Selling a “completely destroyed” home

Summary

Marketplace: Selling a “Completely Destroyed” Home
Host: Kai Ryssdal
Release Date: March 10, 2025

---

1. Economic Overview: Market Reaction to Trade Policy

Timestamp: [00:57]
Kai Ryssdal opens the episode by discussing the turbulent state of the stock market amidst chaotic trade policies emanating from the White House. He notes that major indices experienced significant declines as nervous traders flocked to bonds, pushing yields lower. Ryssdal emphasizes the anticipation of economic repercussions as the dust begins to settle from recent trade announcements.

Quote:

"From American Public Media, this is Marketplace in Los Angeles. I'm Kai Ryssdal... Major indices rolled over, nervous traders went hard into bonds, which sent yields farther down."
[00:57]

2. Consumer Sentiment vs. Economic Reality

Timestamp: [02:35 - 04:24]
Samantha Fields introduces a discussion on the discrepancy between consumer sentiment and actual economic indicators. Ben Harris from the Brookings Institution highlights that despite strong economic measures like low unemployment and a growing stock market, consumer confidence remains surprisingly low. This mismatch suggests that many consumers are concerned about their personal financial futures, leading to reduced spending and increased saving—a behavior that could signal an impending economic slowdown.

Notable Points:

• Ben Harris: Consumers feel pessimistic despite economic indicators.
• Justin Wolfers (University of Michigan): Differentiates between general economic feelings and personal financial situations.
• Kimberly Adams: Reduced consumer demand affects business sales and overall economic growth.

Quotes:

"Instead, consumers have been feeling pretty negative... there's been a real mismatch between sentiment and reality."
- Ben Harris
[02:35]

"What folks are expert in is not the aggregates GDP and the unemployment rate, but their own household economies."
- Justin Wolfers
[03:26]

3. US-China Trade War Impact on Agriculture

Timestamp: [04:34 - 07:05]
Kimberly Adams reports on the intensifying trade war between the US and China, focusing on the retaliatory tariffs imposed by China on US agricultural exports. Products like chicken, wheat, corn, soybeans, pork, and fruit are now subject to additional tariffs ranging from 10% to 15%. This move poses significant challenges for American farmers, potentially reducing exports and increasing domestic supply, which could lead to lower prices and decreased profitability for US producers.

Notable Points:

• Joe Shealy (U.S. Meat Export Federation): Additional duties increase uncertainty for suppliers.
• J.O. Wen (Harvard Business School): Long-term tariffs likely to reduce exports, leading to domestic oversupply.
• Impact on Farmers: Decreased demand from China cannot be offset by US domestic demand, resulting in financial strain.

Quotes:

"Buyers of these goods are going to face relatively cheaper goods. But the problem is that US Demand is nowhere near large enough to compensate for the decline in Chinese demand."
- Dr. Lisa Johnson
[06:53]

"Layer these tariffs on top of all the others already affecting the ag industry... farmers will just make less money."
- J.O. Wen
[07:05]

4. Real Estate: Selling Burned-Down Homes

Timestamp: [07:39 - 15:25]
In a compelling segment, Marketplace explores the unprecedented challenge of selling homes that have been completely destroyed by wildfires in Los Angeles. Samantha Fields reports on the sale of the first listed residential property destroyed by the Palisades and Eaton fires. Realtor Richard Schulman discusses the complexities of pricing and marketing a non-existent property, while seller Terry Bromberg shares the emotional and financial ramifications of selling her charred home.

Notable Points:

• Richard Schulman: Listed the destroyed property at $999,000, receiving over 60 inquiries without buyers seeing the actual property.
• Terry Bromberg: Faces a financial loss despite insurance, chooses not to rebuild due to fear of future fires.
• Investors: View destroyed properties as investment opportunities, betting on future demand and new fire-resistant construction.

