Mistaking Beauty For Truth
A report from the New York Post. “Median home prices across the nation have been increasing with gusto, though perhaps not at levels as staggering as San Jose’s median price tag of $1,183,400. A good many of the nation’s metropolitan locales have experienced record appreciation. Coupled with inventory that is 9 percent lower than it was in 2016 and income that has not kept up with prices, the natural post-recession question arises. One decade after the biggest housing collapse in America’s history led to a global recession, could we be facing another crisis?”
“‘When you talk about a bubble, you think of people being really exhilarated and excited and prices going way up. We don’t see that now,’ says Annie Cion Gruenberger, who has been a New York City broker with Warburg Reality for 28 years. ‘We have a very positive market, but a targeted market of smart buyers.’”
The La Crosse Tribune in Wisconsin. “Not every 11-year-old flips houses for profit. But then again not every 11-year-old has a business mogul grandfather backing her up. Madison Bue of West Salem has been renovating a four-bedroom, two-bath house on La Crosse’s South Side this summer. Grandpa Cliff LeCleir, owner of Central States Warehouse, purchased the property for Madison, who will put any of the profit she makes from flipping the house into a college savings account.”
“The idea to flip a house came during one of her visit to ‘Papa and Nana’s’ house as a way to save for college and embrace her love of shows such as ‘House Hunters’ and other reality programs about people who flip old or run-down houses for profit. ‘I love those shows so much,’ she said. They looked at more than a dozen homes, Madison said. But the 13th home was the charm. ‘I was like ‘bam!’ she said. ‘We gotta get it. It just worked.’”
From CNBC. “As central bankers gather at the annual Jackson Hole symposium, analysts think the death of a major economic concept could dominate discussions. Known as Phillips curve, an economic concept developed by New Zealand economist William Phillips, it shows that inflation and unemployment have a stable and inverse relationship. However, in the recent months with central banks using artificial ways to pump money into the economy, this inverse relationship is seen to be dying.”
“A number of analysts have warned that this could be risky for the global economy and discussions around the death of the Phillips curve could dominate the Jackson Hole symposium. ‘The inverse relationship between unemployment and inflation is dead. The proliferation of low-wage, irregular and insecure jobs means that wage pressures - and therefore spending power - are subdued even as unemployment falls,’ Edward Smythe, an economist at Positive Money, told CNBC via email.”
“Meanwhile, minutes from July’s ECB meeting showed a lengthy discussion of the disconnect between inflation and employment. ‘These included changes in labour markets, work contracts and wage-setting processes, benefiting from the reforms introduced in previous years, which could imply a structural break in the Phillips curve,’ according to the minutes.”
“Alberto Gallo, head of macro strategies and manager of the Algebris Macro Credit Fund, thinks central bankers should still look at removing artificial stimulus, for three reasons. ‘First, it is becoming less useful. Persistent low-interest rates can become deflationary over time, as today’s ageing populations save more, while firms focus on cost savings following a balance sheet recession. The second is QE has side-effects, including the formation of asset bubbles, which may endanger the financial system. The third is to build an adequate policy buffer to face any future risk.’”
From AEON. “Unlike engineers and chemists, economists cannot point to concrete objects – cell phones, plastic – to justify the high valuation of their discipline. Nor, in the case of financial economics and macroeconomics, can they point to the predictive power of their theories. The failure of the field to predict the 2008 crisis has also been well-documented. In 2003, for example, only five years before the Great Recession, the Nobel Laureate Robert E Lucas Jr told the American Economic Association that ‘macroeconomics […] has succeeded: its central problem of depression prevention has been solved’.”
“Short-term predictions fair little better – in April 2014, for instance, a survey of 67 economists yielded 100 per cent consensus: interest rates would rise over the next six months. Instead, they fell. A lot.”
“Nonetheless, surveys indicate that economists see their discipline as ‘the most scientific of the social sciences’. What is the basis of this collective faith, shared by universities, presidents and billionaires? Shouldn’t successful and powerful people be the first to spot the exaggerated worth of a discipline, and the least likely to pay for it?”
