Commercial Real Estate Musical Chairs, With Chairs Added Each Round

Oct 16, 2009 | No Comments | Sean Mills

Finally some CRE news unfortunately it is not the good news we could all use.-Sean
Commercial real estate vacancies hit nearly 25% in Phoenix Valley area. Scottsdale and Southeast Valley vacancies are even higher. Please consider Office vacancy rates in Valley hit record.
Nearly 1 out of every 4 square feet of Valley office space was vacant [...]

Finally some CRE news unfortunately it is not the good news we could all use.-Sean

Commercial real estate vacancies hit nearly 25% in Phoenix Valley area. Scottsdale and Southeast Valley vacancies are even higher. Please consider Office vacancy rates in Valley hit record.

Nearly 1 out of every 4 square feet of Valley office space was vacant in the third quarter ending Sept. 30, commercial-real-estate experts said.

That’s about 28 million square feet of empty space, according to Phoenix commercial-realty brokerage Colliers International, one of several Valley firms tracking the progress of sales and the leasing of office, industrial and retail buildings.

Within the next few months, about 2 million more square feet of office space will open, and less than 20 percent of it has been reported as spoken for by a future tenant.

One of the soon-to-open buildings, the 400,000-square-foot One Central Park East office tower in downtown Phoenix [at left], has yet to announce a lease agreement despite plans to open by the end of the year.

“Actually, leasing agents are optimistic,” said Broker Mindy Korth of Phoenix-based CB Richard Ellis.

Korth said One Central Park is a desirable location that ultimately will find its audience. But she agreed with other experts that the high prices paid by companies such as One Central Park developer Mesirow Financial Real Estate Inc. could make it difficult to pay the bills, based on today’s lower lease rates.

More than 2,200 commercial properties in Maricopa County have received 90-day foreclosure notices since Jan. 1, representing more than $7 billion in real-estate loans on which the borrowers have failed to make payments.

Valley Vacancies

• Overall vacancies – 24.2 percent
• Scottsdale vacancies – 29.1 percent
• Downtown Phoenix vacancies – 15.7 percent
• Southeast Valley vacancies – 30.5 percent

Musical Chairs, With “Desirable Chairs” Added Each Round

Arizona leasing agents are optimistic because the “real-estate crash positions Phoenix as an attractive relocation area for companies in more expensive states, such as California“.

Let’s assume for a moment that businesses transfer to Arizona from California. What would that do to California jobs and California commercial real estate prices? How many tax breaks will Phoenix give to get corporations to relocate? Will California, Illinois, New York, and other places quietly let businesses leave?

Without new business expansion, this setup is nothing more than a game of musical chairs except no chairs are ever removed. Instead so-called “desirable chairs” like One Central Park are added every round, not just in Phoenix, but Miami, Chicago, Portland, San Diego, and countless other places.

Do the math. Musical chairs in reverse is not a viable economic model.

“If you build it, they will come” cannot possibly work unless the number of players increases faster than the number of chairs. The reverse is happening. More chairs are added each month than participants in the game.

Bundle of Joy

I have good news to report tonight. Someone has finally seen me for the joyful optimist that I am.

In Real Estate Strikes Back Planet Yelnick notes: “Mish was a bundle of joy today, also reporting that rents have fallen for the first time in 17 years, and that new FHA rules make condos utterly worthless.”

“Bundle of Joy” was the title of Thursday’s Podcast on HoweStreet.
Forget all that gloom’n'doom stuff, Mish has some GOOD news…rents are falling!

Please click on the link and listen in.

Phil Mackesy and I discussed housing in Vancouver, falling rents in the US, and what it’s like to be under the lights for Three Yahoo Tech Tickers: Deflation, Gold, Stock Market.

Residential rents are indeed falling, as are corporate lease rates. And with this game of musical chairs, commercial real estate lease rates are sure to continue falling for quite some time.
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Dow Breaks 10,000: Don’t Get Caught Up in “Euphoria”, Mish Warns

Oct 16, 2009 | No Comments | Sean Mills

Just a little back up for the last post where I issued the warning about the stock market.-Sean
The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed above 10,000 today for the first time in a year, and more than a decade after first breaking the mark. Since hitting lows in March, the Dow is up an astounding 50%, [...]

Just a little back up for the last post where I issued the warning about the stock market.-Sean

The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed above 10,000 today for the first time in a year, and more than a decade after first breaking the mark. Since hitting lows in March, the Dow is up an astounding 50%, while the S&P 500 has gained 60%.

