May 12, 2020

This piece from Veranda discusses the drawbacks of the open floor plan now that we’re all spending so much more time at home. What design trends might replace the open floor plan in a post Coronavirus cultural shift?

An article from NJ.com talks about the drop in residential listings in New Jersey along with some surveys among NJ Realtors. The survey results show realtors have been advising clients to wait until we know more until they list, but there is still some market activity.

In this article originally published by the Wall Street Journal there is a discussion of why national home prices have continued to rise so far despite the pandemic. There are several theories as to why this has happened so far: limited supply, seller optimism, etc. We will just have to wait to see what happens.

Housing Wire reports that 80% of renters managed to pay their rent last month. In a bit of good news, it appears that rent collections in multi-family properties has been impacted less than originally feared.

This piece from NJBIZ speculates what offices may look like when workers can return; everything from density to HVAC systems may need to be rethought.

This article from Forbes predicts a collapse of commercial real estate. The author focused on retail and office properties. There was no mention of the industrial segment which will likely thrive with the current push toward online shopping. As always, we’ll have to wait to see what happens.

Fox Business reports that the number of new residential listings plunged in April, as expected. April is typically the busiest month for listings, but new listings was 44.1% down from last year. The piece also speculates what could happen later in the year and into 2021.