The Unassuming Economist

Working papers and conferences:

• Mortgage switching through the turning of the interest rate cycle – Central Bank of Ireland
• Time-Varying Persistence of House Price Growth: The Role of Expectations and Credit Supply – SSRN

On the US—developments on house prices, rent, permits and mortgage:    

• U.S. Economic, Housing and Mortgage Market Outlook – May 2024 – Freddie Mac
• Could Housing Inflation Become a Problem Again? – Apollo
• MBA: Mortgage Delinquencies Increased Slightly in Q1 2024 – Calculated Risk
• New Construction Activity Picked Up 5.7% in April – Realtor.com
• Housing Market Update: Mortgages Rates Dip Below 7% For First Time in 5 Weeks, Giving Buyers Some Much-Needed Relief – Redfin
• US Housing Starts, Permits Fall Short as Mortgage Rates Rise. New home construction increased in April after down revisions. Proxy for future building fell to lowest since the end of 2022 – Bloomberg
• Renting Forever and Trying to Create a Strong Financial Future. Either by choice or because they are priced out of the market, many people plan to never stop renting. Building wealth without home equity requires a different mind-set. – New York Times
• 4^th Look at Local Housing Markets in April; California Home Sales Up 4.4% YoY in April – Calculated Risk
• NYC Rents Are So High That Only 5% Are Affordable for the Average Salary. Essential workers hit hardest by New York City’s housing affordability crisis – Bloomberg
• Multifamily Housing Supply and Rents: Feast Today, Famine Tomorrow? – Richmond Fed
• Existing Home Sales Recede in April – NAHB
• Home Sales Fell Again in April After High Mortgage Rates Damped Activity. Sales of previously owned homes decreased 1.9% from the prior month to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.14 million – Wall Street Journal
• Opportunity Zone Home Prices Mixed but Still Keeping Up with Nationwide Price Trends – ATTOM
• NAHB/Wells Fargo Debut New Cost of Housing Index – NAHB  

On the US—other developments:    

• TLDR: The Future of Homeownership. Talking you through my analysis – Home Economics
• Secret #2 – The Real Reason House Prices Skyrocketed After Covid. What the Real Estate Industry Won’t Tell You – Real Estate Decoded
• Secret #3 – For Black Home Ownership, “Affordable” Housing Policies Have Been Worse Than Jim Crow – Real Estate Decoded
• Secret #4 – The U.S. Home Ownership Rate Increased the Fastest When Mortgages Were 20 Years Long and Down Payments Were 20% – Real Estate Decoded
• Secret #5 – The Home Ownership Boom After World War 2 was Due, in Part, to New Houses Becoming a Lot Smaller – Real Estate Decoded
• Keeping What Works: How the GSEs are Protecting Homeowners, Taxpayers, and the Industry – Fannie Mae
• New Single-Family Home Size Decline Continues – NAHB
• Down Payment Share Reaches Q1 High, but Down Payments Fall From Historical Peak – Realtor.com
• Want affordable housing? Take the chassis off manufactured houses. And don’t call them mobile homes. – Washington Post
• Displaced by climate disasters, ageing Americans struggle to find housing. Older adults face a shortage of affordable and accessible homes as climate change worsens – The Guardian

On China:

