The hottest Real Estate Substack posts right now

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Inside The Atlanta Braves 2025 Earnings Report (And Why A Sale Might Be Coming)

Huddle Up • 199 implied HN points • 27 Feb 26
💼 Business Real Estate
  1. The team posted strong 2025 financials — $732 million in revenue and a 172% jump in adjusted OIBDA — showing big growth even if on-field results vary.
  2. The Battery real estate development now drives meaningful, high-margin revenue (about 13% of total), letting the business rely less on game-day performance.
  3. Because the club is publicly traded and has growing, valuable real estate income, its overall value is rising and it could become an attractive candidate for a sale or ownership change.

Why Is Homeowners Insurance Getting So Expensive?

Construction Physics • 35493 implied HN points • 23 Jan 25
💰 Finance Real Estate
  1. Homeowners insurance costs have risen a lot over the past years, with a 33% average increase between 2020 and 2023. This has made it tough for many to afford insurance, leading some to rely on state-backed options.
  2. While rising construction costs and home sizes explain part of the increase, climate change and more frequent severe weather events are likely major factors driving up insurance prices further.
  3. Interestingly, even though some types of damage have become less frequent, the cost to repair them has increased, particularly for wind, hail, and water damage, which contribute significantly to higher insurance losses.

Land should be a public good—not just private property

The Novelleist • 325 implied HN points • 11 Feb 26
💰 Finance Real Estate
  1. Design cities by starting with a clear vision of how people should live together, using that utopian horizon to guide practical planning choices.
  2. Treat land as a public good and organize its use around long-term stewardship instead of short-term speculation.
  3. Capture and return the value created by land to the community so cities become more stable, humane, and make residents stakeholders in local prosperity.

1.600 million Total Housing Completions in 2025 including Manufactured Homes

CalculatedRisk Newsletter • 253 implied HN points • 23 Feb 26
💰 Finance Real Estate
  1. Total housing completions in 2025 fell to about 1.60 million (1.498 million excluding manufactured homes), down roughly 7.5–7.9% year‑over‑year.
  2. Multifamily completions declined sharply in 2025 (5+ unit completions down about 20% from 2023) after a 2024 surge, but they still ranked as the second highest level since 1987.
  3. Single‑family completions dipped slightly to about 1.01 million in 2025, while active single‑family inventory has risen (up 1.4% week‑over‑week and roughly 9.4% year‑over‑year) with a larger spring inventory pickup expected.

Case-Shiller: National House Price Index Up 1.3% year-over-year in December

CalculatedRisk Newsletter • 234 implied HN points • 24 Feb 26
💰 Finance Real Estate
  1. National home prices barely rose in 2025, with the Case‑Shiller National index up just 1.3% year‑over‑year and the weakest full‑year gain since 2011.
  2. There is wide geographic divergence: Midwest and Northeast cities (like Chicago and New York) saw gains while many Sun Belt markets (Tampa, Phoenix, Dallas, Miami) posted declines.
  3. The year split into two halves — modest gains in the first half were followed by nominal declines in the back half, and inflation outpaced price gains from June onward, eroding real home values.
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Fannie and Freddie: Single Family Delinquency Rate Increased in January

CalculatedRisk Newsletter • 191 implied HN points • 26 Feb 26
💰 Finance Real Estate
  1. Single-family serious delinquency rates for Freddie and Fannie ticked up slightly in January (Freddie 0.60%, Fannie 0.59%) but remain very low and at or below pre-pandemic levels.
  2. Fannie Mae’s multi-family delinquency rate declined in the latest report but is still near the elevated levels seen during the housing bust.
  3. Serious delinquencies are concentrated in older bubble-era vintages (2004 and earlier, 2005–2008), while loans originated from 2009–2025 show much lower delinquency rates; the report also counts loans in forbearance as delinquent even though they aren’t sent to credit bureaus.

Rebuilding the American Dream, One Row House at a Time

Common Sense with Bari Weiss • 273 implied HN points • 20 Feb 26
💼 Business Real Estate
  1. A startup uses a factory assembly-line process to mass-produce houses from prebuilt panels and finished rooms.
  2. Their product is a packable row house that can fit into shipping containers and be assembled onsite, offering more space than an apartment but less than a suburban home.
  3. The company aims to tackle the national housing affordability crisis by providing a scalable, lower-cost path to city homeownership.

