The Biggest Housing Bubble In The Entire History Of The United States Is In The Process Of Bursting | The Economic Collapse

The housing bubble that burst during the Great Recession was enormous, but it was nothing compared to what we are facing now.  Two decades ago, the average price of a home in the United States was about $140,000.  Today, the average price of a home in the United States is above $500,000.  We have literally never seen anything even close to a housing bubble of this magnitude.  Unfortunately, what comes up must eventually come down.

Just like we witnessed during the Great Recession, home sales have started to crash.

In January, sales of previously owned homes were 8.4 percent lower than they were in December…

Sales of previously owned homes in January dropped a much wider-than-expected 8.4% from December to a seasonally adjusted, annualized rate of 3.91 million, according to the NAR. Sales were 4.4% lower than January 2025. That is the slowest pace since December 2023 and the biggest monthly drop since February 2022.

This count is based on closings, so contracts that were likely signed in November and December, when the average rate on the 30-year fixed mortgage didn’t move much before dropping slightly in January. That rate is now 6.1%, according to Mortgage News Daily.

Regionally, sales fell across the nation month to month but were down the most in the South and West.

Sales of previously owned homes have been at a depressed level for years, and now things are getting even worse.

It is a really bad time to be a real estate agent in America.  So many really good agents are deeply struggling right now.

One of the primary reasons why home sales are so low is because home prices are way too high.

Over a 20 year period, the average price of a home in the United States increased from about $140,000 to more than $503,000…

While there have been periods of rising and falling home values, the end result is this: In the past 20 years, the average home price in the U.S. has grown from about $140,000 to about $503,800 as of 2025.

That is what a bubble looks like.

If you can believe it, the median value of a home in Montana grew by two-thirds in just four years…

Montana’s typical home value has increased by two-thirds in four years, according to new valuations published this month by the Montana Department of Revenue.

The department estimates that the median residential property in Montana was worth $378,000 as of the beginning of last year. Four years previously, before the state housing market blew up during the COVID-19 pandemic, the median value was $228,000 — meaning values have increased 66%.

What we have witnessed this decade has been absolutely insane.

As a result, 64 percent of all single Americans are now struggling to make their monthly rent or mortgage payments…

Nearly two-thirds (64%) of single people struggle to afford their regular rent or mortgage payments, compared with 39% of married people, according to a recent Redfin survey conducted by Ipsos.

These survey results in this report are from a Redfin survey conducted by Ipsos in November 2025, fielded to 4,000 U.S. residents. We consider survey respondents to struggle with housing payments if they selected “I struggle greatly to afford them,” “I regularly struggle, but sometimes okay,” or “I sometimes struggle, but generally okay.”

This state of affairs couldn’t persist indefinitely.

It was just a matter of time before something started to give, and now we are being told that home prices are falling in 26 of the 50 largest metro areas in the United States…

The sales slump comes as home prices are now falling in 26 of the country’s 50 biggest metro areas, according to recent report from Realtor.com..

This reminds me so much of what we experienced just before the crash of 2008.

And as I discussed yesterday, last month the number of foreclosure filings was 32 percent higher than it was during the same month one year earlier…

With the number of Americans losing their homes to banks rising for an eleventh straight month, it’s clear the housing crisis is getting worse rather than better. US foreclosure activity jumped again in January 2026, with a total of 40,534 properties facing foreclosure filings – a 32 percent increase from the same time last year. Foreclosure filings cover every stage of the process, from the moment a lender issues a legal warning to the point a home is formally seized after missed mortgage payments.

Do you remember what happened the last time that foreclosures spiked dramatically?

It is starting to happen all over again.

Every economic bubble bursts eventually.

Sadly, we live at a time when multiple bubbles appear to be bursting simultaneously.

Former U.S. Representative Ron Paul is warning that the entire system is on the verge of collapsing…

Former Texas Representative Ron Paul said the U.S. economic order rests on “fraud” rooted in the 1971 break from gold and warned that the current system is nearing its end, in a wide-ranging 90th-birthday interview on The Tucker Carlson Podcast released Thursday.

Paul, a Republican-turned-Libertarian-turned-Republican, tied his warning to the end of dollar convertibility into gold under President Richard Nixon, calling it the nation’s “first declaration of bankruptcy,” and argued that persistent money printing and deficits have created a brittle order primed for a severe correction.

In 1971, the median price of a home in the United States was $25,200.

In those days, just about anyone that was willing to work hard could afford a home.

At the end of 1971, the U.S. national debt was sitting at 398 billion dollars.

Now it is sitting at 38.5 trillion dollars.

Do you understand what that means?

The size of our national debt will soon be 100 times larger than it was in 1971.

Just think about that for a moment.

We really are in the end game.

We have destroyed the value of our currency and we are absolutely drowning in debt.

Now the economic bubbles that we have inflated are starting to burst all around us, and the days ahead are going to be filled with a tremendous amount of pain.

Michael’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.

About the Author: Michael Snyder’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com.  He has also written nine other books that are available on Amazon.com including “Chaos”, “End Times”, “7 Year Apocalypse”, “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”.  When you purchase any of Michael’s books you help to support the work that he is doing.  You can also get his articles by email as soon as he publishes them by subscribing to his Substack newsletter.  Michael has published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and he always freely and happily allows others to republish those articles on their own websites.  These are such troubled times, and people need hope.  John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  If you have not already done so, we strongly urge you to invite Jesus Christ to be your Lord and Savior today.

