Thank you all for your many suggestions of type of info available and where to look. Would any of you be willing to speculate what might be going on in the following situation: A major developer bought a parcel of land for a major development (several hundred single family homes, some multi family units and rec facilities.) A gravel road to the parcel had a couple homes on it The developer is currently putting in the roads for the development and has paved the gravel road. This road will be the entrance to the development. The developer has recently bought (for about 150,000) and torn down one of the existing houses. The other existing house has been on the market for over a year (listed for 160,000 for a year reduced to 130,000 a few months ago). In speaking to the listing agent he said the developer had made a verbal offer in the past but never followed through on a written offer. I do not understand given they bought and tore down the house across the street for close to the original listing price of this house why they aren't buying this house. Any ideas why the developer is not buying this house or of a way to find out?

ColorMe, the systems have been funky lately. Interestingly enough, the movement of tectonic plates was embraced earliest by some very strange people of the Von Daniken ilk (but a decade earlier.) I read all those books and enjoyed them mainly because they gave me permission to think about things in a new way. Most of what I read I didn't believe or agree with, but for some reason the plate tectonics stuff held. So, by reading some incredibly stupid book probably about the hollow earth, I learned enough about plate tectonics to dazzle a geologist with my learning a decade or so later. Go figure. Of course I've also learned enough stuff that is dead wrong to cure anyone's bedazzlement. My vote for the worst non-ficion would be the biography Sara & Gerald, of her parents Sara and Gerald Murphy by daughter Honoria Donnelly. These two incredibly interesting and exciting characters (according to two biographies Living Well is the Best Revenge by Calvin Tomkins and Everyone Was So Young by Amanda Vail) gave birth to a daughter who made them sound dull as ditch water.

our reno of Kitchen and DR lasted 6 mos, March to September with DH doing 90% of work....contracted out plumber, electrician and counters...plumber was a friend who did sink, pot filler -copper line and ice machine -copper line...electrician was my brother who ran wire but DH told him what and where and we bought all material ourselves... same as everyone else, dust dust and more dust.... we/I cooked on a induction hot plate, the grill, a griddle - it really was a huge help that the summer was coming, but we planned it that way.... if i remember correctly, there is a thread with "meals to cook while under construction" or something like that...that really helped me... my kids were in college/HS, so that end was so much easier than OP.... we ate in our FR, which is downstairs, split level.... had a dish, condiment, food cart....sounds good, but truly ugly and horrible, but it did serve the purpose. my kids still laugh about.... we were so cramped but we had to make it work, no choice... my best advice is set up a temporary kitchen as best u can and use paper products as often as u can... i had to wash in my "slob sink"...which was tough but again, no choice go to family houses to be in a clean house, let kids sleep there if possible... and hopefully u will get some invites for dinner.... i just kept telling myself..."this too shall pass", this too shall pass".... it will over one day and it will be sooooo worth it hang in there :)

Here is my 2 cents and worth at least half that... We have to remember that "the economy" is not some abstract thing. It is income for people. GDP is literally the compensation people receive for their efforts. This compounds because of the GDP multiplier, simply put... If you lose your job the GDP loses more than your wages, because you spend your money on things like rent, food, entertainment, clothes, etc. Those businesses where you spend your money use it to pay their employees who use it buy stuff so still other businesses can pay their employees. So the economic effect of 10% more unemployment can be large. The current GDPNow estimate (which uses indicators to estimate actual GDP and is not a projection) is scary, the latest estimate is -41.9%. I assure you, you are going to feel a 42% contraction in GDP. Yes, construction is still going, house prices are up, etc. However, that doesn't mean a lot, as the government and businesses have done lots of things to delay the pain, but they have not erased it. I am just letting renters who can't pay rent right now live for free, I am planning on crediting all my renters 3 months free rent, but if they don't go back to work I am eventually going to have to evict them. I can let people live rent free during a pandemic but I can't do it forever. However, it is going to change the money I have available to invest and the same is true for a lot of people. We still need people investing in bonds and MBS's to fuel the mortgage machine and they are not, so something is going to have to happen there. Maybe mortgage rates that are effectively negative. That has been done before and it does work, but there is the moral hazard problem. The government can keep injecting money during the pandemic and delay the pain Keynesian style, but eventually they will have to stop. ----- Here is my projection, it is an educated projection, but it is still just a guess. Actually, my projection is OK, it is my assumptions that are questionable. There will be a slow down in entry level home purchases (which drive the entire housing market). Houses will not lose that much value but they will slow down appreciation, largely this is going to happen because the number of buyers and sellers will both go down. The HELOC market is going to get tighter. We are going to move away from 100% & 95% LTV and go back to 80% and 85% LTV. Rates will stay down but approval will be a bit more difficult, and you will see more actual appraisals ordered. The low wage labor market will get a lot more competitive and construction wages will drop. Construction costs will drop with that and construction will become a bit more competitive. However, we could also see people more willing to improve existing homes than sell, so it might balance out and just become more profitable. In general, I believe there is a serious possibility that we see a change in liquidity versus equity. For years we have seen people preach about paying off your house because we have had a few asset bubbles in the last 30 years... Now we are seeing a liquidity crunch, where people with paid off houses and little savings are driving to food banks in order to eat. I suspect we may see people start valuing cash savings over home equity. I also believe the rental rates will become more competitive for the next 5 years. So that may have positive or negative affects on home value depending on your area. --- If you use any of that stuff above to make a decision, well you're a gambler. My advice to clients today is largely the same as it was before with a few modifications. If you are making a move I would suggest you not depend on a quick sale of your existing property. It may sell quick and that is great but make sure you can make two payments significantly longer than you hope to. You can't eat your shingles, don't sacrifice access to liquidity for equity. Until we can see past this, which will be a couple of months from now, plan but don't execute.