A "Shortage" or "Crisis" versus Regular Scarcity: Part 1

Erdmann Housing Tracker • 358 implied HN points • 16 Feb 26
💼 Business Real Estate
  1. How much of your income goes to housing mostly depends on your income rank, so the common 30% rule is useful because a rise in the share of households above it signals real stress, not just normal variation.
  2. Over the last few decades housing stopped keeping pace with income growth and new homes got smaller, and political limits plus inflated land values have turned that divergence into a real, widespread shortage that would take millions of homes to fix.
  3. Owning and renting are different economic choices—ownership buys control and has different cash flows—so price/rent patterns vary by income and location, and the crisis shows up as people being forced to trade down or leave places they value because local rules block adequate supply.

Inflation Adjusted House Prices 2.2% Below 2022 Peak

CalculatedRisk Newsletter • 191 implied HN points • 25 Feb 26
💰 Finance Real Estate
  1. Nominal house-price indexes are at new all-time highs, but after adjusting for inflation the national index is about 2.2% below its 2022 peak and the Composite 20 is about 2.4% below.
  2. The price-to-rent ratio is roughly 9.5% below its 2022 peak, which suggests prices have softened relative to rents.
  3. Real national house prices remain about 10.3% above the 2006 bubble peak. However, real prices fell about 1.3% in 2025 as rising inventory and persistent inflation put downward pressure, so it may take years for real prices to reach new highs.

Book Review: The Land Trap by Mike Bird

Progress and Poverty • 3386 implied HN points • 13 Nov 25
💼 Business Real Estate
  1. Land has always been valuable for its role in production, its limited supply, and its strategic location. This makes land a crucial asset for economies throughout history.
  2. The financialization of land allows it to be treated as a commodity, which can lead to economic advantages in the short term but poses risks of creating bubbles that harm long-term economic stability.
  3. China's approach to land and real estate, like following Hong Kong's model, has led to significant financial issues, showing the dangers of poor land policies and the importance of learning from successful models like Singapore.

Home construction leading the almost recession recovery

Erdmann Housing Tracker • 210 implied HN points • 25 Feb 26
💼 Business Real Estate
  1. Construction employment is a leading indicator for recessions and recoveries, so sustained building activity makes it harder for a deep recession to take hold.
  2. Rising interest and mortgage rates around 2022 stalled construction job growth, but the sector is also held back by non-labor capacity limits, and overall unemployment has recently peaked and begun to fall.
  3. Recent upticks in new home sales and a normalization of migration into high-growth regions suggest single-family construction may soon rise, and homebuilder results could surprise to the upside.

How malls can become the midtowns of the future

Urben Field Notes • 205 implied HN points • 19 Feb 26
🪑 Design Real Estate
  1. Transforming dying malls and office parks into mixed-use, transit-connected neighborhoods can create new midtowns or metroburbs with homes, shops, offices, and public spaces that are walkable.
  2. The postwar move to car-oriented strip malls and isolated office campuses destroyed the old urban mix and proximity; redeveloping these sites is a chance to restore walkability and everyday urban life.
  3. Cities must shape these projects with public streets and parks, varied architecture, limits on bulky buildings, and strong transit links so they don’t become bland, privately controlled places.

New Home Sales at 745,000 Annual Rate in December

CalculatedRisk Newsletter • 229 implied HN points • 20 Feb 26
💼 Business Real Estate
  1. New home sales ran at a 745,000 seasonally adjusted annual rate in December, and about 679,000 new homes were sold in 2025, a slight decline from 2024.
  2. Inventory is elevated with 7.6 months of supply overall; completed homes are near multi-year highs and homes not started are at an all-time high.
  3. The median new home price is about 10% below its peak mainly due to a change in the mix of homes sold, and initial sales estimates are uncertain and likely to be revised down.