• The property firm that could break China’s back. If Vanke collapses, so might confidence in the state’s management of the economy – The Economist
• China goes on a $1 trln apartment-buying spree – Reuters
• China Is Finally Getting Serious About a Housing Rescue. Beijing announces plan to clear backlog of unsold homes, but questions remain over scale and financing – Wall Street Journal
• China Attempts to End Property Crisis With Broad Rescue Package. Beijing removes floor on mortgages rates, lowers down-payment. China unleashes $42 billion cheap funding to buy unsold homes – Bloomberg
• China unveils package to boost property sector. Central bank eases lending requirements and lowers down-payments to ease years-long slowdown – FT  
• China Home Prices Fall at Faster Pace Despite Revival Efforts. Month-on-month declines in April were steepest in a decade. Government is seeking to address excess housing inventories – Bloomberg
• China Says It Will Start Buying Apartments as Housing Slump Worsens. Signaling growing alarm, policymakers ramped up efforts to stem a continued decline in real estate values. – New York Times
• China’s Housing Crash Could Set Back Millions of Promising Careers – Yahoo Finance 
• Too Big or Not Enough? China Housing Bailout Treads a Fine Line. Beijing will try to provide enough support to absorb unsold apartments while not sparking a new bubble – Wall Street Journal
• China’s rush to prop up housing sector aims to boost confidence ahead of third plenum: analysts. Coordinated steps from Beijing include billions of yuan in central bank funding, eased mortgage rules, and government purchase of unsold inventory. Measures show desire ‘to put a floor under the property slump’ before third plenum, but focus certain to be on industrial policy, observer says – South China Morning Post 
• China’s Housing Rescue Too Small to End Crisis, Analysts Say. Funding amounts to a fraction of cost of outstanding inventory. Involving banks, local governments raises implementation doubt – Bloomberg
• Will China’s fleet of policies to buoy housing sales stem slack tides in the property market? China has approved local governments and state enterprises to buy land and housing, part of an effort to get the property sector moving. Change in approach welcomed by analysts, but most said more ambitious moves will be necessary to turn the sector’s fortunes around – South China Morning Post 
• A Tale of China’s Two Housing Markets. A few cities’ real estate sectors will bottom out this year, while others will struggle with empty flats for decades to come. – Bloomberg
• Slump in China’s home prices, sales set to worsen this year – Reuters poll – Reuters 
• China has finally unveiled its property rescue plan. Will it be enough? Beijing unlocks funding to buy up unsold housing but much more is needed to right stricken sector, analysts say – FT

On other countries:  

• [Australia] Britain’s forgotten financial crisis. Britain had its fastest ever house price growth not in the 2020s but in the 1970s. Houses then were also getting smaller and worse. The problem was a lack of supply. – Work in Progress
• [Canada] To Fight the Housing Crisis, Upzone and Build Public Housing. British Columbia’s housing crisis is among the worst in North America. Just as in other regions grappling with similar challenges, increasing density through upzoning for public and nonprofit housing is essential to tackle the crisis head-on. – Jacobin
• [Germany] German home prices to fall 2% in 2024, supply to lag demand: Reuters poll – Reuters
• [United Kingdom] The link between mortgage debt servicing burdens and arrears: is there a critical threshold? – Bank Underground

On cross-country:

• Charting the future: risks and lending standards in residential real estate – European Central Bank

Working papers and conferences:

• Conference: CGFS- Banque de France Conference on macroprudential policies to mitigate housing market risks – Banque de France
• Optimal Mortgage Refinancing with Inattention – NBER
• Measuring Price Effects from Disasters Using Public Data: A Case Study of Hurricane Ian – Federal Housing Finance Agency

On the US—developments on house prices, rent, permits and mortgage:    

• How rich homebuyers are avoiding high mortgage rates – Yahoo Finance
• US Treasury’s Yellen says Congress should act on nonbank mortgage sector – Yahoo Finance 
• 2nd Look at Local Housing Markets in April. Inventory Continues to Surge in Florida – Calculated Risk
• Single-Family Permits Up in March 2024 – NAHB
• Home Prices Come Into Focus as Key Issue in the 2024 Election – Realtor.com 
• The 5 states with the most housing inventory — and the 5 states with the least. The market has been difficult for people looking to relocate — but there are some places where people may find more luck than others – Quartz
• The Fed’s housing market dilemma, as told by one chart. According to Zillow, national single-family rents rose 5% from March 2023 to March 2024, while multifamily rents rose 2.7%. – Fast Company
• Higher Mortgage Rates Hammer Builder Confidence in May – NAHB
• Sky-High Housing Costs Propel Construction of Rental Homes. Last year developers completed 39% more new rental homes than in 2022 – Wall Street Journal 
• Are home prices still rising? See how prices have changed in your area. – Washington Post
• Housing Costs Continue to Drive Price Gains – NAHB
• American renters are scared renting will cost them for a long time. While renters are staying put amid high mortgage rates and soaring housing prices, many are eyeing homeownership – Quartz
• Florida and Texas Show Signs of Home Prices Falling. Inventory of homes for sale in April exceeded typical prepandemic levels for this time of year in some metro areas in the two states – Wall Street Journal
• Inside the Rent Inflation Measure That Economics Nerds Love to Hate. The Consumer Price Index inflation measure accounts for housing costs in a complicated way. There are reasons for it. – New York Times 

