Bits Bucket And Craigslist Finds For April 12, 2007
Please post off-topic ideas, links and Craigslist finds here.
The Housing Bubble
Examining the home price boom and its effect on owners, lenders, regulators, realtors and the economy as a whole.
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So this fellow takes his home sale profit, beats it, loses it, and who’s to blame? Well not him of course!
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601103&sid=avI34G5JBAjQ&refer=us
Attitudes like this, and the politicians who enable it, are making the “bailout” scenerio more likely.
“These people are supposed to be the great financial minds of the world so they must have had some inkling that this was coming,” said Funk. “They got their money out before the little people.”
Yes thats how it generally works…… why do you think they are rich? Hard work ? no……
The guy in this case is another stay-at-home dad who thought he could make a financial killing without having to work. Reminds me of Eric the Seattle RE ‘investor’, and Jeff, the fired Taco-bell manager-turned-RE ‘investor’, both of whom also appear to have put their family’s financial security at risk by demonstrating their financial acumen (actually, lack of.)
In this case, the dud took the money the family made from selling their first home and invested it unwisely, expecting to use the interest returns to pay the mortgage on their second house. Different approach, similar outcome: ouch.
Yes, Homoaner.
“I knew I had too many eggs in one basket,” said Meyer, a stay-at-home dad. Meyer said his wife, a chemist, may need to delay her retirement because of the losses.
Maybe you should get off your butt and work for a change, too.
Maybe his wife should leave.
“When Buck Meyer thinks about the $300,000 he lost after he bought a subprime mortgage lender’s bonds…”
“…the 52-year-old Meyer, who almost wiped out the nest egg he received from selling his home in Doylestown, Pennsylvania, six years ago.”
“Meyer, who has two children, planned to use the interest payments from the American Business bonds to cover the mortgage payments on his new home outside Chattanooga, Tennessee.”
Are you telling me that he couldn’t have paid off the entire Chattanooga house with the $300K?! It’s freakin’ Chattanooga!
Housing Bubble Accomplices Preparing for Death: Caroline Baum
uk reits / end of gold rush
Canada / housing trend has started to chill
colbert on the housing bust
http://immobilienblasen.blogspot.com/
the baum piece has some good comments on the action in congress
..Let’s hope the committee calls some mortgage-bond investors to testify. If they can be sued for someone else’s actions, they aren’t going to buy any mortgage bonds. Period.
Precedent
Chairman Frank might want to call some folks from the state of Georgia, where the enactment of a Fair Lending Act in 2002 rocked the mortgage industry.
The law assigned liability for predatory lending to everyone along the food chain, from lender to securitizer to investor.
The reaction was predictable. Many lenders pulled out of the state, the rating agencies refused to evaluate the pools of home loans and the secondary market dried up.
The law, which took effect in October 2002, was amended the following March “to address a number of unintended consequences” and to limit assignee liability……
..Let’s hope the committee calls some mortgage-bond investors to testify. If they can be sued for someone else’s actions, they aren’t going to buy any mortgage bonds. Period.
Don’t think so. There is a big difference between lenders pulling out of Georgia (less than 2% of the US market, I’d venture) because it has become the riskiest place to lend and Wall street deciding never to do a mortgage backed security ever again.
They will set their lawyers on the paperwork and force the banks to only put together pools of loans that were made to responsible borrowers for supportable amounts. And a bunch of baby lawyers will spend hours and hours of their time reviewing at least a statistical sampling of the mortgages put into the pool. Dull work, but its a living. I used to have to review leases for stores in strip malls to confirm they could be included in REITs.
And, oh horrors, if a bank wants to sell its mortgages, it will have to be able to confirm that used responsible lending practices and back it up with the paperwork.
I’m looking forward to being part of a very small group of people left in country who can qualify for a mortgage.
I like you
Thanks. I like you too. Good attitude.
And this board has been a god-send. Last Saturday I started explaining the possible effect of the bubble to my father. Reading some of the very pithy descriptions here helps me with that no end. We lawyers aren’t known for our short and sweet explanations.
Polly LMAO
“We lawyers aren’t known for our short and sweet explanations”
I instantly heard: “Strike that…”
It’s been fun chumming the bandwidth with you all…
Don’t think so. There is a big difference between lenders pulling out of Georgia (less than 2% of the US market, I’d venture) because it has become the riskiest place to lend and Wall street deciding never to do a mortgage backed security ever again.
Exactly. If bond holders are held responsible they will simply take their toys and go somewhere else.
In a way I hope these bills pass. No mortgages means low prices. I can borrow money from family (at high rates… but if prices are cheap, who cares?).
But again I hope it doesn’t pass… that would mean that of the ~3.3 million construction jobs 3.0 million would be looking for a new line of work. Our economy cannot handle that… The 1.0 to 1.5 million that will be lost is too much as is.
Got popcorn?
Neil
That scenario is a plausible one.
“The law assigned liability for predatory lending to everyone along the food chain, from lender to securitizer to investor.”
This would be beneficial to the situation, as all participants in the food change would have to think twice before helping encourage GFs to buy stuff they cannot afford using other people’s money.
In prior lending cycles the original lender had to hold the loan packages longer until they became “seasoned loans “,before the secondary market would purchase them alot of times .Everything changed with the new lending of course .
To only put a 3 month buy-back clause on these sub-prime loan notes was a license to steal for the front line lenders .Also ,with these new adjustables the loans become more risky with time rather than more secure.Sure a bunch of foreclosure bound borrowers can make it during the original teaser rate period but watch out when the rates go up . Apparently Wall Street rated the risk on these loans based on, “real estate always goes up “.
Right now it seems to me like the blame shifing game is going on big time .
Agreed, HW. The question is: What does it look like after it’s over?
I am firmly in the “screw the lender!” camp, whoever ends up holding the bad crap should eat it. No recourse against the borrowers.
Bailout, SURE I like it!!! Don’t let the credit reporting agencies ding their credit if they (FB) pay a $3k fee to the gov for being stupid. YEAH, YEAH a “stupid tax!”
Leave their credit as it was before the loan if they pay the “stupid tax”.
The vast majority of these people have 0 equity. How else do you bail someone out when they have no stake (or spent it) in the property, ie 100%+ financing or refis beyond the properties value.
The lenders, or whichever dumbshit bought the loan, should get the drubbing. I don’t personally like the idea of giving the FB any break, but limiting the dammage to their credit scores might appear to be action. This appearance of action may CYA of the politicos.
YKYAAFB when you can find absolutely no humor in YKYAAFB jokes.
How the hell did that post end up here? I just knew mescaline was a bad idea. Never on Thursdays!
Ta-Da! It’s bail out time for the greedy and stupid! Hold on to your pocket book, as usual the poor old taxpayer is going to take it on the chin.
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/39e30d7a-e863-11db-b2c3-000b5df10621.html
Does anyone know where transcripts can be found of the Senators’ exact statements. I’d like to write a letter to my Senator, but I don’t want to rely on media reports for my information.
Hold on a second…the Financial Times article goes on to say:
“Senator Charles Schumer of New York called for “hundreds of millions of dollars” to bail out distressed homeowners, though other leading Democrats reacted cooly to calls for an injection of federal money.”
Schumer is doing what politicians always do; he’s paying lip-service to this problem, just like Congress does with other problems facing this country. I mean, there is a reason why people call this a do nothing Congress.
Bottom line is there won’t be a bail out (the country can’t afford it, it would be almost impossible to exectute without wholesale fraud, and then there’s the whole moral hazard issue).
–
In the name of bailing someone, or something, else Schumer is always trying to bailout the bankers and financiers of New York City. And that is also what Federal Reserve have done since early 1990s.
Jas
“Bottom line is there won’t be a bail out”
If they can find political cover (like maybe a dire price forecast from the NAR), there may be a bailout, as it would increase prospective campaign contributions.
The politico talk about a bailout is REALLY starting to scare me.
Hundreds of millions is window dressing. Even a few billion would not stop this in it’s tracks.
So maybe we will be lucky. *Some* money will be thrown at it, but the problem is too big to solve, so the politicians will give up trying to bail everyone out. They can say they had borrowers best interest at heart, but what can you do?
Write your congressman. Bailing out people in foreclosure would reward people that were recklessness with their finances and punish people that were prudent.
Congress is the master of reckless finance.
Problem is that is the majority of the population. Not people going into foreclosure but people who are reckless with their finances…and many of them vote. We’re in the vast minority.
It is not true that “everyone wants a bailout” as is often professed on this board. At first thought, that may seem to be the case BUT start telling people about this planned bailout (neighbors, friends, family) and you will be hard pressed to find ANYONE who wants their taxes to go towards bailing FB’s.
Try it! Mention this bailout and watch people who could care less about anything else bublicious go nuts. They all hate the idea. It’s just that many have not heard about it yet. (Big surprise).
So spread the word. The faster evryone’s talikng about this, the sooner this crap will end.
On a thread yesterday somebody made a: “You know you’re a redneck when…” joke.
It got me thinking about FB’s?