Parricide

Life Since the Baby Boom • 1613 implied HN points • 15 Dec 25
📰 News Real Estate
  1. A brutal murder happened on that block when a mentally disturbed young woman was released and then stabbed her mother, and she’s now back in confinement.
  2. The house where the killing occurred was bought, cleaned and renovated, then sold again, showing that properties with violent histories can be resold and aren’t always searchable in public records.
  3. The offender contacted the new owner from the institution with threatening messages, and the institution assured the owner the woman would not be released.

Hovnanian 1Q 2026 Earnings

Erdmann Housing Tracker • 168 implied HN points • 26 Feb 26
💰 Finance Real Estate
  1. There are speculative signs that the housing market may be turning.
  2. Hovnanian's 1Q 2026 earnings report is being used to test those speculations about a market turn.
  3. Full analysis of the results is behind a subscription/paywall, though a limited free preview is available.

Freddie Mac House Price Index Decreased in January; Up only 0.4% Year-over-year

CalculatedRisk Newsletter • 110 implied HN points • 27 Feb 26
💰 Finance Real Estate
  1. National house-price growth is stalling: Freddie Mac's index fell 0.13% month-over-month and is up just 0.4% year-over-year, the lowest point in this cycle and essentially flat over the past nine months, so prices could turn negative year-over-year in 2026.
  2. Many places are still below prior peaks: 36 states plus D.C. and most metropolitan areas remain under their previous highs, with the biggest declines concentrated in Florida and California—Punta Gorda is roughly 22% below its recent peak and Austin about 18% down.
  3. Signals point to further cooling but with regional differences: Freddie Mac and NAR readings suggest Case-Shiller will show smaller year-over-year gains, and rising inventory alongside record-low sales has slowed national price growth, though outcomes will vary by market.

Final Look at Local Housing Markets in January

CalculatedRisk Newsletter • 86 implied HN points • 02 Mar 26
💼 Business Real Estate
  1. Existing home sales remain weak — about 3.9 million SAAR and roughly 27% below pre‑pandemic levels, and sales have been unusually low for more than three years.
  2. Housing inventory is rising year‑over‑year and months‑of‑supply are nearing pre‑pandemic norms, which increases the chance that national prices could start to decline sometime in 2026.
  3. Prices are mixed: the national median is only slightly up year‑over‑year, but some local markets (notably California) have seen significant price drops, so conditions vary a lot by region.

December 2025 Residential Construction

Erdmann Housing Tracker • 189 implied HN points • 20 Feb 26
💼 Business Real Estate
  1. Recent Census estimates show residential construction is recovering very slowly, characterized as a "slow, boring" recovery. The recovery is modest rather than a strong rebound.
  2. A persistent housing supply shortage is the dominant factor for near-term construction trends and matters more than mortgage rates. That shortage largely determines how much new building occurs even as interest rates move.
  3. Understanding the current situation requires a long view of about thirty years of housing activity; the analysis connects past policies and market shifts to today’s supply constraints. The narrative explains how historical trends helped create the present housing dynamics.

January 2026 Erdmann Housing Tracker

Erdmann Housing Tracker • 147 implied HN points • 24 Feb 26
💰 Finance Real Estate
  1. Inflation that excludes rent has tracked very close to a 2% trend for about 3½ years.
  2. Rents should be treated separately from other inflation measures because they can distort signals used for monetary policy.
  3. Home price movements are driven by cyclical factors, credit conditions, and supply constraints, and understanding those components is key to interpreting housing trends.

Architecture "Billings remain soft to start 2026"

CalculatedRisk Newsletter • 153 implied HN points • 19 Feb 26
💼 Business Real Estate
  1. Architecture billings are in contraction, with the ABI at 43.8 in January and the index in contraction for 37 of the last 40 months. Because the ABI typically leads nonresidential construction by 9–12 months, this points to a slowdown in commercial real estate investment through 2026.
  2. Multifamily billings have been below the 50 growth threshold for 42 consecutive months, indicating continued weakness in multifamily starts and no billing growth for those firms since mid‑2022.
  3. Pending home sales fell 0.8% month‑over‑month and 0.4% year‑over‑year in January, missing expectations and signaling softer near‑term existing‑home activity; contract signings usually lead closed sales by 45–60 days, so weaker sales are likely in the coming months.