On the US—other developments:    

• Democrats demand action from Biden on affordable housing. Twenty-eight progressive Democrats want the administration to finalize a HUD rule they say is critical to ensuring access to affordable housing for people of color. – Politico
• Affordability Pyramid Shows 64.8 Million Households Cannot Buy a $250,000 Home – NAHB
• Mansion Taxes Won’t Improve Housing Affordability. The policy is gaining in popularity, but the most direct way to address the high cost of housing is just to allow more to be built. – Bloomberg
• Priced Out of Housing, Communities Take Development Into Their Own Hands. Across the country, neighborhood groups are uniting to fund mixed-use developments that meet housing and business demands, giving locals a place to live, work and learn new skills. – New York Times 
• Part 1: Current State of the Housing Market; Overview for mid-May 2024 – Calculated Risk
• Top Compromises Buyers Will Make to Reach Homeownership – NAHB
• 2024 Top Rental Markets for Recent College Graduates – Realtor.com
• Home Depot Posts a Sixth Sales Drop Amid Housing Market Woes – Bloomberg
• Cities need more housing. ADUs can help. – Bloomberg
• 76 Secrets – U.S. Home Ownership – 3 Solutions – Real Estate Decoded
• Can Housing Foreclosures Remain Low as Consumer Debt Rises? – CoreLogic

On China:

• China’s Housing Mess Finally Comes for Xi’s Own. Beijing is opening the door to a real estate bazooka. But only a few developers will benefit. – Bloomberg
• Even a State-Linked Giant Can’t Escape China’s Real-Estate Crisis. China Vanke is under pressure but so far has managed to avoid a default – Wall Street Journal
• Beijing’s ‘Digest’ Plan Signals Shift in China’s Housing Crisis. Analysts stressed it marks the first time in a long-running real-estate downturn that top officials have publicly broached the subject of excess apartment supply.  – Wall Street Journal
• More Chinese Cities Move to Buy Up Housing Inventories. The moves follow similar plans by a half dozen cities in recent weeks – Wall Street Journal

On other countries:  

• [Australia] Housing Market Cycles and Fundamentals – Reserve Bank of Australia
• [Australia] RBA says ‘no quick fix’ to house prices – Financial Review
• [Australia] RBA’s Hunter Sees No ‘Quick Fix’ to Australia’s Housing Crisis. Australia is facing its worst housing crisis in living memory. Central bank sees several potential avenues to fix the problem – Bloomberg  
• [Canada] Canada’s Trudeau Backs Away From Tax Threat on Apartment Owners – Bloomberg
• [Canada] Canadian Homes for Sale Climb With Second-Biggest Jump on Record. Sales fell and new listings rose, loosening up the market. A measure of prices was flat in April from a month earlier – Bloomberg
• [Egypt] Egypt’s real estate prices accelerating! – Global Property Guide
• [Hong Kong] Hong Kong’s housing market conditions continue to deteriorate – Global Property Guide
• [Ireland] Ireland has a new group of voters: The homeless. In EU election, Dublin addresses a Continent-wide problem. – Politico
• [Japan] The housing crisis in the U.S. is flipped upside down in Japan, where each home that’s occupied could be next to an empty one by 2033 – Yahoo Finance
• [Netherlands] ‘What if we built our own?’: young Amsterdammers fight housing crisis with cooperative build. Group of university students awarded plot after city hall passes plan for 15 to 20 cooperative projects – The Guardian
• [New Zealand] New Zealand Houses Take Longer to Sell as Buyers Bide Their Time. Median time to sell has risen after late-2023 decline. House prices fell a second straight month in April, REINZ says – Bloomberg
• [Poland] Poland Forced to Rethink Cheap Mortgage Plan in a Housing Boom. Homebuyers worry that stimulus will push property out of reach. Government says its view is ‘evolving’ amid backlash – Bloomberg
• [South Korea] South Korea tightens scrutiny to speed up real estate restructuring – Reuters  
• [South Korea] Korea Unveils Steps to Quicken Project Finance Restructuring. FSC expects only 2-3% of project finance sites to be disposed. Sites late repaying debt by six months or more to be sold – Bloomberg
• [Sweden] Swedes’ Housing Optimism Grows as Riksbank Cuts and Prices Rise – Bloomberg
• [United Kingdom] Rise in ultra-long mortgages ‘poses risk to UK retirement prospects’. Former pensions minister says data shows buyers increasingly forced to accept terms that stretch into state pension age – The Guardian
• [United Kingdom] ‘It will take two decades to fix the housing crisis’: The developer reshaping south London – The Guardian