The post The Biggest Housing Bubble In The Entire History Of The United States Is In The Process Of Bursting appeared first on The Economic Collapse.

We Just Witnessed Something That Hasn’t Happened Since The Last Housing Crash | The Economic Collapse

During the days of the Great Recession, rapidly falling home prices caused all sorts of havoc for our major financial institutions. Unfortunately, home prices are starting to plummet once again in many areas of the country. And just like during the last housing crash, we are also seeing a surge in foreclosure filings. That doesn’t mean that this current crisis is going to look exactly like what we experienced the last time around. But nobody can deny that there are a lot of alarming similarities between what we are going through now and what we went through during the days of the Great Recession.

According to Zillow, 53 percent of all homes in the United States have lost value within the past year…

More than half of homes in the U.S. lost value over the past year, marking the highest share of properties to depreciate in more than a decade.

Research from Zillow revealed that approximately 53% of all U.S. homes have lost value since last year, up 14% from a year ago. It’s notable given that a share this big has not been seen since the tail end of the Great Recession – around 2012 – when home prices and household wealth started a meaningful recovery.

This is good news, but it is also bad news.

The good news is that prospective homeowners are finally getting some relief.  Home prices have soared in recent years, and this has priced many potential buyers out of the market.  A correction was greatly needed, and we are finally getting one.

The bad news is that prices are falling so quickly that some homeowners are now underwater on their mortgages.  We all saw what happened in 2008 when that started happening on a widespread basis.

So we need home prices to come down, but we don’t want them to come down too rapidly.

Unfortunately, some of the markets that were extremely hot a few years ago are now being hit extremely hard…

Many of the biggest drops are in once-red-hot pandemic boomtowns. In Denver, 91 percent of homes have fallen from their peak value. It’s 89 percent in Austin, and 88 percent in Sacramento.

Florida has been hit hard too: more than 80 percent of homes in Jacksonville, Orlando and Tampa are now worth less than they were a year ago. Dallas and San Antonio are also seeing declines of more than 85 percent.

If we see additional acceleration, this slide in home prices could become an avalanche.

Already, we have witnessed the biggest drop in home values that we have experienced since the end of the last housing crash…

Most homes have lost value from their peak, falling 9.7% on average. It is much larger than the 3.6% reported in spring 2022, but about level with pre-COVID-19 pandemic rates, according to the report. It is still well below the 27% average drawdown in early 2012.

I feel really badly for those that purchased homes during the past couple of years.

Many of them are already underwater on their mortgages, and new foreclosure filings are rapidly rising all over the nation.

One of the states where foreclosure filings are increasingly particularly quickly is Illinois…

But analysts were stunned to see Illinois emerge as one of the worst-hit states last month.

In October, one in every 2,570 Illinois homes had a foreclosure filing — a total of 2,118 properties. That includes 1,252 foreclosure starts (when the paperwork is first began) and 187 completed repossessions (when the foreclosure process is completed).

Illinois saw fewer than 1,900 filings in September, and just 1,597 last October.

‘We’ve definitely noticed an uptick,’ said Jason Merel, a realtor covering Chicago and the northern suburbs.

This reminds me so much of 2008.

If we don’t get this crisis under control very soon, it could get very ugly.

Meanwhile, large retail chains continue to report very disappointing results…

At the start of the week, Goldman’s top consumer specialist Scott Feiler pointed out this would be a “very important week” for earnings across the consumer sector. Home Depot set the tone on Tuesday by cutting its full-year outlook as big-ticket spending and home-renovation demand continue to fade. Now, the next major earnings report just hit the tape, and it’s delivering another clear signal of softening trends.

Target slashed the top end of its 2025 profit outlook amid softening demand, heavy markdowns, and uneven traffic, which continue to plague its turnaround strategy.

I think that Target is in a lot of trouble.

We are being told that Target’s woes are being caused by a four-headed monster of “shabby stores, sinking staff morale, jittery investors, and a leadership shake-up waiting in the wings”…

Inflation-weary shoppers are steering clear of Target’s messy, understaffed stores.

On Wednesday morning, the Minneapolis chain with 1,980 stores said third-quarter profit took yet another hit, deepening a slide that has now stretched across three straight years.

Target’s slump comes from a four-headed monster: shabby stores, sinking staff morale, jittery investors, and a leadership shake-up waiting in the wings.

Without a doubt, all of those factors are contributing to Target’s demise, but to me the biggest reason why Target is struggling is because most of their merchandise is grossly overpriced at a time when consumers have very little discretionary income.

We just don’t have a lot of money to throw around these days.

Once upon a time, it was not a big deal to spend a couple of bucks on a Big Mac.

But now the average price of a Big Mac has risen to six dollars…

In 2000, a Big Mac cost about $2.24. By mid-2025 the average price had climbed to $6. Adjusted for general inflation, that $2.24 sandwich from 2000 would work out to about $4.22 in today’s dollars. In other words, a McDonald’s signature burger costs roughly 40 per cent more than it did 25 years ago.

Other menu options have soared too. A FinanceBuzz analysis found that a quarter pounder with cheese meal more than doubled over the decade, from $5.39 in 2014 to $11.99 in 2024. A ten-piece McNuggets meal climbed from $7.19 in 2019 to $9.19 in 2024.

