The Housing Bubble

A report from Metro New York. “Mayor Michael Bloomberg outlined a local stimulus plan Thursday intended to ease the burdens of the economic crisis. The mayor proposed 18 initiatives, including a Web site for laid-off financial workers and a schedule of smaller quarterly tax payments for properties valued at or below $250,000 instead of larger, biannual payments. The city plans to use $24 million in federal funds to buy foreclosed properties and turn them into roughly 250 affordable housing units. ‘We have an increased obligation to New Yorkers who face harsh, short-term problems,’ Bloomberg said.”

“Some New Yorkers were comforted by his suggestions; others said the billionaire mayor was out-of-touch with everyday struggles. ‘I don’t know any homes in our area valued at [less than $250,000],’ said Joan Bachet, a homeowner in Richmond Hill, Queens. Homes in her neighborhood’s least expensive part go for at least $400,000, she estimated.”

From Reuters. “Luxury home builder Toll Brothers Inc, finding fewer takers for its pricey condos in a market slump, is playing landlord in a bid to lure skittish buyers.

The builder, whose average home price of $672,000 is almost twice that of its nearest rival Standard Pacific Corp, is even trying this tactic in in New York City, where condominium prices seemed immune to a downturn until recently. ‘The market was different,’ said Toll Vice President David Von Spreckelsen. ‘This is new territory.’”

“At Toll’s Northside Piers in New York City…10 one-year leases are available through a local broker instead of the sales office. Rents are in the range of $4,000 to $5,000 per month and prices for the two- and three-bedroom units range from the low $800,000s to about $1.2 million. In that building, the company credits more rent toward the purchase price the earlier a renter decides to buy, Toll’s Von Spreckelsen said.”

From Crain’s New York. “Home prices in the tony beach enclave of the Hamptons have been hit even harder by the sinking economy and credit crisis than their counterparts in New York City. The average price of a house plunged 23.3% to a still expensive $1.5 million in the third quarter from the year-ago period, according to a Prudential Douglas Elliman report prepared by Jonathan Miller, CEO of real estate appraisal firm Miller Samuel Inc.”

“However that decline is far steeper than the 7% dip in Manhattan, the 11% slip in Queens, or the 5.6% slide in Brooklyn over the same time period.”

“In another sign of just how dire the market has become, the number of sales in the Hamptons fell 29% to 257 during the quarter from the year-ago period, while the number of days a house remained on the market grew 16% to 175. The price of a house that is south of Route 27, the most exclusive part of the Hamptons, rose 18% to $1.1 million in the third quarter from the year-ago period. However, even the prices of those typically sought after homes appear to be falling victim to the crisis. The average price fell 29% from the second to the third quarter.”

“‘There isn’t going to be a fire sale at the Hamptons,’ said Rick Hoffman, regional senior VP of the East End for the Corcoran Group. While Mr. Hoffman concedes that the market has slowed, he said it remains insulated because supply is limited.”

From Bloomberg. “The median price for a home on the eastern tip of New York’s Long Island fell to $830,000 from $1.03 million, the biggest drop in at least five years, according to a report by New York based appraiser Miller Samuel Inc. and broker Prudential Douglas Elliman Real Estate.”

“‘The Hamptons market is driven by Wall Street,’ Miller said in an interview. ‘There’s so much financial turmoil right now that even the most affluent people are putting plans on hold.’”

“‘When the stock market crashed everybody put the brakes on,’ said Judi Desiderio, owner of Town & Country Real Estate in East Hampton. ‘It’s just emotion. It’s not even logical anymore.”’

“More than third of the deals that were scheduled to close in the last week of September and the first week of October were put on hold, she said. While most of the transactions were rescheduled and eventually closed, about one in seven of them were called off, she said. ‘It doesn’t matter if you are buying a piece of jewelry or a car or a vacation home — people go into survival mode,’ Desiderio said.”

From Newsday. “Up until this year, Wall Street has had record-high or near-record bonus compensations,” said Jonathan Miller. ‘Prices are really at 2006 levels. The double-digit drops here are certainly a concern, but they’re matched against records that were set in the middle of last year, when we had a flurry of higher-end property selling.’”

“‘With so many less sales and the market kind of at a stalemate, what’s more likely to be trading are the lower-end prices . . . not that last year’s $1-million house is now at $720,000,’ said Hamptons agent Diane Saatchi, senior vice president at The Corcoran Group.”

“Even though pundits and buyers predicted a fire sale of homes and foreclosures owned by troubled Wall Street executives, Saatchi hasn’t seen that. Many of those tycoons bought their second homes with cash, she said.