“In the hypothetical worlds of rational markets, where much of economic theory is set, perhaps. But real-world history tells a different story, of mathematical models masquerading as science and a public eager to buy them, mistaking elegant equations for empirical accuracy. Ultimately, the problem isn’t with worshipping models of the stars, but rather with uncritical worship of the language used to model them, and nowhere is this more prevalent than in economics.”
“After the Great Recession, the failure of economic science to protect our economy was once again impossible to ignore. In 2009, the Nobel Laureate Paul Krugman tried to explain it in The New York Times with a version of the mathiness diagnosis. ‘As I see it,’ he wrote, ‘the economics profession went astray because economists, as a group, mistook beauty, clad in impressive-looking mathematics, for truth.’ Krugman named economists’ ‘desire… to show off their mathematical prowess’ as the ‘central cause of the profession’s failure’.”
“If you’ve invested in an armillary sphere, it’s painful to admit that it doesn’t perform as advertised. When confronted with their profession’s lack of predictive accuracy, some economists find it difficult to admit the truth. Easier, instead, to double down, like the economist John H Cochrane at the University of Chicago. The problem isn’t too much mathematics, he writes in response to Krugman’s 2009 post-Great-Recession mea culpa for the field, but rather ‘that we don’t have enough math’. ”
“Economists who rationalise their discipline’s value can be convincing, especially with prestige and mathiness on their side. But there’s no reason to keep believing them. For more than a century, the public has been warned, and the way forward is clear. It’s time to stop wasting our money and recognise the high priests for what they really are: gifted social scientists who excel at producing mathematical explanations of economies, but who fail, like astrologers before them, at prophecy.”
‘the death of a major economic concept could dominate discussions’
‘Persistent low-interest rates can become deflationary over time’
Yet they point to inflation as proof they have room to create more money. If there was one stitch of scientific method in economics they would have realized low rates/money printing/QE etc is deflationary. I did in the late 1990’s.
‘The second is QE has side-effects, including the formation of asset bubbles’
Well there is that. And watching 11 YOs turn to flipping tells you more than Yellen’s tea leaves.
Yet they point to inflation as proof they have room to create more money.
Consider that their money creation appears to provoke significant investment in unneeded productive capacity—which then ends up driving down prices when capacity exceeds demand, driving inflation metrics lower and lower. In such a deflationary cycle, perhaps they could continue creating money at an increasing rate for quite some time? Eventually, such a model should hit a wall of some sort, but the Japan experience has failed to show us exactly where that wall is, or how hard it might be. Or at least, not yet.
“The second is QE has side-effects, including the formation of asset bubbles’”
Now that housing demand is at 20 year lows and falling, the only path forward in their corrupt minds is to drive it even lower.
“Consider that their money creation appears to provoke significant investment in unneeded productive capacity…”
You just nailed it….and this really gets my goat.
Think of the trillions that could have gone toward R&D, tax cuts, infrastructure, true healthcare reform, reduction of fees and regulations, reduction of crime. Etc.
The Fed is wiping out trillions of real wealth nationwide (worldwide, actually), and in its place is creating trillions in IOUs.
When are we going to return to Austrian economics?
What the Fed has done is create millions (trillions?) of unneeded square footage. All of which needs to be serviced or eventually torn down at considerable cost.
Where are all the environmentalists on this front? Why aren’t they raising hell? They should be. Think of the environmental cost! Too distracted with carbon tax nonsense, I guess. Lemmings are too easy to distract.
Those at the grass roots level who are partaking in the chicanery are culpable as well. No consideration whatsoever of how they are shafting future generations. None.
Greedy miscreants. It’s sick.
It’s insane. It’s a mania.
“If there was one stitch of scientific method in economics they would have realized low rates/money printing/QE etc is deflationary. I did in the late 1990’s.”
It was totally obvious when Japan was doing it. Bernanke has disgraced his profession by substituting political gamesmanship for scientific rigor.
“scientific rigor…”
It was theft, disguised as a benevolent experiment. No rigor required, only gullibility.
‘Persistent low-interest rates can become deflationary over time’
Like from 1933 through 1948 or so, for example? Or Japan from 1990 until whenever it finally ends?
