Confounded Interest – Anthony B. Sanders
Financial Markets And Real Estate
Collapsing crypto and metal prices coupled with a tanking stock market is pointing to EXTREME FEAR.
The BofA bull and bear indicator says the same thing.
The realization that government is just a money laundering operation for politicians and that The Fed is just a friend of the big banks says it all.
According to Redfin, US pending home sales fell to the lowest since the Covid epidemic of 2020.
With the population change from state to state, like New York, California and Illinous to South Carolina and Idaho (home of Napolean Dynamite), it is no wonder that the housing market is in a state of turmoil.
Why leave New York? A scene from Mandami’s NYC.
Home prices exploded under Biden and Covid Federal spending. Making housing unaffordable for millions. Now the turnover rates for homes is at its lowesst rate in decades.
Existing homes are now more expensive than new homes.
Florida housing is getting gut-punched from Naples to Punta Gorda.
Yikes! Median age of first time homebuyers is 40.
Fortunately, Joe Biden is out of office. But Chuck Schumer may make a comeback and restart the insane Covid-era spending. Schumer, the penultimate knucklehead in Congress, approved Ketanji Brown Jackson to sit on the Supreme Court of the USA.
Keep on printing money. It seems that home price growth requires The Fed to keep printing money.
S&P/Case-Shiller released the monthly Home Price Indices for November (“November” is a 3-month average of September, October and November closing prices). September closing prices include some contracts signed in July, so there is a significant lag to this data. Here is a graph of the month-over-month (MoM) change in the Case-Shiller National Index Seasonally Adjusted (SA).
From S&P S&P Cotality Case-Shiller Index Reports Annual Gain In November 2025
From S&P S&P Cotality Case-Shiller Index Reports Annual Gain In November 2025
The S&P Cotality Case-Shiller U.S. National Home Price NSA Index posted a 1.4% annual gain for November, in line with the previous month.
Real home values declined as consumer inflation (2.7%) outpaced the National Index gain (1.4%) by 1.3 percentage points.
Regional divergence persisted: Midwestern and Northeastern markets led by Chicago (+5.7%) and New York (+5.0%) posted gains, while Sun Belt cities including Tampa (–3.9%), Phoenix (–1.4%), Dallas (–1.4%), and Miami (–1.0%) saw declines.
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“Regional patterns continue to illustrate a stark divergence. Chicago leads all cities for a second consecutive month with a 5.7% year-over-year price increase, followed by New York at 5.0% and Cleveland at 3.4%. These historically steady Midwestern and Northeastern markets have maintained respectable gains even as overall conditions cool. By contrast, Tampa home prices are 3.9% lower than a year ago – the steepest decline among the 20 cities, extending that market’s 13-month streak of annual drops. Other Sun Belt boomtowns remain under pressure as well: Phoenix (-1.4%), Dallas (-1.4%), and Miami (-1.0%) each continue to see year-over-year declines, a dramatic turnaround from their pandemic-era strength.
“Monthly price changes were mixed but leaned negative in November, underscoring persistent softness. On a non-seasonally adjusted basis, 15 of the 20 major metro areas saw prices decline from October (versus 16 declines in the previous month). Only a handful of markets – including Los Angeles, San Diego, Miami, New York, and Phoenix – eked out slight gains before seasonal adjustment. After accounting for typical seasonal slowing, the National Index inched up just 0.4% for the month, indicating that price momentum remains muted.
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The S&P Cotality Case-Shiller U.S. National Home Price NSA Index, covering all nine U.S. census divisions, reported a 1.4% annual gain for November. The 10-City Composite showed an annual increase of 2.0%, up from a 1.9% increase in the previous month. The 20-City Composite posted a year-over-year increase of 1.4%, up from a 1.3% increase in the previous month.
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The pre-seasonally adjusted U.S. National Index saw a drop of 0.1% and the 20-City Composite Index fell 0.03%, while the 10-City Composite Index increased 0.1%.
After seasonal adjustment, the U.S. National Index reported a monthly increase of 0.4%, and both the 10-City Composite and 20-City Composite Indices posted month-over-month gains of 0.5%.
Its some kind of wonderful … for home buyers.
Home sellers outnumbered buyers by 47.1% in December 2025, the largest gap since Redfin data began in 2013.
The percentage jumped by +7.1 points from November, the biggest monthly increase since September 2022.
The number of active homebuyers fell -5.9% MoM to 1.34 million, the lowest level on record.
Meanwhile, home sellers declined -1.1% MoM to 1.97 million, the lowest since February 2025.
By comparison, in November 2021, there were 36.5% fewer sellers than buyers.
This all comes as elevated housing costs and economic uncertainty continue to push buyers to the sidelines.
Buyers now hold unprecedented negotiating power, but only if they can afford to enter the market.
Let’s see what sugar babe (aka The Federal Reserve) does.
Like The Talking Heads song “Life During Wartime,” we are dealing with the mortgage market affer Covid. What happened? Mortgage originations plunged after mortgage rates (red line) soared.
In addition, insane Federal spending levels caused housing prices to soar.
‘Stay warm!
Whip it! Will Powell and The Fed whip rates lower?
Bill Pulte has failed so far in making housing affordable. And don’t get me started on The Feral Reserve.
As a consequence of high home prices and relatively high mortgage rates, pending home sales have hit an all-time low.
Gone are the days of Janet Yellen and ZIRP (zero interest rate policies).
The west may be the best, but not for office space vacancies. National office vacancy rates were 20.5% as of Q4 2025, according to Cushman and Wakefield.
Newsom country (California) leads the nation in terms of office vacancy with San Francisco leading the pack at 33.1, Seattle at 32.3% and LA CBD at 31.7%
Q4 2025 Office Vacancy Rates – Cushman and Wakefield
Atlanta 25%
Austin 29%
Charlotte 24.6%
Chicago 25.6%
Cincinnati 25.4%
Dallas 25.9%
Denver 26.3%
Fairfield County, CT 26.8%
Houston 24.8%
Los Angeles CBD 31.7%
Los Angeles Non CBD 22.2%
Milwaukee 24.7%
Minneapolis/St. Paul 27.9%
New York – Downtown 22.2%
New York – Midtown 20.0%
New York – Midtown South 23.9%
Northern VA 24.0%
Oakland 22%
Oklahoma City 29.6%
Phoenix 26.5%
Portland 24.3%
Raleigh/Durham 22.9%
San Francisco 33.1%
Seattle 32.3%
Suburban MD 23.3%
Washington, DC 22.8%
Westchester County, NY 24.4%
Miami’s QB Carson Beck,
The US housing market is showing signs of improvement!
US existing home sales surged +5.1% MoM in December, to an annualized rate of 4.35 million, the highest since March 2023.
This marks the 4th consecutive month of growth and the strongest monthly gain since February 2023.
However, sales remain -2.51 million or -37% below the 2020 peak levels.
For the full year, there were 4.06 million existing home sales, unchanged from 2024.
Meanwhile, the median home sales price rose +0.4% YoY, to $405,400, a record high for any December. But mortgage rates have been declining.
A good Federal Reserve don’t. Print money, that is.
The Federal Reserve prints a lot of money (M2). Unfortunately, it largely benefits elites (the top 1%). The bottom 50% get some benefits, but the gains in net worth largely benefits the elite class.
This sounds like a legal Somali daycare scheme. Perhaps The Fed should be renamed “The Federal Quality Learing Center.”
Yes, Somalis have daycare centers in Columbus Ohio. Thanks Governor Dewine for doing absolutely nothing to reign in their fraud. /sarc
Confounded Interest - Anthony B. Sanders 
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