The Question Lingering Behind Every Headline
A weekend topic starting with KGW in Oregon. “‘I was on the edge of a cliff, hanging by my fingernails, fearing that my kids and I would have to leave Portland,’ Roscoe Ryan remembers. The 41-year-old single mother had been renting a home in Portland’s St. Johns neighborhood for three years when the bad news came. ‘The landlady told me she wanted to sell the house, and I would have to move,’ she recalls.”
“Then the owner offered to sell the 800-square-foot house to Ryan for $290,000. Ryan, who earns $30,000 a year working at an organic grocery store, initially was hopeful. But when lenders told her she’d need to make a $35,000 down payment to qualify for a mortgage, she balked. Scraping together a down payment bigger than her annual salary seemed impossible. Ryan began scrambling for alternatives. At $290,000, the price tag on Ryan’s home is an anomaly in Portland. The city’s current median home price is $422,450. A down payment of 10 percent on a house of that value pencils out to $42,000 — more than half the $73,000 annual earnings for a median-income family of four. That’s a lot to save when rents are exploding and incomes are stagnating, says Chris Bonner, director of the city’s Bureau of Planning.”
“Ryan eventually purchased her home with the help of a modest inheritance, plus a coveted, publicly funded $15,000 down-payment-assistance grant and counseling from Portland Housing Center. She is near her financial limit, with housing costs that consume well over half her earnings and exceed what she was paying for rent.”
“But Ryan believes the benefits are worth the costs. ‘I’m happy,’ she says. ‘My kids, who are 8 and 11, can stay at James Johns Elementary School, and I can walk three blocks to work. I love our whole St. Johns neighborhood.’”
From Neel Kashkari, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. “Everyone can recognize a bubble after it bursts, and then many people convince themselves that they saw it on the way up. Michael Lewis’ highly entertaining book, ‘The Big Short,’ is a perfect example. With the benefit of hindsight, Lewis picked four guys who happened to be right this time. It would have been far more impressive if Lewis had identified and written about them when the housing bubble was forming. Why didn’t he?”
“Because on any given day, there are lots of people predicting various doomsday scenarios. How do you know which one is right among all the cranks? And maybe today’s crank will look brilliant tomorrow. As they say about broken clocks…”
“Monetary policy is a blunt instrument: We set the overnight interest rate, and it then affects rates all across the country, across different asset classes. That’s one of the biggest challenges in trying to use monetary policy to change asset prices. The Fed also has regulatory and supervisory tools that it can use to change the behavior of the financial institutions it supervises.”
“While the Fed can limit the amount of debt used to buy stocks, some countries can also adjust the loan-to-value (LTV) requirements of mortgages. By increasing the down payment requirement (lowering LTVs), those countries could directly target the housing market if it were showing signs of overheating. This is an example of a highly targeted tool that, in theory, should be effective in slowing down the housing market without slowing down the entire economy the way raising rates would.”
“My takeaway from these countries’ experiences is that when asset prices are climbing rapidly, they can be very difficult to slow down, even with policy tools that are targeted squarely at the asset class. That suggests to me that if central bankers were to try to use monetary policy to slow those bubbles down, the rate increases necessary to be effective would likely be large, resulting in high economic cost to the rest of the economy.”
“My takeaway from the varied costs of false negatives is that we must first try to assess the cost of a correction before we determine whether to try to address asset prices that appear elevated. What determines if an asset price correction will trigger a crisis or just a milder downturn? Debt seems to be a key factor. Housing is a huge, highly leveraged market. The mortgage market is roughly a $10 trillion market.”
“Today, people often buy homes with 20% as a down payment. Going into the financial crisis, people were putting little to nothing down with those infamous no-doc loans. Those loans were bundled into mortgage-backed securities, which were then bundled into collateralized debt obligations, and then banks bought them with yet more borrowed money. It was leverage on top of leverage with little equity supporting it all.”
“It’s the Fed’s job to put the brakes on the economy before it overheats, which almost by definition will be unpopular with many people. So why should public awareness matter to the Fed? Regulators don’t exist in a vacuum. The Fed ultimately gets its power from the American people, through authorities granted to it by their elected representatives. Yes, the Fed must make tough, sometimes unpopular choices, but the ability of the Fed to impose and sustain steep costs on the economy and Main Street is limited by the willingness of the people to accept those costs.”
“This essay has been pretty skeptical about the powers of the Fed to identify and slow down bubbles. But there is something we can do that does not require us to identify bubbles in the first place. We can make sure our financial institutions are sound and can withstand the shock of asset price corrections.”
From CBC News. “It’s the question lingering behind every headline. It’s whispered among homeowners, would-be buyers and sellers, economists and policy-makers. What actually happens if Canadian real estate prices crash? On the one hand, a crash might be good for some Canadians already priced out of the market. And even a dramatic 40 per cent drop in prices would set homeowners in markets like Toronto or Vancouver back, what, two or three years?”
“But there are broader concerns for the market and the economy itself that could prove devastating. Home prices are notoriously off the charts. Everyone from the governor of the Bank of Canada to the chatty guy in your local cafe has said, repeatedly, that this increase in prices is not sustainable. But what that means, precisely, is vague.”
“First of all, what is a real crash? Think Toronto in 1989. Prices fell off a cliff. The average cost of a home in Toronto hit a whopping $273,698, a 30-year high. Then the bottom fell out. By 1996, that average had fallen to $198,150. (Yes, you read that right, you could buy a home in Toronto for a mere fraction of the $920,000 it costs today.)”
“Benjamin Tal, deputy chief economist at CIBC World Markets, says the important question isn’t how far prices would fall, but why they fell in the first place. If prices fell because Toronto’s well established supply issue was sorted out, that could actually prove positive for the economy. But if they fell as a result of a quick rise in interest rates, as happened in the United States in 2006, the impact could be severe.”
“‘The higher interest rate environment would lead to a significant increase in debt financing as opposed to other spending,’ says Tal. That would require people to spend more covering their mortgage and leave them with less to spend elsewhere in the economy. ‘Then you get into a consumer-led recession. And this would lead to increased unemployment and people defaulting and continued decline in prices. That’s the worst scenario.’”
“Based on this theory, it’s not hard to see why a double-digit correction in prices could cascade through other parts of the economy, ‘and that can feed on itself,’ says Tal.”
“On the upside, just about everyone agrees that nightmare scenario is still unlikely. Prices are slowing in Toronto and Vancouver. And Tal says one big difference between today’s situation and the U.S. housing crash is that everyone in this country is trying to slow down the market. ‘It’s banks, even developers, clearly policy-makers. You don’t have the situation where banks are seeing green and trying to maximize profits. In fact they are really trying to slow it down. Regulators are trying to slow it down and more is coming.’”
