This is David. Anyone that knows me knows that I always wear white socks with my sandals but I didn't know it was fashionable. I never owned white socks, sandals or shorts until I came here.
I have about ten suits here including a tux and about ten pairs of dress shoes that I never wear. Maybe I should really be fashionable and wear the tux one Sunday in Valencia market while I cook. I thought all the guys without socks were from the province.

 

Smaller banks would include all banks in the Philippines on a global scale. To illustrate: one of the largest banks worldwide is JPMorgan Chase, with assets in excess of 2.5 trillion US$, in comparison ING Bank and Goldman Sachs each have assets of around 1 trillion US$, and the largest bank in the Philippines (BDO) has only 58 billion US$ in assets, or around 2% of the size of JPMorgan Chase.
In general, banks worldwide will suffer from the Covid-19 effects on economies. Those particularly vulnerable will be the ones with low capitalization and/or large exposure (loans) to the worst affected sectors in the economy (airlines/tourism). Quite similar to the financial crisis in 2007/2008 when banks with low capital and those with either lots of bad mortgages on their books or large exposure to Lehman Brothers were caught out.

Yes, the property market will definitely suffer, for multiple reasons. A credit squeeze at the banks may be part of that, but...........
Most importantly consumer confidence is down a lot (meaning people have a less optimistic view about their finances in the future and abstain from making major investments like buying a house). Pag Ibig (government agency tasked with offering subsidized mortgages for social housing projects) has lowered their interest rates for new applicants in an effort to sustain the market. I assume with little success.
If even demand for low cost housing falters, I would expect higher priced segments in the housing market to do even worse. Moreover, no new retirees arriving locally, which will depress demand for up-market housing (whether rentals or buying) even more.
On the supply side the story is quite the opposite. Plenty houses on offer, and numbers are growing by the day.
In my opinion, as long as the Covid problem is still having impact, expect house prices to fall and rents to go down.

The "larger" banks in the Philippines are BDO, Metrobank, Landbank, BPI and PNB (all above 1 trillion Php in assets). Security Bank is somewhat smaller, Veterans Bank is much smaller.
As for the risks, see above.

 

You may jest, but, according to Vogue, socks and sandals are, in fact, the height of fashion these days. Justin Bieber and Sophie Turner have recently been seen wearing them. I have no idea who they are but if they're mentioned in Vogue I guess they must be cool.........

I still wouldn't be seen dead in them though

 

Remember also that most of the local land owners own their property's outright, i see a lot of expat business's going broke because of lack of customers/tourists and still paying rent and utilities. A lot of the big resorts in Dauin for example are advertising room rates at half the normal rate and even being so daft as trying to get long term renters at 2,000 peso's a day on a monthly rate. These business's will fail unless someone has awfully deep pockets or daddy's money. Years ago it was impossible for a foreigner/pinay to get a mortgage on a property but now it is possible, never mind the interest rates. The housing market will drop for sure as expats leave and can't get back in and their lovely trophy brides flog the houses for a pittance because their sister or brother in Saudi are not sending money home anymore for moma and papa and all the family hangers on. Comercial property will remain as it is since its mainly owned by Pinoy/Chinese and they play the long game. IMHO

 

my personal opinion is that anyone wearing socks after three months here ain't gonna make it

 

i agree. i cannot imagine that we won't see a major fire sale over the next year or two at the least. it has always seemed to me that americans especially live a very contemporary existence.

 

I'm not sure what you mean, but err, we all live contemporary lives, even if some might prefer a life in the past or in the future, the present is un-escapable for all, not just Americans

 

ah, i agree with you dutchie! we do all live contemporary lives. i guess what i meant to address is what shapes the life we choose to live. and especially how does history shape our choices and decisions. "those who do not learn history are condemmed to repeat it".

IMHO, some cultures especially in the middle east and asia, especially the chinese, incorporate history (including "ancient" history) in their contemporary lives. much more than americans in general do. i remember reading that the crusades for example are almost unknow to contemorary westerners, but happened yesterday for many mideast cultures. the chinese have around 3500 years of written history to support a country and peoples current thinking and self awareness.

will and ariel durant wrote an eleven volume set of "the history of civilization" which i think is still highly aclaimed.

much too much for me to read, but they did write a hundred page book "the lessons of history" to sort of summarize their beliefs and findings. that in turn has been outlined by a james clear who reduces that book to about 150 bullet points any one of which would be a great discussion topic for people who want to have a chat about the human species. i would higly recommend anyone to search that author and topic and read through the findings. (search james clear on the lessons of history)

one quote of will durant that i had on my wall for most of my adult life, was "education is the progressive discovery of our own ignorance", i e, the more we learn, the less we know. my favorite uncle set me back once with his oklahoma rural high school education by saying, "there is no education like a life lived". i now believe that is true.

so if you have read this far i have to leave you with the latin phrase, "cognito, ergo doleo". (i think, therefore i am drepressed)