- You know you’re a FB when after hearing on the news about the poisoned pet food, you decide that from now on you’re going to stick to Ramen Noodles only.
- You know you’re a FB when you find out that the address of your McMansion is listed in the ‘Lonely Planet Travel Guide’ under ‘Inexpensive Boarding Houses’.
- You know you’re a FB when instead of feeding squirrels you find yourself wondering if they would be a good source of protein.
- You know you’re a FB when you can’t stop yourself from crying uncontrollably when somebody mentions the word ‘cash-flow’.
Others?
This would make a good weekend thread!
Ben, you’ll have a few hundred submissions to choose from before the end of the day.
You know you are a FB when your TV costs more than your monthly salary.
http://centralcoasthousingbubble.blogspot.com/
This is going to lead to more of Neils popcorn, a single malt and a Tickle-me-Elmo day, I can just feel it.
I love this thread!
You know your a FB when you have more equity in your car than your home.
You know you’re a FB when you’ve eaten the last squirrel in the neighborhood.
You know you’re a FB when the pizza boy knows not to take your credit card.
YNYAAFB when you envy your simper days without money.
YNYAAFB when you perfect making gin out of food waste.
YNYAAFB when you offer your damn, but smart, ex-wife the house as part of the settlement as she gloats “no, its yours.”
Got popcorn
Neil
ps
I need to work! This thread will keep me coming back all day!
Hmmm… will we break 1000 posts?
A few hundred? I don’t think so. Penina has no idea what he/she started. By the end of the day this thing goes viral.
You know you’re a FB when you get excited when you hear that weather alert on your 60″ HD plasma that you bought with a HELOC.
– YKYAAFB when the only option left is to refinance at a higher interest rate.
– YKYAAFB when the mortgage broker says to you at the closing table, “don’t worry about it; we’ll refinance you right away!”
– YKYAAFB when you realize ‘reset’ does not mean ’start over.’
– YKYAAFB when you realize your monthly payment does not adjust by X pct. but something else does.
– YKYAAFB when refinance reminds you of playing monopoly and get out of jail free cards.
- YKYAAFB when you get a letter from your Option-ARM servicer WAAAAAY before the reset is due, and the letter keeps using the word ‘recast‘.
Bwaahhhhaaahhaaa… That’s a good one
YKYAFB when you start thinking about renting a small U-Store-It storage room (climate controlled of course) to live in.
I knew there was a reason for those security cameras.
Did you ever notice the clause in the self-storage rental agreement that forbids exactly that? It says something to the effect of, “renter shall not use storage space as a residence.”
– YKYAAFB when the FED puts out a public announcement indicating ‘you’ are ‘contained’ and pose no further threat to the entire financial system.
I love it!
– YKYAAFB and it really starts to set in when your best friend the mortgage broker gets convicted of mortgage fraud.
– YKYAAFB when your lender files for BK protection.
…when your lender files for BK protection before you do.
mrktMaven FL,
Stop it, Stop it, Stop it!……..I just realized it’s 7:45 am…I still have 2 days worth of work to do on my taxes…damn you guys.
… when you realize your lender can file for BK protection but you can’t.
Owwwww…. Damn, that’s gotta hurt…
… when your can’t lose investment’s developer is nabbed with a bag of money at an international airport and the condo conversion is not completed.
… and it’s a foreign international airport.
… when you realize ’subprime’ does not mean ‘below the prime’ lending rate.
… when your builder/developer is also your lender.
… when you can’t borrow unless your ‘child’ co-signs.
… when your child cuts ‘you’ off.
YKYAAFB when it dawns on you that you’d never buy a cut of subprime beef, but you were ok with a subprime loan for some reason?
Love it!
YKYAFB when you receive your W2 at tax time and the amount in box 1 is a mere 25% of the income you stated on your mortgage application.
“YKYAAFB when you start thinking of how to cash in your wife’s breast augmentation in order to make your HELOC payment.”
YKYAAFB when you start to see 2 for 1 offerings, just like dominos pizza, by the housebuilders offering deals on brand new houses that nobody wants…
In your neighborhood~
There are a few different ways to cash in on that. Most I’m sure would be illegal.
YKYAAFB when the following year, your 1099 “gain” on foregiven interest from the foreclosing lender exceeds your W-2 earnings by 500%.
YKYAFV when you had more money from your HELOC than your job.
YKYAFB when your 1099-c shows more income than your W2.
YKYAFB when your first instinct, upon being introduced to a “banker”, is to drop your pants and bend over.
LOL
BWAHHAHA…that one is a killer!!
YKYAFB when the city crew boarding up windows of derelict homes in your neighborhood also boards yours up.
YKYAFB when deer start grazing in the urban greenfield that your gated community has become.
YKYAFB when your for sale sign rots away, and nobody notices.
YKYAFB when the city cedes your subdivision back to the county.
YKYAFB when the tax assessor won’t send you a bill to save the cost of a stamp.
YKYAAFB when you have to change the area code on your for sale sign, as you are now in the 666 area code…
YKYAFB when deer start grazing in the urban greenfield that your gated community has become.
Best one so far…..
When you hunt this deer because your tired of eating dog food, which you have because you ate your dog earlier.
YKYAAFB when you don’t knwo what kind of loan you have.
YKYAAFB when a link to your listing appears on this blog.
YKYAAFB when a bailout starts sounding like good economic policy.
YKYAAFB when you fly in to see your rental and police tape surrounds your house and the police are looking for you to answer questions about your side business .
YKYAAFB when you have to check your paperwork to confirm that this rental is in fact yours.
“YKYAAFB when a link to your listing appears on this blog.” - Best entry so far !!!
YKYAAFB when dave del dotto and tom vu are your last best hope at selling your house…
I maaaaaake you rich~
YKYAAFB when Casey Serin bails you out…
YKYAAFB when sitting is no longer an option (the fact that everyone else has refrained from a reeming reference but me should concern me, shouldn’t it?)
Along those lines…
YKYAAFB when the loan servicer starts sending sample tubes of K-Y with the monthly mortgage statement.
YKYAAFB when the impulse to use smoke signals to call the fire department about that kitchen blaze is stronger than the urge to pick up the phone.
YKYAAFB when you scheme about opening a shoe museum in your garage and charging $5 to view all those Sex & The City Manolo Blahniks you HELOC’d out of your house.
YKYAAFB when your hillbilly kin promise to make some room in the chicken house if “ya’ll need a place to stay.”
YKYAAFB when your hillbilly kin promise to make some room in the chicken house if “ya’ll need a place to stay.”
YKYAAFB when that offer sounds good.
ROTFL
Snappy repost to my post, Neil!
I’m still chuckling over your post.
But I like my “fluffy” one too (below).
Neil
YKYAAFB when you know your agent/broker/lender’s phone number by heart or they are one of your “myFaves” on your T-Mobile phone
YKYAAFB when you find a few uninvited squatters in your rental, but don’t think it’s such a bad idea since it makes your rental more “lived-in”
YKYAAFB when you think it’s a good deal to get cash advances on your credit cards to pay your new adjusted mortgage payments
YKYAAFB when the phone has already been disconnected so smoke signals are your only option for calling the Fire Department!
YKYAAFB when you start wondering if setting the place ablaze was what the broker was talking about when he said your loan was an Option ARM!
YKYAAFB when Donald Trump wants his free tickets back.
Reminds me of what’s his name’s movie about GM and Flint Michigan showing a lady selling rabbits out of her home for “pets or food”.
YNYAAFB when you finally get meat on the table… the same day you told your child that “Fluffy ran away.”
YNYAAFB when your neighbors know to guard their pets from you.
YNYAAFB when you can only get $200/night for your teenage daughter’s “services” due to competition in the neighborhood.
YNYAAFB when the high school boys know your daughter’s going rate and won’t pay a penny above it.
YNYAAFB when you finally get meat on the table… the same day you told your child that “Fluffy ran away.”
Your now #1…Funny…
YKYAAFB when while channel surfing you discover A&E has finally yanked a once popular remodeling show in favor of their new series: R.I.P This House.
YKYAAFB when your local RE brokerage’s new Free Airport Shuttle Service for foriegn tourists is the most commonly seen vehicle in your ailing subdivision.
YKYAAFB when you read about the prices your organs would fetch in a third-world country…and start feeling jealous about it
You know you are a FB when Casey Serin asks you to be to be on the ‘team’ working on his foreclosure book:
“With my experience trying to stop foreclosure and all the exposure on my foreclosure story - it’s only natural.”
“Yes, the time has come for me to write a foreclosure book! The funding, the team and the connections are all coming together. I’ve been blessed with this opportunity to turn my “failure” into a success and help a lot of people in the process. “
YKYAAFB when Senator Schumer’s office calls to book you for a “sympathy panel” before his committee.
YKYAAFB when you wish that talented sign-twirler would want to your daughter.
YKYAAFB when you skimp on car crakes and rather “invest” that money in your suffocating mortgage.
YKYAAFB when you pitch a show called a “How To Catch Greater Fool” to execs. of NBC.