Quotes:

"This closed for 1.2 million."
- Richard Schulman
[08:45]

"Our decision was mostly an emotional one. We don't want to live back there again. We want to relocate."
- Terry Bromberg
[10:36]

"Investors... are betting that in five to seven years demand to live in the Palisades will be stronger than before the fire."
- Joe Soleimani
[11:22]

5. Tesla Stock Decline: Beyond the Market

Timestamp: [12:53 - 15:25]
The episode shifts focus to the significant decline in Tesla’s stock performance, which has lost all gains since the presidential election. Climate economist Garnett Wagner attributes the stock’s struggles to Elon Musk’s political entanglements and increased competition in the electric vehicle (EV) market. Additionally, changes in EPA regulations have curtailed Tesla’s revenue from selling carbon credits, further impacting its financial health.

Notable Points:

• Garnett Wagner: Attributes Tesla’s stock issues to Elon Musk’s politics rather than the EV market itself.
• Seth Goldstein (Morningstar Research): Highlights increased competition as a key factor.
• Gil Tal (UC Davis): EPA regulation changes eliminate a substantial revenue stream for Tesla.

Quotes:

"This isn't an EV market problem, it's an Elon Musk problem."
- Garnett Wagner
[13:32]

"...they have one less very serious revenue source, which is selling credits."
- Gil Tal
[14:18]

"Whether Tesla dominates the field will depend on whether it makes good on its promise to have autonomous vehicles on the road starting in June."
- Garnett Wagner
[15:25]

6. Rural Healthcare Funding Cuts

Timestamp: [19:47 - 24:09]
Marketplace highlights the critical impact of federal funding cuts on rural healthcare facilities. Rural hospitals and clinics, which rely heavily on federal support to provide essential services, face potential closures. Interviews with healthcare providers in Oregon illustrate the dire consequences for remote communities, where patients may have to travel extensive distances for care if local clinics shut down.

Notable Points:

• Teresa Hunt (Ashur Health): Without federal funding, the clinic serving 1,200 patients may cease operations.
• Casey Bolton (Aviva Health): Concerns over Medicaid cuts and federal grant uncertainties threaten the clinic's sustainability.
• Carrie Cochran McLean (National Rural Health Association): Federal funding cuts could force rural clinics out of existence, increasing healthcare costs and reducing access.

Quotes:

"It's just one of many health services that could disappear with federal cuts."
- Dr. Lisa Johnson
[20:31]

"Community health clinics will have to pick up the slack... which then kind of raises costs across the board."
- Carrie Cochran McLean
[21:43]

7. Trade Policy Uncertainty: RM Metals' Struggles

Timestamp: [24:09 - 27:34]
The episode concludes with a deep dive into how fluctuating trade policies and tariffs are adversely affecting businesses like RM Metals. Sam Desai, Vice President of RM Metals, discusses the challenges of adjusting to sudden price increases in aluminum and steel due to recent tariff changes. The uncertainty forces companies to navigate thin profit margins and unpredictable costs, making long-term planning and sustainability increasingly difficult.

Notable Points:

• Sam Desai (RM Metals): Faces a 15-20% loss due to increased raw material costs and struggles to adjust pricing with customers.
• Impact on Business: Tight margins (1-4%) and ongoing uncertainties make it hard to maintain profitability.
• Industry Outlook: Constant tariff changes prevent stable business operations and lead to financial stress.

Quotes:

"It should be... the metal comes in, they give it to the consumer to use and that's what it should be."
- Joe Soleimani
[24:46]

"Our margins have been razor thin... it's been a very tough ordeal to discuss... you never know what's going to happen the next day."
- Sam Desai
[27:34]

---

Conclusion

In this episode of "Marketplace," Kai Ryssdal navigates through a complex landscape of economic challenges, from consumer sentiment versus actual economic conditions to the tangible impacts of trade wars on agriculture and the real estate market. The discussion extends to the struggles faced by companies like Tesla amidst political and regulatory shifts, and the critical threats posed by federal funding cuts to rural healthcare. Each segment underscores the intricate interplay between policy decisions, market forces, and individual livelihoods, painting a comprehensive picture of the current economic climate.

Final Quote:

"Nobody's surprised, right, that it's the Wawas today. Dow Industrials off 890 points... The S&P 500 down 155, 2.7%."
- Kai Ryssdal
[15:53]

---

For a deeper dive into these topics, listen to the full episode of "Marketplace" available on your preferred podcast platform.

