Monthly Archives: October 2025

A Peek Behind the Real Estate Market

If you can believe Discover the Nation, rental markets in metropolitan areas are falling, as much as 12% in some areas. Grand incentives are being offered: rent credits, large gift cards, months of free rent to sign on, and still a lot of empty units sit empty, the windows staring out at what still looks like a bustling economy. It’s a matter of time before the truth breaks forth.

Air BNB homes are either empty or being switched to properties for sale. International investors are standing by, based on new laws, high prices and astronomical special assessments in some areas. For the first time in decades, “renters are back in control”. But are they really? Costs are rising faster than wages, free months worth of incentive notwithstanding, and people are giving up on ‘traditional’ housing like renting or buying. Well what else is there?

This is being called a ‘cultural shift’. More and more people are embracing ‘off grid’ types of lifestyle. More and more people are finding out that a life in under 400 square feet is pretty good when you’re not stressing about how to make a 5 figure house payment. According to Discover the Nation, “Housing markets don’t defy gravity forever.” Some of us watched a big correction in 2008: proof. We didn’t learn a thing, except that greed lives on, no matter what. I feel the effects of that greed looming.

On a side note and keeping the cultural shift in mind, remember that people in their 30’s are focused on setting roots…buying a home, starting a family. This market makes that impossible, and could be one reason young people are so angry these days. Their expected trajectory has been destroyed.

The ones who would be rushing to the market to experience the ‘American Dream’ cannot afford to buy a home now. Jobs are not as available and student loan debt still cripples young people. Those who can afford to buy are eyeing high interest rates and just refusing to accept both high home prices and ridiculous monthly payments. Some are moving back in with parents. House prices have been ridiculously high for a long time now, too long, so one important part of society is now pushed out of home ownership or even renting. Entire groups of people are being offered ‘free housing’, which kills the market in those areas while builders keep flooding the market with product that won’t sell or rent. If I didn’t know better, I’d call that insanity.

The rental market is struggling, clearly. But it’s not just rental high rises and it’s not just luxury accommodations nobody can afford instead of sensible, affordable housing. It’s also production builders. They have finally gotten a strangle hold on resale sellers, because only the wealthy builders can offer the tens of thousands of incentive dollars they offer to potential buyers. One builder is offering up to FIFTY THOUSAND dollars to fill their inventory with bodies, while they still build, by the way, and that’s with a total of 500 to 1500 dollars out of pocket to the buyer. That surely feels like a dream to those brave enough to test that water.

One builder is using their own in-house lenders to ‘qualify’ a buyer with a credit score under 500 in order to sell them a home. Oh, and how about a 3.99% interest rate offered by builders too. Often these come with adjustable rate products which ensure that the 490 credit score buyer will lose that home to foreclosure within years. I’ve seen this before too. By the way, that house that was such a dream come true? It’s still vastly overpriced and possibly cheaply built.

But the builders and lenders have made their money. Builders have ridiculously overpriced badly built product. Loans are sold to investors who will cash in on mortgage interest over the life of the loan…until they default. Am I writing history? Does this sound familiar to you at all? Do you remember the last housing crash?? It’s starting again. When I heard the ‘under 500 credit score’ advertisement, I knew. Here we go again. The only good thing is that buyers who have had to give up hope, will get it back. In the aftermath of a crash, or even during it, buyers have all of the power, and their demands are brutal. Sellers take a beating. Personally? I’m tired of this ridiculous greed-fueled, roller coaster market. And it makes me very sad to see young people blocked out…BLOCKED OUT…of the housing market. So while I see them take revenge after a crash, I understand.

If we think the crash of 2008 was horrible…which it was… we ‘ain’t seen nothing yet’ as they say. This time, the pain will be greater and spread thicker across America. And the recovery will take longer and will look awful if it happens.

Not painting a lovely picture, am I? Well maybe I’m wrong.

I’m Brenda Briggs with Premier Advantage Realty. Reach out and let’s talk.

What?

Okay, when I started blogging I actually used a computer, but I wasn’t great at it and I’m STILL not great at it.

But I appreciate every single person who stops by. Well not the trolls or weirdos, but the REST, yeah. THANK YOU!

That’s all.

Are We Being Manipulated?

We are back to violence. I’ve lived through an era like this in my life, where monstrous violence exceeds the inherent ability for mankind to harm itself. It was the worst of times. I would postulate that at least one of those happens per hundred years, possibly more as humans make an effort to destroy humanity.

I have a theory that we’ve done this before, not just once before, but many times. Everybody knows that major excavations in certain regions uncover literal cities. Those cities had to have been covered over eons ago. But the thing is, everyone stops digging once they find THAT city. I believe there is evidence of other societies beneath even those.

We have a guide called the Bible and I haven’t known it to be wrong. It says that the human heart is wicked. It says that in many ways, not the least of which is use of the word ‘sin’. Call it what you want to. I don’t really care. But leave your children untrained, undisciplined and what happens? Someone once told me that you don’t have to teach a child to lie (I didn’t do it!); you have to teach them to be strong enough to tell the truth. The effort to undermine truth is now called ‘my truth’. That, my friends is what is known as ‘my opinion’. Truth is truth.

I believe generations of children are being brainwashed in institutions where learning is the goal. Learning about mathematics, writing, history (so we don’t repeat it), literature, art, psychology, medicine, grammar (yes, it matters). If I hear one more person say ‘julery’ instead of jewelry, or reality instead of realty, I’m going to explode. You have no concept of root words, like jewel, leading to the word ‘jewel-ry’ if you have not studied or ever read the words. And if you say real-i-ty to me, you will NEVER be my REALTOR. You may go to the DOC-I-TOR, but I go to the doctor. You get my point. Anyway I went down a rabbit hole. Children don’t need to be talking about their genitals; that’s the job of parents to answer those questions. Children don’t need to be swayed in one direction of another politically. They need to learn to speak correctly, write well, cope with stress, understand the value of study, and realize that not everyone is Einstein.

I think now more than ever it is important to know when you are being tricked into having certain ‘beliefs’ or feelings, whether your ‘teacher’ has an agenda other than actual education; and it is important to view everything with skepticism until you get facts. There used to be a bumper stick that said, “Question Authority”. And there was one that said, “Question Everything”. Both are profound statements. And they don’t mean CHALLENGE authority; they mean question. Like…find out if that teacher has fact based teaching. And remember you have a mind of your own.

Please use it.