YKYAAFB when your once bitter renter friend is now a bragging, smug renter.
YKYAAFB when your garage and attic are full to capacity with illegals paying ‘top dollar’ for rent
YKYAAFB when you answer an ad in the back of a magazine to become a minister, hoping to quickly convert your McMansion into a McChurch and file for tax exemption
When Africa starts having a telethon for you.
Senator Schumer calls on subprime bailout
“The federal government should offer troubled borrowers hundreds of millions of dollars to bail them out of subprime mortgage loans, several leading Democratic lawmakers said on Wednesday.”
http://tinyurl.com/yulybk
Politicians suck
It’s easy to write your local congressman using web forms on the internet. I would recommend adding details - e.g. counties you tried to buy in, but the prices were too high - to prove the message is from an actual person. I suspect some Democrats, like Jim Webb from Virginia, won’t support this taxpayer bailout.
Even if it has no effect, it feels cathartic.
Senator Schumer is in for a real shock.
I want to see how he handles the fb’s on no doc loans that stated their income as $80,000 when in effect it was $40,000.
Do these people get a bail out as well?
This bail-out thing will never fly……….to many lies……to much fraud.
He probably knows and has known the magnitude of this problem. I’m sure his top five political campaign contributors gave him some insights:
1. JP Morgan Chase & Co, 2. Merrill Lynch, 3. Bear Stearns, 4. Citigroup Inc, 5. Morgan Stanley
http://www.opensecrets.org/politicians/contrib.asp?CID=N00001093&cycle=2006
So he and Sen. Dodd are owned by the same banks… the Joint Economic Committee and the Senate Banking
Committeee, both serving the greater corporate good.
They might also be owned by the NAR, given the rather conspicuous coincidental timing of their renewed calls for a bailout on the very same day the NAR price forecast flip-flops to negative.
Patrick.net has an easy and quick way to write your senator….I’m sure most of you know this, but for those who don’t.
(I want to see how he handles the fb’s on no doc loans that stated their income as $80,000 when in effect it was $40,000.)
That’s the problem. The young families who over stretched for overpriced houses bid up in the frenzy, because they feared for their future otherwise, are buried in a cesspool of fraud, flips, livin-large on free money, and other sleaze.
The way out is to loosen up the bankrupcy code for the former, since with securitization workouts will be more difficult. Or, perhaps, the securitizations should sell the non-performing loans to investors and take their loss, with the investors doing the workouts and deciding whether to work with the borrower, dump them out, or go after their first born.
C’mon people, you’re forgetting who the real beneficiaries of Schumer’s largesse would be. 1. JP Morgan Chase & Co, 2. Merrill Lynch, 3. Bear Stearns, 4. Citigroup Inc, 5. Morgan Stanley.
Instead of holding CDOs and CMOs that aren’t paying off, they will still get their revenue stream from those “bailed out” FBs.
Bingo.
“The way out is to loosen up the bankrupcy code for the former,”
No, no, no! The way out is for these people who bought more than they can afford to learn a valuable lesson, not to make it easier for people to do stupid things with other peoples’ money. We all pay the price for lax bankruptcy law in the form of higher consumer credit rates.
I honestly don’t believe that. I think interest rate prices are set by an entirely different criteria and don’t for a second think that interest rates would actually go down if everyone was solvent and paid on time.
I mean, think about the mentality of the people who were lending the money in the first place.
The way out is to loosen up the bankrupcy code for the former, since with securitization workouts will be more difficult.
Well, la de da. Predicted almost 2 years ago that the new bankruptcy laws will be under assault almost immediately and that they will become a campaign issue in 2008 (watch out, Hillary - she voted for the revisions)
is it 4 or 5 dems offering bail so far ?
hard to keep track
maybe the gop is too busy working on FREEer healthcare to respond
Saw this yesterday. I’ve never written to a congressman in my life. Took the time to google both Senators Boxer and Feinstein from my state. It was really pretty simple. google them and their webites will come up. I gotta believe if our congressmen start getting barraged with letters and emails from the voters, it might just give them cause to stop and think. I went straight to the point with both senators….support a bailout….lose my vote.
DO IT today. NO matter what state you are in. It’ll make you feel better.
jmf
Now you will get the pleasure of a reply that will basically be irrelvant with respect to your meaning. “We’re sorry that home prices are so high! We’re doing everything we can to make housing more affordable”
421 comments on a cali thread i believe this is a new hbb record
now i ahve plenty to read as i enjoy my morning coffee
There are too many comments for me to read on a daily basis anymore. I’m having to be very selective. When I first started reading this blog 18 months ago I could read everything, including all the great links. Thanks to everyone for all the high quality info.
I know, for now it is Wall Street thread and California thread the day of not the morning after.
Yeah, it got me wondering what HBB thread had the most comments ever so far. Ben, do you know which one?
have -coffee not working yet
It was nice of DL to warn FBs after the fact and after they were shut out of the subprime market and after predicting home prices would fall this year.
It’s different everywhere!
I am very suspicious of the timing of the NAR’s flip-flop prediction, which suddenly inserted negative signs into their price forecasts through 2008, coinciding with a sudden renewal of calls among blue state politicians (Dodd and Shumer) to “save our homes from foreclosure.” The politicians could have at least waited a few days after the NAR forecast was issued to give the appearance that these attacks on the U.S. taxpayer were not coordinated. Under the circumstances, we have to suspect that the NAR bribed Dodd and Shumer to act with offers of bigger campaign contributions if they do so.
I see very little benefit to homeowners from helping them to stay in homes purchased at 10X their household incomes in a falling price environment, other than to help them remain a host to lending industry parasites for a longer period of time.
The main benificiaries of any tax dollars blue state politicians manage to steal from taxpayers will be REIC constituents (NAR members, lenders, investment bankers, etc.). I hope the President reiterates his position that this Dem-proposed bailout should not go forward, as it is not an appropriate use of Federal tax dollars.
——————————————————————————-
More Business news
Senate Democrats call for federal aid as realtors predict housing slump will worsen this year
By Alan Zibel and Dan Caterinicchia
ASSOCIATED PRESS
2:13 p.m. April 11, 2007
WASHINGTON – Key Senate Democrats issued a report Wednesday detailing the housing market’s decline amid calls for federal aid to homeowners at risk of foreclosure.
The report from New York Democrat Charles Schumer, chair of the Joint Economic Committee, came on the same day that the nation’s trade group for realtors offered new projections that the housing slump is worsening.
The National Association of Realtors said the national median price for existing homes would decline this year for the first time since 1968 on the same day an activist nonprofit called on Wall Street to help homeowners restructure their mortgage loans. Across town, senators called for the government to come up with hundreds of millions of dollars to help at-risk homeowners.
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/business/20070411-1413-housingwoes.html
That’s a great article GS. It’s an accurate summary of where this thing is headed. According to the article:
The Federal Housing Administration could be revamped to refinance mortgages in danger of default, the JEC’s report said, citing a proposal by a Harvard professor under which the housing agency could oversee a “rescue fund” that would restructure failed or failing mortgages. Aid could also be provided to community organizations or banks that work with borrowers to refinance loans.
…
The Boston-based Neighborhood Assistance Corporation of America announced plans Wednesday in Washington to work with Bank of America Corp. and Citigroup Inc. on refinancing troubled loans. NACA said existing funds from those banks pledged through federal regulations requiring loans for low- to moderate-income home buyers could be used to help 7,000 to 10,000 homeowners with high-interest rate mortgages refinance at lower rates.
Refinance id!
“I see very little benefit to homeowners from helping them to stay in homes purchased at 10X their household incomes in a falling price environment, other than to help them remain a host to lending industry parasites for a longer period of time.”
Very cogent point, GS. How LOW will they go?
The simultaneous announcement of negative NAR price forecasts with renewed calls for a foreclosure bailout really stinks. It appears that the NAR forecast represented a coordinated effort to give Shumer and Dodd political cover to transfer tax dollars to the REIC. Of course, some of that flow of money will likely be diverted as campaign contributions. I hope someone at the Washington Post can connect the dots, as this has the appearance of political corruption at its worst.
Good post.
Right on GS .
could be payday soon for TXU short sellers and put holders
http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/bus/stories/DN-baker_12bus.ART0.State.Edition1.378ed1f.html
I certainly hope so.
Me too. I will donate all profits on that trade.
“Mr. Baker said he agreed to advise the company when the buyers convinced him that TXU will be different, will shift from mostly focusing on shareholders to considering the interests of the public as well.
“This company didn’t have, and still doesn’t have today, the best reputation in the business environment,” Mr. Baker said.
He made the same case the buyers have been making for weeks: that TXU will be a new and improved company under different ownership.”