‘When you talk about a bubble, you think of people being really exhilarated and excited and prices going way up. We don’t see that now’
Right. Also from the NYP article:
‘When an average $1 million home goes on the market in Santa Clara, Calif., it can reel in 20 offers. Quickly, and without batting an eye.’
“As long as high-tech companies keep bringing people here from all over the world and paying them, high prices will continue,” says Brett Burns, a broker with San Jose-based Climb Real Estate. “If Google uprooted and set up shop in Texas, maybe that would make a big splash, but I don’t see a plateau as long as demand keeps getting fed.”
‘One decade after the biggest housing collapse in America’s history led to a global recession, could we be facing another crisis? “Not happening,” says Burns, adding that the 2007 housing crash “was based on lending practices which have since been cleaned up.”
See Brett is a used house salesman. This makes him an expert in all things economic, regulatory, square footage and in human dynamics. How did Brett acquire all this knowledge? Why he took a few online courses one spring.
Basically all the people running this show are a bunch of self interested idiots.
‘the 2007 housing crash “was based on lending practices which have since been cleaned up.”
Over 90% of those loans that defaulted were prime.
“Basically all the people running this show are a bunch of self interested idiots.”
If ever there was a population of useless, delusional, incompetent pukers, realtors are it. Florida is overrun with them. Try having a conversation with one, you’ll hear more verbal vomit than you ever thought was possible.
“If ever there was a population of useless, delusional, incompetent pukers, realtors are it.”
Think of them as “useful idiots’ … that’s how I think of them.
“Try having a conversation with one, you’ll hear more verbal vomit than you ever thought was possible.”
The verbal vomit isn’t designed to be conversation, it is designed to entice schmucks to willingly and eagerly come into a bank so as to pledge huge chunks of yet-to-be earned income during a huge expanse of their upcoming working lives in order to allow total strangers to coast through life.
IOW, schmucks work, bankers reap - made possible in part by the verbal vomit puked out from one puke’s mouth into another puke’s ear.
In all seriousness, I recently engaged a local realtor in conversation when I stopped by a little office to ask directions in an unfamiliar area.
What a complete jerkwad. A fatuous buttwipe. A lying sack of diarrhea.
Did you offer him a paper towel or a napkin?
LOL
If you look at them as simply salespeople, who put food on their family’s table only if they make a sale, the cause of the behavior becomes clear.
The problem is the deception of the house sales system. When dealing with a retail salesperson or a car salesman or other - it’s clear they’re representing their own interests and the interests of their employer.
However, with real estate, one realtor pretends to be representing the buyer, but in reality both are representing the seller, as both seller’s and buyer’s realtor have the same core interest as the seller, namely, getting as high a price as possible (as they are both paid as a percentage of sales price), and closing the deal as quickly as possible.
That’s the unfortunate and deceptive piece. I suppose buyers are free to negotiate other compensation systems, rather than based on a percent of sales price, but I doubt very many do at all.
Good one, Bubba, that really made me laugh.
Years ago, back in the 1990s, someone did a spoof audio of a lady realtor trying to solicit a listing via the phone, leaving message after message for the prospect, starting out with a couple of cheery messages for the prospect to call them back, and then each message afterwards getting more hostile and desperate than the one before, until the last one threatened to set the prospect’s home on fire if they didn’t call the realtor back.
I think I heard it on a local radio show in South Florida. Wish I could find that bit on line, but I’ve had no success.
Really miss Neil Rogers verbal onslaughts from good old days on South Florida radio. Radio hosts today are dull and slow-witted. Bring back the Neil Rogers and Howard Sterns.
It’s funny how realtors get most of the vitriole, but “investors” get away virtually unscathed.
Realtors are Liars. True.
Real Estate Investors are Liars. Also true.
Sometimes they are one and the same. Oftentimes, they are not.
“investors” get away virtually unscathed.’
You mean like Madison Bue of West Salem?
Her, too.
I would bet my bottom dollar that there are as many “investors” who should spend time in the slammer as there are realtors who should do the same.
