Posted on 05/25/2021 4:57:19 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
For the past several months we have warned about the pernicious effects soaring prices are having on both corporations ("Buckle Up! Inflation Is Here!") and consumers (""This Is Not Transitory": Hyperinflation Fears Are Soaring Across America"), prompting even otherwise boring sellside research to get (hyper) exciting, with Bank of America predicting that "Transitory Hyperinflation Lies Ahead."
But none of this has spooked the Fed into conceding - or believing - that inflation is anything more than transitory. And maybe just this once, the Fed has a point because all else equal, by which we mean lack of rising wages, the best cure to higher prices is, well... higher prices.
Presenting Exhibit A: understanding that Biden's stimmy bonanza is about to end and that soon they will have to live again within their means, Americans' buying intentions (6 months from today) as measured by the Conference Board, have cratered across the 3 major spending categories: homes, automobiles and major household appliances.
The drop was so massive, it amounted to the biggest one-month drop in intentions to purchase appliances...
... and homes...
This confirms what we noted earlier, namely a record divergence between crashing homebuyer confidence (due to record home prices) and soaring homebuilder confidence (also due to record home prices). Guess which one will matter in the end.
This, for better or worse, screams stagflation: as Lynn Franco, senior director of economic indicators at the Conference Board, said while consumers’ assessment of present-day conditions improved, "consumers’ short-term optimism retreated, prompted by expectations of decelerating growth and softening labor market conditions in the months ahead.”
While it's clear why stagflation will be "worse", we say better because if nothing else these data confirm that US consumers are now tapped out, if not today, then certainly 6 months from today when Biden's trillions in stimmies will have been long spent, and the spending spree will be over.
Oh, and for those saying wage hikes may be permanent we have some bad news: employers know very well that the extended unemployment benefits bonanza ends in September at which point millions of currently unemployed workers will flood back into the labor force sending wages sharply lower, and is why instead of raising base pay, most potential employers offer one-time bonuses, which - as the name implies - are one-time. As for higher wage pressures, well... just wait until October when everything reverses, Uncle Sam is no longer a better paying competitor to the US private sector, and wages slump.
What does that mean for the economy? Well, all those producers and retailers who got used to bumper demand and pushed their prices sharply and not so sharply higher, will face a stark choice: either drag prices right back down, or sell far fewer goods and services. That, or just await the next bailout.
One thing is certain: six months from today, the US economy will be far, far uglier.
We changed our plans on buying new kitchen appliances BECAUSE WE CAN’T GET ANY NEW KITCHEN APPLIANCES!
This article is full of economics 101 and commonsense. A redundancy, I know but, something too few are aware of.
We bought our home for cash when we moved from California to a seaside community on the central Gulf Coast of Florida.
We were contemplating selling and buying closer to the shore. Not now. The prices have skyrocketed and these hyperinflated prices remind us of the housing bubble that collapsed in 2008. So, we put that plan on hold for a while. But, I did special order a 2021 BMW Z4 M40i, loaded. So, I don’t fall within the next 6 months window this article is concerned with.
The Dementia Joe fiscal policies and their result is going to make for a much easier President Trump 2024 election. Just like President Reagan slaughtered Carter when I was in Jr. High.
Apartment complexes are having big problems finding appliances to replace old an defective ones.
What a mess.
home prices....builder confidence...and everything around that industry was all a result of the economy that was humming along from the Trump Administration. And it was all extremely hyperinflated.
Low interest rates. Cheap gas. Good paying jobs. Folks moving out of the cities, for the ‘burbs because even with all that good news, the cities were still circling the drain with their Dem policies. Folks could earn a good living working from home. Things were good.
Then 80,000,000 or more folks voted for the most popular Presidential ticket in the history of the country, CornPop and Harris. Two folks that said they were going to increase taxes and open the borders to the 3rd world.
Well, CornPop, Harris, Warren and the rest haven’t yet got around to messing with the economy and taxes.
For now, the aforementioned haven’t touched anything having to do with the Trump Administration policies. Of course there have been some more stimulus checks, but all the other stuff is still a ways off.
And we still haven’t been hit with the insane increase in property taxes headed our way due to all of our new neighbors that have decided to move here from Mexico, Central and South America. Sure, you can deduct your property taxes from income taxes every year, along with your mortgage interest, but you still have to write that check to support Juanita and her 3 kids with the fourth one on the way. All while your property values take a dive with the influx of all of them.
So yeah.....good times ahead. Really good times. /sarc
I’m going to try what might be a pointless battle with Lowe’s on an extended warranty over a washing machine that has a consistent problem with fine metal flakes.
They’ve sent a repair guy out, we’ve run self cleaning time and time again. The laundromat gets old.
Yeah, go buy an appliance tomorrow and let me know how many months it will be before you get it.
In my area I can buy the range I bought a year ago for: FREE Delivery: As soon as Mon, May 31
Appliances like cars will be affected by the semiconductor shortages which are a result of both covid disruption in a long-leadtime industry and the devastating fires, first last October at the AKM fab and just a month ago, at Renesas in Japan.
While this was in Japan, 83% of the worlds CPUs and 70% of memory are manufactured in South Korea and Taiwan so just think for a minute about how little it will take to disrupt every industry that depends on them.
As for home buying plans, things are going to have to slow down if my area is any indication. The housing market has been on fire, houses that were on the market for months in the past are selling in a couple of days. It will slow down because there aren’t any houses to buy.
We were all set this year to first build a 40X60 steel barn on our property in Florida. Then afterwards sell our home (which is paid for ... no mortgage) and build down there.
Those plans just went out the window in the past few weeks.
The price of the steel building went from $28,000 to $43,500 (just the steel no site work) in just 3 months.
With the home prices so high we could get a $300,000+ HELOC and build the house in Florida, but when it came time to see our home in NH I could just see our home crash from approx $350,000 to $150,000 in a matter of 12 months.
Time to just sit tight and save money.
I had an issue with a dishwasher that I bought at Home Depot, along with an extended warranty. They screwed me, thinking they saved themselves $500 by not giving me a new one after the original was repaired multiple times.
And, they were right. They saved $500 by not giving me a new machine. And I took the subsequent $25,000 I spent on remodeling, paint, cabinets, vanities and so forth to another store. So they ultimately won. At least in their own minds.
Good luck. You're gonna need it.
Good for you.
Like i’ve said, don’t by a bubble.
Waiting to build. Cash is king for me in a slump.
Today baking potatoes were unavailable in our local megamart. That has never happened before.
Last week we were in New Orleans and several bartenders said many different brands of beer, wine, and hard liquor weren’t available due to the lack of delivery drivers. That hasn’t happened before.
Something is coming and it won’t be good.
L
Depends on what you want. I think there are a wide range of supply issues out there and it’s interesting to see which items are currently unavailable.
I wonder how much time I have to sell my Arizona winter home before prices crash. It’s more than doubled in value since we bought it in 2014.
In in a similar position.
Want to move and build, but by the time the building is complete, the current house value may have crashed.
Holding pattern
Heck, it’s even difficult to find some paints now. Raw material shortages are affecting that industry. Was told because of the Texas ice storm and power outages they lost half a million to s or couldn’t produce the tonnage. who knows but it’s pretty thin for some of the products.
Well we are waiting for a tenant to find a house so we can move back in, it’s a bigger house, and sell our house on acreage. Was hoping to sell it before anything crashes so I may be out of luck.
True, and I fear it.
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