At the HBB:
“It gets better every day…”
More proof of Corporate benevolence:
Lawyers Say E-Mails Can Help Prove Homeowners’ Katrina Case Against State Farm
http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/070411/katrina_state_farm.html?.v=14&.pf=insurance
“State Farm denies pressuring engineers to change their conclusions, but the e-mails, obtained Tuesday and Wednesday by The Associated Press, indicate the company was threatening to dismiss Raleigh, N.C.-based Forensic Analysis & Engineering Corp. less than two months after Katrina”
fyi- got a call from a realtor last night asking me if i ahd bought a place yet. i tried to explain why i have not but she was so sure i shold buy now. i told her i was interested in renting one of the local condos and she said that is a waste of money.
well anyway business must be booming if she is calling me huh?
btw this is the second cal i have recieved like this in the last 2 weeks and i have not looked at a property in over 13 months
I had a stockbroker knock on my door yesterday cold calling! Can you believe it????
TXchic he knows you have money to “invest”
Not like a lot of HIS clients…………….LOL
I doubt that. You’d never know it by the house or the cars out front. I used to enjoy talking to cold calling brokers. I’d quiz them on their market view and preferred stocks. They were invariably idiots.
Before the days of blocked calls, i’d occasionally get a call from some stock wiz and i’d let them go through their spiel for around 5 minutes, act really interested and then lay down the boom~
I’d merely mention that i’m sorry, but some other stock broker called, an hour ago, and I invested in whatever he told me to, all my savings.
You could cut the pregnant pause between me saying that and them hearing it…
With a knife~
It’s been quite a while since I got a cold call from a stock broker, but I share your view. It was July of 2000, and I asked for a recommendation from the guy who called. He told me they were recommending “LU” (Lucent Technologies) at that time.
We know how that turned out….
Knock on your door?! Do you live in/near the financial district? Do you know the guy socially? Did he then go to the house next door?
Wow!
No. Yes.
O…M…F…G… A Fuller Brush stock salesman. Did he also have a vacuum cleaner in the back seat of his car?
I saw one of my old associates get snookered into a similar scheme. He paid a lot of money for broker license training, and they told him he could get started by selling investment products to all of his acquaintences. I sat through his pitch out of courtesy, and even let him bring along his “upstream”.
Of course, the “products” were heavily laden with up-front commissions, making them completely unattractive to anyone with an ounce of investment knowledge. I don’t think he made a single sale, and is now back to working at a real job.
This in the late ’90s. It sounds like MLM investment sales schemes are making a comeback.
Just be happy he didn’t throw a lump of dirt onto your carpet before remembering he was selling stocks this week, not the vacuum cleaners.
fyi- got a call from a realtor last night asking me if i ahd bought a place yet. i tried to explain why i have not but she was so sure i shold buy now.
Just tell them, yes, you already bought a place and no you can’t give any details. Disarm them the easy way.
What?? you guys haven’t heard of the Do Not Call List.
So as the credit lines tighten and with affordibility so low…should we soon expect a rise in median prices due to the lower end being shut out????
Are the sales of foreclosures/fsbo included in the median price we see?
mike
No. The suiciders were bidding up prices with funny money. Without them, bids will likely reflect real and possibly conservatively saved money.
no weez…if the lower end is shut out, the middle becomes the bottom and therefore the median will fall tremendously.
And then, what happens to the upper end, which (so far) has been immune?
IMO, this is the biggest question mark. Can the $1M+ market sustain itself? Does inland subprime and Alt-A disintegrate while West of PCH maintains an even keel? Can the Übers simply sell their houses to one another, ad infinitum?!
Venice Lofts in Manayunk (Philadelphia, controversial project built on a flat “island” in the middle of a river that often floods) - just went from condo to rentals:
http://www.veniceloftscondo.com/
PS: the rental range ($1600 - $3400) is way out of line for Manayunk/Roxy. good luck with that!
You see that a lot these days: a conversion of wishing prices for a sale to wishing prices for a rental. As if renters are going to cut these idiots any slack either.
Oh no.
In 1998 the canal went over its banks, flooding Main Street and carrying cars away with the rushing water. If a similar scenario occurs, the first floor of Venice Lofts will be underwater - for real.
As predicted when the Kara Homes bk was first filed. This was not a difficult call, unfortunately.
Kara Homes buyers may lose deposits
Several prospective Kara Homes Inc. home buyers all but lost their deposits Monday after a bankruptcy court judge approved the sale of six uncompleted developments to developers and a bank.
An option now is to try to recover a portion of their money as unsecured creditors in the bankruptcy case, said Barry W. Frost, a lawyer for some of the Kara buyers. They would only recoup their money once secured lenders, such as banks, are paid.
Jerrold Fried, 42, of Berkeley, who put down $135,000 on a house at Kara’s Dayna Estates in Toms River, is not hopeful he’ll see any money.
“Unfortunately, in the end of the big bankruptcy, my wife and I are the ones that are going to suffer, and my children,” Fried said. “Everybody else goes before me even though he used my money to build the development.”
Of the more than 20 prospective home buyers with deposits, four buyers at Woodland Estates have signed a new contract with its new owner, Fenix, with another expected to be finalized shortly.
U.S. Bankruptcy Court Judge Michael B. Kaplan said he hopes Magyar Bank will make “similar accords” with other home buyers.
“There are no great solutions,” Kaplan said. “There are no great answers.”
Kaplan resisted calls by lawyers for home buyers, some of whom put down more than $100,000 in deposits, to reject the auction’s results. The deposits “for the most part are the life savings of the contract purchasers,” Frost said.
This story is really terrible. Not every Kara home buyer was a flipper or speculator. As it stands these people are going to lose quite a bit of money. I don’t want to tug on heartstrings here, but some are losing their life savings.
All buyers of new construction should take heed. This is not a risk-free exercise.
jb
I wish I could say I have sympathy but I don’t. Who would be dumb enough to front that kind of money. People with delusions of grandeur.
People thought there was no way they could lose. I remember a doctor telling me in 1999 that we should invest the endowment of our place of worship in the stock market because “stocks always go up.”
The change in housing psychology is amazing and I’m loving it.
“I remember a doctor telling me”
I remember a doctor, standing in his tennis shorts at a pay phone at a Coco’s restaurant in Corona Del Mar CA, shaking/talking/crying to his brother:
“John what happened? What the hell happened? Why? …Why?…Why?
What the hell are we going to do?
Oct 1987, overcast & breezy…
I remember driving home that day and listening to the business report on the radio talking about how much money Sam Walton, Warren Buffett, et al had lost.
I remember my dad calling me from Hong Kong trying to pick my brain, did I know what was happening, could I relate what was going on?
If I had to hazzard a guess, i’d say the information flow of 20 years ago, was 1/10,000th of what it is now, with the addition of the internet.
Stop Loss was about as effective as wet toilet paper that day.
Good news from all of this is you can expect the N.J. Legislature to change the law with regard to deposits, requiring that they be held by a third-party escrow holder. On new subdivision construction here in California, that is the case. In any event, Buyers could have protected themselves by seeking competient counsel who would have recognized the risk associated with disbursing funds to the builder prior to closing.
Which reminds me, yesterday I saw someone offering 1oz. Gold Eagles at $100 below spot. They had a great rating but will only accept cash and it needs to be mailed overseas. What a deal…..
Amazing how nobody thinks of simple protective measures like this until the losses are real and substantial. That would seem intuitive to me. I have never bought a new house but unless I was under the influence of some recreational substance, doubt I’d be fronting 100K to any builder. I worked on the General Homes bankruptcy in 1990. That would scare anyone away.
The best thing to come out of the former Iraq war was an interesting thing for me…
Hershey chocloate spent a considerable amount of time and energy perfecting a milk chocolate bar, that could withstand the punishing heat of the desert, up to 125 degrees.
So they made hundreds of millions of said kind of sweet and the war lasted a few days and they remaindered the rest to the 99 Cent Store, who sold them for 10 for 99 Cents.
I backpack and hike a fair amount in the desert and High Sierra and milk chocolate melts rather easily. And I like milk chocolate.
I had a nice stash of heat proof goodness for a few years, in the early 90’s~
Are there steps a buyer can take in a deposit contract to ensure some sort of priority in the creditor food chain?
Yeah. Hiring Akin, Gump. LOL
Well you can probably improve your odds if the contract states that the deposit goes into an escrow account maintained by a 3rd party bank with no interest in the project and can only be released to the developer at closing.
In theory, there would be no way for the developer to touch your money until closing.
Most contracts you are presented with will protect the developer, etc but offer no protections to you. Why not replace it with a contract that offers equal protections to both parties. If the developer isn’t willing to consider such a thing, maybe you don’t want to deal with them.
Shea Homes is changing is adjusting their strategy on the Central Coast.
http://centralcoasthousingbubble.blogspot.com/
Know the $135k fellow from school days. Amazes me to see $1,000,000 homes in ol’ Toms River. Watched inexpensive-materials tract homes bump there from $150-200k range to $400k plus. Income there not nearly proportional to housing costs. Should be ugly few years in TR
A $135k deposit, that must be a house in the $800k-1M range?
Maybe one day soon he’ll buy that house for $500k?
We’ve all seen the Credit Suisse/Ivy Zelman chart of ARM resets by now, right?
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/136440158-O.png
I have a friend who works in middle management at Wachovia. I sent him a link to the chart… and it turns out Wachovia blocks it. I tried a few different links to it, including the original source material (the entire presentation as a PDF), and they were all blocked.