Reading List 05/24/25

Construction Physics • 7724 implied HN points • 24 May 25
💼 Business Real Estate
  1. Tulsa is attracting remote workers by offering $10,000 to new residents, which helps local businesses and encourages tech company growth.
  2. A tornado in St. Louis caused massive damage, destroying thousands of buildings and resulting in multiple fatalities due to sirens not sounding.
  3. In Shenzhen, stolen iPhones from around the world are often broken down and sold for parts, highlighting a global issue of theft and recycling.

Cool Paper on the progressive effect of upzoning

Erdmann Housing Tracker • 252 implied HN points • 09 Feb 26
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Real Estate
  1. Targeted upzoning mainly triggers redevelopment on low-density, high-value parcels near city centers, and those changes tend to take many years to materialize.
  2. Newly added floorspace lowers rents only modestly and diffusely because supply effects spread across the region, so undoing the large scarcity-driven rent premium would require much larger, citywide building and depends a lot on migration responses.
  3. Mid-20th-century zoning now imposes large welfare losses because floorspace prices far exceed construction costs, and the post-2008 mortgage/finance shock that curtailed suburban single-family building amplified the current housing shortage.

Q4 Update: Delinquencies, Foreclosures and REO

CalculatedRisk Newsletter • 62 implied HN points • 03 Mar 26
💰 Finance Real Estate
  1. Delinquencies, foreclosures, and the dollar value of REO properties have risen year‑over‑year but remain low by historical standards.
  2. Solid mortgage underwriting, widespread homeowner equity, and mostly fixed low rates make a large wave of foreclosures and cascading price declines unlikely.
  3. Foreclosure starts and inventory increases warrant monitoring, but many borrowers can sell or restructure loans, so the overall situation looks manageable rather than crisis‑level.

Do We Want High Home Prices?

MD&A • 138 implied HN points • 15 Feb 26
💰 Finance Real Estate
  1. Don't reason from a price change: the same price move can mean very different things depending on whether supply or demand shifted. For example, lower prices from more supply help consumers, but lower prices from a recession hurt them.
  2. High housing prices can be good or bad depending on the cause: when they come from supply restrictions like zoning and fees they mostly hurt renters and lock people out, but when they come from higher wages and growth they reflect higher living standards. Developers will build more if prices rise for the right reasons, but supply limits break that feedback and create persistent unaffordability.
  3. Owning a home only partly hedges future housing costs, so paper gains from house-price inflation often offset higher lifetime housing liabilities; amenities raise prices because they're scarce, not because higher prices make them better. Increasing housing supply lets people enjoy amenities without forcing others out.

Asking Rents Decline Year-over-year

CalculatedRisk Newsletter • 248 implied HN points • 03 Feb 26
💼 Business Real Estate
  1. Asking rents nationwide have fallen year‑over‑year across several major indexes, continuing a multi‑month streak and pulling rents down from their 2022 peak.
  2. A surge in multifamily supply plus weaker demand — including slower household formation and changes in immigration — has raised vacancies and kept rent growth under pressure.
  3. The trend is uneven: single‑family rents and a few metros still show modest gains, while many large markets are seeing weaker growth or outright declines.

Reading List 01/18/25

Construction Physics • 11483 implied HN points • 18 Jan 25
🕹 Technology Real Estate
  1. Real estate development plays a big role in how skyscrapers look and are built. There are great books that explain the process and thinking of developers involved in these projects.
  2. Congestion pricing in New York is improving traffic speeds significantly in a short time. People entering the zone are moving faster, helping them save time and frustration during their commutes.
  3. Some homes in Los Angeles survived wildfires due to smart design choices that included careful landscaping and construction techniques. These details can make a big difference in fire-prone areas.

Selling Freddie and Fannie - What's the Real Point?

TK News by Matt Taibbi • 3184 implied HN points • 20 Aug 25
💼 Business Real Estate
  1. The Trump administration is considering selling a part of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, which have been government-owned since the 2008 financial crisis. This might result in big profits for investment banks and hedge fund managers.
  2. Freddie and Fannie were once public companies but became like hedge funds over time, leading to risky investments that contributed to their downfall. The move to make them public again raises questions about whether it will end in disaster again.
  3. Selling shares in these companies could lead to higher mortgage rates for homebuyers, which would make buying a home more expensive. Concerns are being raised about whether this plan actually benefits the public.

