Just finished talking with a co-worker who's SO is a high-end realtor and property owner...

We were discussing housing in Coastal San Diego county (between them there's 6 school aged kids and they need a bigger house). He informed me that since 2020, 1/3 of the house and apartment purchases have been investment or realty firms - the Blackstone/Zillow/Redfin type - and they've been losing their shirts.
They buy houses sight,-unseen at inflated prices to snap them up, then try to flip them for half again what they paid.
Unfortunately, Southern California homes are susceptible to termites and dry rot, especially those built from 1960 on that are approaching their major renovation needed age, which can easily end up being half the price they overpaid... apparently Blackstone has told all the realtors that that aren't adding any more to their San Diego county portfolios after the September purchases get processed.
So they're stuck with about 10k to 20k empty homes they either have to sell at a loss or try to rent. A 3500 sq.ft near the beach on half an acre in Carlsbad they had looked at that was selling for $3.2 million this summer, (Blackstone bought it at $2million in 2020) was just dropped down to $1.8 million, then taken off the market to rent for $9k a month. Which made him sad, as they were planning on selling two of her high end rentals and their current house to make a 50/60% down payment, putting it well within reach. And my co-worker said his SO figured they still needed about $100k in structural renovations when they looked at it -as she said," new hardware floors, granite countertops, and paint isn't the same as fixing dry-rot, updating the electrical, and leveling of the foundations that have gone out of true on a 60 year old house."
She comes from a family that builds and renovates houses.

So - the housing bubble is starting crack. And it's going to hit the most "deserving" corporate flippers first.

Haele