Economic pain train's a coming (Boston, Cohasset: student loan, buyers, top school)

[Taffee72]

My coworker's sister just bought a house in Worcester and had to offer higher than list and wrote a letter to win the deal. She and her husband had previously put offers on some other homes in the surrounding towns and couldn't get anything because there were still tons of buyers bidding on everything.

[bugelrex]

Originally Posted by Taffee72

My coworker's sister just bought a house in Worcester and had to offer higher than list and wrote a letter to win the deal. She and her husband had previously put offers on some other homes in the surrounding towns and couldn't get anything because there were still tons of buyers bidding on everything.

Let me guess...that house had a really nice home office?

[wolfgang239]

There are still tons of people sitting at home accumulating money, having recently eliminated many typical expenses and with hours and hours to scour redfin and zillow. Meanwhile there's almost nothing out there for inventory. People need/want to move. Needing to go over ask is a given with these factors. What remains to be seen is whether that is a foolish decision but I wouldn't be upset if the market dove 10% immediately if I planned on staying in a home for awhile. I just bought and sold myself. The sell side I had an offer within hours, but would probably have had a couple more if it weren't for corona. Buy side was competitive to say the least.

If people in MA start losing their jobs en masse then we have a problem. But we aren't Vegas or FL so I hold out hope for minimal impact.

[bjimmy24]

Originally Posted by wolfgang239

There are still tons of people sitting at home accumulating money, having recently eliminated many typical expenses and with hours and hours to scour redfin and zillow. Meanwhile there's almost nothing out there for inventory. People need/want to move. Needing to go over ask is a given with these factors. What remains to be seen is whether that is a foolish decision but I wouldn't be upset if the market dove 10% immediately if I planned on staying in a home for awhile. I just bought and sold myself. The sell side I had an offer within hours, but would probably have had a couple more if it weren't for corona. Buy side was competitive to say the least.

If people in MA start losing their jobs en masse then we have a problem. But we aren't Vegas or FL so I hold out hope for minimal impact.

People in mass HAVE started losing jobs en masse. Almost 1 million in a state of 7 million.

[Taffee72]

Originally Posted by bugelrex

Let me guess...that house had a really nice home office?

Not only that but a finished basement, so my coworker (a 20 something female) moved in with her sister, the home buyer, to get out of their parents' house. Although she did not explicitly tell me, I gather that she will be doing some babysitting in exchange for living at their house.

[wolfgang239]

Originally Posted by bjimmy24

People in mass HAVE started losing jobs en masse. Almost 1 million in a state of 7 million.

While this is definitely true I'd speculate that the majority of folks who have lost their jobs were not planning on buying real estate in greater Boston. And inventory has fallen faster than demand. Although unlikely, hopefully those who have lost their jobs will be getting them back. Obviously this could get worse but I'm just referring to the present.

Edit: This whole thing also hit right at the beginning of the seasonal MA real estate cycle. Tons of folks were probably on the edge of their seat already waiting to pounce. Although many have probably tabled that idea for now.

[Shizim]

Originally Posted by mdovell

NBA has a degree has been gradually water down. I highly suggest looking at online MBA programs. University of Illinois think runs one through Coursera which might be about 30 grand. UMass Amherst stupidly spent 50 million dollars on a new business Wing I have no idea why they spend such a high amount. if you really think that high-end MBA programs have much of a value read the book ahead of the curve which looks at Harvards MBA program. I'm not doubting that there is some value of a business education. but anybody advocating to spend six figures or more to obtain something that might not have validity let alone reliability is a bit foolish.

I think this is over simplified. A top 25 MBA can add more than 50k to your comp in finance year one. And that's exponential.

But I will say that there are too many meh level MBA programs. Waste of money.

It's my overall POV on colleges in general:
Too many schools with too many people taking useless majors. We need less colleges and more trade schools. Not
everyone is for college. And college isn't for everyone.

My economic TBD is around office rents in the city and inner ring. I know several companies rethinking thier financial district presence size and if it's worth the cost. It's not.

[charolastra00]

Originally Posted by brightdoglover

(I understand the real estate wars around Cambridge/Boston/the area. Completely skewed my choices and needs my whole working life).