Who saw the Kung-fu Robots coming?

Taipology • 60 implied HN points • 18 Feb 26
🌐 International Real Estate
  1. China is moving from copying to genuine leadership in some advanced tech fields — the new agile humanoid robots show authoritarian systems can still innovate fast.
  2. China functions as an authoritarian developmental/bureaucratic state with constant tensions between reformers and conservatives, central and local governments, and rural and urban interests, which explains its shifting growth phases from countryside gains to city-led booms and then more balanced growth.
  3. Some big risks have shifted since 2016: the real-estate market proved to be a massive bubble that was popped by policy, and Xi’s mix of anti-corruption and industrial activism has reduced certain problems while concentrating political control and creating new uncertainties.

A tale of two American cities

Wrong Side of History • 693 implied HN points • 13 Dec 25
💼 Business Real Estate
  1. Austin has become a magnet for talent and tech firms because of Texas’s low regulation, cheap land and energy, and an influx of Californians and international migrants, turning it into a fast-growing, futuristic city.
  2. That rapid growth brings clear benefits—jobs, higher wages and lots of new housing—but also serious social costs like rising costs of living, displacement of the city’s bohemian culture, and visible homelessness and mental-health problems.
  3. The story reflects a broader American pattern: a bold, experimental meritocracy that drives big inventions and new institutions, yet often produces stark inequality and an uncertain civic legacy because mobile tech elites don’t always create lasting public cultural endowments.

Final Look at Housing Markets in December and a Look Ahead to January Sales

CalculatedRisk Newsletter • 224 implied HN points • 02 Feb 26
💼 Business Real Estate
  1. Existing-home sales are very weak: 2025 posted the lowest annual sales since 1995, with a SAAR near 4.35 million and about 19% below pre‑pandemic levels.
  2. Inventory is rising and months‑of‑supply are above pre‑pandemic norms, and that higher supply—despite only a small median price gain—increases the risk of national price declines in 2026.
  3. Falling mortgage rates in late 2025 make a slight uptick in January sales likely, but new listings remain below 2019 levels so inventory improvements may be uneven across markets.

The Middleman Economy: Why Realtors Just Took a Big Loss and Homebuyers Might Benefit

BIG by Matt Stoller • 38389 implied HN points • 02 Nov 23
💼 Business Real Estate
  1. A $1.8 billion antitrust decision against the National Association of Realtors for price-fixing could change the housing market.
  2. The high commission structure for real estate agents in the U.S. could lead to changes in how homes are bought and sold.
  3. Private enforcement of antitrust laws is important in challenging monopolistic practices and promoting fair competition in the real estate industry.

Follow Up to Random Thoughts

Erdmann Housing Tracker • 210 implied HN points • 02 Feb 26
💰 Finance Real Estate
  1. The U.S. faces a large housing shortage — at least about 10 million homes and plausibly 12–15 million units — largely because construction fell after 2008 and vacancies have been depleted.
  2. Vacancies are at a functional bottom so new-home production must rise well above current rates to stop rent inflation, and major zoning reforms in supply-constrained (Closed Access) cities are needed to reach the higher end of the required housing.
  3. Per-capita housing consumption and residential investment are well below historical trends — conservatively about 13% below and equivalent to roughly $7 trillion (about 13 years of current investment) — meaning sustained, large-scale building is needed to close the gap.

GIGO from the San Francisco Fed

Erdmann Housing Tracker • 147 implied HN points • 10 Feb 26
💰 Finance Real Estate
  1. The post-2008 mortgage crackdown and a long-weakened construction sector made housing supply—especially multi-family—largely inelastic across U.S. cities, so migration has been the main way markets equilibrate rather than local building responding to demand.
  2. Metro-area averages hide how shortages disproportionately hit poorer households: a uniform lot premium pushes up low-tier home prices proportionally more, displacing lower-income families and mechanically raising local average incomes, which can be mistaken for voluntary preference sorting.
  3. The finding that incomes correlate with house prices is empirically right but misinterpreted; the deeper story is constrained supply and selection effects, and as building capacity recovers local zoning and demand differences (and related policy choices) will again determine affordability.

