Meet America's newest mega-landlords: Google, Facebook, and Elon Musk

Tech Insider : Economy
For rent signs featuring logos for Google, Meta, and Tesla pop up in front of a row of gray two-story houses.
After years of running up against housing shortages, companies like Google, Meta, and Disney are taking matters into their own hands.

Arantza Pena Popo/Business Insider

Distressed commercial real estate debt hit $80 billion last quarter, the highest amount in a decade

Tech Insider
office building bankers workers employees
There's around $216 billion of potentially distressed commercial real estate properties, according to MSCI Real Assets.

REUTERS/Carlo Allegri

Rents in Oakland have fallen faster than anywhere else in the US for a simple reason: The city built more housing

Tech Insider : Economy, Politics
New apartments are constructed as seen from this drone view at the Brooklyn Basin development in Oakland, Calif., on Tuesday, August 24, 2021.
New apartments are constructed as seen from this drone view at the Brooklyn Basin development in Oakland, Calif., on Tuesday, August 24, 2021.

Jane Tyska/Getty Images

Americans' average rent payments have jumped to $2,047. This chart shows how affordability has evolved in the last decade.

Tech Insider
brooklyn apartment rent
A sign advertises an apartment for rent along a row of brownstone townhouses in the Fort Greene neighborhood on June 24, 2016 in the Brooklyn borough of New York City

Drew Angerer/Getty

I entered a bidding war to land an apartment. It was way more brutal than I expected.

Tech Insider : Economy, Economy
A auction gavel hits the top of a New York apartment, sending yellow sparks from its perimeter. Anonymous hands raise numerous prices as they bid on this apartment amid a light blue background
At every step of my apartment hunt, the message was clear: Being first in line may not be enough.

Arantza Pena Popo/Insider

The Brooklyn landlord everyone hates could soon come to your neighborhood. Tenants warn these private equity groups are raising rent and ignoring maintenance issues.

Tech Insider : Economy
Residential apartment buildings are seen on July 26, 2022 in the Brooklyn borough of New York City.
Residential apartment buildings are seen on July 26, 2022 in the Brooklyn borough of New York City.

Spencer Platt/Getty Images

The genius plan that could bring down skyrocketing home prices

Tech Insider : Economy, Politics
large triplex with a price tag/New Zealand flag attached and two small homes with price tags/American flags attached
If the US wants to build more homes, slow down rent growth, and give more people a place to live, it needs to learn from New Zealand.

Tyler Le/Insider

Apartment rents in the US declined in July for the first time since the pandemic began

Tech Insider
A street view of the exterior of a large apartment building with 13 floors and tall trees outside.
The exterior of their apartment block.

Amanda Goh/Insider

Commercial real estate is being rattled by this year's crises. A recession in the sector might be at hand, experts say.

Tech Insider

Happy Friday eve, readers. Phil Rosen here, clocking in from NYC. 

There's a lot to say about financial markets these days — the debt ceiling is a fast-approaching crisis, the banking sector has been rattled by failures, and stocks are still fighting the Fed. 

The secondary impacts of these risks are less obvious. What happens in each worst-case scenario?

Commercial real estate may hold one answer.

Everyone fled big cities during the pandemic. So why is your rent still so damn high?

Tech Insider : Economy, Politics
An apartment building with individuals moving into empty rooms
If you're wondering why your rent is still so high, look no further than all the people who ditched their roommates over the past few years.

Tyler Le/Insider

Because people ditched their roommates

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