There may even be more investors than realtors.
Many “investors” (hedge funds and individual investors alike) have undoubtedly forged some very questionable relationships with realtors. Inside information and deals, favorable contracts and terms, undercutting other would-be buyers.
“It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.”
- Upton Sinclair
“As long as high-tech companies keep bringing people here from all over the world and paying them, high prices will continue,”
I hear this same line frequently here in Seattle.
I’m Not. Buying. It.
Sure, there is some local effect; there is also some global effect. Which is larger? Time will tell. But this can’t be the one place where the bubble makes sense, when the rest of the world is clearly in a bubble without any “Amazon Effect” (as it’s called locally) to explain it.
How is a salesman qualified to teach me about ‘lending practices’? I’ll never understand that.
“As long as high-tech companies keep bringing people here from all over the world and paying them, high prices will continue,”
Don’t they generally pay these folks less than they pay Americans for doing these jobs? In which case, absent fraud and speculation, shouldn’t these people be less likely to buy real estate?
Crown Heights Brooklyn, NY Rental Rates Crater 10% YOY
https://www.zillow.com/crown-heights-new-york-ny/home-values/
44k household income
Dead hockey zone
http://www.city-data.com/neighborhood/Crown-Heights-Brooklyn-NY.html
Honkey
Known as Phillips curve, an economic concept developed by New Zealand economist William Phillips, it shows that inflation and unemployment have a stable and inverse relationship. However, in the recent months with central banks
Cut welfare schemes and gov spending you’ll find u
can go way low
See Singapore
an economic concept developed by New Zealand economist William Phillips
did you know there have been 3 iterations of the phillips curve? that’s because they’re trying to make it fit reality. they can’t. it’s been debunked for over 20 years and yet they won’t admit it doesn’t work. they just keep trying. they’ll never make it work because it’s a lie.
but it’s such an appealing idea that they’ll probably never give up on it. it’s so simple that they want it to be true. it’s like astrology. astrology has been debunked too, but people keep believing in it. (although i guess astrology never really needed debunking. but you get the idea.)
people that rely on the phillips curve for investing will eventually go broke.
Keynesian b.s. is about pols controlling your $
5 minutes after cb,s create 2% inflation were doomed
Food prices seem to be on the move
Interesting what you said about food.
I have also noted a sudden and rapid increase in most items (both food and non-food) during the past three weeks. Before Hurricane Harvey and after.
Perhaps I didn’t imagine it after all.
The problem with econometrics is that all relevant variables must be accounted for, including derivative ones.
Let me being with an example. When people move to the suburbs, heart attacks go up by 50%. This is a derivative effect. Longer commutes lead to less time available for fitness, which tends to increase the rates of obesity, which in turn explains higher heart attack rates. Miss any of the derivative steps and the statistics provide no additional insight.
Back to economics. Competition compels innovation and productivity , which leads to lower production costs. Aggressive competitors cut prices, forcing others to do the same. This leads to a tendency for a decrease in the rate of profit. Two side effects happen. First, reduced demand for labor as innovation increases productivity. Second, the pressure from the declining rate of profit leads the PTB to mobilize their media empires to 1) tout all the benefits of globalization 2) build political cover for the outsourcing of manufacturing.
Both of these have a depressing effect on wages. So the “market” or the people must buy the output of the PTB, cannot maintain aggregate demand (due to stagnant wage growth or in some cases, negative real wage growth).
This is a paradox that CBs have temporarily solved by money printing. They either willfully ignore or are blissfully unaware of the underlying dynamics. Either way, money printing has led to a fleeting increase in aggregate demand, as corporations and individuals lever up with cheap debt. Borrowing cheaply and investing in appreciating assets is a fun game. As long as asset prices keep rising, the game can go on. But if they do not, little support can be expected from overextended consumers or “financialized” corporations.
Once asset prices being a meaningful decline, the ‘borrow short, go long’ crowd will behave as though someone yelled “fire” in a theater. I believe that the choice is now binary – either keep the bubbles inflating or hit stall speed and well, you know what happens then…
The CBs are most definitely aware…they are simply criminal/unethical in intent.