‘With the benefit of hindsight, Lewis picked four guys who happened to be right this time. It would have been far more impressive if Lewis had identified and written about them when the housing bubble was forming. Why didn’t he?’
‘Because on any given day, there are lots of people predicting various doomsday scenarios. How do you know which one is right among all the cranks?’
OK, I’m going to play along and then I’m going to tell you what I really think. I did predict this whole mess, in 2005 on a radio show with 13 million listeners. How? Prices, motivation, speculation.
‘She is near her financial limit, with housing costs that consume well over half her earnings and exceed what she was paying for rent.’
Peter Schiff identified speculators in 2005 as including people who could have rented cheaper and with less risk. This lady is speculating, even though she probably doesn’t realize it. It’s for the children.
The other day a poster said Canada’s housing bubble was “obvious”. I said in an interview in 2007 Canada had a bubble. Then a funny thing happened. The bust started and Canada along with Australia convinced themselves they didn’t have a bubble, it was blowback from the evil subprime debacle in the Us (the vast majority of defaults weren’t subprime, but hey, thar’s gold in them thar Alberta double-wides). Then around 2011 I did another interview with the Globe and Mail and a bunch of people again went off about stopped clocks, etc. Look at them now. Oh we can’t go back, it would damage consumption! It’s going back and there ain’t a damn thing anyone can do about it.
So, maybe if someone had listened to this crank, an entire nation wouldn’t have its tail in a crack.
‘Canada’s red hot housing market—fuelled primarily by soaring prices first in Vancouver, and now in Toronto—has drawn many a bubble warning from some real estate watchers. But there were others who once talked down bubble fears. However with prices in Canada’s largest city climbing at more than 25 per cent a year, bubble warnings have surged too.’
‘We track the observations of economists, politicians and regulators as they watched Canadian house prices heat up over the past few years and finally become so hot in Toronto that officials at all levels of government have scrambled to intervene in an attempt to cool it off.’
‘The emojis in the graph represent the various stages of bubble anxiety—from calm to frantic—for the six individuals we looked at. Tap each to read their quote from that time.’
This is the flip side: people like Tal who waved off any concern about house prices for years.
‘She is near her financial limit, with housing costs that consume well over half her earnings and exceed what she was paying for rent.’
Gotcha!
Bahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha.
Given all the cultures in Toronto area, one of the few universal group thinks is the confusion between a home, and owning property.
1. Dumb ‘em down.
2. profit.
“My kids, who are 8 and 11, can stay at James Johns Elementary School, and I can walk three blocks to work”
The older child is nearing the age for orthodontic braces. The early teen years are where your kids really start costing you money, e.g., school music band, field trips, brand name clothing, sports gear, etc., which won’t be happening in this household.
Braces are for the well heeled. They cost about $5000 and dental insurance MIGHT cover $1500 of that. Even as a renter she couldn’t afford it.
There is one exception: those on Medicaid. My sister is a teacher, and she once told me that two groups of kids had braces: “the rich” and the Medicaid crowd. Those in between do without.
According to Neel Kashkari, I’m like a broken clock for noticing that house prices in my state bore no relationship whatsoever to the incomes of people who live and work here. Just shut up and leave this to the experts, I get it. How come the question isn’t “why are our policymakers so breathtakingly incompetent?”
And did he just admit that the Fed uses monetary policy to change asset prices? When did that become part of its portfolio?
Now I’m going to tell you what I really think:
‘My takeaway from these countries’ experiences is that when asset prices are climbing rapidly, they can be very difficult to slow down, even with policy tools that are targeted squarely at the asset class. That suggests to me that if central bankers were to try to use monetary policy to slow those bubbles down, the rate increases necessary to be effective would likely be large, resulting in high economic cost to the rest of the economy.’
Just what kind of fools do you take us for? Bernanke openly targeted increasing house prices. He foamed the runway for banks. The federal government and central bankers round the world purposefully reflated these bubbles to save their cookies, because the global economy sucks prunes. Are we supposed to forget about the “wealth effect” Yellen marbled at us year after year?
It’s stupid - incredibly stupid, to use house prices to boost consumption. And it hasn’t stopped. A GSE just took student loans out of the calculation for loans. How about the federally backed loans for illegal immigrants living 5 to a house to qualify? So this Neel guy can wax theoretical all day: they did this thing. And it wasn’t a one off policy. How about QE? Why was it bonds and MBS if this wasn’t set up all along? What about Mel Watt and his “pedal to the metal”?
‘‘The higher interest rate environment would lead to a significant increase in debt financing as opposed to other spending,’ says Tal. That would require people to spend more covering their mortgage and leave them with less to spend elsewhere in the economy. ‘Then you get into a consumer-led recession.’
Guess what genius: housing bubbles cut into consumer spending too, as does all time high rents. And you want to tell us about cranks and stopped clocks? All of you id-juts should be out of job and banished to dumb ass island.
love your righteous anger at this pompous, self important, omniscient posing a**hole
I suspect the coming Great Reset is going to bring a little long-lost something called accountability and consequences for the Wall Street grifters and their Fed accomplices.
“I suspect the coming Great Reset is going to bring a little long-lost something called accountability and consequences for the Wall Street grifters and their Fed accomplices.”
Shirley, you jest.
Bankers have been known to be assassinated.
I don’t get angry about stuff like this. I’ve long realized not much is going to change in my lifetime, that it’s probably always been this way and I should focus on the little joys that come along. There’s plenty of constructive things to do with family and planning for my future. That said, I don’t know the purpose of putting out papers like this. The odd dismissive nature of it. “Oh we’ll just make sure the banks are OK.” He mentions commercial real estate: NYC CRE doubled in two years recently. Does he not know a lot of that is financed with pensions? And aren’t those institutions as well?
This woman in Portland: now paying half her income on the loan. Single with two little kids. Now that’s a shaky arrangement. What this paper is saying as I read it is, no one is watching the store and no one needs to and our only responsibility is to clean up after it blows. Nice tidy package.
‘She is near her financial limit, with housing costs that consume well over half her earnings and exceed what she was paying for rent…But Ryan believes the benefits are worth the costs. ‘I’m happy,’ she says.’
It’s all fun til someone loses an eye.
Ryan is in denial on a subject that is not mentioned anywhere in the piece. Namely that unemployment is a fact of life which she WILL experience at some time. When she does, her house will be a disasterous hinderance.