Ominous.
Thanks for the link, ptb. I had heard about Ivy’s report but hadn’t seen the chart. Ominous, indeed.
Our company blocks it too and we have no involvement in banking, RE or construction. It’s a standard net-nanny block to keep employees from browsing the like of Youtube, Flickr, Photobucket etc on work time. I would not think it “ominous” that Wachovia is blocking this, they are probably blocking the whole host site.
Can’t you just download it and send it as an attachment?
Does this mean that in 3 years or so we are in for another waave of pain? Should we delay thinking of buying from 2008/09 to 2011/12?
There has been some analysis indicating that a lot of the Alt-A stuff nominally resetting in 2009/10/11 are 5/1 Option ARMs taken out in 2004/04/06. A lot of these will recast (hit their LTV limit and convert to fully amortizing) well before their reset date.
If so, that 2009/10/11 bulge will in reality spread out across the preceding ‘valley’. Still gonna be ugly though.
Why are basically all the resets for subprime at most two years out?
I thought a huge proportion of buying in 2006 was subprime financed…?
On CNBC this morning, they are finally starting to talk about “market tops” and all of the debt used to fuel the “recent runup”. And they are talking about how if a bailout occurs, we’ll be forced to pay for it. Methinks the IB lapdogs are starting to get a sniff of the steaming pile and don’t like it.
Hello,
At hte bottom is a TXchick msg.
I had one of those moments last night when the reality of what I read here actually clicked. It was not a good feeling. I live in No. VA and within a couple miles in the last few months 5 foreclosures. One is a 1.3 million house that is being actioned for 799,000
The other was a townhouse whose sad history I traced. First they were looking for someone to rent the basement for $600.00. Then it was for sale, then rent, then its in foreclosure. Sale price 699,000 approx. Foreclose auction price 499,000
Another was a house for auction at $999,999 The house I found had a serious fire a year ago 100K damages. Why? Cooking on a sterno stove. No Power? Couldnt make that months bill?
The other thing was if lending standards tighten to 3x income. Meanwhile a recession and outsourcing kill high paying jobs then 3x for 2 people working will be what? 180K
This is for TxChick whose posts I enjoy. I don’t know if it is any good but…
I am part time musician. If I understand shorts & puts you make money knowing ahead time a company will drop in value?
Fender, Marshall, Gibson, Guitar Center
Why? The first 3 because guitars became art objects, the equivalent of convertibles, and investments for baby boomers. The convertible because it was a time machine to go way back when even if way when never existed.
Prices sKyrocketed. Now, the demos of who they are going to sell to have radically changed. Guitar Center, all of the above plus they have brick and mortar outlets.
Any reports on vintage musical instrument prices dropping along with home prices?
I havent priced them lately. When Gibons from the 50’s passed the 10k mark I quit. I have noticed PRS high end guitars on ebay not moving even at decent prices. Others can have the plasmas, planes, and boats. I want a PRS Santana or a 57 Gibson Black Beauty
I may work in socioeconomics but my degree is in art - (yep heard all the jokes and make a few myself)
For some reason, art sales still seem to be doing well. I sold 4 paintings in one month and I’m not a bargain. I also used to collect 1700 and 1800 textiles and do restoration work. These market seems to be declining. On the flip side, I’m starting to see more donations to museum archives especially in mid 1800 pieces. Interesting.
The pinnacle of American Art, in my mind, would be the 1920’s…
It never recovered.
Sure, anything like that that is a discretionary purchase which would only be made in ez money days. I would think musical instruments are even more discretionary than something such as a TV.
Discretionary? Ha. I have 5 guitars. My wife and kid just don’t understand me. sob.
I have another indicator for hard times.
Watch cars on the road and listen to them. During the last really ugly downturn pulling up to a stop light meant listening to a symphony of brakes rubbing on metal cause the pads were gone.
Also people quit getting the dents and minor bangs fixed. Either no insurance, dont want their rates to go up, or they spent the repair check.
I’ve got a dented car, complete with a small crack in the windshield and knowing history like I do…
not a bad thing~
Wealth hid itself away in the 1930’s, nothing showy from the 1920’s worked anymore.
History will repeat itself.
My slightly damaged car and my extraordinarily average appearance will earn no wrath from the neo family Joad, that I will encounter in my travels during the times to come.
How will they react to your ride?
Hey, not trying to be an a-hole here, but it doesn’t look we will be driving around too much in the future anyway.
Google Matthew Simmons and see what he has to say.
Good call. Also expect more accidents in rainy weather as people put off replacing tires as long as possible and/or buying the cheapest tires possible as replacements.
No wonder the tire salesman acted like he won the lotto the other day when I bought a set of 4 premium Michelins…
Back in the days when I owned cars, I never skimped on tires. The “contact patch” on a tire is about an inch wide. That’s all the rubber you get (x4) to stop at 3500 pound hunk of metal traveling 110 feet per second (75 mph).
I guess some people think it’s ok to spend $35 for that 1 inch of rubber. I quite enjoy living and breathing. $150-200 seems worth it to me.
That’s why it can be a mistake to pick up an exotic vehicle at a ‘too good to be true’ price during a downturn. They have very often not had their required servicing, and going forward can be extremely expensive to keep running.
Like a Ford Freestar minivan. Avoiding it, because a relic.
Luckily, Sen. John Cornyn (R-Tex.) on reintroduced Tuesday his Securing Knowledge, Innovation and Leadership (SKIL) bill. It increases the annual cap of 65,000 to 115,000. Automatically increases the new cap by 20 percent each year the cap is hit, and creates a new exemption to the cap for anyone who has an “advanced degree in science, technology, engineering, or math” from any foreign university. No provision was included that would reduce the cap if the previous year’s limit was not met.
http://www.internetnews.com/bus-news/article.php/3671211
The limit will always be met. They currently run out of H1-B’s within a few hours of accepting applications.
H1-B’s can be useful, but are not preferred really. The visa holder is pretty limited in resisting unfair work rules and from moving to a new job. I personally would be more inclined to offer a fast-tracked green card system to people with advanced degrees in the hard sciences and engineering. Give preference to degrees from US institutions to ensure the continued leadership of our higher education system.
Most of these people would be better Americans than most current citizens, and from my years working in a high-tech job along-side tons of H1-B’s I can say that the desire to become an American is very high.
Where are most coming from? W/o checking, I am assuming China and India? When I was in grad school in the late 70’s early 80’s, at least half the engineering grad students were from foreign countries.
I’m guessing it’s higher now. My professor colleagues tell me at some places > 80% of the people applying to engineering grad school in the US are foreign born.
Where’s the equivalent bill for MDs?
Interesting that in a WSJ article, the mortgage bankers (I think) are planning an ad campaign to counteract the exaggerations of the MSM frenzy.
Too bad they didn’t do the same in 2004 and 2005.
Who really benefitted from the bubble, as opposed to a slow and steady progression of housing prices in line with inflation and interest rates? The brokers, the fraudsters, and some oldsters who sold and downsized at the top. The rest of us lose, some more than others. We’re arguing about who loses most now.
Funny moment last night when Cramer was on while I was cleaning up in the kitchen.
During his lightening round a caller asked about K. Hovninian (sp), HOV (I think), and he stammered over it really quick and almost under his breath said, “No, no, stay away they are going way down. NEXT CALLER!!”
Chuckster…
Throwing a couple hundred million buckaroos @ the housing bubble, will get you around 333 homes in San Diego, free and clear~
Thank you for letting me tell you how utterly ridiculous your plan really is.
What a dope…
http://yochicago.com/today/market-conditions/first-price-slide-ever-predicted-nar_4645/
I look at that website every so often; they are a real estate publication and of course have an interest in increased sales and what not. However, I have had rational discussions with some of the people that run that site. From what I saw, they never cheered on the flipper side of the boom.
Some of the people that comment on that site are pure idiots; maybe that was what you were referring to?
No, they definitely haven’t cheered the “flipper” side but they have promoted RE as a good investment as in, buy one to live in and one to rent.
The poster of that particular post, Joe Zekas, keeps touting, “Things are fine here, no need to worry.”, and dismisses every media story against RE as agenda driven.
The only reason he posted the Realtor.com report, which downplayed the ‘07 loss prediction, was because someone else post the CNN article.
In ‘06 he keep saying, “This is the second best sales year.”. Now he’s defending ‘07 as what’s predicted to be the fourth best sales year. How much further do sales have to back track for him to admit what’s going on? Answer: When he gets foreclosed on.
I got into a disagreement with Zekas about the state of the Chicago market 2 or 3 months ago.
On the other hand, a while back Zekas and I had a nice discussion lamenting how terrible the average floor plan was these days and how the desire to squeeze the most money possible out of a development was really killing the livability of a lot of the newer housing.
I think Joe does some nice stuff on that site. I like some of the neighborhood videos. He did a nice one on selecting a home inspector. He did rip on a guy who said the 300sqft units at The Flats on LaSalle was a good investment. But for the most part he completely dismesses every red flag that the housing market throws at his face. When he dismisses articles as a media agenda to bring down the housing market I’m nearly beside myself. He loses all credibility.