One wonders what the CBs have planned for when everything implodes. Surely they must have something in mind.
Seizure of assets and wealth held by citizens?
War?
Massive inflation and a population that is largely destitute?
Coral Gables, FL Housing Prices Crater 5% YOY
https://www.zillow.com/coral-gables-fl/home-values/
“When you talk about a bubble, you think of people being really exhilarated and excited and prices going way up. We don’t see that now,”
Huh. Funny, that’s exactly what we’re seeing now. She just has her head stuck in the ground in the hopes of not seeing the glaring, neon lights that keep flashing “Bubble! Bubble! Bubble!” Unwillingness to see something does not make it so. However, I’d like to give her a little more credit and assume that she sees the same thing the rest or us are seeing, but is hoping to milk the greater fool until the last penny clinks into her piggy bank.
I’m seeing a bit of a stall around here. Or what they call “sticky”.
When we sold our place at the top of bubble 1.0, all I had to do was put a little ad on an obscure website. I don’t recall Zillow being on my radar. I didn’t even do craigslist. Not even a sign out front. And we got a bunch of traffic and ultimately a buyer.
OTOH, an acquaintance of ours is doing FSBO via Zillow, Craigslist, and some other site, and has the house priced right with respect to the market in their area. He first got hit with a flurry of investors. And then a trickle of interested people, a couple of whom were realtors sniffing around for a listing. Some people made appointments and were no-shows.
I did a fair amount of profitability forecasting in my prior job.
If the numbers didn’t work the first time, change the assumptions until you hit the number the boss wants. Presto “instant profitability”
I suspect some of the economist math is working the same way. What number do we want, didn’t hit it, OK, lets change assumptions and rerun until we hit it!!
Sounds about right.
Economists and the labor bureaus certainly participate in such charades when it comes to unemployment figures.
Making up numbers certainly is easier than setting realistic targets and working your @ss off to reach goals. It also papers over lots of ignorance and malfeasance.
Morrison, CO Housing Prices Crater 6% YOY
http://www.movoto.com/morrison-co/market-trends/
• Multiple regression analysis
• Fitting data points to an equation
• confidence interval
• p-value
Just because economists are trained to understand what these things mean, and other social scientists are not, doesn’t mean using junk data and pretending not to understand dependent and independent variables gives them any clearer picture of a huge dynamic machine.
Understanding human psychology and human nature, as well as the nature of how humans view currency is the core of economics. It’s not a science, in that they will never be able to show directly that X stimulus always causes Y reaction via a certain mechanism, but are always stuck with finding correlations in populations and drawing conclusions from that.
I’m not trying to denigrate economics, I think it, like any other social science, is a worthy field of investigation, but pretending it’s a science, like calculating space vehicle trajectories is destructive.
Pretending it’s a science however, does give the economist much more power than other social scientists.
Excellent post.
An interesting phenomenon during the past decade is the ongoing exaltation of all things STEM, and the denigration of everything else.
I’m not convinced that STEM majors are more brilliant than anyone else. Certainly more brilliant in STEM subjects, but not much else.
As you have said, economics is not a science. It is largely a social science. As is politics. As is marketing.
People in STEM fields have more money in their pockets. They do not, however, have more power. They remain subservient to trends and decisions that oftentimes have nothing to do with their areas of expertise.
I’m not convinced that STEM majors are more brilliant than anyone else. Certainly more brilliant in STEM subjects, but not much else.
Used to be that the average STEM worker was maybe 90th percentile in general intelligence and enjoyed gadgetry. There are still some of those but many have found themselves unemployed as they age. Now it’s a competition between the global top 1%. The people who are at the architect/visionary level who really drive this stuff actually ARE that brilliant, but everybody else is more brilliant about the politics of how to get and stay in the game than they are about gadgetry and such, IMO.
On economists and economic models.
