market scenarios and reasonable logic, a decline in listing inventory nearly always meant a tightening market was developing – fewer houses coming on line matched against steady demand meant housing prices were more likely to stabilize or rise.
Declining inventory is the variable in the housing equation that usually makes conditions improve. During the mid-decade housing boom, falling inventory was caused by the insatiable demand by buyers – product could not get out to the market fastest enough. Listing inventory was simply “worked off” by (artificially) inflated demand. Listing discounts approached zero, days on market fell to record lows and prices rose rapidly.
Old scenario: Declining Listing Inventory = declining housing prices ease their decline, prices stabilize or prices rise.
However over the last year, listing inventory fell sharply in many markets yet sales were generally anemic or showing nominal increases. In the NAR numbers, non-seasonally adjusted sales were up 1.4% year over year (using NSA since inventory is also NSA) yet inventory was down 21.2%. Inventory was clearly not declining because sales were overpowering the amount of listing inventory that was available.
New scenario: Declining Listing Inventory = fall in seller confidence and the sharp decline in distressed inventory entering the market.
From NAR…
Total housing inventory at the end of December dropped 9.2 percent to 2.38 million existing homes available for sale, which represents a 6.2-month supply2 at the current sales pace, down from a 7.2-month supply in November.
“The inventory supply suggests many markets will see prices stabilize or grow moderately in the near future,” Yun said. – National Association of Realtors
We are seeing unusual declines in many markets I keep tabs on such as:
Admittedly I am cherry picking some of the cities that are posting huge declines in inventory. However the problem I find in all of these markets, is that sales are only increasing a few percentage points. Not nearly enough to explain the rapid decline.
The drops are being touted as a good sign that housing is getting back on its feet. I’m not so sure.
I think the sharp drop in many US housing markets (and this has been happening for much of 2011) has to do with three key reasons:
A large swath of foreclosure volume was artificially delayed.
Seller confidence has waned after the pounding it took last fall.
Low interest rates extended by the Fed for the next two years have removed any sense of urgency.
Declining foreclosure volume is one of the key reason inventory levels are dropping. The 1/3 decline in foreclosure volume in 2011 has resulted in a sharp drop in foreclosure inventory resulting in a sharp drop in total inventory. Distressed sales have been running at about 30% of total sales nationally for a few years but fell to about 20% in 2011. With a 2 million more homes expected to go into foreclosure over the next 2 years, a year long internal review of procedure after the 2010 “robo-signing” scandal and the 50 State AG settlement with the largest services/banks, distressed inventory is expected to rise sharply over the next several years.
Weak seller confidence is causing property not to be released into the market unless the need to sell is not optional. The 2011 home seller and buyer was bashed with the debt ceiling debate, the S&P downgrade of US debt, 400 point daily swings in the financial markets, the European debt crisis, the AG/Service settlement drama and the political stalemate on housing policy in Washington. What do people do when faced with the unknown? They sit and wait. Buyers had a lot more incentive to act with falling mortgage rates to record levels but mortgage underwriting grew tighter over the year as well.
The extension of the low interest rate policy by the Fed through the end of 2014 has obliterated any sense of urgency by sellers. I am getting a lot of feedback from real estate professionals about this as well as seeing it within my own appraisal practice. There is a lot going on the world right now and the action by the Fed suggested that they weren’t particularly encouraged by the economy. To many this may seem as an incentive for sellers to get going and sell. But many of those sellers have to buy.
The drop in inventory as a phenomenon may or may not pass quickly but one thing is clear – weird changes in market behavior happen for a reason – I don’t see declining inventory as a particular sign of strength in the housing market.
Posted by Jonathan J. Miller -Sunday, February 12, 2012, 10:44 PM 2 Comments
My wife and I were in Home Depot today buying fixtures for a bathroom renovation and I was struck by the crazy marketing approach by American Standard for one of their toilets.
Hook, Slice or Flush?
UPDATE
American Standard commented on the post and graciously shared a video demonstration they put together to showcase the ability of their toilets to flush a bunch of gold balls (not sure if a sentence like this has ever been put together) and a lot of cool other stuff. Great stuff – love their marketing moxie!
Posted by Jonathan J. Miller -Wednesday, February 8, 2012, 2:41 PM 2 Comments
This research paper from the Boston Fed addresses the issue of “House Lock” – the idea that people who have negative equity on their homes are trapped and can not migrate to where the jobs are.
…These observations have raised concerns that the prolonged weakness in the U.S. housing market is keeping unemployment high by preventing homeowners who have negative equity from relocating to other states with better job markets. Having a negative equity position in their homes is likely to further deter homeowners from selling in an already weak housing market. Other options, such as engaging in a short sale or strategically defaulting on the loan, can be costly in terms of lost value or a damaged credit record. And in all likelihood, the number of underwater households is likely to persist as house prices continue to fall in many areas due to continually high levels of unemployment and foreclosure.
The report concludes that there is NOT a strong correlation between people stuck in their homes and the high unemployment rate.
home owners are already less transient than renters and account for only 20% of state-to-state migration.
negative equity reduces the probably of migration but does not impact unemployment rates.
Still it seems to me that Fed has become much more focused on housing as the way to fix the economy as of late. Of course, this is not official Fed policy speaking in this paper, but with what feels like an increase in housing related research (or I am super sensitive to this as of late), maybe it represents the “Id” of the Fed mindset. You can see it in the last sentence of the paper:
Instead, increased efforts to alleviate the housing sector’s drag on the economy— such as helping more homeowners to refinance or stemming the tide of foreclosures—may be more effective at stimulating aggregate demand and reducing the high rate of joblessness during the recovery.
Are American Homeowners Locked into Their Houses? The Impact of Housing Market Conditions on State-to-State Migration [Federal Reserve Bank of Boston]
This video has some spicy language, not for the faint of heart, it but c’mon, this is riveting economics humor by Yoram Bauman, the first and only stand-up economist. This new video delves into the theory of why S*** happens.
A few years ago I LMAO with his Ten Principles of Economics. It’s so [...]
