Weekly News (June 15, 2022)

Interest Rate (24th Week)

(By Fairway Home Loan )

                  Prime Rate:3.75 – 4.00%  /  Fed Fund Rate: 0.75- 1.00% .

• 3% Down payment for 1st home buyer is available.
• 5% Down payment 2-4 units FHA program available
• 15% Down payment 2 families -conventional program available.
• Potential home buyer — Have a pre-approval first before the shop.  Now we have 48hour underwriting turn-around times for regular loans.
• Self employed borrower – Need to prepare 3 month business bank statements and the YTD Profit and Loss Statement. YTD income can’t decline more than 30% compared to last year.
• 2022 Conventional loan limit:

Conforming SFR : $647,200.00/ Conforming high balance: $970,800.00

Conforming 2 Family: $828,700/ Conforming High Balance: $1,243,050

Manhattan Median Rent is over $4000 first time ever

(   Korea Times   6/13  )

• The median rent is over $4,000 in Manhattan, up 1.9% from the last month and 25.2% from last year, and the average rent is $4,975, up 3.2% from last month and 22.0% from a year ago, according to Douglas Elliman.
• Rent for studio and 1Br show strong increase: the median rent for studio is $2,975, up 26.3% from a year ago and the median rent for 1Br is $3,999, up 25.0% from last year.
• The median rent in Brooklyn is $3,250, up 18.2% from a year ago and the median rent in NW Queens is $2,950, up 19.6% from last year.
• While rent is soaring, the inventory becomes less and less: while number of new leases in May last year was 9,500, this year May it becomes 4,934 which is about a half.
• Rent listing inventory is 5,776, down 70% from last year, and vacancy rate becomes 1.8% this year May from 7.5% last year.

“NUBIANI” restaurant opened in K Town in Manhattan

(   Korea Daily    6/15   )

• The modern Korean BBQ restaurant NUBIANI opens today by KTM consulting group ( CEO: JoonHo Moon).
• The former store at 15 W 32nd St was 3rd Floor Café (3층 포차) which was famous for Korean foreign students and New Yorkers and they renovated the place for more than a year.
• They boast of the spectacular view of the Empire State Building and chef table style: total of 30 employees, including 4 professional chefs and 10 supporting staffs, are serving the customers.

Five Bergen towns stayed hot even as the real estate market slowed  

(  The Rcord  6/15)

• New Jersey’s housing market is showing signs of stabilizing after two frenzied years, thanks to rising mortgage rates.
• Whether due to location, luxury offerings, access to New York or other factors, some towns remained in demand last month. Even as the market normalized following the Fed ‘s biggest interest-rate hike in 22 years.
• According to compiling data by Compass Real Estate of Ridgewood using MLS statistics, five towns: Fairlawn, Hackensack, Mahwah, Paramus, and Tenafly kept the price jumping.
• Fairlawn, known for easy way access and shopping, is centrally located in the county and convenient to downtowns such as Ridgewood and Glenrock. The median price in May was $599K, up 14% from the same month a year ago.
• Hackensack, the Bergen County’s capital, has shown a building boom of condos, coops and apartments recent years and has become a desirable location for both its relative affordability and its cultural diversities. The median price is $392K, up 33% from a year earlier.
• Mahwah, the county’s largest municipality, has rural feel and is known for its parks and green spaces, such as Ramapo Reservation, whose hiking trails beckon those seeking an outdoorsy life style. The median price is $627K, rising 39% from a year ago.
• Paramus is centrally located and a shopping mecca, with four large malls and retail stores along with Rt 17 and Rt 4. The 1.65% tax rate is one of the lowest in the county. The median price is $985K, up 35%.
• Tenafly draws for its proximity to the GWB and highly rated public school. The May median price is $1.1M, up 28% from last year.

  Single Home New Construction slows down

( Korea Daily  6/13)

• Due to mortgage interest-rate hike and material costs, new construction shows 1.1M starts in April, down 7.3% annually, Department of Commerce reported.
• Construction material costs rose 19% from a year ago due to supply-chain disruption.
• Overall new construction rose 15% in April from a year earlier because of increased construction of multi-family buildings such as apartment and condo which shows the fastest increase in 40 years.
• Larence Yun, chief economist of NAR, said that builders are expecting more increase of rent due to high mortgage rates and low inventory of existing houses.

US 10 Year Treasury Yield Nears 3.5%

(   WSJ   6/15 )

• Investor’s retreat from government bonds in recent days reflects deepening gloom over the outlook for markets after Friday’s surprisingly hot inflation report: 8.6%.
• Rocked by data showing a broadening increase in consumer prices, bonds slid sharply on Friday and then Monday and Tuesday, pushing yields on U.S. Treasurys – which rise when prices fall – to their highest levels in more than a decade.
• Heading into Friday, there was widespread hope on Wall Street that bond yields had finally reached the peak of this year’s climb, having done enough to tighten financial conditions that consumer demand and inflation could gradually return to more sustainable levels.
• Now, many say they have little idea how high the Fed will have to raise short term interest rates to wrest control of prices, which are rising at a rate several times higher than the central bank’s 2% annual target.
• Treasury yields play a critical role. Their rise has helped the average 30-year fixed mortgage rate above 5% for the first time in more than a decade.

Crypto Meltdown Worsens as Coinbase, Celsius Retrench  

   (  WSJ   6/15  )

• Cryptocurrency exchange company Coinbase Global Inc. said it would cut almost a fifth of its staff and crypto lender Celsius Network LLC hired a law firm to examine restructuring options, as problems in the industry deepened.
• Coinbase who went IPO in April, one of signal growth companies of the crypto boom, said it is slashing its workforce by 1,100 employees, or about 18% of its staff because the company had grown too quickly and a potential recession could lead to another crypto winter.
• Celsius told users on Sunday night that it was pausing all withdrawals, swaps and transfers between accounts due to extreme market conditions, adding more turbulence to cryptocurrency prices.
• As of 5pm Tuesday, bitcoin traded at $21,991.89, down 5.4% for the day, and 68% below its all-time high

Others/Tech News: Carbon-removal Industry draws larger  Investments

• For last two months, $2B pledged to emerging technology promising to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

             ( Climeworks AG, a Swiss company provided)