Transcript

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[Kai Rysdal]

Following along, today did not come as a surprise. From American Public Media, this is Marketplace in Los Angeles. I'm Kyle Rizdal. It is Monday today. This one is the 10th of March. Good as always. Have you along, everybody? The temptation, of course, on a day like today is to point out that the stock market is not the economy. And it's not. That said, though, in contrast to those days where the market swings pretty wildly and the general vibe is, yeah, I don't know, markets just do that sometimes. Today we know exactly what's going on. The chaotic trade policy coming from the White House and the refrain from everybody from the president on down being, yeah, there's going to be some discomfort. The rubber has finally started to meet the economic road. Major indices rolled over, nervous traders went hard into bonds, which sent yields farther down. And now we are just waiting for the dust to settle. And as we wait, consider this. The latest survey of consumer expectations from the Federal Reserve bank of New York shows that more than a quarter of households are expecting their financial situations to deteriorate considerably in the coming year. A growing number expect to be spending more, and they believe it's going to be increasingly hard to get credit. And fewer say they're likely to quit their jobs voluntarily this year, in part because they expect unemployment to rise. Marketplace's Samantha Fields gets us going.

[Ben Harris]

In economics, the consumer is not always right. Ben Harris at Brookings says take the last couple of years. By almost any measure, the economy has been strong.

[Samantha Fields]

Unemployment has been historically low. The stock market's growing economic growth has been continuing. We would have expected that people's outlook, all in all, would be relatively positive.

[Ben Harris]

Instead, consumers have been feeling pretty negative, he says there's been a real mismatch between sentiment and reality.

[Samantha Fields]

Middle part of 2022, for example, people were just as down on the economy as they were during the great financial crisis, even though the economy in 2022 is doing so much better.

[Ben Harris]

Consumers then were also saying one thing that they were worried about the economy and doing another continuing to spend like they weren't worried.

[Lisa]

Just because folks say they're unhappy about the state of the economy, that doesn't mean much.

[Ben Harris]

Justin Wolfers at the University of Michigan says it's important to distinguish between how people feel about the economy broadly and how they feel about what's happening in their own lives.

[Lisa]

Because what folks are expert in is not the aggregates GDP and the unemployment rate, but their own household economies.

[Ben Harris]

And in the last couple of years, when people said they were worried about the economy, they were worried about the.

[Lisa]

Headlines of the national economy, but not their own household economies.

[Ben Harris]

But this latest survey from the New York Fed shows people are increasingly concerned about their own financial futures. Vicki Bogan at Duke University says that is worth watching. Because if people are worried about their own bills and job prospects, they're less likely to spend.

[Kimberly Adams]

They're more likely to save money. When they're reducing their spending and saving more, what is it going to do? It's going to reduce the demand for goods and services. When consumers reduce their demand for goods and services, business sales are going to decline.

[Ben Harris]

Which is why when consumer expectations fall, there's always the possibility an economic slowdown could be coming. I'm Samantha Fields for Marketplace on Wall street today.

[Kai Rysdal]

Stocks bad, bonds good. We'll have the details when we do the number. As surely as the sun rises in the east, tariffs bring retaliatory tariffs. Mexico's talking about it. Canada's doing it. China too, specifically. With extra levies on US agricultural exports, Chinese buyers are going to pay 15% more for US chicken, wheat and corn, 10% on soybeans, pork and fruit. Marketplace's Kimberly Adams explains just how the trade war this time is going to play out for American farmers.

[Kimberly Adams]

For agricultural products already on their way from the U.S. to China, nothing changes. Joe Shealy is with the U.S. meat Export Federation.

[Joe Shealy]

Our understanding is that the product that's already en route that the additional duty would not be in effect for that product, that it would clear under the duties that were already in place.

[Kimberly Adams]

But Scheele says there is an immediate impact on the psychology of the market.

[Joe Shealy]

Anytime you inject additional costs or additional uncertainty, certainly suppliers have to look at how much China will remain part of their sales, their export portfolio.

[Kimberly Adams]

If you're a US Producer of, say, corn or chickens and a buyer in China has already agreed to buy a certain amount from you at a certain price, what what happens now depends on exactly what kind of deal you made. J. O Wen teaches business and international economy at the Harvard Business School.

