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by metaphor 1282 days ago
Nominal terms may not be the best way to look at it.

Here's a more intuitive visualization[1] of just how ridiculous the situation is.

The at-a-glance takeaway is that those who bought anytime from 2021 and today are, on average, almost certainly holding an illiquid bag that's even more overvalued than the inflation-adjusted peak of the housing bubble leading into the GFC.

The original Black Knight press release[2] cited by the article highlights:

> Of all homes purchased with a mortgage in 2022, 8% are now at least marginally underwater and nearly 40% have less than 10% equity stakes in their home, a situation most concentrated among FHA/VA loans

> More than 25% of 2022 FHA/VA purchase mortgage holders have now dipped into negative equity, with 80% having less than 10% equity

In other words, low income and veteran home buyers. What I'd like to know is what percentage of these homes were financed with adjustable-rate mortgages...based on the implied trend, those people are liable to be sucking hind tit sooner than later.

As for those with fixed-rate mortgages that are able to continue making payments, being underwater just means less future business for Black Knight...soon to be ICE's problem if/when the acquisition closes next year.

[1] https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=kYEb

[2] https://www.blackknightinc.com/black-knights-october-2022-mo...

2 comments

> What I'd like to know is what percentage of these homes were financed with adjustable-rate mortgages...

I bought a house in the last couple of years and then refinanced it a couple of times. I can say the interest rate spread between an ARM and fixed was not very much over the last 5 years. So I'd assume not many were issued.

i don't know about ARMs but I worked at a WeWork for a bit next to a mortgage lender and they were talking people into getting mortgages against their 401(k)s...
In my country (New Zealand), you can withdraw all except NZ$1000 from your retirement savings (usually only available at 65), if you are a first home buyer, to help you get into the market.

You can imagine how that went.

In the US you can borrow against something like $50k of it, but you do need a payment plan (with interest) IIRC. And you have account minimums and its only for certain purposes... etc. Thankfully our 401ks are safe from this for now.