There are surely MBA courses on line, and have been for some time. I'm thinking of the Sloan School at MIT- I know someone who was taking the courses online years ago.

It would be through my university. I'm not at all willing to take out a penny of debt for student loans. I received my first master's degree through tuition remission, and I can follow suit through our MBA program. It's not MIT or Harvard, but it's fairly well regarded and... so long as I hold onto my job... free.

That said, I suspect many early career people will be considering to go back to school for MBAs to weather job losses. While in no way is e-learning replacing all brick and mortar schools, it seems like online course design is a better option for job security.

[mdovell]

Originally Posted by bjimmy24

People in mass HAVE started losing jobs en masse. Almost 1 million in a state of 7 million.

We haven't fully felt this yet. The low ended jobs were the first to go but then the suppliers for that are the next.

Any business has customers, employees and suppliers. If the customers are at home and the employees are gone it means the suppliers are left hanging.

The largest food concession companies in the world are Aramark, Sodexco and Global Compass. They service sporting events, schools, colleges, prisons etc. Any place where a large number of people eat is usually serviced by one of the three.

Sodexco 470,000 employees world wide. They service a number of school districts in Mass.
OTCMKTS: SDXAY stock is still way down.

Compass Global (they own chadwells if that rings a bell, they service the 128 belt schools)
https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/CMPGF/
Six year low for the stock.

Aramark 215,000 employees. Stock is at a six year low
NYSE: ARMK

If your hotel and restaurants are closed you have to think of all the companies that supply everything. Cleaning the floors, washing the dishes, sourcing the food, supplying the decor etc.

Then you have to figure the cash flow with many of these relative to earnings.

I know we aren't florida or vegas and I get what you are saying but the many major industries are now work at home. As more work from home there's less of a value of being in boston or closer since you do not have to pay as much for the same access. I'm not talking medical but legal, finance/accounting, academia etc. If people don't feel safe enough for going back to school for higher ed in Boston this September then all bets are off. We can have a empty summer and that's probably what's going to happen but if we have this a year to 18 months I really don't think people will go back, especially for the elderly.

Boston Calling was cancelled
Feast of St. Anthony was cancelled
Boston Marathon delayed until the fall (hopefully)
Red Sox home opener didn't happen
Boston pops fireworks cancelled
Boston Pride parade cancelled.

Students make up 20% of the Boston population. I don't care where you are in the world but if you have a 20% drop in population the economy is hurt. This isn't like it's wartime or some natural disaster.
https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/20...A8J/story.html

There's plenty of inventory out there if you are willing to go into other areas. There's a reason why 128 and 495 were made it was rings around boston to make getting to boston easier. The further away the cheaper the housing, I think we can generally agree on that. Here's a question. If the supply is so low why not just make an offer on a house that isn't for sale and see if they'll sell? Might be rude but if the price is right....

In region waterfire in providence has been cancelled. If this goes to the fall maybe king richards fair and the big e

[mdovell]

Originally Posted by Shizim

I think this is over simplified. A top 25 MBA can add more than 50k to your comp in finance year one. And that's exponential.

But I will say that there are too many meh level MBA programs. Waste of money.

It's my overall POV on colleges in general:
Too many schools with too many people taking useless majors. We need less colleges and more trade schools. Not
everyone is for college. And college isn't for everyone.

My economic TBD is around office rents in the city and inner ring. I know several companies rethinking thier financial district presence size and if it's worth the cost. It's not.

Basically whatever group that has credentials didn't take them seriously over the past 25 years. There's too many "Part time no GMAT needed" commercials on TV.

I only know one person that went to get a MBA that really made it up there (amazon). I'm fine with higher education for various fields but the problem is much of what is in a mba program has its own major. If you want to major in finance or accounting that's fine. But when you start putting things together... my income increased significantly with degrees but you have to know how to adapt and don't assume what is given is 100% of the way in. Having said that the real way on building wealth is investments, not labor. Budgeting is a huge factor. I have a friend that makes maybe 3x what I make..but his rent is also 2-3x. Add in the higher taxes and it's nearly a wash. Debt matters more with age and he also still has student loans.

I don't think higher ed is for everyone either. Trade schools can do a fair amount but we don't want to dump people into any group or industry and think it solves the problem either.