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Hardeeville Tops Growth List

post from S.C. Real Estate News on 02 July 2009 10:19:00 AM. © S.C. Real Estate News

- The StateHardeeville, which has annexed parts of the vast Sun City development in Jasper County, grew the fastest among South Carolina?s cities and towns last year, according to Census Bureau...

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Columbia Office Occupancy Rate Drops

post from S.C. Real Estate News on 02 July 2009 10:14:00 AM. © S.C. Real Estate News

- Columbia Regional Business ReportThe Columbia office market occupancy rate dropped 2% in the second quarter of 2009 compared to the same period in 2008 with an addition 145,614 square feet coming...

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Beazer to Pay $53 Million in Mortgage Settlement

post from Housing Wire on 02 July 2009 09:28:47 AM. © Housing Wire

At least one home builder is still feeling the full effect of the mortgage bubble implosion — and this time, the wounds were self-inflicted.For builder Beazer Homes USA (BZH: 1.83 0.00%), news Wednesday of a costly settlement was not the first sign of trouble out of its mortgage lending division. Beazer Homes and its mortgage [...]

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Banks Want Free Field That Could Lead To Another
Real Estate Bubble-Burst Cycle

post from Real Estate Investing For Real | A BiggerPockets Investment Property Blog on 02 July 2009 09:23:15 AM. © Real Estate Investing For Real | A BiggerPockets Investment Property Blog

Image by wallyg via Flickr Think the big banks would be at least a little grateful to American taxpayers for bailing them out with their money? Yeah, right! A published report the other day says these “too big to fail” institutions are doing everything in their taxpayer fueled power to head off a proposal by [...]

Banks Want Free Field That Could Lead To Another Real Estate Bubble-Burst Cycle

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Why does Phyllis Harb hire a decorator just for
you

post from Los Angeles Real Estate Blog on 02 July 2009 09:21:56 AM. © Los Angeles Real Estate Blog

The way we live in a home and the way it is showcased to sell are different. I have learned that when I provide complimentary home staging service to my clients, their homes sell faster. Homes which sell faster typically sell for more money. Realtor.org has an online magazine for Realtors; my favorite features are frequently the ones pertaining to home staging. Often, homeowners simply need to ?tone it down?. Company: Park Ave Home Staging & Redesign, Pennsylvania Problem: "Upon entering the master bedroom, the bed stops you. There ...

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ecorator-just-for-you.aspx?ref=rss

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The Townhouses Burnt Down - Now what

post from Toronto Real Estate West on 02 July 2009 08:47:00 AM. © Toronto Real Estate West

Last Monday night 56 or 57 townhouses under construction by Dunpar Homes at their Burnhamthorpe and Ponytrail site in Mississauga burned to the ground. This site has had fires before. All are being investigated as arson.In all, 96 high-end townhouses[...]

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RealUp Growing RealFast

post from S.C. Real Estate News on 02 July 2009 08:20:00 AM. © S.C. Real Estate News

Awhile back, I wrote about a new online listing site - RealUp. It has been just over a month since RealUp launched their beta site, and they have over 2,700 users with more than $11 billion of...

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On The Margin: Total Unemployment June 2009

post from Paper Economy - A US Real Estate Bubble Blog on 02 July 2009 07:49:00 AM. © Paper Economy - A US Real Estate Bubble Blog

Today?s Employment Situation report showed that in June ?total unemployment? continued its ascent and now stands at 16.5% of the civilian population or 38.88 million people.

The traditional unemployment rate is calculated from the monthly household survey results using a fairly explicit qualification of ?unemployed? (essentially unemployed and currently looking for full time employment) leaving many workers to be considered effectively ?on the margin? either employed in part time work when full time is preferred or simply unemployed and no longer looking for work.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics considers ?marginally attached? workers (including discouraged workers) and persons who have settled for part time employment to be ?underutilized? labor.

The broadest view of unemployment would include both traditionally unemployed workers and all other underutilized workers.

To calculate the ?total? rate of unemployment we would simply use this larger group rather than the smaller and more restrictive ?unemployed? group used in the traditional unemployment rate calculation.

Below is a chart (click for larger version) showing the ?total? unemployment rate versus the ?traditional? unemployment rate along with the year-over-year percent change to the ?total? unemployment rate.

Notice that the ?total? unemployment rate has been skyrocketing as of late showing a 63.37% year-over-year increase and reaching the highest level seen since the government began tracking the many measures of marginalized workers while the spread between the ?traditional? and ?total? unemployment rates stands at 7%.