Our standard of living is going down.

Anyone that cannot see this is blind.

In a desperate attempt to stay afloat financially, many Americans are taking on second jobs…

It takes Tazo Stuart-Riascos 28,000 steps per day to make ends meet in one of America’s most unaffordable places.

He begins clocking that prodigious number of paces before sunrise, as he hustles from his apartment in Oakland to his retail job in San Francisco, then back to the East Bay for his night shift at Trader Joe’s, where he’s on his feet until 10 p.m. All that scrambling and Stuart-Riascos still just barely gets by.

He’s part of a growing number of people — many working one or more jobs — who find themselves struggling to stay afloat as the cost of living skyrockets and wages fail to keep pace, making it even harder to survive in the already-expensive Bay Area.

Of course now that the labor market is really tightening up, finding work has become a lot more difficult.

Just like we witnessed during the Great Recession, mass layoffs are happening all over the nation.

Many Americans are extremely concerned about what economic conditions are going to look like during the months ahead.

As always, let us hope for the best, but let us also prepare for the worst.

Michael’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.

About the Author: Michael Snyder’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com.  He has also written nine other books that are available on Amazon.com including “Chaos”, “End Times”, “7 Year Apocalypse”, “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”.  When you purchase any of Michael’s books you help to support the work that he is doing.  You can also get his articles by email as soon as he publishes them by subscribing to his Substack newsletter.  Michael has published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and he always freely and happily allows others to republish those articles on their own websites.  These are such troubled times, and people need hope.  John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  If you have not already done so, we strongly urge you to invite Jesus Christ to be your Lord and Savior today.

The post We Just Witnessed Something That Hasn’t Happened Since The Last Housing Crash appeared first on The Economic Collapse.

The Primary-Residence Scam: Here’s Why James, Schiff, Cook, and Swalwell’s Mortgage Fraud Cannot Be Tolerated | The Gateway Pundit

The Primary-Residence Scam: Here’s Why James, Schiff, Cook, and Swalwell’s Mortgage Fraud Cannot Be Tolerated

Guest post by Joel Gilbert

The American mortgage system is one of the largest and most intricate financial infrastructures in the world.

It relies on a vast network of borrowers, lenders, underwriters, title companies, insurers, appraisers, and global investors who buy mortgage-backed securities. Every link in this chain depends on one thing: accurate, truthful information.

When borrowers falsify occupancy status, particularly by pretending a property is their primary residence, they distort risk, manipulate pricing, and inflict real financial harm on both lenders and honest borrowers.

This is why prosecutors have long treated primary-residence fraud as a serious federal offense, and I believe it’s why Director Bill Pulte and Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) regulators are referring violators to the Department of Justice.

A Straightforward Example: Maxine Waters Told the Truth

California Election Code §349 requires its elected officials to maintain a “domicile” and “fixed habitation” in California, and the U.S. Constitution requires they be an “inhabitant” of their home state.

Congresswoman Maxine Waters complies. While she owns a home in Los Angeles, her mortgage documents for her Washington D.C. residence correctly identify 2105 1/2 S Street NW as a second home, both in her 1991 purchase and in her 2007 refinance.

As an honest public official, Waters accepted slightly higher interest rates than if she had lied and claimed her Washington D.C. home was her “principal residence” (or primary home), a designation which receives the lowest rates available because they are considered lowest risk by lenders.

The “Bad Four”: When Politicians Misrepresent for Personal Gain

Enter Adam Schiff, Letitia James, Lisa Cook, and Eric Swalwell. These public officials have done the opposite of Maxine Waters, misrepresenting their home occupancy to manipulate banks to obtain lower, owner-occupied interest rates they are not entitled to.

U.S. Senator Adam Schiff declared two different homes as his primary residence, one in Potomac, Maryland, and another in Burbank, California.

Like Adam Schiff, Lisa Cook, a Federal Reserve Board Governor, declared two different properties as primary residences in different mortgages, one in Michigan and another in Georgia.

California Congressman Eric Swalwell declared his Washington, D.C. home as his principal residence in his mortgage documents, a status he is required to maintain in California.

His lack of any verifiable California home means he’s in violation of state election law. If Swalwell can somehow provide a California home address, he is committing mortgage fraud in Washington, D.C.

Letitia James, New York’s Attorney General, bought two homes in Norfolk, Virginia, in recent years. She declared one as her primary residence despite being a New York state resident.

James declared her other Norfolk residence as a “second home,” but then treated it as a rental property in violation of her mortgage terms.

In addition, Letitia James, for more than 24 years, misrepresented her five-unit building at 296 Lafayette Avenue in Brooklyn, variously claiming it had one to four units to illegally obtain refinancing, a federal government HAMP loan, and mortgage lines of credit at lower interest rates and closing costs.

This is the same crime as “primary residence” fraud, misrepresenting key mortgage data for financial gain.

Why the Truth Matters to the System

The distinctions between a primary residence, a second home, or a rental property is central to the economics of mortgage lending. Historical data shows that borrowers are 3-4 times more likely to default on non-owner-occupied properties.

Allowing lies about occupancy hides this elevated risk.

How about down payments? Primary residences may require as little as 3-5% down, while second properties are often 20-25% higher.

When someone misrepresents a second home or investment property as their primary residence, they distort the lender’s assessment of risk.

