Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis

High-End Property Slowdown in Maryland and Texas: Where Next?
Export Prices Unexpectedly Collapse, Led by Agriculture; Non-Petroleum Import Prices Sink Most Since October 2009
Sorting the European Far Left from the Far Right: 10 Comments - Can You Tell Left From Right?

High-End Property Slowdown in Maryland and Texas: Where Next?

Posted: 09 Oct 2015 12:52 PM PDT

Correction: In what follows, I said initially said Virginia when I meant Maryland. Title and all references to Virginia corrected to Maryland. The person I quoted below said "MD" but somehow I spelled it out as Virginia. Apologies offered.

In response to Chicago Suburbs $1 Million+ Home Sales "Not Totally Dead" Yet; Rush for the Exit, I received emails from Maryland and Texas about slowdowns in those states.

Anecdotes do not constitute "data" but all three stories (counting Chicago) show significant weakness at the high-end in widely varying areas with distinct economic backdrop differences.

Paul from Maryland

Mish, I live in the Howard County, Maryland. It's the 4th wealthiest county in the US. We recently had a presentation by a Realtor on the state of the market. It's still a very strong seller's market in the $600K and below range. Inventory is around 2.5 months on a 3 month rolling average basis.

However, the high end is abysmal. Houses asking $2.5M+ are not selling at all. There are 20 on the market with no sales. In the $1M to $2.5M category, 293 are up for sale, with only 27sold, a weak showing.

A friend of mine who lives in a high end area told me about a neighbor who had asked $1.5M and sold for $850K. The Realtor opined that that a recession next year was likely.

Paul

Aaron From Texas

Hello Mish,

Good article on Chicago. We are seeing a similar slowdown on the high end here in Houston, particularly in the Energy Corridor (West Houston). Right now Texas has a huge problem with skyrocketing residential property taxes. I was on the local news last night talking about the City of Sugar Land's latest exercise in corporate welfare as they gifted about $8 million in new tax incentives to Schlumberger. That's $8 million that will be strapped to the backs of homeowners who have no real access to due process to fight our corrupt appraisal districts. It's actually fairly easy for corporations to get a nice discount from the CADs because Texas is a non-disclosure state, and the CADS get roughed up when they are sued in district court.

Aaron Layman

Oh Those CADs

I gave Aaron a call. "CAD" stands for County Appraisal District. It seems the CADs go way out of their way to appraise business property low and home prices high. They can get away with it because sale prices are not disclosed.

Aaron has his own real estate business and a blog. He wrote about the Schlumberger deal recently in Sugar Land Homeowners Get Steamrolled.

In a second email Aaron wrote ...

Hi Mish,

It was a pleasure talking to you. Thanks for the call. We have a "Sugar Land" TX, but not a "Sugar Town". My market here in Katy is more directly tied to the Energy Corridor. We have seen a very noticeable drop in new construction sales here this year in Katy and West Houston. Builders were chasing the high end of the market, and now those homes priced at $500,000 and higher are not selling nearly as well. What a surprise!

Cross Creek Ranch was one of the nation's hottest spots for new home construction in 2013 and the first half of 2014. Now things are rolling over. 6 of the last 7 months have resulted in negative YoY prices. One of my clients was able to get $119,000 off of the original list price for a new spec home.

For additional background, I am not just a licensed, practicing real estate broker. I am also a licensed educator and frequent blogger. I enjoy writing, and I have become fascinated with the crony capitalism from the Federal Reserve and various levels of government. Our financial markets are now a comedic farce, similar to our warped & manipulated housing market. It is an absolute travesty what is happening in this country, and I am continually amazed at the lengths our politicians and apologists will go to as they attempt to whitewash all of the fraud that is taking place and keep corporate criminals out of jail.

Interesting times!

Best Regards,
Aaron

Sugar Land vs. Sugar Town

That's the kind of honesty that's going to get an endorsement from me. If you are in the Texas energy belt looking to buy or sell, Aaron appears to be a good source.

I had mistakenly referred to Sugar Land as Sugar Town in one of our email exchanges. Thus the correction, with an accompanying musical Tribute

Link if video does not play: Nancy Sinatra - Sugar Town 1967

Where Next?

High-end rot is apparent in Howard County Maryland, the Texas energy belt, and Chicago suburbs.

Where's the next high-end bust? I actually suspect they are happening all over the place. And if so, recall my earlier statement that the economy rots from the periphery to the core but home price rot starts at the high-end and works its way lower.

I propose housing is not as strong as the bulk of economists believe it is.

Mike "Mish" Shedlock

Export Prices Unexpectedly Collapse, Led by Agriculture; Non-Petroleum Import Prices Sink Most Since October 2009

Posted: 09 Oct 2015 09:07 AM PDT

Economists expected export prices to drop by 0.2%. Instead they fell 0.7%, outside the range of any Econoday Import/Export Estimate.