“‘A lot of people, instead of lowering their prices, are hoping they can turn their vacation home into a rental property to get through this market,’ she said. ‘They’re not lowering their prices so much as looking at another way to get income from the house.’”

“Jamie Pastorelli and her husband used to hire a baby-sitter twice a week so they could catch a movie or share dinner at a favorite restaurant. Now their nights out together are down to twice a month. ‘We’re just cutting back as much as we can,’ Jamie Pastorelli of Northport, said yesterday. ‘Baby-sitters, holiday spending. That’s the plan.’”

“Jamie Pastorelli, a real-estate broker, said most of her family also has been spending less, eliminating any extras. ‘There are 16 nieces and nephews,’ she said, ‘Everyone says the same thing - it’s time to cut back.’”

“Mohammed Shaikh, 27, of Westbury, a stockbroker in Manhattan, said he’s spending, just not as much. ‘I will still go to the movies and still go out to dinner; I just won’t do it as much.’”

“New York Community Bancorp., the Westbury-based holding company for New York Community Bank and New York Commercial Bank, said Tuesday net income declined 48 percent in the third quarter, compared to the same period last year, largely the result of an investment with the now bankrupt Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.”

“The company, a lender to real estate firms, said it earned $58.1 million in the quarter, compared to earnings of $110.9 million in the same period last year. The bank said that the third quarter included a charge of $44.2 million. Included in that charge was $35 million related to the bank’s investment in Lehman Brothers.”

“Aggrieved investors in Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc have added new legal claims in what is sure to be one of the most closely watched lawsuits of the mortgage crisis, accusing company insiders and others of misleading them before the firm collapsed.”

“New court papers filed this week by a group of public pension funds suing to try to recover money lost on Lehman’s fall include information gleaned from more than 20 former employees at the Wall Street firm and its mortgage lending subsidiaries.”

“These ‘confidential witnesses’ include a former Lehman vice president who is quoted as saying that employees were ’skeptical’ of the Wall Street firm’s own public statements that it was well-positioned to withstand a housing downturn.”

“‘Lehman assured investors, falsely, that its exposure to the real estate meltdown was well contained, due, in part, to its claimed excellence in ‘hedging’ against losses in that sector,’ the 182-page court filing contends. It says the company’s financial reports ‘lacked transparency, masking Lehman’s exposure to mortgage-related losses.’”

“Total damages sought by the plaintiffs are sure to be in the ‘many billions of dollars,’ said David Stickney, one of the lawyers for the funds. Defendants include Lehman Chief Executive Richard Fuld and other company insiders and board members.”

“The new complaint also adds claims against a group of other Wall Street banks that underwrote Lehman securities offerings, including Citigroup Inc and Bank of America Corp. In one instance, the complaint cites an unnamed former BNC (one of the company’s lending units) chief operating officer who characterizes the lender’s sales and underwriting practices as ’some of the things that were most egregious in terms of the mistakes the subprime mortgage industry made.’”

The Buffalo News. “When the good times were rolling in recent years, New York State, not unlike Wall Street speculators, rode the euphoria with big budgets that spread around the cash at double and triple the rate of inflation. Now, with the nation and Wall Street in economic chaos, the state faces the consequences: $14 billion in red ink over the next 17 months.”

“Wall Street…provides 20 percent of the state’s revenues. The result is likely to mean major cuts coming to schools, hospitals, local governments and the thousands of entities that rely on state aid each year. An assortment of services faces retrenchment after years of growth. And, depending on which cuts are made when state leaders get down to business, increases in income or property taxes are not being ruled out for next year.”

”There will be hard and painful cuts. There is no segment of this budget that will not be cut,’ Gov. David A. Paterson warned.”

“In a midyear update on the state’s finances, Paterson shocked Albany with word that not only had the current year’s deficit swelled to $1.5 billion, but the state is now staring at a $12.5 billion shortfall in the fiscal year beginning next April 1. Over four years, the gap is a staggering $47 billion — nearly double what was projected just before the recent Wall Street collapse.’

“Among the most troubling projections is that the state will be losing 160,000 private-sector jobs by the end of next year, with higher-paying financial-sector layoffs 50 percent higher than after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.”

“Fiscal watchdogs said past warnings that the state was not prepared in the event of a sudden slide in the economy are now coming true. Spending increases of triple the inflation rate in some recent years contributed to a culture in Albany of being unable to say no to popular spending programs. ‘We knew things were starting to get shaky,’ said Elizabeth Lynam of the nonpartisan Citizens Budget Commission.”