Homebuilder Earnings

Erdmann Housing Tracker • 168 implied HN points • 03 Feb 26
💼 Business Real Estate
  1. Pulte, M/I, and Meritage all reported earnings covering the period through December.
  2. Their earnings reports appeared to tell a similar overall story or trend across the three companies.
  3. Full details and deeper analysis are behind a subscription/paywall, so you need access to the paid content for the complete write-up.

Freddie Mac House Price Index Up 0.7% Year-over-Year in December

CalculatedRisk Newsletter • 167 implied HN points • 30 Jan 26
💰 Finance Real Estate
  1. National house prices barely rose — up 0.7% year-over-year in December and essentially flat month-to-month, marking a cycle low and raising the risk that YoY growth could turn negative in 2026.
  2. Many markets are down from recent peaks — 23 states and D.C. are below their previous highs, and the biggest city declines are concentrated in Florida, Texas, and California with Punta Gorda and Austin among the worst performers.
  3. Market signals point to further cooling — Freddie Mac and NAR measures seem to lead Case-Shiller, and rising inventory plus the lowest sales since 1995 have slowed national price growth and may push it lower.

“We Are Not as Wealthy as We Thought We Were”

Erdmann Housing Tracker • 505 implied HN points • 17 Dec 25
💰 Finance Real Estate
  1. Much of the $58 trillion in U.S. residential real estate value reflects higher prices on existing homes caused by constrained supply, so it is rent extraction rather than new wealth from better housing.
  2. New home construction has lagged, reversing the old "filtering down" process so older homes now "filter up," raising rents and lowering real incomes—especially for lower-income families.
  3. Official household net worth is overstated because future rent gains are counted as assets while the costs to tenants are not counted as liabilities, meaning measured wealth rose without improving living standards.

“We Are Not as Wealthy as We Thought We Were”: Part 3

Erdmann Housing Tracker • 421 implied HN points • 26 Dec 25
💼 Business Real Estate
  1. Filtering describes how homes change hands over time, and while houses used to "filter down" to lower-income buyers, since about 2008 many places have seen upward filtering where higher-income families replace lower-income ones and pay more for land rather than better homes.
  2. Upward filtering forces people into hard compromises — renters face steadily rising rents and many families are pushed to move away from schools, jobs, and social networks to avoid being priced out.
  3. The shift toward upward filtering is tied to chronic housing undersupply and restrictive permitting, so much of the apparent rise in household wealth is actually land-value gains captured by owners, not broader improvements in people's living standards.

On Yglesias on Manufactured Homes

Construction Physics • 20252 implied HN points • 05 Jan 24
💼 Business Real Estate
  1. Manufactured homes can reduce home construction costs compared to site-built homes.
  2. The theory that HUD code requirements caused manufactured home decline may not be accurate.
  3. Improving financing and reducing zoning restrictions may not significantly increase manufactured home construction.

Is This the Time to Buy a Home?

Spilled Coffee • 36 implied HN points • 04 Mar 26
💰 Finance Real Estate
  1. Interest rates are finally falling, but that hasn’t translated into lower home prices yet, so cheaper financing doesn’t automatically mean cheaper homes.
  2. Inventory is rising and there are more sellers than buyers, yet overall demand has barely moved, creating mixed signals about whether it’s truly a buyer’s market.
  3. Individual listings can still spark bidding wars and sell well above asking—especially for clean, desirable properties—so outcomes vary by property and buyers should be selective and cautious.

“We Are Not as Wealthy as We Thought We Were”: Part 2

Erdmann Housing Tracker • 421 implied HN points • 22 Dec 25
💰 Finance Real Estate
  1. Home prices jumped far above their long-term trend even though residential investment and real housing consumption fell, meaning the housing stock didn’t improve while market values rose.
  2. Rising rents drove much of the value increase — rent inflation has outpaced overall prices and a 1% rise in rent is associated with about a 1.68% rise in price/income, in part because land trades at higher price/rent multiples than structures.
  3. Because real investment in homes has declined, families pay more for housing, and if demand-side forces are blamed for higher prices that necessarily implies very tight supply; historically, large federal homeownership programs raised ownership without inflating values when they boosted housing supply.