Also, Ben Jones wrote, “I’ve long realized not much is going to change in my lifetime.” It has been my experience that things may change very, very quickly. One historic example is the Soviet Union. What caused the USSR’s demise? It started with Chernobyl, and that caused the population to lose confidence in their system of governance. So, what we see in the stupidity of the real estate markets could change very quickly. It depends upon what causes would start the debacle. I’m thinking that it has started in 2007, and it’s just taking a while to complete. Of course, I’m more than likely wrong. We’ll see.
Regards,
Roidy
“Just what kind of fools do you take us for?”
Bahahahahahahaha … such a question.
The answer: The same kind of fools that you are.
Next question?
‘My takeaway from these countries’ experiences is that when asset prices are climbing rapidly, they can be very difficult to slow down, even with policy tools that are targeted squarely at the asset class.
I love how he pretends that there is actually experience somewhere, _anywhere_, in actually attempting to slow the price climb of a bubble with targeted policy tools. Umm, where was that, pray tell?? From what I’ve observed, every central bank seems to be doing their best to avoid taking away the punch bowl on this bubble.
Exactly which central bank is using their regulatory powers to require 40% down—or even 20% down?
Singapore did. Cut demand and increased supply, told the REIC to tough it when they whined. This started in 2013.
“Guess what genius: housing bubbles cut into consumer spending too, as does all time high rents. And you want to tell us about cranks and stopped clocks? All of you id-juts should be out of job and banished to dumb ass island.”
+1 I always wonder if guys like this are lying or actually that dumb.
I bought a set of gnomes at walmart this morning. Picked up a shovel too.
Ben - do you have a special snowflake image in this collection?
Triggleypuff should suffice.
Just the ticket.
https://westernrifleshooters.files.wordpress.com/2017/05/dathoofwsaavtuw.jpg
that is unethical behavior!
azdude,
Please define the word “ethics”.
Then, please write 2-3 paragraphs on your views as to what currently is ethical about the housing industry and what currently is not ethical about the housing industry.
Note that for something to be ethical, something else must not be.
I’m interested in your thoughts.
Thanks.
“that is unethical behavior!”
One thing I find very unethical is to allow those without ethics or means to enter a country and do whatever they feel like doing upon their arrival.
That includes the Chinese, whom dozens of individuals on this board apparently obsess about.
All this talk about the Chinese, their money, their economy, their industry.
Very little discussion about the ethics (or lack thereof) of Chinese arriving on our shores.
The lack of interest here in their ethical codes (whatever those ethics might be, good or bad) speaks quite loudly. From this outsider’s vantage point, ethics is by far the thing I would be most concerned about if I were witnessing a large influx of foreigners first hand.
Ethics and morals trump everything else. Including money and housing prices.
Very little discussion about the ethics (or lack thereof) of Chinese arriving on our shores ??
The History of Chinese Americans or the history of ethnic Chinese in the United States relates to the three major waves of Chinese immigration to the United States with the first beginning in the 19th century. Chinese immigrants in the 19th century worked as laborers, particularly on the transcontinental railroad, such as the Central Pacific Railroad. They also worked as laborers in the mining industry, and suffered racial discrimination at every level of society. While industrial employers were eager to get this new and cheap labor, the ordinary white public was stirred to anger by the presence of this “yellow peril”.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Chinese_Americans
Greenspan’s gang used to mention “moral hazard” frequently. When was the last time you heard a central banker use those words?
I hear ya!
My answer? Never.
‘Nary an ethic meaningful enough to hold a candle to a bubble.
Note the near total lack of concern -lack of interest, even - in morals and ethics. It’s all about the bennies and houses. And the Chinese…the Masters of the Universe.
Keep an eye on those derivatives, Ben. I am; I have nothing to report. It’s interestingly quiet on that front. Please advise should you come across something. Thanks.
Yes, scdave, very little.
The story of the Chinese arriving here 25-150 years ago is mostly otiose relative to today’s arrivals and the reason for their arrival. Different times, different circumstances.
You are making a serious miscalculation if you think today’s goings-on is a good thing for the country ethically and morally.
Today’s story is one of plunder. It is not one of racism, sexism or any other such politically correct nonsense.
Today’s story is one of plunder. It is not one of racism, sexism or any other such politically correct nonsense ??
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwjB6Oa8vJDUAhUNymMKHX1BCLYQFggkMAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nytimes.com%2F1990%2F09%2F07%2Fbusiness%2Fjapanese-buy-pebble-beach-golf-course.html&usg=AFQjCNFy5yWutRBEwejeuTuh0KWv1g5lIQ&sig2=3yoO5Ez6BC7mkZkJVSKqXA
And then six years later;
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=5&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwjB6Oa8vJDUAhUNymMKHX1BCLYQFgg_MAQ&url=http%3A%2F%2Farticles.chicagotribune.com%2F1996-06-03%2Fbusiness%2F9606030053_1_pacific-rim-practice-e-y-kenneth-leventhal-japanese-investors&usg=AFQjCNEofMKtq99pcO9Wd_aLbHzTjAyXYA&sig2=uRner5T2_7LsO_DIoScC3g
Again, today’s story is one of plunder, and not racism nor sexism.
scdave….a suggestion. Rather than rely on select news outlets for your take on the world, rely on yourself. You are smarter than they are anyway.
What do you see in your world? When you interact with people? When you run errands?
Do you witness others behaving as news outlets say they do? I don’t. I see something entirely different.
Rather than rely on select news outlets for your take on the world ??
I don’t watch FOX or listen to people like Rush, Info wars and the like…I pretty much tune in everywhere else and I read probably 3 hours everyday from all sorts of outlets including some excellent posts here…
What do you see in your world… Do you witness others behaving as news outlets say they do ?
I am a bit lost on your question…
scdave,
If you are a bit lost on my question, then I have a recommendation for you…which is also a challenge.
For the entire month of June, do not read any newspapers, listen to radio news or watch news on the television. Stay away from internet-based news and opinions as well.
Try it. It’s quite the eye opener.
The day-to-day world is nothing like what the news media wants you to believe that it is.
If it’s any help, MacBeth, two of the you-pick farms around here have had to start charging *admission* just to enter their picking fields. The reason is that lots of people would go out to the fields and eat all the berries they could, but not carry any back to buy. One party was caught in the strawberry field with cans of whipped cream, presumably to snack on berries for free. Or, a family would pick a ton of berries indiscriminately, and then hand the buckets to grandma who would sort through the berries throw out anything not perfect.* Last year, one of the farms had Free Wednesday without admission, but I noticed that they didn’t continue that this year.