[Dr. Lisa Johnson]

A lot of these contracts have clauses that are about unexpected trade policy changes that will determine whether the buyer or the seller is paying the unexpected tariff or how they're sharing that is it 50, 50 or 70, 30?

[Kimberly Adams]

Longer term tariffs are likely to mean fewer exports, says Wen. And for some products, that will mean more supply on the domestic market, US.

[Dr. Lisa Johnson]

Buyers of these goods are going to face relatively cheaper goods. But the problem is that US Demand is nowhere near large enough to compensate for the decline in Chinese demand.

[Kimberly Adams]

Layer these tariffs on top of all the others already affecting the ag industry, Wen says, and the takeaway is that farmers will just make less money. In Washington, I'm Kimberly Adams for Marketplace.

[Kai Rysdal]

Selling a home can be complicated. Contingencies, comps, escrow, closing costs. There's a whole vocabulary that buyers and sellers have to navigate to finally reach a deal. And that is in the best of times. What's it like, do you suppose, to sell a house that doesn't exist anymore? Thousands of homeowners here in Los Angeles affected by the Palisades and the Eaton fires are deciding whether to rebuild or just sell and start new someplace else. A couple of weeks ago, the very first listed residential property destroyed by the Palisades fire was sold. As Marketplace's Matt Levin reports, there's not.

[Samantha Fields]

Much left of 17126 Avenida de la Eradura in the Pacific Palisades Highlands neighborhood.

[Richard Schulman]

So you can see the EPA came through. That's what this complete check mark is.

[Samantha Fields]

Realtor Richard Schulman is showing me the remnants of the 2,500 square foot ranch style house that used to be here. A charred file cabinet a few feet from where the front door probably was. Some cans of paint around what was likely the front yard. But at the end of the street there's still an ocean view.

[Richard Schulman]

So this is the first publicly listed and closed property in the Palisades. This closed for 1.2 million.

[Samantha Fields]

Shulman listed the property on January 15, barely a week after the fire started. It closed in late February. If you're wondering how in the world a lot with 9,900 square feet of rubble fetches over a million dollars, it's the Palisades.

[Richard Schulman]

This is one of the most Beautiful places to live in the world. You're in a totally secluded part of la, but you're still in the, in the city.

[Samantha Fields]

Before the fires, the home would have sold for something like two and a half million. Shulman listed the property for 999,000. But it's not like there were other burned down comps he could find on Zillow.

[Richard Schulman]

This hasn't been done before here. So we're trying to guess along the way and try to get the best answer.

[Samantha Fields]

He settled on a price he thought would drum up interest. Schuman wasn't sure how much demand there would actually be after the fires. Terry Bromberg, the seller, also had her doubts.

[Kimberly Adams]

I couldn't imagine anybody wanting to buy a completely destroyed, burned up property.

[Samantha Fields]

Bromberg is 69. She lived at the Erradura property for the past 20 years, the last few with her daughter Rosie Galanis and son in law Kenneth. While Bromberg was at work. When the fires came, Rosie and Kenneth had to wait hours to make their escape. Abandoned cars were blocking the only exit route. At first Bromberg wanted to rebuild. Rosie talked her out of it.

[Dr. Lisa Johnson]

When she brought that up, I just broke down and I was like, like.

[Garnett Wagner]

We go back and rebuild for what?

[Dr. Lisa Johnson]

Like for this to happen again.

[Samantha Fields]

That 999,000 listing price meant Bromberg would likely be selling the home for less than the 1.5 million she and her late husband paid for it 20 years ago. Even with insurance, Bromberg would be taking a financial hit.

[Kimberly Adams]

Our decision was mostly an emotional one. We don't want to live back there again. We want to relocate.

[Samantha Fields]

When Realtor Richard Schulman posted 17126 eradure on the MLS with pictures of the house before the fires, he knew the pool of buyers would be mostly wealthy developers and investors offering all cash.

[Richard Schulman]

We had over 60 inquiries. We had a stack of offers. I think we had six offers over the list price.