The bank thinks they are issuing a safer loan than they actually are. In reality, they are being exposed to the elevated risks associated with investment properties including higher vacancy rates, greater likelihood of strategic default, and more volatile cash flows.

If this deception is tolerated, the pricing model for mortgages collapses. The lender cannot correctly measure risk, and without accurate risk assessments, the cost of lending rises for everyone.

Make no mistake, primary-residence fraud is theft. Lying about primary residence constitutes mortgage fraud, a federal crime under 18 U.S.C. § 1014. Penalties may include federal felony charges, up to 30 years in prison, fines up to $1 million, and civil liability, including treble damages.

The 2008 crisis proved what happens when lenders package inaccurate or misleading loan data: market collapse and taxpayer-backed bailouts.

This is because mortgage fraud strikes at the heart of the lending system. If lying about a primary residence were tolerated, the mortgage system would degrade rapidly. Risk-based pricing would stop functioning.

Investors would lose confidence in loan pools. Neighborhoods would suffer from hidden absentee ownership.

Mortgage rates would rise as lending standards tighten, and millions of legitimate buyers would be locked out of the market.

In the end, the actions of Letitia James, Adam Schiff, Lisa Cook, and Eric Swalwell aren’t harmless technicalities, they are deliberate manipulations of a system they are sworn to uphold.

These four officials sit at the pinnacle of public trust – a state attorney general who lectures others about integrity, a senator who postures as a defender of democracy, a Federal Reserve governor responsible for national economic stability, and a congressman obligated to follow the very laws he writes.

Yet each exploited the mortgage system for personal financial gain, securing benefits ordinary Americans would be criminally charged for attempting. Their conduct isn’t simply hypocritical, it is corrosive.

When the people entrusted with enforcing the rules instead violate them, they weaken the entire financial system, erode public confidence, and show contempt for the citizens they serve.

Joel Gilbert is a Los Angeles-based film producer and president of Highway 61 Entertainment. He is the producer of the new film Roseanne Barr Is America. He is also the producer of: Dreams from My Real Father, The Trayvon Hoax, Trump: The Art of the Insult, and many other films on American politics and music icons. Gilbert is on Twitter: @JoelSGilbert.

The post The Primary-Residence Scam: Here’s Why James, Schiff, Cook, and Swalwell’s Mortgage Fraud Cannot Be Tolerated appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.

This Was A Major Red Flag In 2008, And Now It Is Happening Again! | The Economic Collapse

The alarms are getting even louder each week.  It has become exceedingly clear that the U.S. economy has entered a crisis that is similar to what we experienced in 2008 and 2009, and a lot of people are really starting to freak out.  For those that cannot see the stunning parallels between the Great Recession and what we are going through now, I don’t know what to say to them.  There are a lot of people out there that simply choose to believe whatever they want to believe no matter what the evidence indicates.  In this case, all of the evidence is pointing in a single direction.

When foreclosure filings started to spike prior to the global financial crisis in 2008, that was a major red flag.

Now it is happening again.

In fact, during the month of October 2025 foreclosure filings were 19 percent higher than they were in October 2024…

In October alone, there were 36,766 foreclosure filings — the first step in the process, when a lender warns a borrower they’re in default. That’s up three percent from September and 19 percent from a year ago.

‘Foreclosure activity continued its steady upward trend in October — the eighth straight month of year-over-year increases,’ said ATTOM CEO Rob Barber.

The rise is stirring uncomfortable memories of 2008, when a wave of foreclosures triggered the worst housing crash in modern US history.

Read the second paragraph in that quote again.

Foreclosure activity has increased for eight consecutive months.

That is what we call a trend.

Some of the markets that were once the hottest are now seeing the highest rates of foreclosure filings…

States with the worst foreclosure rates were Florida (one in every 1,829 housing units with a foreclosure filing), South Carolina (one in every 1,982), Illinois (one in every 2,570), Delaware (on in every 2,710), and Nevada (one in ever 2,747).

Among metro areas with populations of a million or more, Tampa posted the highest foreclosure rate at one in every 1,373 housing units.

Following Tampa were Jacksonville (one in every 1,576 housing units), Orlando (one in every 1,703), Riverside (one in every 1,983), and Cleveland (one in every 2,114).

What a mess.

The good news is that it looks like there will soon be a lot of homes on the market in Florida.

We live at a time when our nation is facing a very serious housing affordability crisis, and this has hit our young adults particularly hard.

The following chart which was once posted by Charlie Kirk demonstrates how home ownership among young adults has plunged in recent years…

These days, a lot of young adults are convinced that they will never be able to become homeowners.

Others that have really stretched themselves financially to purchase homes are now being hit with foreclosure notices.

I really detest what Wall Street has done to the housing market, and now we are reaping the consequences.

Renting is the primary alternative to home ownership, but renters are having a really hard time right now too.

As Daisy Luther has aptly pointed out, vast numbers of renters are being ruthlessly evicted from their homes in this very harsh economic environment…

Rents in America are ridiculously high in many areas, and nearly impossible to find in other areas. This is harder to track than foreclosures for two reasons.

Nobody official is keeping track of evictions, so we have to rely on extrapolated data from regions that do have somebody watching. One example of this is a company called “Eviction Lab” that tracks data from ten states, but only in specific cities and counties in those states. Even with this sparse reporting, their home page shows more than a million evictions over the last year, and more than 78,000 just last month.