The owners, of course, can’t say the nationality of the customers doing this, (and nearly ruining it for everyone else) but privately I heard that they were Chinese or other southeast Asian.
—————–
*I saw this myself — little piles of underripe berries on the edge of a row. For a long time I thought the pile was where kid had dropped a bucket, until I heard about the sorting.
“The reason is that lots of people would go out to the fields and eat all the berries they could, but not carry any back to buy.”
That’s pathetic.
For the entire month of June, do not read any newspapers, listen to radio news or watch news on the television. Stay away from internet-based news and opinions as well ??
LOL. I would not make it 24 hours. 🤠
Oxide,
I can understand how recent arrivals wouldn’t carry the same ethical code; if I were to move to Beijing, my ethical code would be quite different than theirs. Naturally, I would create numerous problems just by being me.
What’s different now is that few people now require the new arrivals to live by the ethical code of the host country. There is no expectation. Do whatever the F you feel like doing. Rape and pillage is not what the United States is about. It never has been. Hard work and singing for your supper (if need be) is the way here.
Maybe 6-8 months back, I was admonished by a few people here when I said the social contract is alive and well in the United States. From my vantage point, in flyover, such is the case. In fact, it is becoming increasingly so. Social graces and expectations, for example, are most definitely making a comeback. Public decency is re-asserting itself as an expectation. The people themselves are doing it, and promoting it outwardly to each other. I do this myself - when I experience exemplary behavior, I compliment someone on it immediately. I receive compliments in return. It happens often - several times a day, in fact. No religious overtone whatsoever. Just public decency.
I decided to take on that responsibility myself after seeing that more than 40,000 people from middle America drove more than 500 miles one way to help residents of Joplin after the tornado there.
That’s one hell of a testament.
Perhaps the American social contract is no longer enforced on the coasts, I don’t know.
I will tell you one thing. If the Chinese are taking over California and ruining it, it’s because the locals aren’t demanding better behavior of one another.
No one can expect a well functioning community, neighborhood, society where the prevailing attitude is “screw it - anything goes. Every man or woman for themselves. Everyone else is doing it, so why shouldn’t I?”
I am very much under the impression that that’s what it is like to live in most places on the West Coast and in several places on the East Coast from Washington DC northward.
Your thoughts?
scdave,
TRY IT. See if you can go without for two weeks.
You can do it!
You will be blown away by how your perception of things and people changes. Truly fascinating.
Rachel Maddow’s ratings would drop.
LOL. Good one phony.
It has to be impossible for the immigration people to evaluate ethics of migrants and keep out those who fail to meet some standard.
Statements very similar to these statements about the Chinese were made abut Irish immigrants 170 years ago.
You would think this Clinton like character would do well in China
http://www.shanghaidaily.com/nation/Former-Chinese-official-executed-following-supreme-courts-approval/shdaily.shtml
“Because on any given day, there are lots of people predicting various doomsday scenarios. How do you know which one is right among all the cranks? And maybe today’s crank will look brilliant tomorrow. As they say about broken clocks…”
F**k you, Kashkari. If we were a nation of laws you and your fellow Fed grifters would be serving life sentences along with your mega-criminal accomplices at the TBTF banks. The people who predicted “various doomsday scenarios” did so based on rational factors and basic arithmetic, while the insane levels of irresponsibility and Keynesian frauds and racketeering demonstrated by the central banks, which is the central factor in creating all asset bubbles since the first tech bubble, continue to defy all logic and forestall the inevitable financial reckoning day, making it exponentially worse when it finally arrives.
End the Fed.
http://endthefed.org
“some countries can also adjust the loan-to-value (LTV) requirements of mortgages”
“It’s the Fed’s job to put the brakes on the economy before it overheats”
Sir, you could not possibly be farther removed from what has happened here in recent years. Your crew have given us extremely low interest rates AND low down payment loans for so long the whole place is suffering from heatstroke.
The Federal Reserve cue card:
Step 1: Create fake money stealing value from everyone
Step 2: Loan the fake money to people with interest
Step 3: Take people’s stuff when they can’t repay the debt
Step 4: Get government to enforce our fraud
Step 5: Plunder humanity
I like it, I love it, I want some more of it.
‘It would have been far more impressive if Lewis had identified and written about them when the housing bubble was forming. Why didn’t he? Because on any given day, there are lots of people predicting various doomsday scenarios. How do you know which one is right among all the cranks?’
In 2005 I posted a Santa Cruz Sentinel article where Yellen was asked if there was a bubble in the bay area and she said no. Jeebus, that was bubble central! Then around a year later she warned at a Fed meeting about “ghost towns” at new developments. Uh, have you check out the dark towers in Manhattan and Miami Beach lately?
This talk about stopped doomsday-stopped clocks and cranks is intended to shut down discussion from those that disagree with them. But going along with this guys reasoning, they should at least consider me more credible than themselves. And I’m saying these prices are a disaster in the making.
‘Today, people often buy homes with 20% as a down payment’
He does get points for stand up comedy though.
‘Today, people often buy homes with 20% as a down payment’
That’s the biggest lie they are telling you since 2008/09.
YOU DON’T NEED 20% DOWN PAYMENT PERIOD.
Conventional loans require a minimum of 5 percent as a down payment. FHA loans only require 3.5 percent
And just in case you can’t come up with the 3.5 percent required FHA down payment to qualify, there are firms which will fraudulently help you create the false appearance that you can.
These startups will help you make a down payment — by taking a stake in your house
Published: May 25, 2017 2:05 p.m. ET
Several years after her divorce, Tricia DeWaal was still living in the 3,200-square-foot home where she’d raised her children. When her youngest moved out, DeWaal knew it was time to downsize.
“For what I wanted, I had a 20% down payment, but that would pretty much clean me out in terms of cash,” DeWaal told MarketWatch. “I wanted to have some backup.”
After lots of online research, DeWaal came across a company called Unison, which had an intriguing sales pitch. The company’s home-buyer program offers buyers money for a down payment in exchange for a share of equity in the home, to be paid back when the owner sells.
DeWaal had what she called a “very positive experience.” “It’s definitely a good thing for somebody who’s trying to afford a certain amount that they can’t quite get to,” she said.
…
Yeah, I saw that the other day Pbear. Finding ways to shoehorn people into a house.
‘Today, people often buy homes with 20% as a down payment’
Chinese money launderers and embezzlers, and the Fed’s favored Wall Street financial firms, are usually making all-cash offers. Because the system rewards and enables criminality.
well said
Thank you.