[Samantha Fields]

Because access to the Palisades was restricted, all those offers came without buyers seeing the actual property. Joe Soleimani is the realtor who represented the winning bidder, who didn't want to talk.

[Kai Rysdal]

We did a lot of Google, you.

[Joe Soleimani]

Know, with Google Street View and we did a lot of other stuff.

[Samantha Fields]

Investors like the one Soleimani represents are betting that in five to seven years demand to live in the Palisades will be stronger than before the fire. They think new fire hardened homes and infrastructure will convince potential buyers. It's less risky now because this risk.

[Joe Soleimani]

Was there before, you know, and if.

[Kai Rysdal]

You even go back to other places.

[Joe Soleimani]

That in the past they had fire.

[Kai Rysdal]

Or what have you.

[Joe Soleimani]

After a while, people start going back.

[Samantha Fields]

So tell me what used to be here.

[Richard Schulman]

This was a really beautiful townhome complex called the Woody's.

[Samantha Fields]

There's two Realtor Richard Schulman is showing one of his three other Palisades listings a town home that was part of a larger complex completely destroyed by the fires. It looks like someone dropped a bomb on it. The asking price? 750 grand.

[Richard Schulman]

It's just a dream, you know, it's a dream of what this will be in the future. You know, the what you're buying is this view of this hillside here and the trees here and how this is going to look when it's done.

[Samantha Fields]

Schulman says he's already got plenty of interested buyers. I'm Matt Levin for Marketplace.

[Kai Rysdal]

Stock of the Day today. Among the many, many that wound up deep in the red is ticker symbol TSLA shares off 15% on the day, 36% the past month. For Tesla, obviously what investors are willing to pay for a share of any given company is an amalgam of hard business decisions and how any given investor feels about that company and in this case about its CEO and said CEOs side hustle with the observation that Tesla shares have now lost all their gains since the presidential election. Just to pick a random point in time, Marketplace's Kelly Wells has more.

[Garnett Wagner]

This isn't an EV market problem, it's an Elon Musk problem, says climate economist Garnett Wagner at Columbia Business School.

[Lisa]

What's happening here you can probably explain through the politics and the optics.

[Garnett Wagner]

Wagner says Tesla stock exploded after the November election because of Elon Musk's proximity to newly elected President Trump.

[Lisa]

That proximity has not turned into Tesla sales, at least not yet, and maybe never.

[Garnett Wagner]

So EV drivers are buying other cars, and equity strategist Seth Goldstein at Morningstar Research says that's not just because of politics.

[Kai Rysdal]

We're seeing increased competition.

[Richard Schulman]

Other automakers are now offering comparable long.

[Kai Rysdal]

Range vehicles at a similar price point.

[Garnett Wagner]

On top of all that, the Trump administration has brought with it some bad news for a huge piece of Tesla's business. Gil Tal is the director of the Electric Vehicle Research center at UC Davis.

[Lisa]

Tesla have one less very serious revenue source, which is selling credits.

[Garnett Wagner]

Tal says Tesla, one of the cleanest automakers, sells carbon credits to its more pollutive colleagues so they can meet state regulations and those imposed by the Environment Environmental Protection Agency. The EPA regulation is now in question.

[Lisa]

By canceling the EPA regulation and so on, they just directly canceling this market.

[Garnett Wagner]

That would be bad news when credits make up more than a third of Tesla's business. Moreover, Tesla sales are cratering in Europe and there have been protests against the company here and abroad because of Elon Musk's political involvements. Jessica Caldwell with Edmunds says this summer is going to be a major test for Tesla's future.

[Ben Harris]

People that buy stock in Tesla, it's.

[Kai Rysdal]

Almost like a dream as to what.

[Lisa]

Is going to happen.

[Dr. Lisa Johnson]

Is Tesla going to dominate the robo taxi field?

[Ben Harris]

Because we know who does that, is.

[Kai Rysdal]

Going to be an extremely profitable company.

[Garnett Wagner]

Whether Tesla dominates the field will depend on whether it makes good on its promise to have autonomous vehicles on the road starting in June. I'm Kailey Wells for Marketplace.

[Kai Rysdal]

Coming up.

[Joe Soleimani]

But it's been a very tough ordeal to discuss, you know, price changes.

