'Commercial real estate is melting down fast': Elon Musk warns

As a serial entrepreneur who co-founded Tesla Inc., revolutionized the electric car industry and is sending rockets into space, Elon Musk isn’t known for being a real estate guru. But lately, the billionaire has been sounding the alarm for the sector.

As a serial entrepreneur who co-founded Tesla Inc., revolutionized the electric car industry and is sending rockets into space, Elon Musk isn’t known for being a real estate guru. But lately, the billionaire has been sounding the alarm for the sector.

“Commercial real estate is melting down fast,” Musk said in a recent tweet. “Home values next.”

He elaborated on the dire forecast during an interview with former Fox News personality Tucker Carlson in April.

“We really haven’t seen the commercial real estate shoe drop. That’s more like an anvil, not a shoe,” Musk said. “So the stuff we’ve seen thus far actually hasn’t even — it’s only slightly real estate portfolio degradation. But that will become a very serious thing later this year, in my view.”

He pointed out that the work-from-home trend has substantially reduced the use of office buildings around the world. And that does not bode well for commercial real estate. “Almost all cities at this point have record vacancies of commercial real estate,” Musk said.