Tell me more about the financial reckoning day you speak of. What is going to happen?
“What is going to happen?”
Lots of pain, lots of commitments of “Never again!”, then back to the same ol’ thing.
There is no learning curve.
I was wondering about the “Great Reset” thing.
There is a forgetting curve, though.
Sadly, the forgetting curve is inversely proportional to the degree of pain—and much of the pain was kicked down the road this time around.
all the hand-wringing housing stats from the the years prior to 2010 are worthless because they don’t reflect the ONE BILLION CHINESE who are now globally affecting . . . EVERYTHING!
it’s just
that
simple
I haven’t seen a Chinese person in my necks of the woods for YEARS.
So, no, it is not affecting everything.
“I haven’t seen a Chinese person in my necks of the woods for YEARS”
We live in an interconnected world, you do not need to see them to have your world impacted by the rising wealth in China. When Chinese drive up coastal housing, people are displaced or just choose to sell their inflated properties and move where housing is cheaper thus driving up the housing properties in that area.
Yeah, that’s why China had QE in multiples of the rest of the world combined. Why we are allowing this monopoly money to enter our RE market is beyond explanation. If Mexico printed up 100 trillion pesos, and we let it in, I’m sure they could buy some coastal shacks too.
You live in your world, I live in mine.
And there are things other than wealth. In case you didn’t know.
And I don’t give a sh*t about the Chinese one way or the other, as shocking as that might be.
What I care about is ethics. As shocking as that might be.
Ethics are not driven by the Chinese. They are driven by principal.
I suggest you think about that for a while.
“principle”
“principle”
A Freudian slip, perhaps?
“When Chinese drive up coastal housing, people are displaced or just choose to sell their inflated properties and move where housing is cheaper thus driving up the housing properties in that area.”
This is an asinine statement.
One does not lead to another. The Chinese are not forcing coastal residents to leave their environs, nor are the Chinese forcing coastal residents to move elsewhere, build houses 2-3 times the size of existing homes in their new communities.
What you have just illustrated (again) is a lack of attention to ethics. This time, not just among the Chinese, but coastal Americans as well, who apparently have little regard for others living elsewhere in the United States.
Typical.
“This is an asinine statement.”
But true.
“The Chinese are not forcing coastal residents to leave their environs, nor are the Chinese forcing coastal residents to move elsewhere, build houses 2-3 times the size of existing homes in their new communities.”
The word “forcing” is not the correct word and it was not the word that was used here. I believe the word that was used here was “choose”.
Debt slavery, unlike the old-fashioned kind of slavery, is not performed by coercion as it was done in the Good ‘Old Days, instead it is done by persuasion - persuasion as in convincing a schmuck that he/she should voluntarily become a slave by applying his/her signature to a dotted line.
What does affect everyone is the “long arm of debt donkeys”.
The Chinese created the biggest expansion of debt in history and used the money to build, build, build. This caused a parabolic rise in the price of resources required to build stuff; oil, copper, iron & etc. This makes our everday lives more expensive in many ways even though we haven’t been such the dumbass. It’s not just the Chinese but they are the biggest donkey on the planet. Every time anyone borrows for decades to buy a house they can’t afford is the same thing in microcosm.
It is good news to see the beginnings of it unraveling.
No, Mr. Banker, it isn’t true.
The Chinese aren’t forcing anyone in the USA to do anything.
They are not coming to our shores, sticking a gun to people’s head, and telling them to move elsewhere and build $400K homes in communities where $250K homes are considered extravagant.
It IS an asinine statement, both in concept and in practicality.
Worse yet, it’s an excuse.
And that’s what you are attempting to do here as well, Mr. Banker. Excuse it. Your comment is equally asinine.
I don’t play your game. And I won’t. Get used to it.
Rich enough to borrow themselves into oblivion, apparently…
Business Day
Why China’s Growing Debt Load Worries the World
点击查看本文中文版
By KEITH BRADSHER
MAY 24, 2017
Workers at a steel factory in Dalian, China. As China’s stunning economic performance over recent decades has become difficult to sustain, the country has used debt to fuel growth. Credit China Daily/Reuters
Moody’s Investors Service downgraded its rating of China’s sovereign debt one notch on Wednesday, citing concerns over growing debt in the country, which has the world’s second-largest economy. In recent years, as China’s stunning economic performance of past decades has become difficult to sustain, the country has used debt to fuel growth.
Now, Moody’s says, China will have to borrow more and more to maintain the levels of economic growth the government wants. The concerns Moody’s raises will sound familiar to those who follow the Chinese economy closely. Expressed by one of the world’s top credit ratings agencies, however, the misgivings will be harder to ignore.
Why Is China’s Debt a Problem?
…
The Chinese are already implementing the solution and Moody’s was only predicting a 5% growth scenario, here is the plan and the part about renting is particularly interesting:
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/business/chinadata/2016-10/01/content_27164704.htm
With manufacturing and construction in decline, some say the Chinese have to keep borrowing just to postpone the pain of deleveraging, for which they have no plan.
“Early this week…iron ore stockpiles hit a new record high in China…port holdings have already surpassed the 20.85 million added in 2016 and are sitting at the highest level on record.”
http://www.mining.com/iron-ore-crashes-58-tonne/
Meanwhile the value of iron ore is falling on China’s credit down rating and dubious prospects, their first downgrade since the Tienanmen Square massacre.
Maybe they can stem their commodities price crash by bringing in greater fools from abroad to prop up the market?
China Plans to Open Up Commodity Trading to Foreigners to Bring Down Prices
Bloomberg News
May 18, 2017, 3:00 PM PDT May 19, 2017, 2:47 AM PDT
China buys more raw materials than any nation, but that doesn’t mean it always gets the best prices. So the government is altering domestic commodity exchanges to bring in more foreign investors and expand the country’s influence on global markets.
Two decades of rapid economic growth have left the world’s biggest population consuming more food, energy and metals than it can produce, turning the country into a powerhouse importer. Still, the value of many purchased commodities, from crude oil to soybeans, is set by global benchmarks priced in dollars on exchanges in other countries, where markets are more open.
After years of building up locals-only markets for key products like grains in Dalian and metals in Shanghai, China wants to expand the kinds of investments permitted for foreigners. Exchange operators also plan to add futures contracts for key raw materials including hogs, apples, cotton yarn, pulp and urea fertilizer, as well as options on copper, corn and cotton. Despite bullish comments by officials, however, some question whether authorities have the appetite to truly open up.
