Morning Update | June 24, 2025 | The Brian Scalabrine Lesson, and Bidding War Skirmishes
How the White Mamba and the real estate market are connected
Good morning, One South Nation!
Remember to hydrate.
Brian Scalabine
I am sports fan — which is not a newsflash for those who know me.
For the majority of my formative years (pre-internet) I dedicated an obscene amount of my memory to useless information about college and professional players (often obscure) and their careers across a wide variety of sports.
From the NFL to MLB to the NBA to ACC hoops to the PGA Tour (and you can even toss in some Nascar), I watched a lot of games and somehow managed to remember a lot of what I saw.
The White Mamba
Enter Brian Scalabrine — a.k.a. ‘The White Mamba’ and ‘Air Veal.’
After a decent college career at Southern Cal, Scalabrine was a 2nd round pick of the New Jersey Nets and played for the Nets, Celtics, and Bulls over a 11 year career.
His career stats are not overwhelming (averaged about 3 points and 2 rebounds per game) and was never in danger of ever making an All Star team, but he was a fan favorite for his hustle, grit, and engaging personality — and in his time in the league, he managed to play in 4 NBA championships as a backup and even won a ring in 2005 with Boston.
Not too shabby.
‘I’m Closer to LeBron…’
Somewhat recently, Scalabrine has become a bit of an internet sensation for his response to his haters who basically say that he wasn’t very good.
His response goes something like this — ‘I’m a lot closer to LeBron James than you are to me.’
Who Wins?
The result?
Scalabrine became the target of challenges by numerous ‘mid’ hoopsters who thought that they can take him on the court, given his relative pedestrian career and lack of anything approaching Michael Jordan-esque highlights.
Luckily for the all of us, many of these challenges have been captured on video.
Spolier alert — despite the fact that Scalabinre is now in his later 40s and carrying around a few more lbs than he did back in the day, it doesn’t really work out well for his challengers.
They get schooled.
Why? Scalabrine is good at basketball. Very good.
For over a decade, Scalabrine was one of about 500 players in the world who were good enough to play in the NBA — and the NBA is probably the hardest professional athletic job to get, much less keep.
So despite the fact that he looked quite pedestrian on any random Thursday night on TNT when he battled Kobe or Tim Duncan, Scalabrine is an extremely accomplished professional.
The Point
I’m now going to make the point — the real estate market today is Brian Scalabrine. It may not look good when compared to LeBron, but it is pretty daggone good when you compare it to say, me.
The 2020 to 2022 market was LeBron (or Jordan, or Bird, or Magic, or Curry, or Kareem, or Wilt.)
2023 and 2024 were also good, but not quite Jordan / LeBron. Tracy McGrady, perhaps? Allen Iverson, maybe?
And while 2025 is also still chugging along quite well, things aren’t as frothy as 2021. So when you try to compare the two, of course it is going to look subpar.
It isn’t.
Perspective
It’s all about perspective.
2021 spoiled us all. We now think that any market where there aren’t 20 offers that escalate to +20% above the asking price, we are in a depression.
Whatever.
2008
2025 is still a lot closer to 2021 than it is to 2008.
I was already a 15 year vet in 2008 (the year we opened One South, btw) — so I feel more than qualified to compare the two.
They have nothing to do with one another. Nothing.
Unless you lived through the Great Financial Crisis and tried to get homes sold when lending was pretty much nil and foreclosures were everywhere as a result, I don’t want to hear your opinion about 2025.
Continuing to use basketball as a theme, 2008 would be more akin to a Sunday morning church league made up of ‘50 something’ dudes wearing headbands and canvas Chuck Taylors — chucking up brick after brick.
If the next 20 years of real estate are Brian Scalabrine-esque, we should be so lucky.
I’m now done with the analogy … thanks if you made it this far.
RVA Market
Inventory remains a little elevated from the spring, but still no where near approaching an issue.
Over the weekend, we saw multiple bidding wars, albeit smaller.
3-4 offers vs. 10. Bidding skirmishes, perhaps?
Median DOM is still sub-10 days (9) and the Median Price is now above $440K.
Rates
The long end of the curve continues to drift down slowly.
30 year money is now at a 60 day low. It hasn’t been one big movement down followed by a holding pattern — more of a few bps each and every day.
I like the trend.
Inflation
Inflation readings have come down over the past few prints, and my sense is that is driving the move down as much as anything.
So as long as the June numbers don’t come back on fire, I think that we could be finally be looking at the Federal Reserve officially taking their foot ever so slightly off the brake.
Iran Conflict Ending?
Man I hope so.
Futures markets this morning seem to be reacting to the proposed cease fire between Israel and Iran (and I guess the US?) so it will be interesting to see how rates react.
Surprisingly, the price of oil actually went DOWN in the last few days, despite the airstrikes and Iranian threats to close the Straigt of Hormuz.
Go figure.
That said, a cease fire feels like a good first step.
Peace would be a nice change for once. Perhaps the parties who seem so willing to sacrifice others will yield to those who just want a safe space to build a life and raise a family.
One can wish.
Enjoy the heat!
Rick