On cross-country:

• Global Housing Shortages Are Crushing Immigration-Fueled Growth. Households go backwards in 13 developed economies as record immigration runs into a housing crisis. – Bloomberg
• Rents Set to Be Last Domino to Fall in Global Inflation Battle. Immigration and housing shortages fuel rents in Australia, UK. Sticky inflation prevents central banks from cutting rates – Bloomberg
• With China’s Property Market Struggling, India, Korea and Vietnam Are Hot. Rents in cities across Asia are rising fast as multinationals shift away from the mainland. – Bloomberg
• Fix Europe’s housing crisis or risk fuelling the far-right, UN expert warns. Unaffordable rents and property prices risk becoming a key political battleground across the continent – The Guardian
• Higher costs and cramped conditions: the impact of Europe’s housing crisis. Affording a home has become a political issue as rents and prices soar and supply plummets – The Guardian

Working papers and conferences:

• Estimating the importance of monetary policy shocks for variation in the U.S. homeownership rate – FED
• Mortgage Rate Lock‑In and Homeowners’ Moving Plans – New York Fed
• How Are They Now? A Checkup on Homeowners Who Experienced Foreclosure – New York Fed
• Owner-occupied housing costs, policy communication, and inflation expectations – National Bank of Belgium
• The impact of prudential regulations on the UK housing market and economy: insights from an agent-based model – Bank of England
• Discrimination Against Housing Vouchers: Evidence from Online Rental Listings – SSRN
• Total Returns to Residential Rental Housings – SSRN

On the US—developments on house prices, rent, permits and mortgage:    

• Housing Price Growth Expectations Increase; Renters Express Concern for Ability to Own a Home – New York Fed
• Housing Market Update: For the First Time in Nearly 2 Years, There’s No Major American Metro Where Home Prices Are Falling – Redfin
• This Popular Spot for Homebuyers Has Nearly 57% of the U.S. Housing Inventory—and It’s Affordable – Realtor.com
• Inflation Adjusted House Prices 2.4% Below Peak. Price-to-rent index is 7.5% below 2022 peak – Calculated Risk
• The mortgage reform that could unleash the next big US stimulus. Freddie Mac wants to enter the secondary home equity loan market in a win-win for the government, Wall Street and consumers – FT
• Housing market inventory is shifting. Here’s what the data shows. The housing market saw a 30% increase in active inventory in April, but that’s still 35% below pre-pandemic levels. – Fast Company
• US Home Price Insights – May 2024 – CoreLogic
• Mortgage Activity Remains Lower Midway Through Spring Buying Season – NAHB
• 1st Look at Local Housing Markets in April. Early Reports Suggest NAR reported Sales might be up slightly Year-over-year – Calculated Risk 
• Homeowners are getting rich. Renters? Not so much – Axios
• ‘Seriously Underwater’ Home Mortgages Tick Up Across the US. Southern states see jump in share of very underwater homes. A dozen states have at least 2,500 more than last year: ATTOM – Bloomberg