The other reason we don’t have official numbers is something called “informal evictions.” Some states have laws against dramatic increases in rent, but not all states do. Both my daughter and I, living in a metro area, have faced a vast increase in rent when our leases were up. For my daughter, the increase was $900 a month and for me it was $600 a month.

Most of the country is just barely scraping by from month to month.

So it is really easy to push most Americans into a state of financial disaster.

Just look at what is happening with subprime auto loans.

The share of those loans that are at least 60 days delinquent has reached the highest level ever recorded…

The share of subprime borrowers at least 60 days behind on their auto loans rose to 6.65% in October, the highest level on record, according to Fitch Ratings data going back to the early 1990s.

As auto loan delinquencies spike, we are seeing a shocking surge in vehicle repossessions as well…

A near-record number of cars are being repossessed as Americans continue to fall behind on their auto loans amid mounting financial strain.

According to data from the Recovery Database Network (RDN), analyzed by CURepossession, 2025 has seen over 7.5 million repossession assignments—authorizations given to an agency to recover a vehicle on behalf of a lender. Based on historic trends, this figure is expected to reach a record 10.5 million by the end of the year.

Although recovery ratios have fallen in recent years—potentially lowering the number of actual repossessions—it is projected that over three million cars could be repossessed in 2025, a level only reached in 2009 during the Great Recession.

Do you remember the “subprime mortgage meltdown” that we witnessed in 2008 and 2009?

Well, this time around we have a “subprime auto loan meltdown”, and a couple of very large lenders have already gone belly up…

PrimaLend, which serves the “buy-here-pay-here” auto financing market — where dealers sell and directly finance vehicles for customers with poor or limited credit — filed for bankruptcy protection last month.

Tricolor, which sold cars and provided auto loans mostly to low-income Hispanic communities in the Southwestern United States, also filed for bankruptcy in September.

Unfortunately, a lot more Americans will be getting behind on their mortgages and their auto loans during the months ahead because a lot more Americans will be losing their jobs.

With each passing day, we learn of more mass layoffs.

Today, it is being reported that Verizon “is planning to cut 15,000 jobs”…

The optics look awful for Verizon Communications if the Wall Street Journal’s report is accurate: the carrier is preparing for its largest job cuts ever just days before millions of Americans hit the road for Thanksgiving.

WSJ says Verizon is planning to cut 15,000 jobs. If that figure is correct, Bloomberg’s latest data suggests this would be about 15% of its roughly 100,000-person workforce. WSJ notes this would be the largest workforce reduction on record for the carrier.

Does this mean that Verizon’s customer service is about to get even worse?

Of course it would be exceedingly difficult for it to get any worse than it is right now.

By the way, you may have noticed that stock prices are absolutely plummeting.

I think that we will see a lot more market volatility in the days ahead, because global events are going to get quite chaotic.

We are truly living in one of the most pivotal times in all of human history.

Sadly, the vast majority of the population still doesn’t understand what is happening to us, and that is very unfortunate.

Michael’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.

About the Author: Michael Snyder’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com.  He has also written nine other books that are available on Amazon.com including “Chaos”, “End Times”, “7 Year Apocalypse”, “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”.  When you purchase any of Michael’s books you help to support the work that he is doing.  You can also get his articles by email as soon as he publishes them by subscribing to his Substack newsletter.  Michael has published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and he always freely and happily allows others to republish those articles on their own websites.  These are such troubled times, and people need hope.  John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  If you have not already done so, we strongly urge you to invite Jesus Christ to be your Lord and Savior today.

The post This Was A Major Red Flag In 2008, And Now It Is Happening Again! appeared first on The Economic Collapse.

Home Prices Are Starting To Crash – Is That Really Good News Or Really Bad News? | The Economic Collapse

Home prices are falling all over the nation.  Should we be cheering or should we be concerned?  In this article, I am going to discuss two distinct scenarios.  In one scenario, lower housing prices could be a really good thing for our economy.  But if another scenario plays out, we could potentially be looking at a repeat of the chaotic days of 2008 and 2009.

Zero Hedge is reporting that home prices in the 20 biggest cities in the United States declined for a 4th consecutive month in June…

Home prices in America’s 20 largest cities fell for the 4th straight month in June (the latest data available from S&P CoreLogic’s Case-Shiller data released this morning).

The 0.25% MoM drop was larger than expected and dragged the YoY price growth down to +2.15% – the weakest since July 2023…

Four months in a row is definitely a trend.

And other data points are confirming that a significant turning point has arrived.

According to Zillow, 27.4 percent of all home listings had their prices slashed during the month of July…

Home prices are falling in half of the nation’s largest markets, a new report reveals —sparking fears that a housing crash is looming.

Sellers are slashing prices at record rates to to lure hesitant buyers put off by soaring mortgage rates and economic uncertainty.

In July alone, 27.4 percent of listings had a price cut — the highest rate ever recorded in Zillow’s monthly data going back to 2018.

When more than a quarter of all listings have their prices cut in just one month, that is a tsunami.

If this continues, things are going to get pretty crazy.

Personally, I think that it is quite noteworthy that prices are being cut the fastest in areas that were “booming” not too long ago…

Florida and Texas, in particular, are home to former boomtowns where prices have fallen at the quickest rate over the past year.

Tampa prices are down 6.2 percent, Austin 6 percent, Miami 4.6 percent, Orlando 4.3 percent and Dallas 3.9 percent, according to Zillow.