“Internationalizing its futures market can boost China’s sway on global prices and help it eventually become a price-setter instead of a price-taker,” said Han Qian, associate professor of finance at Wang Yanan Institute for Studies in Economics at Xiamen University. “It not only fits into China’s strategy to promote global use of the yuan, but also frees domestic producers from foreign exchange risks.”
…
China has every incentive in the world to keep commodity prices down and not up the story recognizes it and so does the link, it contradicts your point
From the Kashkari article: ““This essay has been pretty skeptical about the powers of the Fed to identify and slow down bubbles. But there is something we can do that does not require us to identify bubbles in the first place. We can make sure our financial institutions are sound and can withstand the shock of asset price corrections.”
The financial industry should be free to innovate and experiment and engage in all kinds of legal activities.
The problem is, with the modern consolidation of the financial industry, components cannot fail without risking wider contagion. This is by design. Thus, a problem in a gambling unit of a financial conglomerate can threaten consumer deposits and business funding.
The answer to this has been bailouts - privatizing profits and socializing losses. There are consequences to this. All bailouts or stimulus are purely redistributive. The government or central bank does not create more wealth and takes that to give to the FIRE sector. It extracts from the society at large and gives to the failed/corrupted organization.
The answer should be: re-modularizing the financial sector into components which can fail without threatening consumer deposits or business funding. Basically break up the financial sector into components which can fail safely. This lesson was learned after the Great Depression (Glass-Steagall), but it was insufficiently profitable. As a result it was chipped away over the decades, as the financial sector slowly consolidated into the opaque, uncontrollable mass it is today.
But… the government is also under regulatory capture by the FIRE sector and there’s a revolving door between the Fed and Wall Street. So these policies of consolidation-bailout/wealth extraction will continue. As the situation becomes more dire for more people, the electorate will begin to elect more non-traditional candidates.
“The answer to this has been bailouts - privatizing profits and socializing losses. There are consequences to this. All bailouts or stimulus are purely redistributive. The government or central bank does not create more wealth and takes that to give to the FIRE sector. It extracts from the society at large and gives to the failed/corrupted organization.”
As ALWAYS, the answer is to shrink the size of government. PERIOD.
The government knows no other way than to behave as you have cited. The government knows not how to generate profits, how to create wealth.
It only siphons wealth. It must, or it must shrink in size. It privatizes the profits and socializes the losses better than ALL companies in the United States combined.
It operates at a net loss. ALWAYS.
• Government creates the physical and security infrastructure within which society operates. Roads, security, power and communication (natural monopolies granted and regulated by government).
• The central bank creates the currency and banking infrastructure within which society operates.
• The best these two entities could do would be to create “friction-free” infrastructures, to allow the society to generate wealth.
• The logical fallacy these two entities suffer from that because they have the power to destroy an economy, conversely, they also have the power to make it prosperous. It’s the old central planning siren song.
• Analogy: A body can have blood vessels clogged with plaque. Removing all the plaque does not mean the person becomes a top Olympic athlete, but it does mean the body can then operate at its peak potential.
• The government and central bank can add and remove plaque but they cannot turn the body into a top athlete. That is up to the members of society.
The Fed and government should stop pretending the financial companies are doing some selfless public service (Lloyd Blankfein: “We’re doing God’s work.” Politicians and central bankers: “Amen! Yes he is!”)
The financial companies are for-profit companies with one pure reason for existence: To extract as much profit from the world as possible. And they ought to be treated as such.
“The financial companies are for-profit companies with one pure reason for existence: To extract as much profit from the world as possible.”
Check.
“And they ought to be treated as such.”
They already are:
Step 1. Present to a schmuck a dotted line the insures that he send to you large chunks of his paycheck to you each and every month for many years - years that often stretch out to decades.
Step 2. Hand a ink pen to the schmuck and allow him to voluntarily sign the dotted line you just them presented to him.
The reason economists cannot identify bubbles is because they are unwilling or unable to separate speculative demand from consumption demand.
Upton Sinclair — ‘It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.’
Bingo.
I would also add “and his not addressing it”.
Plenty of people understand plenty.
Plenty of people look the other way.
Six corporations own every major media outlet in this country (Google it).
Six globalist oligarchs own those corporations.
Those Oligopoly media propaganda outlets (let’s call them what they are) and their Real Journalist stenographers disseminate a Narrative that is crafted to promote and advance the interests of globalism, the corporate state, neocon intervention abroad, and the incorporated neoliberal plantation our media border collies are herding us onto.
Any Real Journalist who for some unfathomable reason decided to challenge The Narrative would be out of a job, post haste, while their editors would spike any story deemed as not conforming to the oligarchy’s financial interest or being inconveniently truthful.
If you want real news and real truth, look to blogs like this one, not the captured media.
“Those Oligopoly media propaganda outlets (let’s call them what they are) and their Real Journalist stenographers disseminate a Narrative that is crafted to promote and advance the interests of globalism, the corporate state, neocon intervention abroad, and the incorporated neoliberal plantation our media border collies are herding us onto.”
+1
I like to hit the sheeple at work with that one just see the blank look on their face and watch them scurry away.
If they identified bubbles with any accuracy, they’d be out of a job.
It’s that simple.
When you are incompetent, you must create unnecessary work. You create unnecessary work by creating problems, not solving them.
Planned obsolescence works marvelously well at the government level. At the “consultant” level. Obsolescence hardly is the sole purview of manufacturing.
They create bubbles. Look at Australia: sure they had laws saying foreigners could only buy new shacks and air-boxes. About a year ago they “discovered” it wasn’t being enforced. Canada had a fig leaf of anti-money laundering laws, then they found out it was completely ignored. The Panama Papers showed the same thing was happening in the US. And the central banks in all these places keep interest rates pinned to the floor. What would happen to GSE bond markets if the Federal Reserve sold 2 trillion$ in MBS and another 2 trillion$ in treasuries? Mortgages wouldn’t be sub-4%.
Ben, government has to create bubbles. If government cannot do so, it cannot expand. Too many people nowadays functionally serve at a net loss to society.
Government already has overplayed its hand. There is no going back for government, not if it hopes to maintain its current size or to increase.
It must create bubbles OR it must decrease markedly in size.
It is one or the other. Period.
It is much too late to pretend otherwise.
The government IS the Titanic. Government employees are its passengers. The smart ones figured this out years ago.
“The smart ones figured this out years ago.”
(smile)
Ben. Don’t suggest anyone holds their breath - but this may be the only solution some day - sell fed holdings - at a discount - and owners enforce collection - same as banks have been doing in south america. Big profit, recycled, want same big profits.
No matter what - interest rates probably would go to about 6% - prime.