[Kai Rysdal]

Yeah, those tariff conversations can be awkward. First though, let's do the numbers. Yeah. Nobody's surprised, right, that it's the Wawas today. Dow Industrials off 890 points. Two and a tenth percent, 41,000. The NASDAQ subtracted 727 points 4%. Even 17,468. The S&P 500 down 155, 2.7%, 56 and 14. There the proximate causes, you know, Right. Okay. S and P is about to do another one of its quarterly rebalancings. It announced it's replacing four companies in the index. And that is usually good news for the newcomer shares. But today, forget about it. Losses for newbies Doordash, which gave up a 10th percent. TKO Holdings Group. Actually it's TKO Group holdings, that's parent of WWE and UFC. Get it? TKO took a 1.1% hit retailer Williams Sonoma which fell 1.7%. The one new addition that did gain energy, of course. Natural gas producer Expand energy which inflated 3 and 2 10%. Bonds rose yield on the 10 year tino down 4.22%. You're listening to Market Place.

[Lisa]

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[Lisa]

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[Kai Rysdal]

I'm Kai Rysdal. A reminder by way of setting up this next piece that what Elon Musk and his operatives call government savings often, even usually aren't governments, aren't businesses and can't be run the same way. Case in point, healthcare and government funding. Hospitals and clinics in rural parts of the country rely heavily on federal funding to keep the doors open and services available. And the cuts that have been made so far are having ripple effects far from Washington. Oregon Public Broadcasting's Lillian Karabake has more.

[Dr. Lisa Johnson]

Last fall, Bobby Nikolaitis was on the once a week bus that travels through the Oregon outback.

[Garnett Wagner]

This bus, we are like family.

[Kai Rysdal]

It's a great group of people.

[Dr. Lisa Johnson]

Nikolaitis was making the 130 mile trip to get a blood draw at a clinic. On average, rural patients travel twice as far to healthcare, bus driver Debbie Warren said. It's part of rural living. Doctor's appointments are a long ways away.

[Kai Rysdal]

But there's peace and quiet.

[Dr. Lisa Johnson]

This bus service is federally funded, and it's just one of many health services that could disappear with federal cuts. Rural community health clinics are also feeling threatened. Take Fossil, Oregon, a community in the high desert that's so remote, the Census Bureau doesn't even categorize it as rural, but rather frontier. One person per acre. That's Teresa Hunt, the CEO of Ashur Health, the only provider in this area serving 1,200 patients a year. And without the federal money for being a federally qualified health center, there's just. There's no way that we'll be here. Well, it would be devastating for the people that live here. And if the clinic loses funding and closes, patients will have to drive more than three hours over winding mountain passes to get care. Many other rural clinics face similar challenges.

[Joe Shealy]

We're designed to take care of the underserved. We're the primary care safety net for a community.

[Dr. Lisa Johnson]

That's Casey Bolton, CEO of Aviva Health, a community health clinic in rural Douglas County, Oregon. It serves about 18,000 patients a year with the help of federal funding. Last month, Bolton started to worry he might not have access to federal grants that are already promised to the clinic. So he tried to withdraw the remaining balance. Apparently, he wasn't the only one.

[Joe Shealy]

Think of it kind of like a run on the bank, like everyone's trying to draw off the system. It overloaded the system.

[Dr. Lisa Johnson]

The federal portal from the Health Resources and Services Administration crashed.

[Joe Shealy]

We're all thinking the same thing. Let's get ahead of this.

[Dr. Lisa Johnson]

He was eventually able to withdraw the $3 million of grant funding, but that money will only get the clinic so far. Meanwhile, Bolten is even more worried about possible cuts to Medicaid.

[Joe Shealy]

It's kind of like the ER for outpatient care. We won't turn folks away based on their ability to pay.

[Dr. Lisa Johnson]

Nationally, about 47% of children in rural areas use Medicaid. It's even more for Aviva Health.

[Joe Shealy]

That's my big worry, actually.

