Not sure zk. The pent up supply thing is a mystery. I think that if I were an underwater guy, and I saw other under water guys get loan mods, or forgiveness, or live for months or even years without paying a mortgage, perhaps I would think twice. Why sell? Even if the home appreciates to where you are not underwater why sell?

Sounds like we are the same. I have spent the last 3 years buying as much RE as I could however none of it is in Cali. By trade I am an engineer so it is my nature to try to figure everything out. However that is not always the case in RE especially in this situation. It could be a blend of alot of things. The stock market is rising but alot of people consider that riskier then then RE. If you buy 600k worth of equities and they depreciate by 200k you lost 200k. If the same thing happens to your home you get a loan mod or maybe some forgiveness.

Easy choice to make right?

Is RE a good hedge against inflation? Maybe…. only if there is wage inflation as well. So maybe it hedges maybe the asset depreciates but you are locked into a low rate that you locked in with yesterdays dollars…

I wish I knew the reason only because I could then give clients good advice as to when I think things will normalize again. Right now I get asked when will things normalize and all I can say is when we finish this leg. Maybe in a month or two, maybe end of summer… maybe longer. We just look at supply and DOM.