A poll of Canadian “analysts” assures us that home prices will remain stable. They know who signs their paychecks.
http://ca.reuters.com/article/topNews/idCAKBN18L1PG-OCATP
Dumb ‘em down, profit.
1. Dumb ‘em down and convince them that price equals value and that it is a wonderful thing that a high price can only be supported by lots of debt, hence lots of debt is a wonderful thing because lots of debt supports a high price and high price equals high value, which in turn is a wonderful thing.
2. Position yourself in such a way that this wonderful debt is something that is generated by money that you control (but belongs to somebody else) and hence you become a wonderful person because you are the one who generated the wonderful debt that allows the previously unaffordable to appear to become affordable (but actually doesn’t).
“A poll of Canadian “analysts” assures us that home prices will remain stable. They know who signs their paychecks.”
“remains stable” = remains high.
A high price is a wonderful thing because a high price represents wealth.
An analyst that can justify a high price is a wonderful person because he supports stability, he supports wealth.
An analyst who does not go along with all of this will be replaced by an analyst who will.
A high price is a wonderful thing because a high price represents wealth.
Wrong, Skippy. In this case a high price represents speculative excess and a counterparty who is going to be getting jingle mail when the housing bubble blown by central bank financial crack cocaine implodes under the weight of its own fictitious, unsustainable valuations.
Lawsuit: Zillow ‘Zestimates’ Are Wrong, Preventing Homes From Selling | NBC Nightly News
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=19BfEEtpcgg
apparently, a “low appraisal” from Zillow is “scaring off buyers.”
Or….the house is overpriced?
This is what a slow-motion bank run looks like. A bank mosey, if you will.
http://www.homecapital.com/press_releases/2017/HCG%20Liquidity%20Update%20May%2026%202017.pdf
From the Free Dictionary:
mo•sey (ˈmoʊ zi)
v.i. -seyed, -sey•ing. Informal.
1. to wander leisurely; stroll; saunter (often fol. by along, about, etc.).
2. to leave quickly; decamp.
[1820–30, Amer.; orig. uncertain]
B…b…but ABQ Dan told us oil would be $100 a barrel by now.
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/memorial-day-gas-prices-set-to-be-22-cheaper-than-average-2017-05-23
I think he said it would be back to $100+ ASAP back in 2015 when prices first cratered.
Timing wrong direction right people that bought oil drillers when I made that call have done well particularly those who did what I always advise to hedge by writing calls since bottoms are difficult to call and you have not seen anything yet:
https://sputniknews.com/business/201705271054039053-mainland-china-profits-oil-demand/
“Ryan eventually purchased her home with the help of a modest inheritance, plus a coveted, publicly funded $15,000 down-payment-assistance grant and counseling from Portland Housing Center. She is near her financial limit, with housing costs that consume well over half her earnings and exceed what she was paying for rent.”
Great example there of how Democrat-sponsored housing assistance programs end up financially ruining their intended beneficiaries.
By design. And I also thing the bubbles are by design as well - govt knows exactly how they work and they may be a part of economic warfare to supplement more covert and overt forms of warfare between nations.
Similarly, I’m starting to thing the out of control spending in terms of govt bloat, salaries and pensions of a few key blue states like CA, IL and NY are by design as attempts to subsume those states that are not profligate. Not sure what the end state is, or if there is even an intended one in that may just be about the short term accumulation and consolidation of power by fascists.
“It would have been far more impressive if Lewis had identified and written about them when the housing bubble was forming. Why didn’t he?”
He could have found plenty of candidates right here on this blog.
“Because on any given day, there are lots of people predicting various doomsday scenarios. How do you know which one is right among all the cranks? And maybe today’s crank will look brilliant tomorrow. As they say about broken clocks…”
It truly is difficult to predict at what point the Fed’s bubble support programs will lose their efficacy!
“Monetary policy is a blunt instrument: We set the overnight interest rate, and it then affects rates all across the country, across different asset classes. That’s one of the biggest challenges in trying to use monetary policy to change asset prices. The Fed also has regulatory and supervisory tools that it can use to change the behavior of the financial institutions it supervises.”
I suggest direct purchase of bonds which serve to finance purchases in the asset class whose price the Fed wants to prop up.
Oh wait! Who do the Wizards of Fed think they are fooling?
Business News | Thu May 18, 2017 | 2:04pm EDT
U.S. Fed buys $6.1 billion of mortgage bonds, sells $200 million
The Federal Reserve bought $6.058 billion of agency mortgage-backed securities in the week from May 11 to May 17, compared with $7.139 billion purchased the previous week, the New York Federal Reserve Bank said on Thursday.
In a move to help the housing market begun in October 2011, the U.S. central bank has been using funds from principal payments on the agency debt and agency mortgage-backed securities, or MBS, it holds to reinvest in agency MBS.
…
Chris Martenson: The Federal Reserve is destroying America.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-05-27/chris-martenson-federal-reserve-destroying-america
Gregg Allman of The Allman Brothers Band dies at age 69
Russ Bynum and Kristin M. Hall, Associated Press Updated 5:27 pm, Saturday, May 27, 2017
The Allman Brothers Band - Ain’t Wasting Time
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h2Ro7LLEaQQ
The Allman Brothers Band - Blue Sky
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wwyXQn9g40I
no one left to run with anymore
http://www.arabianbusiness.com/uae-sees-steep-rise-in-credit-card-applications-672542.html
when thy greed
exceeds thy need
be ever so careful
thoust does not bleed
Greed killed the pig.
What excuse will Yellen the Felon trot out when she punts yet again on raising interest rates in June?
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-05-27/fed-fail-traders-cut-rate-hike-bets-most-history-last-week
Obama is not president anymore, she is more likely to do her job when the President who might be hurt is one she hates. What she does not understand is she will probably doing him a favor by allowing seniors to finally have a safe place to make a return.
Ken Kesey Land…. Oregon
Let’s look at some numbers.
She paid 290K
35K down
Resultant mortgage 255K or
$1188/month
$4K/year taxes
Assessed value $150K
P+I+Taxes = $1521 /month
That does NOT include home insurance or medical. Can I add on another $400/month? We are now at $1921/ month.
Yearly salary $30K or $2500/month. Let’s subtract 10% for Income taxes + soc security . We are now down to $2250/month.
Lemme see now…..that works out to 85 percent MOTD (Money Out The Door).
Okay…. she gets back some of her interest payments at IRS time. Let’s say that $400/month is returned to her.
So…$2250 + $400 - $1921 =……$729/month to live on…or $182/week.
