Hi, I’m Matt Turner, Business Editor at Insider. Welcome back to Insider Weekly, a roundup of some of our most important news.
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do not miss: Our first digital cover story, featuring Serena Williams. The tennis star has opened up about her mom’s guilt, her venture capital firm, and the possibility of a “King Richard” sequel. Check out the full profile here.
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Wall Street is charging the housing market
Benjamin Rundel / Getty Images
If you or someone you know has tried to buy a home in the past six months, you’ve likely heard the horror stories.
Personally, I’ve heard of friends in Chicago, Los Angeles, New York, and other cities across the United States. Homes that look like they might be within someone’s budget end up being 30% to 40% above demand. Buyers of all cash are snapping up the major sites. Many homes are sold unseen.
To make matters worse, mortgage rates skyrocketed, driving up monthly costs, and wealthy investors, many of them backed by billions from Wall Street, added to the competition. According to a recent analysis, investors bought a third of all US homes for sale in the first quarter, the highest level in at least a decade.
Meanwhile, startups are ready to help those who already own a home access some of their equity.
Not surprisingly, then, the number of people looking for information about the housing bubble is on the rise, too. Read on for a Q&A with real estate reporter James Rodriguez to explain what’s going on.
What is one of the biggest things we’re seeing right now in the housing market?
The biggest story at the moment is mortgage rates, which have been rising over the past three months at the fastest pace in nearly 28 years. Early in the pandemic, record low mortgage rates encouraged buying activity despite rising home prices. But this week, the average 30-year loan rate hit 5% for the first time since 2011 — meaning optimistic buyers are staring at expensive monthly payments, on top of a shortage of listings and fierce competition for homes.
One of your recent success stories focused on Someone sold a Wall Street stake in her house. What is going on with this trend?
Home values have risen over the past two years, which means American homeowners are sitting on trillions of dollars of essentially trapped equity unless they sell their homes, refinance them, or take out a line of credit for home purchases.
But these options don’t work for everyone, and a number of companies offer an alternative called “home equity investments,” where they give homeowners cash in exchange for a percentage of their home’s future appreciation. These companies are backed by billions of dollars from Wall Street firms, eager to increase their bets in the US housing market.
How many people are using Google “Is there a housing bubble?” I rocketed up. What will you tell them?
Much of the concern about today’s housing bubble stems from the Federal Reserve raising interest rates, raising the odds of a
Recession
. But the good news is that experts we spoke with largely agree that the fundamentals of today’s housing market are very different from what they were in the lead-up to the financial crisis — lending standards have tightened and there is much less supply relative to demand, suggesting that the market On a more solid foundation than in 2008.
Read more here:
Read also:
From intern to partner Andreessen Horowitz in
Carra Wu is a partner at Andreessen Horowitz.
Alex Chang
In 2021 – after already dropping out of Harvard (twice) and working for Apple and Microsoft – 23-year-old Kara Wu got a coveted internship at Andreessen Horowitz, the Silicon Valley VC that has penetrated the cryptocurrency market deeper than any other. competitor. .
Now, a year later, Wu is the company’s youngest check writer and a rising star in the crypto investing world — and it all started with a cold six-sentence email.
Read the full story here:
Generation Z is more united than previous generations
Marian Ayala / from the inside
Generation Z is the most accomplished generation: They have more years of formal education, lower high school dropout rates, are more likely to avoid drug use, and have lower teen pregnancy rates. But they are also incredibly lonely.
A new study finds that Gen Zers eat fewer meals with their families, have less free time, and feel more pressure from their parents than previous generations, creating a pervasive sense of loneliness — which was exacerbated by their parents.
Read the full story here:
Several models say Tyra Banks “ANTM” left them shocked
Michel Rohn for Insider
America’s Next Top Model, a mixed modeling camp competition, was reality TV gold, designed as a golden ticket for models who wouldn’t otherwise have had the chance to break into the fashion industry.
But as the seasons wore on, the photo shoots, refinements, and challenges became increasingly unreasonable, and several models told Insider that it came at the expense of their mental and physical health.
Read the full story here:
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Curated by Matt Turner. Edited by Jordan Parker Erb and Lisa Ryan. Subscribe to get more newsletters here.