On the US—other developments:    

• The US housing ‘lock-in effect’ –quantified. And can US mortgages be made portable or assumable? – FT
• Wealthy Homeowners Aren’t Selling. A Look at the Tightest Luxury Markets. A supply crunch is affecting markets across the country, as the mortgage rate lock-in takes control of the high end – Wall Street Journal
• Want to Reduce the Cost of Housing? Build More of It. Everyone agrees that the rent (or the mortgage) is too high, but the best ways to make it more affordable aren’t very popular. – Bloomberg
• Affordable Housing Won’t Come From Bullying the Fed. Democrats who want to coerce the central bank into lowering rates to ease mortgage costs are asking for trouble. – Bloomberg
• How Immigration Restrictions Reduce Housing Construction and Exacerbate Shortages. A new study shows deportation of undocumented migrants reduces housing construction by diminishing the supply of workers needed to do it. – Reason
• Rent Control Remains the Wrong Solution to Housing Woes. Restricting the price of housing kills incentives to supply places to live. – Reason
• Housing Deregulation as Poverty Policy – Cato
• How the NAR settlement impacts real estate in D.C. – Axios
• Return of the Housing Godzillas. Freddie Mac and its Biden regulator want to guarantee second mortgages. What could possibly go wrong? – Wall Street Journal
• Residential Building Wages Continued to Rise – NAHB
• April 2024 Monthly Housing Market Trends Report – Realtor.com
• It Really Is ‘Almost Impossible’ for New Homebuyers – Bloomberg
• CoreLogic Southern California Housing Market Update: May 2024 – CoreLogic 
• Housing Sentiment Again Shows Signs of Plateauing – Fannie Mae
• FACT SHEET: Vice President Harris Announces $5.5 Billion to Boost Affordable Housing, Invest in Economic Growth, Build Wealth, and Address Homelessness in Communities Throughout America – The White House
• It’s Budget Season in Philadelphia. How Will the New Administration Choose to Fund Its Housing Priorities? Local dollars, partnerships, and evaluation needed to advance the city’s housing agenda – Pew 

On China:

• Chinese homebuyers favour ‘second-hand’ houses as property crisis bites. With tens of thousands of new developments yet to be completed, buyers are looking again at older buildings – FT
• China’s Economic Bump Fades but Not Worry Over Jobs and Property Prices – Barron’s
• Chinese megacity Hangzhou, home to Alibaba, lifts all home purchase curbs – The Straits Times 

On other countries:  