She’s bringing home free food, being a vegetarian, and working at her store….and… the folks at the bank, the real estate agency, and the assistance center are all really happy for her. They truly appreciate her business.
The word “cute” comes to mind. The kids are cute, the tiny cottage is cute, she’s cute and…..the banker’s Lexus is cute.
Two things;
If she is only paying $60 in IRS withholding, she won’t get $4800 back at filing time.
She might be getting child support from the donor.
Around here if you pay $290K for a house, the assessment is generously increased to that automatically. Different in Oregon?
$60/month.
You’re correct. I was too generous. I looked at the Tax tables now. I am assuming she’s itemizing and that most of her P+I is Interest. That will bring down her taxable income to 20K.
I don’t think she’s making it on $135-150/week. Car insurance and electric bills will wipe that out.
There’s additional OUTSIDE help coming to her. I’m saying that 30k doesn’t make a $255K mortgage doable.
Whoops. Late night math is taking its toll. It’s only $25/week for electric and car insurance. That leaves $110/week to live on. I don’t think that’s doable either without external assistance.
She might also qualify for EIC. I seem to recall reading that giant TV’s sell the most around tax refund (EIC) season.
She’d be getting the child tax credit or $1k per child. Her taxable income after either standard or itemize deductions and 3 exemptions is like $12k or so. So she likely gets most all her fed income tax witheld plus the credits refunded.
From 20k to 12k gives her an additional $21/week. Her credits get her another $16/week.
110+21+16 = $147/week.
No mention of the daughters and their expenses.
Who qualified her?
Does a 20% down-payment always guarantee being given a mortgage in Oregon?
America’s declining mobility has millennials feeling stuck
Why Americans are moving less, and why that’s a big deal for housing and economic opportunity
https://www.curbed.com/2017/5/23/15678336/move-mobility-millennial-real-estate
The asterik at the bottom states that data was not collected from !972-1975. Did someone forget to collect it or were they preoccupied with the mother of all Bear stock markets?
Puzzling to whom?
WHEN did the Recession end?
Define way down because a lot of people stopped looking and unemployed men over 50 are extinct in the job market.
The answer for Mr. Fry’s observation is that being the senior researcher denotes an older man out of touch with what is going on in the real world. Come to a college campus and talk to older students, 28-35. They work long hours, have serious bills, live at home and keep on hoping it will get better, knowing the chances for that are rather slim.
Did the Recession of 1980 ever end? Can a decline be traced back to starting two decades earlier?
today’s tip…no interior decorators left behind
7 Trends That’ll Be “in” for 2017 — and 3 That’ll Be “Out”
http://www.countryliving.com/home-design/g3914/2017-home-design-trends/
are you guilty????
http://thefederalistpapers.org/us/the-difference-in-customer-service-10-years-ago-compared-to-today-perfectly-explained
It’s not a meal anymore it is an event.
Everyone in London has their nose in their phone:
When they’re walking in the street
On the bus
On the tube (no signal down there, so I’m not sure what they’re doing)
In the restaurant
In parks
Even in museums
And I thought it was bad back in my podunky town.
Will be going to see the Lion King musical next week. I wouldn’t be surprised to see people checking their snapchats or fakebook or whatever during the performance.
We were personally affected by the British Airways meltdown. Our son was supposed to arrive today to join us here. His flight was cancelled and we have no idea if they can rebook him this week as he can’t even get through to BA. This has been a bad week for the UK. I’m also not sure that I buy that it was an IT glitch, I have a hunch that there was a security threat and they grounded the fleet, while keeping a tight lid on it.
a few weeks ago this asian lady just walked in front of my car i had the green light almost killed her but luckily i stopped within a foot of her, i got out yelled at her grabbed her phone yelled at the moron on the other end . there is no way i would have let anyone take the blame but her
Ive had safe drivers all my life i m not about to let some jerk yapping on the phone make me lose it without a serious dog eat dog fight with the police and insurance company. I would even sue her estate for damages if she didn’t survive.
remember insurance companies have a secret if they payout anything even if it fraudulent it gets charged to you and your rates rise
Happy to be out of the restaurant business (sold 2004.) Was hard then, must be really bad now.
I think that those that offer cheap eats are probably staying busier. There’s a great place I sometimes go to that has a gyro/salad/fountain drink combo for $10. I have no idea of how much money they make on that.
Here in jolly old England the pubs have daily themed specials. For instance, last Thursday we ate at a Wetherspoons pub. On Thursdays it’s “Curry Club” night where you can get an Indian dish and a beer for about $9 USD, tax included. No tipping, since you order at the bar.
“Because on any given day, there are lots of people predicting various doomsday scenarios. How do you know which one is right among all the cranks? And maybe today’s crank will look brilliant tomorrow. As they say about broken clocks…”
fluent corporate BS, hear it all the time. I’m surprised he didn’t trot out “We are where we are, however we got here. What matters is where we go next.”
Strange they never admit they got it wrong and someone else got it right, nope they go into move along nothing to see here mode.
They don’t say that until the SHTF, along with the required “no one saw it coming”
It has just occurred to me that when Ben first starts to warn about a bubble in an area is probably the time to buy the house then sell it eighteen months later. He seems to be about two or three years ahead of the experts. Of cause you’d have to flip it otherwise you really would catch a falling knife.
Is it unethical if auntie FED lets retail investors eat crow by letting the bubble they created collapse?
Auntie FED doesn’t give a rat’s a$$ about retail investors, only its TBTF bankster accomplices.
As house price growth slows to a halt following the Brexit vote, house prices in parts of Teesside have done even worse - and FALLEN.
Redcar and Cleveland saw prices fall by 2.4% between June 2016, when the average price was £118,851, and March 2017, when prices averaged £115,962, compared to UK house price growth of 0.3%.
http://www.gazettelive.co.uk/news/property/house-prices-havent-just-slowed-13100559
You ain’t seen nothin’ yet
B-b-b-baby, you just ain’t seen n-n-nothin’ yet
Here’s something that you never gonna forget
B-b-b-baby, you just ain’t seen n-n-nothin’ yet
What sorry CYA excuses will Yellen the Felon offer up after the next financial crash?
http://jessescrossroadscafe.blogspot.com/2017/05/discussing-recovery-part-one-and.html
Things get weirder and wackier
CNN Source Used to Push FAKE Russia Story is a ‘Leading Democrat Convicted of Child Porn
http://girlsjustwannahaveguns.com/cnn-source-used-push-fake-russia-story-leading-democrat-convicted-child-porn/
hows this for a website name
http://girlsjustwannahaveguns.com/