There’s One Big Reason Why Housing Inventory Is so Tight Right Now

June 17, 2023June 17, 2023 Admin

Welcome to Saturday. I’m Phil Rosen. A lot of moving parts today — we’ve got stories on Tesla, Microsoft, housing and more.

Let’s get started.

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1. Pretty much everyone with a mortgage is paying a lower rate than what’s being offered today. That stat comes from Redfin, which says over 90% of mortgage borrowers have a rate under 6%. That’s compared to about 6.7% you can expect to pay on a new 30-year home loan today. It’s keeping sellers on the sidelines and pushing inventory to near-record lows.

2. Elon Musk has been shirking rent payments for Twitter, and that’s creating problems for Goldman Sachs. The firm helped originate a $1.7 billion loan to Columbia Property, which owns some Twitter offices. Musk has apparently said he’d pay rent over his dead body.

3. Meet a former waitress who lived paycheck to paycheck before acquiring her first property. She bought a home in Detroit for $6,300 — then figured out how to scale to 35 units and achieve financial freedom.

4. Did you know RV sales are an under-the-radar bellwether for the health of the economy? And as it turns out, they’re tanking right now.

5. Russia’s central bank has sounded the alarm on the economy. A weakening ruble and a record labor shortage have added to the country’s inflation issues, and policymakers signaled that interest rate hikes could soon be on the way.

6. Low housing supply could lead to an increasing number of eager Americans to build a type of house in the yard of an existing home. A new report from Miami University forecasted that we could see an uptick in what’s known as accessory dwelling units — also known as “backyard homes.”

7. Argentina may ditch its peso and adopt the dollar. That’s according to the country’s presidential frontrunner, Javier Milei, who thinks the move could help ease soaring prices. In May, inflation in Argentina hit 109%.

8. Jeff Bezos just bought Amazon stock for the first time in more than 20 years. He bought a single share of the company for about $115 in May. Given the odd timing of the trade, it’s possible he was doing some Elon-Musk-style trolling.

9. Goldman Sachs strategists listed out which stocks they expect to run higher this year. This batch of 24 names, in the firm’s view, look poised to latch onto a coming rally before year-end. Here’s the full list.

10. Top Wall Street strategists broke down why you should proceed with caution on AI stocks. The hype is here and seems to be growing, but there are still concerns over it’s long-term staying power. Four experts explain why.

Curated by Phil Rosen in New York. Feedback or tips? Tweet @philrosenn or email [email protected]

Edited by Max Adams (@maxradams) in New York.