• [Australia] Australia’s housing crisis to worsen with ‘significant shortfall in supply’, Labor’s expert council says. Report predicts numerous factors, including migration, mean housing affordability and inequality, will continue to deteriorate – The Guardian
• [Australia] Australia’s Housing Rent Hits Record High in Headache for RBA – Bloomberg
• [Australia] Australia’s Housing Rent Hits Record High in Headache for RBA. Data add to evidence that price pressures remain stubborn. New households due to migration outpacing supply of dwellings – Bloomberg
• [Australia] The Reserve Bank’s bleak news on housing. The RBA is concerned that housing supply continues to fall short of underlying demand, which is keeping upward pressure on house prices and rents. – Financial Review
• [Australia] Pace of house price growth to cool as risks emerge – Financial Review
• [Canada] Key Toronto Homebuying Season Turns in Buyers’ Favor This Year. Number of properties put up for sale soars from year ago. Many would-be buyers may wait for BOC rate cuts, Pearce says – Bloomberg
• [Germany] GREIX Q1 2024: Real estate prices volatile, number of transactions low – KIEL
• [Hong Kong] The painful slump in Hong Kong property. Prices and rents have fallen amid higher interest rates and a slowdown in China. Some experts warn that recovery could be elusive – FT
• [Hong Kong] Hong Kong authorities urged to focus on quality over quantity of public housing flats. Our Hong Kong Foundation think tank expects government will meet public housing supply goal as an average of 35,000 flats set to be completed annually over next five years. ‘We can see that we are entering a ‘harvest phase’ in land supply in the next few years, hence the prospects of [housing] supply will continue to improve,’ think tank’s vice-president says – South China Morning Post
• [Hong Kong] Hong Kong property: mainland Chinese buyers snapping up 8 out of 10 new homes in some sales, agents say. Mainland Chinese buyers account for anywhere from 30 per cent up to 80 per cent of the sales in some recent launches, according to agents. The strong return of mainland Chinese buyers is boosting hopes of price stability in the residential property market – South China Morning Post
• [Hong Kong] Hong Kong property: most middle-income households see prices rising now restrictions are in the past, Citibank survey finds. Most respondents considered the dropping of stamp duties to be the most important of the moves to stir the market. Citibank itself forecasts a 10 per cent drop in home prices this year because of high interest rates and inventories – South China Morning Post
• [Germany] German Residential Real Estate Recovery Remains Elusive. Apartment valuations fell, single-family home prices were flat. Multi-family home prices slid 10.5% in first months of 2024 – Bloomberg
• [Mexico] Improving housing and urban development policies in Mexico – OECD
• [United Kingdom] Number of new homes in England predicted to drop to half of official target. Savills calls on government to take action to boost housebuilding – FT
• [United Kingdom] United Kingdom’s housing market woes persist – Global Property Guide
• [United Kingdom] UK House Prices Stagnate in April as Mortgage Costs Climb. Halifax says prices up just 0.1% compared to a month earlier. Market bets on delayed start to BOE rate cuts hamper market – Bloomberg
• [United Kingdom] UK Mortgage Arrears Rise as Borrowing Rates Squeeze Homeowners. Loans in arrears climbed 3% in the three months through March. Homeowners behind on payments up 26% from a year earlier – Bloomberg

On cross-country:

• How the Super Rich Are Developing Their Own Real Estate Markets. The boom in ultra-luxury accommodation. – Bloomberg

Working papers and conferences:

• Event: Not Your Typical Cycle: Where Does Real Estate Go From Here? On May 8 – Dallas Fed
• House Prices and Declining Internal Migration in the United States – NBER
• The Housing Supply Channel of Monetary Policy – SSRN
• The Effect of House Prices on Fertility: Evidence from House Purchase Restrictions – SSRN

On the US—developments on house prices, rent, permits and mortgage:    

• Wall Street Has Spent Billions Buying Homes. A Crackdown Is Looming. Lawmakers say investors that scooped up hundreds of thousands of houses to rent out are driving up home prices – Wall Street Journal
• Case-Shiller: National House Price Index Up 6.4% year-over-year in February. FHFA: House Prices Increased in February, up 7.0% YoY – Calculated Risk
• We need to fix New York’s broken rental system. Renters in New York City face prohibitive fees to get into a new home. Zillow is working to change that. – Zillow
• The build-to-rent housing market has grown more than 300% since 2019. In 2023, there were a record-breaking 27,495 build-to-rent homes completed, according to a new report. These 20 housing markets saw the biggest increases. – Fast Company

On the US—other developments:    

