Figure 1: Ten-Year Treasury prices have dropped sharply since November 8th, corresponding to a significant rise in mortgage interest rates.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\nHigher rates mean mortgages are more expensive.\u00a0 Higher mortgages mean less buying power, and less buying power means less competitive bidding for homes.<\/p>\n
2.)\u00a0 Crucial tax deductions are in limbo.<\/strong><\/p>\nInvestors hate uncertainty, and right now the upcoming tax policy impacting real estate is one huge question mark.\u00a0 Real estate investors today receive incredibly generous tax breaks.\u00a0 Mortgage interest and real estate taxes are generally deductible when computing income tax.\u00a0 Investors depreciate buildings even though the properties are usually increasing in market value.\u00a0 The more adventurous and frequent flippers benefit from 1031 tax deferred exchanges and the primary residence capital gains exclusion rules.<\/p>\n
The President-elect has vowed to eliminate many tax loopholes in favor of an across-the-board lower income tax rate for everyone.\u00a0 However, Trump has also stressed the importance of home ownership and has undoubtedly taken advantage of many of the real estate tax breaks in his former mogul life.\u00a0 Ultimately, the answer is we don\u2019t know which tax deductions will survive.\u00a0 But the uncertainty itself presents a huge problem as investors take a wait-and-see approach before their next purchase.<\/p>\n
3.)\u00a0 Foreign buyers taking a pause<\/strong><\/p>\nOn a related note, it\u2019s no secret foreign buyers have played a significant role in the housing recovery since 2008.\u00a0 Some recent trends are dissuading foreign demand.\u00a0 First, the immigration laws are in limbo while the new administration figures out how strictly it wants to pursue isolationist policies.\u00a0 Secondly, several key currencies have been crashing against the USD, making the foreign buying community less attracted to American properties (RMB for example fell 10% in the last 18 months).<\/p>\n
4.)\u00a0 The Airbnb arbitrage may be fading<\/strong><\/p>\nWe all love the sharing economy.\u00a0 Many of us have personally benefitted from staying as an Airbnb guest or even earning supplemental income as an Airbnb host.\u00a0 What we don\u2019t realize is how much of the total sharing economy is a short-term renting economy. \u00a0Specifically, there exist many markets where it is very profitable to buy a home, furnish it, arrange regular cleanings, and then rent it out on a short-term renting service.\u00a0 The net income can significantly exceed that of a traditional long-term rental landlord, and the result is upward pressure on housing prices for the entire neighborhood.<\/p>\n
We are finally seeing cities fight back.\u00a0 New York City, the largest apartment rental market in the US, has recently passed laws to forbid professional Airbnb host from operating without jumping through costly hurdles.\u00a0 Other cities are likely to follow and in the coming years, we will see one of the most spectacular regulatory debates impacting residents across the country.\u00a0 The results will impact other companies such as the hotel and hospitality industry, and even online portals, such as RentHop, listing longer term apartments for rent. \u00a0While we don\u2019t expect Airbnb to vanish, real estate investors may slow down in the coming years as they wait out the legislative and enforcement uncertainty.<\/p>\n
5.)\u00a0 The nine-year recession cycle<\/strong><\/p>\nLet\u2019s go back to the most recent period of extremely high interest rates.\u00a0 In 1981, inflation had run wild. The Volcker-era Federal Reserve fought hard to keep price stability using brutally tight monetary policies that brought us 18% interest rates on 30-year mortgages.\u00a0 Fast forward 9 years and we hit the 1990 oil shock recession (reaching 7.8% unemployment). Most of us heard of the next recession, the infamous dot-com bubble that peaked in 1999.\u00a0 And of course, the recent housing crisis is fresh on all our minds.\u00a0 In the worst crash since the Great Depression, the stock market fell 60% peak-to-trough from early 2008 to March 2009.\u00a0 Maybe it is all coincidence, but there are convincing arguments that the modern economy is constantly oscillating around boom and bust cycles as capital flows across asset classes. Are we doomed to begin another recession in the next 18 months?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
We are now 7 years past the worst of the housing crisis and great recession of 2008.\u00a0 In most markets, the long foreclosure overhangs and short sales are finally back to historical levels.\u00a0 Hotter markets such as San Francisco, Seattle, Denver, and Dallas are well past their old bubble highs (harder hit markets like Detroit […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4443,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"yes","_lmt_disable":"no","footnotes":""},"categories":[154],"tags":[193,190,191,186,188,185,177,187,189,192],"class_list":{"0":"post-4442","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-market-trends","8":"tag-193","9":"tag-airbnb","10":"tag-china","11":"tag-crash","12":"tag-depression","13":"tag-housing","14":"tag-inflation","15":"tag-interest","16":"tag-recession","17":"tag-trump-taxes"},"yoast_head":"\n
The Upcoming 2017 Housing Crisis? - Real Estate Topics, Tips, and Guides<\/title>\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\t \n\t \n\t \n \n \n \n \n \n\t \n\t \n\t \n