I’m almost positive the he’s a custom home builder, though sometimes I get the people on that site mixed up.
It would certainly go a long way toward explaining his actions.
I don’t know about that but I do recall in past posts that he once did condo conversions so he has a RE backround and, mostly likely, friends in the biz.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18025299/
Article on increased evictions
Now here’s something I never knew before: The article says that the vast majority make plans well ahead of time, get a rental, move, etc. BUT, if you are one of those recalcitrant types, or just plain in denial, the bank will actually send movers to pack your stuff!
I think that’s pretty darn nice!
Major miss by MTG (large mortage insurer) announced conveniently late last night:
http://yahoo.reuters.com/news/articlehybrid.aspx?storyID=urn:newsml:reuters.com:20070412:MTFH30345_2007-04-12_03-45-21_N11273445&type=comktNews&rpc=44
Their profit fell. I don’t care how far profits fall, even to zero. We haven’t arrived at our desitiantion until there are losses.
I just noticed most of the adds on the page have gone from mortgage broker type stuff, to “have to sell your house” do a lot of FB’s visit the site?
Ryland COO Kip Scott to leave company
Bankruptcy May Not Save Homes
Filing Isn’t Helping
Many Borrowers
Avoid Foreclosure
By LINGLING WEI
April 12, 2007; Page D6
More financially stretched borrowers are realizing even declaring bankruptcy can’t save their homes from foreclosure.
Take, for example, Bernice and Harlan King in Cleveland. The couple, saddled with about $30,000 in credit-card and other debts and behind on their $1,650 monthly mortgage payments, filed Chapter 13 late last year to prevent their mortgage lender from repossessing their house. Their hope was to work out a plan to catch up with the mortgage payments and repay other bills over three to five years. Now they are giving up, and their house is heading for foreclosure.
“It’s just too much trying to catch up,” said Ms. King, 48 years old, a court stenographer.
The Kings and people like them present a worrisome trend for investors in mortgage-backed bonds already spooked by soaring delinquencies and defaults on home loans to people with the weakest credit. According to a study released in March by Credit Suisse Group, more subprime borrowers are turning to bankruptcy court to stave off foreclosure, as softening housing prices make it harder for them to sell their homes to repay debts.
At the same time, the study shows, the number of borrowers who are actually able to bring current their mortgage payments through bankruptcy is declining, and more filers are ultimately turning their homes over to the lenders. The finding means investors in high-yielding mortgage-backed securities should expect higher losses on the underlying collateral.
At least part of the blame, says the report, lies with a bankruptcy law passed in 2005. The law raised the bar for people to qualify for Chapter 7 “fresh start” bankruptcy proceedings. Chapter 7 can enable individual filers to wipe away debts such as credit-card and medical bills so they can continue to make their mortgage payments. With access limited, more subprime borrowers are forced into Chapter 13, where some can’t maintain their payment schedules for more than a couple of months.
The Kings, for example, had thought about filing Chapter 7, but made too much money to pass the new bankruptcy law’s means test, said Mr. King, an airline baggage handler.
http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB117634131165567194-7vUoNfVNtJQE3TI4kvhQzDHePzI_20070418.html?mod=mktw
An airline baggage handler could make high five-figures. Unions are sweet deals.
Buried in the article, but at least someone’s being honest.
“Ms. King blamed her foreclosure mainly on the couple’s lack of financial discipline”
I’d have to read the bankruptcy docket but something doesn’t smell right here. In the olden days, you could propose and have confirmed a Chapter 13 plan that would pay maybe 10-15c on the dollar to unsecured creditors, strip the liens on your car down to FMV and definitely save your house. Something here does not add up.
What’s up is the fact that these people bought houses that they NEVER had ANY chance of making full payments on. Their “plan” was to jump from teaser rate to teaser rate, pulling cash out each time, until…. well their thinking never really got that far.
Right but running the numbers on this case. If they have 30K in unsecured (credit card) debt and back payments on their house (let’s say 10K worth), why can’t that go into a confirmable five year plan paying let’s say 25% on the unsecured ($7,500 + $10,000 plus trustee’s administration fees) = ~$300 into a plan. With any decent income, they should be able to swing that plus continue to make the mortgage payments. Something’s missing.
Would bankruptcy save the house if you went 100%, and overstated income? You wouldn’t have enough to make the payment even with 0 unsecured debt to pay. Or will the bankruptcy also alter the payments on the house?
Used to be you could lien strip or renegotiate but it’s been a long long time since I had anything to do with that kind of case. It’s probably all different now.
“To whom it may concern: It is springtime. It is late afternoon.”
“We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful what we pretend to be.”
Kurt Vonnegut (rest in peace)
Indeed. The world needs Kilgore Trout. Now, more than ever.
Here’s another one I liked.
“The main business of humanity is to do a good job of being human beings, not to serve as appendages to machines, institutions and systems”. Kurt Vonnegut.
Ha! You think the fools and scammers have quit? Try this:
http://dallas.craigslist.org/acc/310471818.html
So many foreclosures, so little time.
Practitioners: If you are not doing BK right now, you are really mi$$ing out.
~Misstrial
Yeah but not that consumer crap. Big 11s are going to be all over the place and that’s where the real fun is. But the hours are just ghastly. I love that work though. It’s so interesting.
Hmm - maybe I missed it, but if not I’m amazed there wasn’t a post (or article) about this -
“$1 Billion Pledged to Help Fend Off Foreclosures”
“Neighborhood Assistance Corporation of America, an 18-year-old housing advocacy group, yesterday announced it would commit $1 billion to refinancing the loans of lower-income people at risk of losing their homes.”
“The financing will come from CitiGroup and Bank of America, which have been lending money for years to borrowers screened by the nonprofit group. NACA, of Boston, said it had helped put 50,000 people in homes since its creation.”
http://tinyurl.com/2xflom
Craigslist is a gold mine today! Anyone in Seattle with free time?
HOT Female needs deck built/replaced!! Very real…
——————————————————————————–
Reply to: serv-310264686@craigslist.org
Date: 2007-04-11, 5:28PM PDT
I am seriously over budget on a remodel of an investment
property I have. I need a elevated deck of about 700 sq
feet rebuilt. I will buy the lumber and you supply the labor
in trade for….. ME… very very real… The home is vacant
and quiet and perfect for what you need and what I have…
I am a total barbie doll type female… think Christie Brinkley…
I am married and have permission to play and I will pick a
great deck builder who really deserves some extra on the side..
Married preferred but not required.
Please explain why I should pick you… I need a good deck built
first but am interested in making this enjoyable as well… ok?
Please send a pic, even g rated, but tell me about yourselve.
I placed this ad a few days ago and plan to interview 2 guys from
it… I would like to increase that to 4-5 guys/builders…
Location: Woodinville
it’s NOT ok to contact this poster with services or other commercial interests
License info: Unlicensed
PostingID: 310264686
If this turns into a full-blown depression look for this kind of thing everywhere. Prostitution always goes way up during depressions.
Depressions bring out both the worst and best aspects of society. We learn a lot about our inner cores that was previously hidden during good times.
That’s just gross!
All I can say is: “I’m floored”
Wow… Is it really that bad out there?
Is this Stanley Johnson’s wife?
No way that would happen in Seattle. People are so rich there, they have no problem affording homes at any price. Just ask the local papers. hehehe
Scary. Construction must still be going prety well in Woodinville though if she can find guys wiling to work for “free”. I like bartering but that doesn’t sound like a super deal. Unless your a trust fund construction guy.
I can believe it. I house sat in Woodinville for a month once. Pot smoking hippee farmer couple with day jobs on a one pig 7 goose farm. A stripper rented the over-garage apartment.
“If we value the pursuit of knowledge, we must be free to follow wherever that search may lead us. The free mind is not a barking dog, to be tethered on a ten-foot chain.”
Adlai E. Stevenson, Jr.
China accumulated more that $300 billion in additional foreign reserves last year:
BEIJING - China’s foreign reserves, already the world’s largest, have risen past $1.2 trillion, a state news agency said Thursday, amid surging trade and plans to create a multibillion-dollar company to invest some of the stockpile.
The figure, as of the end of March, represented a 37.4 percent rise over the same period last year, the Xinhua News Agency said, citing the central bank.
China’s reserves have risen rapidly as huge trade surpluses and foreign investment force Beijing to drain billions of dollars from the economy every month through bond sales to hold down pressure for prices to rise. The money is stockpiled in U.S. Treasury bonds and other foreign assets.
The government announced last month it will create a multibillion-dollar company to invest a portion of the reserves in hopes of making more profitable use of the money.
http://streetlightblog.blogspot.com/
So we are trying to scrape up a few hundred million Dollars to save ourselves from ourselves and China is wondering where to park this year’s additional $300 billion worth of their savings, the results of hard work…
Irony is so cheap, now.
