“Critics say title insurance is little used and overpriced, with the bulk of the premiums consumers pay going to title agents in the form of a commission.” In my experience it is the escrow officers and sales reps whose commissions take a sizable chunk from policy premiums.
“With this tidal wave of maturing and distressed loans, appraisers will play a key role in setting the values from which the market will begin the next stage in the real estate cycle.”
However, in a case of legislation looking for a problem, New York Governor Kathy Hochul has the proposed Restaurant Reservation Anti-Piracy Act on her desk which would require permission from restaurants to offer bookings.
“As stressed loans grow due to maturities, however, we expect that banks will start selling these more challenged loans to reduce their troubled loan exposures,” Murray said. Banks will take losses when these loans are unloaded, impairing capital and in some cases leading to bank failures.
The Hindenburg report provides many individual examples of sketchy loans made by Axos to sketchy characters. Not atypical is one where Axos lent up to $97.5 million for an apartment construction project in Queens where the “borrower has been criminally indicted twice personally, including a case involving a construction kickback scheme with a mafia captain. His company was indicted in a third case.”
Everything seems A-OK with the U.S. economy on the surface. But, the latest Grant’s Interest Rate Observer’s lead story, entitled “The case of the fragile 27%” uses the report by Paul Kupiec, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, D.C., to make the case that systemic risk to the nation’s banking system is bubbling just below the economy’s surface.
The majority of those surveyed — 59% — cited inflation as the top risk facing financial markets between now and year end. A US recession was listed as top risk by nearly a quarter of those queried.
Saleha Mohsin, author of Paper Soldiers: How the Weaponization of the Dollar Changed the World Order told Alloway and Weisenthal, “In 2001, 9/11 hits and, you know, the Global War on Terror did not start with military tanks rolling into some country or American troops in their boots hitting the ground somewhere. It started Sept. 24th, 2001 with George W. Bush, with a stroke of a pen giving the US Treasury Department the authority to weaponize the dollar.”
“They sell bonds and then people buy the bonds and lends the money. Yeah.” Bernstein went on as he appeared to become further confused, while attempting to reassure himself with his own answer, reports The Daily Mail.
So, for the really rich a misplaced day in New York (or on the other coast, California) can mean millions lost to the tax authority. How serious is this? Nahmias and Kamisher write, “state officials are stepping up already-intense scrutiny to make sure former residents have actually moved. It’s a complex operation that involves cutting-edge artificial intelligence and tracking everything from travel to the location of people’s pets.”
While us more seasoned gold bugs still feel alone, Katherine Hamilton wrote in the WSJ, “Americans can’t get enough gold. Costco, which started offering gold bars last year online and in a few stores, has been selling out within hours.”
“This is the kind of thing where it’s likely to be a very slow-moving train as the financial sector and commercial real estate market move forward,” he said, adding that refinancing deals will play out in the next few years. “It’ll take some time.”
Both agree the U.S. government has borrowed its way into disaster with the only way out being to debase the currency. Pal estimates the debasement to be 15% a year and thus if your investments and income isn’t rising by that much you are falling behind. Schiff doesn’t put a percentage on the money printing or debasement but essentially agrees. What a person is to do is where they disagree.
Price inflation affects consumers differently. For those drinking their whiskey with Coke, just about any will probably do, but for those imbibing theirs neat or on the rocks may spend a few more cheaper bucks for smoothness.
For Boyd, Harrison wrote “Something,” the Fab Four’s second most-covered hit and called “the greatest love song of the twentieth century” by Beatlephobe Frank Sinatra. Clapton’s passion for his friend’s wife inspired the scorching “Layla.” “I just knew — knew, knew! — it was about me,” Boyd recalled of the moment she first heard “Layla.” Later, when Boyd had left Harrison and married Clapton, he serenaded her with “Wonderful Tonight.”
The number of emergency distributions hit record highs both of the last two years, according to Vanguard, which administers 401(k)-type accounts for nearly five million people and published the data ahead of an annual report scheduled for June, reports the WSJ.
Scott Rechler, chief executive officer of New York landlord RXR described the market in five stages of grief Elisabeth Kübler-Ross outlined in her 1969 book On Death and Dying: Denial, Bargaining, Depression, Anger, Acceptance,
“In 2024, we’re at that fifth stage of grief,” Rechler said. “People are now in acceptance.”
Nobody has bought Musk’s Boring line of bull except the Las Vegas Convention and Visitor Authority (LVCVA) which forked over $52.5 million in 2019 and $4 million per year for two tunnels less than a mile long under the convention center. Las Vegas Mayor Carolyn Goodman was the lone vote against the project. She told Bloomberg, “Everybody turned them down,” she now recalls thinking. “What are we, dumb here?”
Real estate mogul Barry Sternlicht told Bloomberg “there’s a giant skeleton in the closet of the regional banks,” referring to commercial real estate loans. He made the point that “every piece of real estate is worth less when interest rates go up 500 basis points.”
With 400 square feet, no garage, and driveways just wide enough for one vehicle or two motorcycles — builders can offer prices under $300,000 in markets like San Antonio and Redmond, Oregon. The days of the $100,000 to $300,000 starter home are long gone in many markets. “This is the front end of what we are going to see,” said Ken Perlman, a managing principal at John Burns Research and Consulting.