A bounce back for petroleum prices helped to limit import-price contraction in September, coming in at only minus 0.1 percent. But contraction in export prices, where agriculture and not petroleum is the wild card, was very heavy, at minus 0.7 percent in the month. Year-on-year rates are very weak, still in the double-digits for imports at minus 10.7 percent and at minus 7.4 percent for exports.

A striking detail on the import side is slightly deepening year-on-year contraction in various core readings, still in the low to mid single digits with non-petroleum down 3.3 percent. This is the largest decline since October 2009 and points to fundamental price weakness for imports, in part a function of the strong currency which is giving U.S. buyers more for their dollars. Prices for petroleum imports rose 1.1 percent in the month, a welcome positive for the Fed's efforts to raise inflation but still a fraction of the giant 11.8 and 6.6 percent declines of the prior two months.

On the export side, prices of agricultural goods fell 1.1 percent and are down a stiff 13.5 percent year-on-year in news that is not welcome in the farm sector. Non-agricultural export prices fell 0.6 percent in the month with the year-on-year rate also speaking to fundamental price weakness, at minus 6.7 percent in what is record weakness.

But the price bounce for petroleum is a reminder that the great price drag from this year's oil rout may have run its course, especially given this month's early strength in oil prices. Still, this is a weak report that underscores the strong dollar's negative-price effects on imports.

Welcome Rise

Once again, the economic cheerleaders are praising price inflation. Bear in mind, this same group of cheerleaders have said all along that falling oil prices were a good thing because consumers would spend the money elsewhere.

Thus, falling oil prices are good, and so are rising oil prices. Do these people read what they write?

Off the Chart - Import Prices

Import prices are now down 14 consecutive months, year-over-year, literally "off the chart" as shown from the BLS Report on Import/Export Prices.

The last time year-over-year import prices rose was for the 12-month period ending July 2014.

Off the Chart - Export Prices

Year-over-Year export prices are also "off the chart", albeit for one month less.

Prices for U.S. exports fell 0.7 percent in September, following a 1.4-percent drop the previous month. Falling agricultural and nonagricultural export prices each contributed to the September and August declines. The price index for overall exports fell 7.4 percent over the past year, the largest year-over-year decrease for the index since an 8.3-percent drop for the 12 months ended July 2009.

Agricultural export prices declined 1.1 percent in September, after falling 2.5 percent in August. The decrease was mostly the result of an 8.3-percent drop in soybean prices, although a 4.3-percent decline in nut prices also contributed to falling export agricultural prices. The price index for agricultural exports decreased 13.5 percent for the year ended in September. Declining prices for meat, soybeans, and wheat over the past year primarily drove the drop.

Soybeans

Live Cattle

Word About "The Unexpected"

One might think that economists estimating export prices would be following the price of grains, soybeans, cattle, etc.

Do they? Or do they just pull guesses out of the air?

Mike "Mish" Shedlock

Sorting the European Far Left from the Far Right: 10 Comments - Can You Tell Left From Right?

Posted: 09 Oct 2015 07:57 AM PDT

In recent speeches in European parliament, press articles, or tweets can you tell whether the listed statements below were from the far left or the far right?

Here are the candidates.

Quiz statements below are as presented in Spanish newspaper Libre Mercado. I made slight translation changes for ease in reading, some from Google translate, some from translate.com. I also removed an identifying political party reference from one statement.

A key phrase in each statement has an identifying link. Without looking, who said what?

"We are participating in a spiral of endless austerity to save the euro and the German model of low wages"
"The people reject EU finance ministers which dictate how solidarity and living conditions have to be understood"
"Under pressure from Germany, the will of the Greek people has been trampled."
"The interest in our country is not to abdicate to Mr. Schauble to set the continent's economic policy. The interest of our country is not subject to a firm policy in Berlin, Brussels and Washington."
"The real sword hanging over our heads is austerity, and under austerity we fail to defend our values."
"Thank you, Mrs. Merkel come with your vice-chancellor, administer of the province of France, Francois Hollande."
"To the grand coalition that governs us: Merkel and Hollande, we deserve an alternative in Europe."
"Austerity is synonymous with massive unemployment, insecurity and the collapse of our welfare system. "
"The Eurogroup has brutally blackmailed Greece but despite that, the Greek people have not lost confidence in Syriza"
"The defense of German interests do not justify the subjugation of other European peoples. Your model [Merkel and Hollande] is subjugation to the US, austerity and unfair competition."

Far Right - Marine Le Pen: 1, 3, 4, 6, 8, 10
Far Left - Gabi Zimmer - 2, 5, 9
Far Left - Pablo Iglesias - 7

Statement 7 originally said "To the grand coalition that governs us: Merkel and Hollande, and to PP and PSOE, we deserve an alternative in Europe."

This was not an easy quiz. In fact, unless one heard the speeches or followed the tweets, it was damn near impossible. And that's precisely the point.

The far left and far right are both fed up with the EU. Some positions are indistinguishable.

Mike "Mish" Shedlock

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Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis

Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis

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