4 ms·

I'm inclined to believe a lot of this is for money laundering or parking cash in other countries as a store of value (and I'm admittedly biased after the NYT ar

I'm inclined to believe a lot of this is for money laundering or parking cash in other countries as a store of value (and I'm admittedly biased after the NYT article about Trump's work). Maybe even buying a place for a rich son/daughter to go to university or just experience US culture, or escape danger in their home country. Local governments have a interest to not crack down on this in the form of taxes and fees associated with their real estate laws.

UncleEntity 8y ago
Probably not, more like a continuation of the last real estate boom where the new money (from zero or negative interest rates) is going into multi-family mega-complexes instead of McMansions this time. Where I live (downtown Phoenix) every single vacant lot and quite a few "marginal" businesses the developers could get their hands on have been turned into massive luxury condo/apartment complexes. So much so the city is telling my landlord he isn't charging "market rates" and needs to increase the rent, and taxes he pays, due to all the high-rent places that went up in the last couple years -- luckily he doesn't agree so...