And Texas real estate is dirt cheap compared to California and New York.
We hear Chinese spoken in Costco in Austin as often as Spanish.
In addition to being the gateway to the Far East, California is the home of Silicon Valley. New York is the gateway to Europe, and the home of Wall Street, insurance companies galore and the nation’s commercial banking giants. Texas has oil and gas, which are in a slump that may last years, as oil producers scramble for market share by pumping every barrel they can produce to offset the price declines triggered by more supply. The last downward price spiral lasted 15 years. Still, it’s good that Chinese buyers are keeping Texas mortgages above water. It’s silly, though, given that there is so much more room for appreciation in Chinese real estate, due to nugatory holding costs and rapidly rising personal incomes there.