Jon Brooks
@jonbrooks
Most housing headlines are wrong.
I break down what’s actually happening in real time.
$3.5B+ sold | 8,500+ units since 2020
60k+ subs on Substack Newsletter
271 Following 14.8K Followers
The housing market already crashed.
Not prices.
Liquidity.
Nobody can afford to move anymore.
Transaction volume is sitting near record lows.
Prices are falling.
It's not just Florida and Texas anymore.
Builders are calling $500,000 zero-lot-line boxes “starter homes.”
Meanwhile 71% of Floridians can’t afford new construction.
This isn’t a housing shortage.
It’s a delusional pricing problem.
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No kidding.
For 5 years, we ran mortgage “workout” programs where missed payments were pushed to the BACK of the loan.
People weren’t current.
The debt was just delayed.
Now those programs are ending.
And suddenly:
• Delinquencies are rising
• Foreclosures are climbing
• Short sales are returning
• Consumers are tapped out
A massive amount of financial stress was papered over after 2020.
Now the bill is finally coming due.
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Baby Boomers continue to drive the real estate market forward.
Trading houses to each other.
Young working people have become tax cattle for the modern economy.
They get hit with:
• Inflation
• Student debt
• Record housing costs
• Payroll taxes
• Higher insurance
• Higher rates
All while trying to fund an aging population sitting on most of the assets.
It’s not “tax the rich.”
It’s increasingly:
take money from the young to subsidize the old.
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Jacksonville median household income: $68,000.
Income needed to buy a normal house today: $116,000.
That’s not a balanced market.
That’s a financial wall.
In 2013, 57% of young adults believed they’d buy a home within 5 years.
Today?
That number collapsed to 25%.
This isn’t a housing slowdown.
It’s an entire generation giving up.
There is no housing shortage.
There’s an affordability crisis.
Inventory has been climbing for years while demand is collapsing under the weight of rates, insurance, taxes, and stagnant wages.
The problem isn’t a lack of homes.
It’s that the middle class can’t afford the payment.
That’s a very different problem.
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The American Dream didn’t die.
It got repriced.
+79% in 6 years.
Wages barely moved.
And people wonder why nobody can buy a house anymore.
Housing comes next
US CREDIT CARD DELINQUENCIES HIT 13.1% — HIGHEST SINCE 2011
STUDENT LOAN DELINQUENCIES SURGE TO 10.3% — HIGHEST SINCE 2020
AUTO LOAN DELINQUENCIES HIT A RECORD 5.6%
If you make under $115,000 a year, you’re now basically lower middle class in America.
Read that again.
It now takes roughly $116,000 of household income to afford a house.
The median household income?
Just $69,000.
This is why:
• People feel broke
• Consumer debt is exploding
• Young families can’t get ahead
• The middle class is disappearing in real time
The economy looks strong on paper.
But the average American is getting financially suffocated.
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Serious delinquent loans are starting to surge.
Credit cards.
Auto loans.
Student loans.
The middle class is getting squeezed from every angle.
Next comes:
• More foreclosures
• More short sales
• More distressed inventory hitting the market into year-end
This is what happens when asset prices rise faster than incomes for too long.
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Jacksonville is now ranked the least hot housing market in America.
Behind Austin.
Behind Tampa.
That’s what happens when you combine:
• Massive speculation
• Overbuilding
• Weak wage growth
• Investors chasing momentum instead of fundamentals
For years, people screamed “housing shortage.”
But in markets like Jacksonville, the real problem was a mismatch between incomes and prices.
Now the math is breaking.
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Rent growth is now negative.
That completely messes up the entire underwriting of real estate.
Prices must come down.
Housing supply is back to 2020 levels.
Next step: 2016 levels.
If we crack 4.5%, RE breaks..
Existing home sales just hit the lowest April level since 2009.
Think about how insane that is.
Higher inventory.
Falling rents.
Massive affordability crisis.
Builders slashing prices and buying down rates.
But the headlines still say:
“Housing market remains resilient.”
No.
The market is frozen.
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I just got a message from my insurance company.
To keep coverage, I have to upload 50+ photos of the key components of my house.
Roof. Plumbing. Electrical. HVAC. Water heater. Appliances. Everything.
So let me get this straight...
If everything is done correctly, maintained perfectly, and lower risk... do I get LOWER homeowners insurance?
Or is this just another way to find reasons to charge me more?
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If you can rent your house
for less than the mortgage payment,
your house is overpriced.