Before you get your broker on the phone or start trading that dormant online brokerage account, take heed of this warning from Mike “Mish” Shedlock, the blogger behind MISH’S Global Economic Trend Analysis: “Five years from now, I think its quite likely the Dow is not going to be much more than 10,000,” he says.

Source Article

Why so negative?

“We’ve still not solved any of those structural problems” Buy Xenical cheap in the housing, banking and debt markets, that caused last year’s crisis, he claims.

Shedlock’s advice: ignore the euphoria, and “take some chips off the table.  Now’s just not a good time to be invested.”

Shedlock, also an investment advisor representative for SitkaPacific Capital Management, thinks investors are better positioned in gold and cash.

Renting Beats Home-Buying Remorse After Meltdown: John F. Wasik

Oct 16, 2009 | No Comments | Sean Mills

All in all some good advice for a newbie homeowner the only problem I see with this is the stock market you could be investing in is even more unstable than the real estate market.  A 40-50% decline in the stock market in less than 6 months now that was a wild ride.  I will [...]

Oct. 14 (Bloomberg) — Unless you want to stay in a neighborhood for life, renting a home may make more sense.

With more foreclosures and huge inventories of unsold homes looming and mortgage rates held down by the government, the housing market may not stabilize for years.

It’s no longer a given that you will build home equity. The housing debacle may have depressed housing prices for a generation in all but a handful of areas.

Am I spouting American housing heresy? After all, can’t you still build wealth by simply buying a home and holding it? And with 30-year, fixed-rate mortgages dipping below 5 percent, isn’t your buy signal flashing “go”?

A rent-versus-buy decision is a complicated one. You will need to make some blunt assumptions and do some in-depth homework on the neighborhood in which you want to buy.

The first layer of your decision-making is the duration of your investment. If you are fairly certain you are going to be in a neighborhood for an extended period — say you have a young family, like the local schools and have a secure government job — check the “buy” category and calculate ownership costs.

Those facing relocation, looking to downsize or retiring should strongly consider renting.

It’s difficult to recoup all of your closing costs and down payment in a short period of time. This is the easy part.

Rent Versus Buy

Now comes some gnarly cash-flow analysis for those leaning toward buying.

Let’s say you were considering a $300,000 home, put down 20 percent, and obtained a 5 percent, 30-year fixed-rate mortgage. You are in the 33 percent federal-tax bracket and you will pay $7,000 annually in property taxes and about $1,000 for insurance and maintenance. Your total monthly payments are $1,945.

Comparing your purchase to a similar property renting for $2,000 a month, you come out ahead buying and holding for 30 years. While your actual cash outlay is much less for renting — $583,267 versus $751,236 for buying — once you figure in the tax benefits over three decades, you are better off buying.

The combination of appreciation, leverage and tax breaks makes buying the winner over 30 years. Instead of having paid rent and gained no equity, this example will show a net asset value of $526,770 for buyers. This, of course, assumes a positive annual gain in your home’s price.

This example assumes a 1 percent annual return rate, stable property taxes and federal write-offs continuing untouched.

Property Taxes

Yet times have changed and it’s unlikely you will have the same mortgage, expenses and write-offs for three decades.

Real-estate taxes are wild cards that few brokers will discuss. Since public agencies are mostly dependent on property valuations for revenue, they are hurting in this housing recession and may be crippled for years from depressed home values. I’m seeing this in my area where the primary school district alone is facing a $3.5 million shortfall.

The most dangerous assumption is that property taxes will remain static. Ask your broker for past real-estate bills and the fiscal shape of local taxing bodies.

Another flawed assumption is appreciation. You can still lose home equity.

Check on median property values where you are buying. A few states were relatively untouched by the recent bubble, such as Texas, Utah, Wyoming, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Tennessee and North Carolina. Home-value declines were the worst in Nevada, California, Florida and Arizona, according to the U.S. Census Bureau’s most recent American Community Survey.

Invest the Difference

Still want to buy a home? Then dig even deeper in your targeted areas.

How many foreclosures are pending? Are there any vacant homes? What has been the mortgage default trend over the past two years? Is there a glut or shortage of unsold housing units? You can find local housing inventories by contacting area realtor associations.