‘Metros where price corrections are steepest are among those with the largest increase in inventory compared to before the pandemic,’ said Kara Ng, senior economist at Zillow.

Needless to say, we have seen this happen before.

And it didn’t end well.

According to the National Association of Home Builders, prices on new homes are being cut as well…

A closely watched gauge of builder sentiment tracked by the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) fell in August to its lowest level in more than two-and-a-half years. More than a third of builders reported cutting prices by an average of 5 percent, while two-thirds offered incentives such as help with closing costs to attract wary buyers.

Many Americans that have been frozen out of the market are very excited that prices are starting to come down.

Homes have become so unaffordable in recent years, and one recent survey discovered that the average American is spending 42 percent of his or her annual income on housing costs…

Four in ten American parents say they don’t believe, or aren’t sure, their children will be able to afford to live in the same neighborhood where they grew up, according to a sobering new poll. In fact, the survey suggests that more than half of all Americans think they’re already paying too much for housing, with the average person reporting that 42% of their annual income goes toward housing costs.

The study of 1,000 Americans, conducted by Talker Research and commissioned by construction finance platform Built, highlights how concerns about housing affordability have become widespread. What was once viewed as a problem mainly affecting the poorest households is now seen as an issue facing a much broader slice of the population.

42 percent is a level that was never going to be sustainable.

It was inevitable that home prices would start to come down, and now it is happening.

If home prices decline in an orderly fashion, eventually more Americans will be able to purchase homes and that will be a great thing for the entire industry.

Let us hope that is how things play out.

But there is also another possible scenario.

If home prices in the United States crash hard, all of a sudden millions of Americans could find themselves underwater on their mortgages.

In such a scenario, large numbers of those homeowners could simply choose to walk away from their mortgages just like we witnessed in 2008 and 2009, and that would cause chaos for financial institutions all over the nation.

In addition, when prices are falling very rapidly it can cause hesitancy among potential buyers.

After all, who wants to buy a home when it might be worth $20,000 less next month?

And it appears that we are already starting to see some early warning signs.  Home purchases in the U.S. fell through at “the highest July rate on record”, and I think that the perception that home prices are starting to crash is contributing to this…

15% of home purchases fell through last month—the highest July rate on record—as high homebuying costs made buyers skittish. Cancellations were most common in Texas and Florida.

Roughly 58,000 U.S. home-purchase agreements were canceled in July, equal to 15.3% of homes that went under contract last month. That’s up from 14.5% a year earlier and marks the highest July rate in records dating back to 2017.

This is beginning to feel so much like 2008 and 2009.

And just like in 2008 and 2009, employers are conducting large scale layoffs all over the nation.

For example, employees at Paramount are bracing for “a massive round of layoffs”…

It will be a turkey of a Thanksgiving for thousands of Paramount employees.

The media giant is targeting early November for what one insider called an epic “bloodbath” — a massive round of layoffs following its merger with Hollywood studio Skydance Media, The Post has learned.

Jeff Shell — the former NBCUniversal boss tapped by Skydance as Paramount’s new president — has told managers at the home to Paramount Pictures, CBS, MTV and Showtime to start compiling “kill lists,” a source with knowledge said.

So many people are losing good jobs right now.

If you still have your job, you should consider yourself to be blessed.

I also wanted to mention that another large restaurant chain just declared bankruptcy…

Bravo Brio Restaurants LLC, the parent of Bravo! Italian Kitchen and Brio Italian Grille, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection for the second time in five years, citing the “acute financial distress” facing the industry.

The company filed in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Middle District of Florida on Aug. 18, aiming to restructure its debt, streamline and reduce operational expenses, shed underperforming leases, close underperforming locations and attract a new investor.

The worse that economic conditions get, the faster home prices are likely to fall.

And the faster that home prices fall, the more likely it is that we will see a financial panic.

The housing bubble that we are facing today is far, far larger than the housing bubble that burst in 2008 and 2009.

If you can’t see the storm clouds looming on the horizon at this stage, I don’t know what to say.

Michael’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.

About the Author: Michael Snyder’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com.  He has also written nine other books that are available on Amazon.com including “Chaos”, “End Times”, “7 Year Apocalypse”, “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”.  When you purchase any of Michael’s books you help to support the work that he is doing.  You can also get his articles by email as soon as he publishes them by subscribing to his Substack newsletter.  Michael has published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and he always freely and happily allows others to republish those articles on their own websites.  These are such troubled times, and people need hope.  John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  If you have not already done so, we strongly urge you to invite Jesus Christ to be your Lord and Savior today.

The post Home Prices Are Starting To Crash – Is That Really Good News Or Really Bad News? appeared first on The Economic Collapse.

Here Are 6 Signs That The Housing Market Depression In The United States Is Getting Even Worse | The Economic Collapse

America’s housing market has been in a “deep freeze” for more than a year.  The combination of very high interest rates and very high home prices has frozen millions of potential buyers out of the market.  As a result, home sales have fallen to extremely depressed levels.  When I first warned that we were heading into a housing market depression, a lot of people thought that I was exaggerating.  But now the numbers show that is exactly what has happened.  The following are 6 signs that the housing market depression in the United States is getting even worse.

#1 Sales of previously-owned homes in the U.S. just fell again.  In fact, we just witnessed the slowest April that we have seen since 2009…

The spring housing market continues to struggle amid high interest rates and low consumer confidence.