“All Models Are Wrong: Reflections on becoming a systems scientist
John Sterman, MIT
2002
John D Sterman is the J. Spencer Standish Professor of Management and Director of the Systems Dynamics Group at the MIT Sloan School of Management
Thoughtful leaders increasingly recognize that we are not only failing to solve the persistent problems we face, but are in fact causing them. System dynamics is designed to help avoid such policy resistance and identify high-leverage policies for sustained improvement. What does it take to be an effective systems thinker, and to teach system dynamics fruitfully? Understanding complex systems requires mastery of concepts such as feedback, stocks and flows, time delays,and nonlinearity. Research shows that these concepts are highly counterintuitive and poorly understood. It also shows how they can be taught and learned. Doing so requires the use of formal models and simulations to test our mental models and develop our intuition about complex systems. Yet, though essential, these concepts and tools are not sufficient. Becoming an effective systems thinker also requires the rigorous and disciplined use of scientific inquiry skills so that we can uncover our hidden assumptions and biases. It requires respect and empathy for others and other viewpoints. Most important, and most difficult to learn, systems thinking requires understanding that all models are wrong and humility about the limitations of our knowledge. Such humility is essential in creating an environment in which we can learn about the complex systems in which we are embedded and work effectively to create the world we truly desire.”
http://web.mit.edu/jsterman/www/All_Models_Are_Wrong_(SDR).pdf
Thanks for sharing Neuro
Thanks for sharing this as well, Neuro.
I’m convinced that the exercise of trying to “understand complex systems” can be counterproductive in itself.
Much in life need not be analyzed to death. Much in life is already too complicated as to yield maximum efficacy, efficiency and/or profit. Both in business and in private life. We all feel it, are aggravated by it. Further, we’re awash in data, much of it useless, with much of what remains incorrectly applied. So why do we do it?
One input that I think might be beneficial into any “system” analysis is “ethics”. What role does “ethics” play in complex systems? Both in design and application of “systems”? Do system designers consider “ethics” as they do their work? I doubt it. Perhaps they should.
The quest to “know” and to “solve”…is there an ethical limit in the pursuit?
I am increasingly under the impression that “complex” tends to be less ethical than “simple” in as much that “complex” requires more inputs, leading to increased incidence of incorrect data and assumptions. Data and assumptions that have to be substantiated somehow. Data and assumptions that, once acted upon, are destructive rather than productive.
I like what Sterman says here. I agree with much of it. He loses me when he talks about “humility about the limitations of our knowledge”. It’s never a bad thing not to know everything, either as individuals or as a species. Individuals and societies are freed to focus on practicalities and enjoy what is right in front of them.
Much in life need not be analyzed to death. Much in life is already too complicated as to yield maximum efficacy, efficiency and/or profit. Both in business and in private life. We all feel it, are aggravated by it. Further, we’re awash in data, much of it useless, with much of what remains incorrectly applied. So why do we do it?
My theory is that many people are energy-limited, but some have enough energy that they are limited only by time. Therefore time efficiency matters to them but energy efficiency does not. They are sometimes able to eke out small advantages by using their extra energy to “analyze to death” and get ahead of the competition. So because they can, they think they must. The energy limited sometimes can accomplish just as much by careful use of their more limited resources but are usually not taken as seriously when they are seen as less energetic, therefore less motivated.
See “low energy” as an insult during the election season. We reward people who are going full speed all the time even when they are wrong.
See “low energy” as an insult during the election season. We reward people who are going full speed all the time even when they are wrong.
IIRC, this was a point made in the book ‘Quiet’, about people being drawn to a bias for action, but there’s (often overlooked) value in a more thoughtful, analytical approach to problem solving.
(* Could totally be mis-remembering this and just projecting my own opinions on this
“Thousands of files containing the personal information and expertise of Americans with classified and up to Top Secret security clearances have been exposed by an unsecured Amazon server, potentially for most of the year.”
https://gizmodo.com/thousands-of-job-applicants-citing-top-secret-us-govern-1798733354
Heckuva job, Jeffie!
LOL, I coulda toldya, fer free, that the gummint contract with Amaponzi would be a bit of a clusterfark, based on what happened to a small website that I subscribe to.
OTOH, I can’t bring myself to give a rat’s patootie about the applicants, so it’s a win-win for me!
