Adam Tooze & the Global Housing Downturn

Economic historian Adam Tooze asks whether the next shoe to drop in what he calls “the polycrisis” will be a global housing crash triggered by steadily rising interest rates.

Formerly white-hot American housing markets such as Austin, Seattle, and Cape Floral, Florida are now facing the steepest declines — bad situations made worse by recent climate disasters, including wildfire smoke and Hurricane Ian. But the real crisis is unfolding overseas, where property markets in China, Sweden, Canada, and others are grinding to a halt. Tooze spells it out:

“In the global economy there are three really large asset classes: the equities issued by corporations ($109 trillion); the debt securities issued by corporations and governments ($123 trillion); and real estate, which is dominated by residential real estate, valued worldwide at $258 trillion. Commercial real estate ($32.6 trillion) and agricultural land add another $68 trillion. If economic news were reported more sensibly, indices of global real estate would figure every day alongside the S&P500 and the Nasdaq. The surge in global house prices in 2019-2021 added tens of trillions to measured global wealth. If that unwinds it will deliver a huge recessionary shock.”

This is the moment Climate Alpha was made for. As the polycrisis scrambles once-reliable economic formulas and triggers a worldwide flight to quality in the world’s overwhelmingly largest asset class, our tools literally tell investors where to go as opposed to when to sell.

Our Climate Price™ analysis suite generates risk-adjusted valuations of real estate portfolios out to 2040 under multiple scenarios, including the effects of rapid interest rate hikes and faster-than-expected climate change impacts.