If China starts buying up property and assets in the US, guess who is going to complain the most…
My guess is the people that buy up cheap Chinese crap by the cartload at Wal-Mart
The only assets that China wants from the US are raw materials. China buys its grain from Brazil and its raw materials from Australia, Brazil, Africa, Canada and the US. “China imported 100.19 million tons of iron ore in the first three months of this year, an increase of 23.4 percent year-on-year, according to the General Administration of Customs.”
It would be great if China wanted our overpriced property, that would eliminate our CAD. Unfortunately China’s trade agents are pretty smart so it “aint gonna happen.”
As if Pot growers and Meth labs aren’t enough, LA Times reports today:
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-toxic12apr12,1,1272751.story?coll=la-headlines-california&ctrack=1&cset=true
“State has most minorities near toxic facilities
L.A. tops the nation’s major urban areas with 1.1million Latinos, blacks and Asians living within two miles of hazardous waste sites.”
Versus how many white people? What is the total population of LA? What is the ratio of white to minority? There are lies, damn lies, and statistics. Ignore that which does not give you all the facts. Someone is just trying to take a number and spin it to alarm you.
I don’t know, math guy, but, like many California cities, LA is remarkably segregated. I can’t think of any mixed neighborhoods from the time that I lived there. Even middle class/upper class neighborhoods were segregated by race. So it wouldn’t be hard for certain groups to be clustered near toxic sites.
Which politician’s suffers from this:
Study reveals “Robin Hood impulse” in human nature:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070411/sc_nm/psychology_robinhood_dc
“Fowler acknowledged the experiment might yield different results if conducted in another country or somewhere other than a U.S. college campus”
Isn’t this where kids get their first “line-of-credit”?
Credit Fodder
Building permits are down 50% vs. 2 years ago in the Ft. Collins, CO area:
http://www.coloradoan.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070412/BUSINESS/704120360
A jewel (IMO):
>>Shields said the loss of 7,000 high-tech jobs in the past few years has hurt the area.
“We see issues of underemployment, with workers working under their abilities,” Shields said. “Other nations are producing far more graduates in engineering, science and math than the U.S. We must keep expanding our educational opportunities.”
Let’s see…thousands of engineers and other techies have been laid off locally, and most of them are currently underemployed. The solution therefore must be to train more engineers and techies!!
You know things are dire when “Housing is vital to sustainability in Northern Colorado”. I guess you can’t have a vibrant economy built on low paying retail jobs selling imported goods.
I can’t remember the last time I read some good, local, economic news in the Coloradoan.
Her statement is technically correct, we need more engineers and techies in this country. The work is there.
Just not in Colorado.
Norm Matloff of UC Davis has done a great deal of work documenting that the techie shortage is a myth and that we don’t need more H1-B’s.
Hmm, I haven’t seen any of that work. Just going by my personal experience.
Any time any of my techie friends want a new job, they’ve always had choices. Just recently I started looking and within two months I had multiple offers (I accepted one this morning; pay increase of 9%, woo!). Most places called to schedule interviews within hours of receiving my resume.
It sure feels like a shortage out there.
There are niches with demand. For instance, .NET programmers are in demand.
One thing that Matloff has documented is that as a techie ages it becomes harder to find work, regardless of skill sets.
http://heather.cs.ucdavis.edu/itaa.html
I have been looking to hire qualified civil/environmental engineers in Columbus for a year. Can’t get any, because all my competitors are doing the same.
Rising foreclosures reshaping communities
http://www.usatoday.com/money/economy/housing/2007-04-12-foreclose-cover-usat_N.htm
Be sure to check out the foreclosure rankings. The number of homes entering foreclosure hit a record in fourth-quarter 2006. States and how they rank based on percentage of subprime adjustable-rate mortgages that went into foreclosure.
Someone sent me a mortgage delinquency rate spreadsheet by state and metro today, with data from 4Q-05 to 1Q-07.
At the top in 1Q deliquencies, you have Texas, deadbeat capital of the U.S., and the depressed Midwest.
But the eye opener is the change in deliquency rate from 4Q-05 to 1Q07. Nevada, Puerto Rico, Florida, California 1-2-3-4. Texas is middle of the pack.
Interesting article. One of the women there had “fought for years to combat mortgage fraud and lobbied authorities to take action”.
What???!!! I thought the politicians are stunned and amazed at what’s happened? You mean people were telling them about it all along??!!!
I’ve known for a long long time that this unstable market was going to end up decimating whole neighborhoods. That was one of the main reasons I was so surprised and sickened by the way it was being cheered on by nearly everyone.
Time to close this chapter for once and for all. Let the prices fall to where they are trully affordable and will make for stable communities.
Getting rid of things like Fannie/Freddie, the 500K capital gains exemption, the mortgage interest tax right off, bringing back the 20% downpayment. There are a ton of things they could do to turn houses back into homes again and get rid of this lottery ticket mentality attached to houses. It really wreaks for neighborhoods and communities.
The first step is for houses to become affordable again though. Nothing will change if we don’t get rid of the “stupid, phoney prices”.
Tucson REIC warned againstfraud:
http://www.azstarnet.com/business/178000
Another case of barn door closed, horse gone.
There was an amusing tidbit on the news last night about Orpheum Lofts in downtown PHX. This is an old art deco building that was converted into loft condos a few years ago. The condos are very nice, assuming you’re into the exposed bricks ‘n duct work scene, but needless to say they’re way overpriced for what they are, and, as with every other condo project here, largely flipper owned. The residents found out this week that they’re losing their parking spaces. The developer owned the lot next door, which he gated and turned into the parking area for the building. He’s now sold the lot, so the residents are basically SOL. They interviewed one resident who said that she was PROMISED that parking would be permanently available. The promise was not in writing, of course—in fact, the sales contract apparently included a clause specifically mentioning that the developer had the option of eliminating the parking spaces. So now, all of the residents have to find someplace else to park (good luck with that in downtown PHX—their choice of metered street parking or hourly ramps), and the flippers are stuck with condos that have no parking. Good luck with those…
Housing and mortgage stocks up big in the last few minutes - anyone know what’s up?
PPT intervention?
OK, just because real estate sector shares are going up (as usual) against an endless background stream of bad news does not provide conclusive evidence of share price manipulation. It is also possible that prospects are improving for blue party politicians to get their bailout proposals passed, thanks to some help from the NAR’s negative price forecast. An injection of tax dollars would be cause for optimism in real estate sector stocks.
Which is more economical over time — rent or buy? Cool graph you can manipulate the parameters in NYT.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/10/business/2007_BUYRENT_GRAPHIC.html?_r=2&oref=slogin&oref=slogin
SB Sun has several on affordability:
How much is too much (Study: Inland Empire homes overvalued by 16.7%)
http://www.sbsun.com/ci_5647625
Getting into that residence: Forum explore ways to make homes more affordable. (http://www.dailybulletin.com/business/ci_5647101) With quote:
“Indeed, the Occidental study shows that a family able to make a 10percent down payment on a $500,000 home and getting a 7 percent interest rate would need $4,043 a month to cover insurance, property taxes and mortgage.”
$4000 a month. That should exclude about 90% of all households, nationwide, right? Even in places like California I doubt that even 20% of future buyers could swing a $4k monthly payment. Assuming that it would be 30% of gross income, that’s 160K per year, which puts the median priced home out of just about every one’s reach.
Last year a headhunter tried to lure me back to San Diego. I politely declined, citing the insane housing prices. He said I would get paid more than I do now. I asked him if it would be about 150K per year. He thought I was joking. “I can get you maybe 10K more than now” he said. How am I supposed to afford a 600K house with just 10K more? We’ll he asked, don’t you have a few hundred thous equity in your current house? No, I replied, I live in Colorado, not California. My house is only worth 300K, and that’s all I can afford with the salry you are offering me. He kept insisting that I was being “difficult” and that I could afford a house in San Diego.
“How am I supposed to afford a 600K house with just 10K more?”
Rent until prices correct to affordable levels.
While I believe that SD house prices will come down, I don’t think that it will ever be “affordable”. I was amazed at how quickly it recovered from the 90’s crash.
The funny thing about Rancho Cucamonga is that they think the real problem is that real demand is outstripping supply, as opposed to phoney demand backed by suicide notes.
“Ruh says local governments need to embrace smaller lots and attached housing and to consider the “remaining land of the valley floor as an asset.”
Not sure if this was posted yesterday or not.
Shiller: Mr. Worst-case scenario
http://money.cnn.com/2007/04/09/real_estate/shiller.moneymag/
How did affordability get to where it is today? Ask Alan Greenspan, Fed Chairman from 1987-2005 (the greatest period of housing price inflation in U.S. history)…
“Question: So how rich can you get on real estate?
Answer: From 1890 through 1990, the return on residential real estate was just about zero after inflation.
Question: Excuse me? That’s all? Hasn’t it been higher lately?
Answer: Since 1987 it’s been 6 percent [or about 3 percent a year after inflation].
Question: So real estate doesn’t go up roughly 10 percent a year?
Answer: It can’t be true that homes rise 10 percent a year. If they did, in the long run no one would be able to afford a house.