Frank Armstrong III, a Coconut Grove, Florida-based financial planner and author of “Save Your Retirement” (FT Press, $14.99), says home ownership “is no longer a risk-free transaction. This has been the assumption for 30 years, and it’s been rebutted.”

An unstable or declining neighborhood usually translates into home-equity loss for buyers, most of whom have no idea when an area has hit bottom.

There’s no shame in not buying and exploiting the hidden upside in renting, though.

The money you would have spent on maintenance, taxes and insurance can pay off credit-card bills or be invested in an emergency fund, retirement or college savings. I know that few people will look at it this way, but renting might be a chance to recover financially.

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Foreclosures: ‘Worst three months of all time’

Oct 16, 2009 | No Comments | Sean Mills

Despite signs of broader economic recovery, number of foreclosure filings hit a record high in the third quarter – a sign the plague is still spreading.
NEW pharmacies online YORK (CNNMoney.com) — Despite concerted government-led and lender-supported efforts to prevent foreclosures, the number of filings hit a record high in the third quarter, according to [...]

Despite signs of broader economic recovery, number of foreclosure filings hit a record high in the third quarter – a sign the plague is still spreading.

NEW pharmacies online YORK (CNNMoney.com) — Despite concerted government-led and lender-supported efforts to prevent foreclosures, the number of filings hit a record high in the third quarter, according to a report issued Thursday.

“They were the worst three months of all time,” said Rick Sharga, spokesman for RealtyTrac, an online marketer of foreclosed homes.

During that time, 937,840 homes received a foreclosure letter — whether a default notice, auction notice or bank repossession, the RealtyTrac report said. That means one in every 136 U.S. homes were in foreclosure, which is a 5% increase from the second quarter and a 23% jump over the third quarter of 2008.

Nevada continued to be the worst-hit state with one filing for every 23 households. But even tranquil Vermont, where the foreclosure crisis has barely brushed the housing market, saw foreclosure filings jump nearly 170% compared with the third quarter of 2008. Still, that resulted in just one filing for every 5,023 households in the state — the best record in the country.

The RealtyTrac report also unveiled the results for September, and it found that there was slight relief from foreclosure filings. Last month, notices totaled 343,638, down 4% compared with August. Unfortunately, that total accounts for 87,821 homes that were repossessed by lenders.

That deluge contributed significantly to the quarter’s record 237,052 repossessions, a 21% jump from the previous three months. So far this year lenders have taken back 623,852 homes.

“REO activity increased from the previous quarter in all but two states and the District of Columbia, indicating that lenders may be starting to work through some of the pent-up foreclosure inventory caused by legislative delays, loan-modification efforts and high volumes of distressed properties,” James Saccacio, RealtyTrac’s CEO, said in a statement.

Most disturbing is that all foreclosures — not just repossessions — are rampant despite efforts to corral them. Not only has the Obama administration’s Making Home Affordable foreclosure prevention program taken a bite out of REOs but lenders themselves have scaled back repossessions over the past few months to give the program time to work.

And in some low-price markets, lenders simply aren’t following through on foreclosures, according to Jim Rokakis, treasurer for Cuyahoga County, Ohio, which includes Cleveland.

“They’ll even set the date for the sheriff’s sale, but they don’t file the final papers,” he said. “They hold it in abeyance and let the residents stay in the house.”

In ever more frequent cases, delinquent borrowers want out of the mortgage worse than the lenders. There are no firm statistics for it, but many industry watchers claim the percentage of REOs caused by borrowers voluntarily walking away from their homes is skyrocketing.

A study of the trend by the Chicago Booth School of Business and the Kellogg School of Management determined that when home price declines drop home values 10% below the mortgage balances, people start to give up their homes. When “negative equity” approaches 50%, 17% of households default, even when they can still afford their mortgage payments.

No end in sight

The foreclosure crisis may not diminish anytime soon. “The fastest growing area is in the 180 days late-plus category, the most seriously delinquent borrowers,” Sharga said. “It’s going to be a lingering problem.”

Plus, the RealtyTrac statistics may understate the depth of the foreclosure mess because lender and government actions have delayed many filings. As a result, some delinquencies have not been counted on the foreclosure tallies. That means the crisis may not end quickly.

And because there are so many delinquent borrowers, Sharga predicts the banks will be slow to take back their properties and put the repossessed homes back on the market.

“It’s hard to envision [the banks] putting millions on properties up for sale and cratering prices,” he said. “Recovery will be slow and gradual. I don’t see home prices getting much better until 2013.”