As Dusty Springfield famously sang, “the world goes round without even a sound, and it looks like summer is over”.

 

Dusty was spot on regarding the second part of that lyric but the property and financial worlds were making plenty of noise over the past few months.

 

Growing confidence in the markets

Stockmarkets have rebounded, as have equities and commodities. Investors have regained their appetites for debt and the interest rates at which banks lend to each other has fallen back to near pre-crisis levels. Ben Bernanke, the Fed Reserve chief, has announced that the worst recession since 1929 was “very likely over at this point“. The Sage of Omaha himself (aka Warren Buffett), told CNBC yesterday that “the US housing crisis was over“.  

 

Confidence is also growing rapidly amongst large investors. I’m not just talking about hedge funds starting to actually buy shares again rather than short them, but also about pension funds and private equity groups buying huge amounts of distressed property in places like Florida.

 

Twice in the last 4 weeks I’ve seen developments with 100-300 units for sale taken off the market because single groups have purchased them outright, swiping the rug out from under the feet of those who were considering purchasing one or two units.

 

Kind Regards

 

Colin Murphy

Torcana.com

Many people (although hopefully not too many readers of these blog posts) can be forgiven for wishing journalists and commentators would simply shut up for a while about the trends in the housing and mortgage markets and concentrate on more important things like reducing unemployment and improving healthcare.

However, and whether we like it or not, the focus on the housing market needs to continue because it has direct links to many other industries and house prices directly affect consumer spending. Simply put, if people know that their house is increasing in value, they will tend to spend more money (and vice versa). In economic jargon, this is referred to as the Wealth Effect and it is very influential. The economic policy models of the Fed Reserve assume that a person whose house appreciates by $100,000 will increase his spending by the same proportion as a person who receives an extra $100,000 in stocks, shares and regular income.

Declining house prices also limit a banks willingness to lend money - not just for houses but also for cars, business start ups, holidays and general investment. Far too many people who should have known better lost sight of these forces.

Colin Murphy
Torcana.com