The chart below (click for larger) calculates the spread between the ?total? unemployment rate and the ?traditional? unemployment rate.

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Envisioning Employment: Employment Situation June
2009

post from Paper Economy - A US Real Estate Bubble Blog on 02 July 2009 07:26:00 AM. © Paper Economy - A US Real Estate Bubble Blog

Today?s Employment Situation Report continued to reflect a severely contracting recessionary economy with the unemployment rate increasing to 9.5% while the Establishment survey showed another notable decline of 467,000 non-farm jobs over the same period.

As I had noted in a prior post, we are quickly approaching the second seasonal unemployment spike for the year (mid-January and mid-July are the typical unemployment spikes) that, in all likeliness, will bring a notable degree of re-acceleration to unemployment.

With the latest news just littered with poor earnings reports and announcements of job cuts and layoffs cutting across all regions and most industries, the recessionary job loss trend now appears to be following a far more severe trend than seen during our prior two recessions.

The following chart combines both the ?residential building? and ?residential specialty trade contractors? into one payroll series and then plotting the data since 2002.

Notice that, in aggregate, these payrolls, having peaked in February 2006 and declined 30.21% or 1,043,000 jobs since then, appear to be headed lower.

Also note that independently, ?residential building? has lost 31.45% of its payrolls or 321,600 jobs since it peaked during September 2006 and that ?residential specialty trade contractors? have lost 29.88% of its payrolls or 729,100 jobs since it peaked during February 2006.

Next, let?s take a look a slightly broader set of industry sectors that have been directly impacted both by the housing boom and now the bust (click for larger chart).

Note that I carefully selected sectors that showed either an obvious expansion-to-contraction trend OR a flattening-to-contraction trend and that ALL sectors have both a historical and logical relationship to residential housing as well as recent industry press releases disclosing declining profits as a result of the housing bust.

As you can see, sectors that are now being directly impacted by the current housing decline are numerous and cut across many levels of the job market from construction and materials to manufacturing and finally to retail.

Combining these series into an aggregate of payrolls ?directly impacted? by the housing boom and bust cycle and plotting it, along with the S&P/Case-Shiller Composite Home Price Index (click on chart below for larger version) since 1997 provides some pretty solid evidence that a relationship exists.

To expand the analysis a bit look at the following chart that shows percent change on year-over-year basis to BOTH the ?directly impacted? payrolls sectors and ALL private non-farm payroll overlaid with the S&P/Case-Shiller Composite Home Price Index.

To get a sense of the relative intensity of the pullback to the ?directly impacted? payrolls by plotting both the percentage of overall private non-farm payrolls that the ?directly impacted? aggregate represents as well as the contributions it is making to the rate of change of the underlying total private non-farm payrolls.

Notice that at its peak the ?directly impacted? payrolls represented over 6.7% (now 6.12%) of Total Private Non-Farm Payrolls and now contracted to a far more significant degree than that seen during the entire course of the 2001-2003 contraction.

Plotting the ratio of overall and private non-farm payroll as well as the payroll of various business sectors to overall non-institutional population (above 16 years old and not in jail or ?juvee?), the last eight years seem to pose more questions than answers.

The payroll-population ratio concept simply provides a mechanism for better isolating the changes to payroll rosters by calculating the percentage of population that is employed in a given sector at any given time.

In the following chart (click for larger version) you can see the ratio of overall non-farm payroll and private non-farm payroll to non-institutional population from 1948 overlaid with all U.S. recessions in that period.

As you can see, there is a fairly strong correlation to declining percent of population employed in non-farm and private non-farm endeavors and recession with particularly good peak-trough alignment for all recessions prior to 1990.

During the 2001 recession (and to a far lesser extent in 1990), although there where large declines to the ratio during the official recession period, the economy seemed to be able resume growth while the ratio continued to slide or stayed well below the peak of the prior expansion.

This is an interesting situation in that, although increases in population have been steady and could have replenished the literal number of jobs lost during the downdraft of 2000-2003, the 2000s expansion of payrolls was not strong (jobless recovery).

The following chart (click for larger version), on the other hand, the payroll ratio related to construction has remained above even the peak set in the 90s expansion but has dropped significantly below trend.

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Industry minister 'Gets It'

Bolder and more inclusive digital future embraced by Canadian federal cabinet ministers. With attention mounting on the need for a national digital strategy, Industry Minister Tony Clement brought together 150 leaders from across the country last week for a major...

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