Sales of previously owned homes in April declined 0.5% from March to a seasonally adjusted, annualized rate of 4 million units, according to the National Association of Realtors. That is the slowest April pace since 2009.

In 2009, there were 306 million people living in the United States.

Today, there are 340 million people living in the United States.

So the fact that we have fallen to a level that we haven’t seen since the Great Recession should deeply trouble all of us.

#2 Sales of previously-owned homes are falling even though active listings and new listings are both rising…

Active listings—the total number of homes for sale—last month hit the highest level since March 2020. They climbed 1.2% from a month earlier on a seasonally adjusted basis and rose 16.7% year over year.

New listings rose to the highest level since July 2022, increasing 1.3% month over month on a seasonally adjusted basis and 8.6% year over year—the largest annual gain since May 2024.

“A lot of people are selling their homes and downsizing because they’re worried about the economy,” said Meme Loggins, a Redfin Premier real estate agent in Portland, OR. “During the pandemic, everybody wanted more space for a home office or for their kids to run around, but now people are more focused on saving money. A lot of folks are getting rid of their investment properties, and I’m working with a couple of federal employees who are afraid of losing their jobs, so they’re selling their homes and thinking of moving into condos.”

#3 Most potential young homebuyers have been completely forced out of the market.  Shockingly, the average age of a homebuyer in the U.S. has surged to an all-time record high of 56…

The average age of homebuyers in the U.S. has risen by six years since July 2023 — another sign that younger Americans are being priced out of the market due to escalating ownership costs.

The average age of homebuyers is now 56, up from 49 in 2023, according to the National Association of Realtors’ annual state-of-the-market report released Monday. That’s a historic high, up from an average age in the low-to-mid 40s in the early 2010s.

#4 The median age of first-time homebuyers is spiking as well…

The median age of first-time buyers also rose from 35 to 38, while the share of first-timers dropped from 32% to 24% of all buyers for the year ending July 2024. That marks the lowest percentage since NAR started tracking the metric in 1981.

“In my two decades in the mortgage business, I’ve never seen a more difficult time for millennials to purchase a home,” says Bob Driscoll, senior vice president and director of residential lending at Massachusetts-based bank Rockland Trust.

This is a really bad thing for our society.

If most young couples cannot purchase a home until they are in their late thirties, something has gone horribly, horribly wrong.

#5 Zillow is reporting that home values have fallen in 27 U.S. states so far this year.  Is this the beginning of a price crash?…

Home values fell in half the country as the housing market faces a nationwide downturn.

According to Zillow, monthly home values dropped in 27 out of the 50 states this year. While Florida, Colorado, Washington, D.C., California and Washington state experienced the greatest value declines from March to April, the data could foreshadow a larger housing market shift.

#6 Meanwhile, employers continue to conduct mass layoffs all over the nation, and this is only going to increase pressure on the housing market.  For example, Walmart just announced that it will be laying off about 1,500 very well paid corporate employees…

Walmart is laying off around 1,500 corporate employees across various departments within its home office in Bentonville, Arkansas, multiple reports say.

In a memo shared with associates on May 21, Walmart executives said the company is “reshaping” some of its teams in an effort to modernize its business and enhance “associate, customer and member experiences.”

Most of the U.S. population simply cannot afford to shell out several thousand dollars for a mortgage payment every month.

Either interest rates will have to come down or housing prices will.

And if housing prices start falling like we saw in 2008 and 2009, that will cause all sorts of problems for our major financial institutions.

So hopefully the Federal Reserve will cut interest rates before it is too late.

One recent survey discovered that financial stress is at an all-time high for 70 percent of the U.S. population.

Absurdly high housing costs are one of the biggest reasons why so many people are financially stressed right now.

Home prices are way too high and so are rental prices.

If you were able to purchase a home and lock in a mortgage more than five years ago, you were extremely fortunate.

Those that wish to relocate now are facing ridiculously high prices and painfully high interest rates.

It has been said that he who hesitates is lost.

In this case, that is so true.

A lot of people out there that waited to pull the trigger have completely missed their chance.

Now the housing market is entering a very difficult chapter, and a tremendous amount of pain is ahead.

Michael’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.

About the Author: Michael Snyder’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com.  He has also written nine other books that are available on Amazon.com including “Chaos”, “End Times”, “7 Year Apocalypse”, “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”.  When you purchase any of Michael’s books you help to support the work that he is doing.  You can also get his articles by email as soon as he publishes them by subscribing to his Substack newsletter.  Michael has published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and he always freely and happily allows others to republish those articles on their own websites.  These are such troubled times, and people need hope.  John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  If you have not already done so, we strongly urge you to invite Jesus Christ to be your Lord and Savior today.

The post Here Are 6 Signs That The Housing Market Depression In The United States Is Getting Even Worse appeared first on The Economic Collapse.

The Collapse Of U.S. Home Sales Is Here | The Economic Collapse

This is a very difficult time for real estate agents and homeowners that are trying to sell their homes.  As I have documented below, sales of previously-owned homes in the United States just fell to the lowest level that we have seen during the month of March since 2009.  Needless to say, in March 2009 we were in the middle of the Great Recession.  Meanwhile, the number of unsold homes that are currently on the market just continues to pile up.  This is likely to put an enormous amount of downward pressure on home prices in the months ahead.