• The crippling home insurance crisis hitting America. While climate is changing, the model for insurance has not – FT
• Federal Housing Plan: Ambition and Reality – TD
• Biden’s Plan for Unaffordable Housing. A new HUD energy rule will raise the cost of home construction when homes are already out of reach for many Americans. – Wall Street Journal
• After decades of inaction, states are finally stepping up on housing. The affordability crisis is forcing politicians’ hands. – Vox 
• How Rising Costs Affect Home Affordability – NAHB
• ADUs could expand the affordable housing toolkit—if local governments can work through some growing pains – Brookings
• Can New Suburban Housing Make Urban Areas More Affordable? – Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies
• The Gen-Z Advantage in Housing. A study suggests that Gen Z has it better in the housing market than the millennials who came before them. – New York Times
• Fannie and Freddie: Single Family Serious Delinquency Rate Decreased, Multi-family Decreased in March. CoreLogic: “US Mortgage Delinquency, Foreclosure Rates Hover Near Historic Lows” – Calculated Risk
• San Francisco Buyers Bring Its Luxury Housing Market Back to Life. A recovery is under way in the Bay Area, as interest-rate shock finally wears off and stock-market gains fuel high-end home sales – Wall Street Journal
• Young Americans Are Getting Left Behind by Rising Home Prices, Higher Stocks. Higher asset prices are considered signs of a good economy. But for many, they hurt more than help. – Wall Street Journal
• Biden Rolls Out New Minimum Energy Standards for Affordable Housing. Updated efficiency standards for new federal affordable housing construction could save lower-income renters and homeowners tens of millions of dollars each year. – Bloomberg 
• The Spring 2024 Wall Street Journal/Realtor.com Housing Market Ranking – Realtor.com
• Here’s How Immigration Will Boost the US Economy, From Strong Hiring to More Housing. Migrants seen increasing pace of job growth, consumer spending. More construction workers may also mean more completed housing – Bloomberg
• Housing Share of GDP Surpasses 16% for First Time Since 2022 – NAHB
• Florida and Texas have a surging supply of houses — but people aren’t buying. Home-building really took off in Florida and Texas in the aftermath of the pandemic. Now many of these new developments are sitting empty – Quartz
• Affordable housing crisis looms large in election – The Hill

On China:

• UBS Analyst Who Took On Evergrande Now Bullish on China Property. Lam sees a gradual recovery in the beaten-down property sector. Analyst was among the first to put a sell rating on Evergrande – Bloomberg
• China Home Sales Keep Falling as Top Officials Pledge Support – Bloomberg

On other countries:  

• [Australia] Australian Home Prices Climb Further as Downside Risks Build – Bloomberg
• [Canada] Mortgage stress tests cause more harm than good. Here’s how to fix them – Globe and Mail
• [Canada] Canada’s house prices increasing again – Global Property Guide
• [Canada] Housing Shortages and Immigration Booms Are Colliding. On today’s Big Take podcast: What happens when rapid immigration meets slow housing production. – Bloomberg
• [New Zealand] New Zealand House Prices Dip For The First Time in Eight Months – Bloomberg
• [Hong Kong] Hong Kong banks can absorb risks from falling property prices – S&P Global
• [United Kingdom] UK House Prices Fall Again After Mortgage Rates Creep Higher. Nationwide suggests property market has stagnated again. High cost of purchase and borrowing strains affordability – Bloomberg
• [United Kingdom] UK house prices fall unexpectedly for second month in a row. Nationwide data reflects impact of recent rise in mortgage rates – FT and The Guardian  

On cross-country:

• Golden Visa Programs, Once a Boon, Lose Their Luster. Spain is the latest European country to end its program, which brought in billions of euros from real estate investors seeking residency status but worsened a housing crisis for locals. – New York Times
• Why higher-for-longer interest rates may not be bad news for Asian property. While some markets have seen sharp declines in prices and transactions, borrowing costs are not the only factor at play in the region. The supply-demand imbalance, for one, is just as important – South China Morning Post

Working papers and conferences:

• Dynamics of the Long Term Housing Yield: Evidence from Natural Experiments – Princeton
• Hidden costs of homeownership: Race, income, and lender differences in loan closing costs – JP Morgan Chase
• The Mortgage Piggy Bank: Building Wealth Through Amortization – Quarterly Journal of Economics
• Housing Leverage, Home Value, and Retirement – SSRN
• Financialisation of the Maltese household? Household debt dynamics, the mortgage market, and housing in Malta – SSRN

On the US—developments on house prices, rent, permits and mortgage:    