[Dr. Lisa Johnson]

The House passed a budget resolution that calls for $880 billion in health services cuts. These are facilities that literally have zero days cash on hand to operate. That's Carrie Cochran McLean with the National Rural Health Association. She says rural health care providers are left scrambling trying to even get federal grant coordinators on the phone. Cochran McLean says cuts to federally staffed clinics could shift pressure elsewhere and in rural areas, Community health clinics will have to pick up the slack. Those costs have to go somewhere, and frequently they end up being shifted to other parts of our healthcare system, which then in turn kind of raises costs across the board, which is kind of a never ending spiral. And she says for patients in rural areas, these federal funding uncertainties threaten to spiral clinics out of existence altogether. In Oregon, I'm Lillian Kaerbake for Marketplace.

[Kai Rysdal]

The white hot center of uncertainty in this economy right now is, of course, trade policy. On again, off again, on again, off again. Tariff pronouncements will do that to you also and not something we've really talked about in this go round of Trump tariffs, exemptions, carve outs for certain products subject to the whim of the Commerce Department. Among those dealing with that uncertainty is Sam Desai. He's vice president of RM Metals out of South Plainfield, New Jersey. We first talked to him back in 2018 when his company was deep in the heart of the steel and aluminum tariffs back then and filing for exemptions. And we figured it was time to check back in.

[Joe Soleimani]

You know, I'm not in the prediction business. I feel like I'm making guesses all day. It's not the way it should be. It should be, the metal comes in, they give it to the consumer to use and that's what it should be. Right?

[Kai Rysdal]

Foreign.

[Joe Soleimani]

Was announced about a month ago. Aluminum pricing has gone up about 20%. Steel prices have gone up about 15%. Just based on some remarks over the last four weeks. You know, I don't know if they, they have changed the prices yet in the retail stores, but I can guarantee you they'll change them in the next couple weeks. I have product coming in right now and I sold it to a customer and now I'm going to see them on Thursday. But I got to figure out how to get them to increase the price. Right now I'm at a loss of about 15%. The customers, majority of them are willing to work with us because they understand it's not my fault. But it's been a very tough ordeal to discuss, you know, price changes against whatever the contract is for. We've been busy because a lot of people are trying to build up their inventory levels of whatever steel they carry. So that's been a positive thing. We see that lasting to a point. Once their inventories are full, they're going to see what happens with these new duties coming about. I'll say one thing is true. Everybody expects prices to go up. The manufacturing is going to increase, but if the raw material keeps coming at a higher price, it's just hard to sustain the same cost structure. And right now our margins are very low. It's between 1% to 4%. That's it. Just because of all the uncertainty out there. And, you know, last year we had all these shipping costs that went up. This year we have these tariffs that are changing. So, yeah, our margins have been razor thin. Our company's been in business for almost 40 years now. In the past, things were pretty much, you know, flat. Prices changed up and down. But in the last five years, I would say that the drastic changes that have happened have made business very difficult and very stressful. You never know what's going to happen the next day. But this is what I do. I'm in the steel industry and I have, you know, another 20 years, hopefully in the business. So I just keep going at it.

[Kai Rysdal]

Sam decide going at it with RM Metals in South Plainfield, New Jersey. This final note on the way out today, in which the subject is the price elasticity of demand. Credit to Axios for this one, which spotted research from the University of California, Berkeley, that shows it took a 228% increase in the price of eggs to reduce the number of eggs bought by just 4%. There aren't really any good substitutes, and even six or eight dollars a dozen is not a huge part of people's food budgets. Our daily production team includes Andy Corbin, Nicholas guillong, Maria Hollenhorst, Iru Ekbanobi, Sarah Leeson, Sean McHenry, and Sophia Terenzio. I'm Kai Rysdal. We will see you tomorrow, Everybody. This is APM.

[Kimberly Adams]

Consumer confidence had its sharpest monthly decline since 2021, which means we're all in our feels about money. And while uncertainty is the only constant these days, it's also a great reason to get serious about understanding personal finance. I'm Janelie Espinal, host of Financially Inclined, a podcast from Marketplace that makes learning about money simple. Learn about practical skills like negotiating job offers, dealing with money in friendship and love, entrepreneurship and student loans. Get serious about your money and build a life you've always dreamed of. Listen to Financially Inclined wherever you get your podcast.