Of course the collapse of U.S. home sales that we are now witnessing did not actually begin during the Trump administration.

In 2024, while Joe Biden was still in the White House, sales of previously-owned homes hit the lowest level in almost three decades…

The final figures for home sales last year are in, and the story is quite grim: 2024 was the slowest year for existing home sales in nearly three decades.

Existing-home sales last year totaled 4.06 million, the lowest on an annual basis since 1995, according to the National Association of REALTORS® on Friday.

A big factor behind the slowdown was elevated mortgage rates, which spent most of the year above 6.5%.

In 1995, 266 million people were living in the United States.

Today, 340 million people are living in the United States.

So on a per capita basis, things were even worse last year than they were in 1995.

And now it appears that our problems are accelerating.  The number of previously-owned homes sold in March 2025 was even lower than it was in March 2024.  In fact, we haven’t seen a March this bad since 2009…

Higher mortgage rates and concern over the broader economy are making for a weak start to the all-important spring housing market.

Sales of previously owned homes in March fell 5.9% from February to 4.02 million units on a seasonally adjusted annualized basis, according to the National Association of Realtors. That’s the slowest March sales pace since 2009.

The housing market is in a depressed state.

Nobody can deny that.

Sales are falling even though the number of homes being listed for sale has been rising at a very brisk rate…

Sales fell despite a sharp increase in available listings. At the end of March, there were 1.33 million units for sale, an increase of nearly 20% from March 2024.

In Florida, the number of homes listed for sale has actually risen to the highest level ever recorded…

The number of homes on the market in the Sunshine State rose 23% year over year to a record high in January amid a decrease in homebuying, an influx of newly built homes for sale, intensifying natural disasters, and surging insurance costs and HOA fees.

Florida ended January with 172,209 homes for sale—the highest inventory of any month in records dating back to 2012. That’s up 22.7% from a year earlier.

When supply is very high but demand is very low, that is inevitably going to force prices down.

And we are already starting to see condo prices decline precipitously in some areas of the country…

Condos are often the first and biggest movers in local housing markets. Prices exploded in many of them over the three years between mid-2019 and the peak in mid-2022, by 60% such as in Austin, TX; by 70% such as in Tampa, FL, and Chula Vista, San Diego County, CA; or by 80% such as in Mesa, AZ, and Lakeland, FL.

But this absurdity is now coming unglued, and prices have begun spiraling down. In Austin, which is on the forefront of this movement, prices have already given up nearly two-thirds of the 60% three-year gain. People who bought at the top in mid-2022 are 22% underwater. People who bought in mid-2019 are still sitting on a 20% gain that is shrinking.

Unless the Federal Reserve cuts interest rates, it is likely that home prices will decline significantly.

But of course the truth is that the Federal Reserve may soon be forced to start cutting rates because economic conditions are really starting to deteriorate.

Once rates go down, home prices could start rising again.

In this economic environment, there is just so much uncertainty.

But what we do know is that much of the population is really struggling right now.

In fact, a brand new survey that was just released found that approximately two-fifths of all U.S. adults under the age of 30 are barely getting by financially…

Young Americans are sounding the alarm about their finances, with roughly 2 in 5 people under 30 saying they’re either “struggling to make ends meet” or “getting by with limited security.”

That’s according to a survey of 2,096 adults ages 18 to 29, conducted by Harvard’s Institute of Politics between March 14 and 25, 2025. The survey found that among that age group, financial insecurity most affected women, Hispanics and those without college degrees.

Times are tough.

Four years of Bidenomics did an incredible amount of damage to our economy, and now consumers have far less discretionary income than they once did.

This is one of the reasons why so many restaurant chains are now in such deep financial trouble.  This week, we learned that Jack in the Box will be closing “between 150 to 200 underperforming restaurants”…

Jack in the Box said Wednesday it is planning to close between 150 to 200 underperforming restaurants and could sell the Del Taco brand it acquired three years ago.

The San Diego-based chain, which currently operates and franchises 2,200 restaurants across 22 states, primarily on the West coast and Midwest, said it plans to close 80 to 120 locations by the end of 2025, with the “remaining underperforming restaurants closing thereafter based on respective franchise agreement termination dates.”

I wish that I had better news for you.

I really do.

But what we are facing is undeniable.

When the Federal Reserve started to raise interest rates, I warned that it would be absolutely devastating for the housing market.

And that is exactly what has transpired.  March 2025 was the worst March for home sales since the Great Recession.

Hopefully the Federal Reserve will cut interest rates.  If they choose to do so, I will cheer.

But for now, we have got a real mess on our hands.

The collapse of U.S. home sales is here, and so far the Federal Reserve is choosing to sit on the sidelines and watch it happen.

Michael’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.

About the Author: Michael Snyder’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com.  He has also written nine other books that are available on Amazon.com including “Chaos”, “End Times”, “7 Year Apocalypse”, “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”.  When you purchase any of Michael’s books you help to support the work that he is doing.  You can also get his articles by email as soon as he publishes them by subscribing to his Substack newsletter.  Michael has published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and he always freely and happily allows others to republish those articles on their own websites.  These are such troubled times, and people need hope.  John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  If you have not already done so, we strongly urge you to invite Jesus Christ to be your Lord and Savior today.

The post The Collapse Of U.S. Home Sales Is Here appeared first on The Economic Collapse.