• Housing Market Slumps as Mortgage Rates Top 7%. Existing home sales in March fell 4.3% from February – Wall Street Journal
• US Economic, Housing and Mortgage Market Outlook – April 2024 – Freddie Mac
• This State’s Housing Market Looks Most Vulnerable to Higher Mortgage Rates – Barron’s
• March 2024 Existing Home Sales: Housing Supply Continued To Increase But Sales Fell On Mortgage Rates Upside Surprise – Zillow
• The Cost of Buying a Home Hits New Record As Mortgage Rates Jump, Prices Rise 5% – Redfin 
• Housing Market Slumps as Mortgage Rates Top 7%. Existing home sales in March fell 4.3% from February – Wall Street Journal
• U.S. housing market paralyzed by lock-in effect – The Seattle Times
• New Home Sales Increase to 693,000 Annual Rate in March. Median New Home Price is Down 13% from the Peak – Calculated Risk
• Despite Higher Mortgage Rates, New Home Sales Post Solid Gain in March – NAHB
• Act Now or Miss Out: The 10 U.S. Cities Where Homes Are Selling Faster Than Anywhere Else – Realtor.com

On the US—other developments:    

• Housing Will Get More Expensive Because of the Fed. The only way to address the primary driver of high shelter costs is to build more apartments and houses. High interest rates prevent that. – Bloomberg
• Why a Housing Shortage Exists Despite More Houses Per Person – Marginal Revolution
• These Home Sellers Are Done Waiting for the Fed to Lower Rates. People need to upsize, downsize and change jobs, even if mortgage rates don’t come down soon – Wall Street Journal
• Scott on Housing in America: “The American Dream of homeownership is further out of reach today than it was just a few years ago.” – US Senate Committee on Banking Housing and Urban Affairs
• NMHC: “Apartment Market Continues to Loosen”. Leading indicator for Rents and Apartment Vacancies suggests more weakness for Apartments – Calculated Risk
• Housing market inventory is rising across most of the country—just look at these maps. Nationally, a lot more homes are available for sale than this time last year, but regionally the year-over-year housing inventory shifts vary by a lot. – Fast Company
• Challenge Accepted: How renters can overcome barriers to homeownership. Compromise is the watchword for location and affordability – Washington Post
• Costly Complexity. The needless complexity of affordable housing programs are hurting people they’re supposed to help. – Reason
• Final Look at Local Housing Markets in March – Calculated Risk

On China:

• The Folly of China’s Real-Estate Boom Was Easy to See, but No One Wanted to Stop It. Developers, home buyers and Western bankers all ignored warning signs; ‘financial anomalies’ and ‘shenanigans’ – Wall Street Journal

On other countries:  

• [Israel] How Israel turned homeowners into YIMBYs. A housing success story – The Work in Progress
• [Italy] How a home-improvement subsidy is wrecking Italy’s public finances. Government largesse is costing taxpayers – The Economist
• [Philippine] Philippines housing market continues to recover – Global Property Guide
• [Switzerland] Switzerland’s stable housing market – Global Property Guide
• [United Kingdom] Hotspots turn not-spots as the rural housing market cools. As the work-from-home bubble bursts, Londoners who bought out of town during the pandemic are finding selling up a slow business – FT
• [United Kingdom] London Mansions Sold at 30% Discount Spell Gloom for Luxury Market. Wealthy home sellers are cutting prices to secure deals as a slump grips the city’s high-end postcodes. – Bloomberg
• [United Kingdom] London house prices underperformed rest of UK for past 8 years. High costs, post-Covid trends and rising mortgage rates suppressed demand – FT
• [United Kingdom] The struggle to choose the right mortgage. As interest rates stay higher for longer, those looking to refinance face some difficult choices – FT
• [United Kingdom] Can long-term mortgages help solve the UK’s housing crisis? Home loans with interest rates fixed for a decade or more could get more buyers on to the ladder — and disrupt a £1.6tn industry – FT
• [United Kingdom] The UK Housing Market Has Turned a Corner. But asking price increases are still lagging wages and inflation. – Bloomberg