“One decade after the biggest housing collapse in America’s history led to a global recession, could we be facing another crisis?”
The obvious answer is no.
Rather we are facing the same ongoing crisis that started with insane, historically unprecedented rates of price increases circa 1996. The Fed’s efforts to paper over the crisis with several rounds of quantitative easing simple left it more deeply and permanently ensconced.
Holy Jeebus, I had stopped monitoring a couple of the New England shore towns that I was following in the spring and early summer and just checked back on one of them and the inventory has exploded, on Zillow, anyway. Looks like a lot of people are putting their homes up for sale. Need to look at realtor.com and see how many are pending.
If Trump follows through on his threat to end trade with China, I will eat my hat.
Julian Assange 🔹 (@JulianAssange)
twitter.com/JulianAssange - 3 hours ago
90% of North Korea’s trade is with China. If Trump blocks $650B of US trade with China he’ll be deposed immediately.
I’m not so sure about that. If the alternative is getting fried, it’s sort of a no-brainer. Nuke war is a great equalizer, and you know how those leets feel about being equal.
OTOH, it’s my humble opinion that NK is acting up because of Trump’s trade threats toward China, so…
I’d love to see it. Abrupt end to the nightmare of China trade, accompanied by an ejection of all Chinese nationals. I mean, it is really kind of silly to have one entity threaten another for not buying its stuff. Kinda like Home Depot sending some goons over to my house for deciding to switch to Lowe’s.
Hmm, apparently the big T just decided to end DACA, which was essentially illegal in the first place. Congress is rending their garments and wailing like banshees. Oooh, ooh, they’re going to ACT! Congress is going to ACT! Isn’t that interesting. Can’t act for their own constituents, though. As Kelly said, they should’ve gotten their act together a long time ago.
Anyway, he may act on China, too.
A fair amount of pendings at the lower end of the market in the one New England shore town I follow. Thins out markedly at the higher price points. And there are some dogs that have been on the market for at least a year. I love how the listing expires and then it comes up as a new listing all over again.
It gets mighty cold in the winter in New England, palmy… are you sure you want to move back there?
Nah, I just follow it out of curiosity, in case I ever win the lottery and want a summer home on the New England shore.
In the meantime, I’m developing a bit of an interest in that Rutherfordton/Forest City/Spindale area as a year round. Looks like a real sleeper to me, what’s your opinion?
I’ve never been there. Looking at the map it appears to be very rural in nature. Two summers ago I drove eastbound on route 74 on a Sunday afternoon in August and the traffic was very light, but that cuts a bit south of the towns you mentioned.
Shelby was the biggest town on that drive, and that seemed like an odd place. Route 74 through Shelby was a “stroad”. A road is designed for throughput and a street is designed for mingling, for lack of a better term. A “stroad” combines both and serves neither purpose very well.
Rutherford looks like it’s close enough for a day trip into Charlotte or Asheville.
It boils down to what your selection criteria is for a new place. My guess is that it’s going to be rural with little influence from new comers as it’s a bit too far from the major cities and doesn’t seem to have a special draw of its own.
It’s also going to be hot in the summer. Not Tampa Bay hot, but hot and humid nonetheless. And it’ll probably get a couple of snowfalls each winter, but nothing like Connecticut.
I hope that helps.
Thanks, Bubba. It sounds like the place for me. I can take the heat for three months. As long as it’s got decent phone and internet, which I’m told it does, I’m good to go.
Yup
Not Greenwich, though. Southern Rhode Island and Chatham, up on Cape Cod. I don’t really follow Greenwich, except to read Fountain’s RE blog from time to time for amusement.
“A fair amount of pendings at the lower end of the market in the one New England shore town I follow.”
“Not Greenwich, though”
I told you I would let you know.
Ok, I was a little confused what the Yup meant. Good job, then, I think.
Thank you Walter Becker
Steely Dan’s Walter Becker Dies At 67
September 3, 201712:44 PM ET
Steely Dan - Do It Again
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sil76t2X_DE
Hermiston, OR Housing Prices Crater 16% YOY
http://www.movoto.com/hermiston-or/market-trends/