MarketWatch: Weekly Real Estate Update for Riverdale, Bronx – 1/22/2023 – 1/29/2023

Did You Know?

* Evergrande Group, the world’s most indebted property developer and second largest in China, has been ordered to liquidate by a Hong Kong court, in a massive setback for China’s ailing real estate sector that could ripple through the world’s second largest economy.  Some major U.S. investment companies and other funds, including BlackRock, UBS, HSBC and Ashmore Group, held more than $1.3 billion of Evergrande’s international bonds.(CNN)

* Mortgage rates in the US will decline this year, stoking optimism about the battered real estate market, according to the latest Bloomberg Markets Live Pulse survey. 

The rate on a 30-year, fixed mortgage is expected to fall to 5.5% at the end of the year, according to the median from 236 respondents. That’d be down more than a full percentage point from its current level of about 6.69%, and the first annual decline after three straight years of gains. (BLOOMBERG)

* Is frigid weather around the US keeping some buyers on the sidelines? If so, this might be the best time to step in before things heat up….literally!

* In the past, corporate profit growth accounted for around a third of inflation. But a report from the Kansas City Fed found that nearly 60% of inflation in 2021 was because of corporate profits. ‘Greedflation’ caused more than 50% of 2022’s inflation surge, a study found, as corporate profits remain at all-time highs. (FORTUNE)

Courtesy of Stephen Lascher, Wells Fargo