What was it? Like 36% decrease in foreign buying overall? China specifically was like a 60% decrease?
I'm not an expert or anything, so what I think means exactly jack. Having mentioned that, those decreases seem to me to be far in excess of anything that could be reasonably explained by economic factors alone. Something must be going on.
"Fleeing" seems like a legitimate label for it.
Fleeing implies they have a choice and are choosing to leave because of poor prospects in US housing. That might be true. But the choice might be involuntary or be due to sharply rising prospects in China or elsewhere. If China those capital controls are significant, maybe a better title is "Chinese purchasers dragged away from US housing kicking, screaming and cursing their own government". That is a possible interpretation based on what is included in the article.
Principal Component Analysis is really difficult to do on a live economy because no one is omniscient and policies/events enter and go in a less than ideal simultaneity.
I mean, the Canadians don't have currency controls. Neither do the Mexicans. All three of the Big Three foreign real estate buyers have pulled back in a material fashion this year.
Like I said, I just think something must be going on here. I don't think this can be waved off as "Well, it's just China."
"Hispanics are experiencing the largest homeownership gains of any ethnic group in the U.S., a turnaround for the population hardest hit by the housing bust that could help buoy the market for years."
https://www.wsj.com/articles/wave-of-hispanic-buyers-boosts-...
We're talking about foreign buyers.
We mean "Mexican" buyers as in, actual citizens of Mexico.
Not Mexican buyers as in, "That guy has a funny, spanish sounding last name, he must be Mexican."
We're not talking about Hispanic Americans.
China, 2000: 1.2 trillion USD [0]
China, 2017: 12.2 trillion USD [0]
Mexico, 2000: 700 billion USD [1]
Mexico, 2017: 1.15 trillion USD [1]
If GDP is a proxy for wealth, China --over the past ~2 decades-- had way much more potential in investing in foreign real estate. I don't understand why per capita GDP would be more relevant in determining which nation would have more capacity in investing in foreign real estate. That capacity for investment seems independent of how the wealth is divided among a countries citizens.
The rest of your comment makes sense. But this last part doesn't seem right: if wealth were distributed evenly in China, then there might be no Chinese buyers for US real estate. It's only due to inequality ('how the wealth is divided') that there is a segment who can afford this.
Yup, totally agree with this and the overall point you were making in your comments.