Shiller is brilliant.
Answer: … I’m inclined to think there’s a good chance that the return on real estate will be negative, substantially negative, over the next 10 years because all booms reverse in the end.
Question: All right. We won’t call that a forecast either. So how should people think about their home as an asset?
Answer: Avoid concentration of risks. You need a house, but I would avoid a second one - or at least avoid an outsize house. Over-investing in real estate now would be a recipe for disaster.
Question: You also write about the risk to human capital. What’s that?
Answer: What you’re trying to do is to invest in skills that somebody else will want to pay you for. Let’s say you want to work at Bethlehem Steel. That would have been a good idea in the 1950s, not so good by the 1970s. The world went the wrong way on you.
Question: How can you manage that risk?
Answer: I used to coach children’s soccer, and I would tell my players, “Stand away from the pack, and sooner or later the ball will come to you.”
In your career choices too: Get away from the pack. Also, you associate your home country with safety. But the rest of the world is pretty peaceful too, on average, and the average is all that matters.
I think relatively few [Americans] are getting away from the pack, investing more outside the U.S. than in.
Question: How are you investing now?
Answer: I’m probably a little over 60 percent in stocks, almost all of it outside the U.S. I have a lot of cash. And I’ve been reducing my exposure to real estate. It may be at the end of a cycle.
The funny thing is… realistically, he’s not even close to being “Mr. Worst Case Scenario.”
His viewpoint just blows away the MSM because their heads are so far stuck in the sand.
‘…he’s not even close to being “Mr. Worst Case Scenario.”’
Referring to Shiller as such serves the newspaper’s ulterior motive of helping to ensure that real estate always goes up, in the long run.
Chuck (austin powers) Schumer:
We demand hundreds of millions of Dollars…
CNBC just did a segment on the subprime bailout. Their in-house economist said there should be NO bailout. If the lenders want to keep the FB’s in their houses, the two should work it out between themselves. There is no role for the government in that.
I’ve posted this before, but I really wonder how many of these FB’s will even want that option versus just going into foreclosure. For someone who has been in their house for a while and refinanced into a “bad loan,” I can understand those people wanting to stay. But what about everyone who stampeded in after 2004? Are those people really going to want to pay mortgages and property taxes and insurance and upkeep and utilities on houses that aren’t worth anywhere near what they paid?? Why not just foreclose?
“If the lenders want to keep the FB’s in their houses, the two should work it out between themselves. There is no role for the government in that.”
I wish the red state politicians would pick up this theme. So far, blue state politicians have threatened to rob taxpayers to give more money to the undeserving real estate industry players who created the mess. This is a perfect opportunity to take a stand in favor of the advantage of free markets over government (blue state politician) manipulation. Watch out for your wallets!
Barney Frank is not a red state pol.
Here are some stats from South Santa Barbara County. (There was actually an article in the Santa Barbara News Suppress about Santa Barbara County being a leader in the decline of property prices, I don’t think that applies to South Santa Barbara County, which is the coastal area (North Santa Barbara County is Santa Maria, Lompton, Guadalupe, Santa Ynez (nice) and other areas which will definitely be hit).
Note Montecito’s almost doubled average-probably a few outlier $20MM+ properties (I know of one $20MM + property in escrow, due to close next month-no financing contingency!). It really is different in Montecito.
South Santa Barbara County
Month Number of Sales Average Sales Price Median Sales Price Number of Sales over $1 Million
Jan - Mar 2007 418 2,039,312$ 1,000,000$ 212
Jan - Mar 2006 430 1,938,850$ 1,050,000$ 232
Jan - Mar 2005 504 1,448,504$ 987,500$ 245
Jan - Mar 2004 590 1,083,917$ 802,000$ 178
Jan - Mar 2003 450 1,067,508$ 699,500$ 121
Jan - Mar 2002 634 801,365$ 544,750$ 111
Santa Barbara
Month Number of Sales Average Sales Price Median Sales Price
Jan - Mar 2007 204 1,300,027$ 962,500$
Jan - Mar 2006 219 1,327,576$ 1,045,000$
Jan - Mar 2005 246 1,144,709$ 990,000$
Jan - Mar 2004 323 955,578$ 836,500$
Jan - Mar 2003 214 1,024,115$ 735,000$
Jan - Mar 2002 346 657,208$ 550,000$
Goleta
Month Number of Sales Average Sales Price Median Sales Price
Jan - Mar 2007 85 847,126$ 814,000$
Jan - Mar 2006 95 1,426,821$ 881,000$
Jan - Mar 2005 124 1,138,415$ 807,500$
Jan - Mar 2004 128 863,340$ 720,000$
Jan - Mar 2003 112 664,133$ 616,250$
Jan - Mar 2002 132 545,458$ 439,500$
Carpinteria
Month Number of Sales Average Sales Price Median Sales Price
Jan - Mar 2007 29 1,676,103$ 950,000$
Jan - Mar 2006 25 1,297,000$ 850,000$
Jan - Mar 2005 25 1,150,380$ 735,000$
Jan - Mar 2004 47 845,670$ 600,000$
Jan - Mar 2003 53 796,169$ 575,000$
Jan - Mar 2002 44 512,602$ 439,500$
Montecito
Month Number of Sales Average Sales Price Median Sales Price
Jan - Mar 2007 70 4,580,112$ 2,600,000$
Jan - Mar 2006 65 3,524,562$ 2,374,545$
Jan - Mar 2005 79 2,830,164$ 2,200,000$
Jan - Mar 2004 68 2,070,113$ 1,777,500$
Jan - Mar 2003 51 2,356,723$ 1,600,000$
Jan - Mar 2002 74 2,192,048$ 1,637,500$
Isn’t this a bit fishy? PMI has decided to delay the quarterly risk report (due late April) until June. Here’s the wording of their press release:
“Title: PMI to Release Improved U.S. Market Risk Index(SM) in June 2007
Date: 4/12/2007 11:00:00 AM
WALNUT CREEK, Calif., April 12, 2007 /PRNewswire-FirstCall via COMTEX News Network/ — PMI Mortgage Insurance Co., the U.S. subsidiary of The PMI Group, Inc. (NYSE: PMI), announced today that it will release an improved U.S. Market Risk Index(SM) in mid-June 2007.
“We’re always working to improve the predictive ability of our models,” said Mark F. Milner, Chief Risk Officer of PMI Mortgage Insurance Co. “Periodically updating model inputs is consistent with our ‘best practice’ approach to risk management.” PMI’s June report will be based on first quarter data provided by the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight (OFHEO), which is scheduled to be released May 31. On the timing, Milner explained, “What’s available right now is fourth quarter data. Given the lag time in the data and the significant changes that have been occurring in the market, waiting until June to release the new model will provide a substantially better view of house price risk.”
PMI’s U.S. Market Risk Index is a proprietary statistical model that predicts the probability of a regional decline in home prices in the nation’s 50 largest metropolitan statistical areas (MSAs) and metropolitan statistical area divisions (MSADs). In addition to the OFHEO House Price Index, the U.S. Market Risk Index uses labor market statistics from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and other public data as well as a variety of proprietary measures calculated by PMI.
The revised model will give additional weight to recent trends, including home price volatility, a key variable in ranking relative probabilities of price declines. It is expected that the new model will result in increased risk scores for some areas in the Western and Southeastern U.S., where volatility has been more pronounced in recent years, and decreased scores for some areas in the Northeast. “
Is PMI still predicting “some probability” of price declines these days?
They are hinting strongly that their risk index will increase quite a bit in CA and FL (note that this is risk of FURTHER declines). Southern CA was already at 60% risk, so we’ll probably see 80% or so. That might not be all that shocking to the readers of this blog, but it looks to me like they don’t want the main street media to report it yet.
I think PMI is between a rock and a hard place. They have to retain their credibility, but on the other hand: a risk-rating of 80% or more for an area might be the wake-up call for all the people in denial.
If prices drop rapidly, PMI will start losing money.
If price declines have already taken place, shouldn’t the “risk of price declines” be reset to 100%? Or are they only trying to predict the risk of future price declines?
Future.
I can see why they don’t want to use the new model on Q4 data right now. It would be outdated - the market is changing quickly.
On the other hand, the OFHEO HPI data is usually lagging in and of itself, and presents other difficulties, correct?
Remember the Tennessee housewife who shot her husband in the back last year? She was sending money to Nigeria!
http://www.courttv.com/news/2006/0719/mary_winkler_ap.html
This property has quite a bit of history. I grew up around the corner, and the same people lived there until 2004 I believe (about 30 years) The couple that lived there were pack-rats of the worst kind - like piles of garbage 3 feet high, etc.. In fact, the window you see to the left was egged in the early 90s, and the stain stayed there until the house was sold. When it went for sale, the realtor tried cleaning it up a bit, but the SMELL, and the stains on the walls, floors (where there wasn’t holes rotted through the hardwood) were hard to hide. There was a porch in the back that had yellow tape across it so you couldn’t step on it as it was rotting away. Also in the backyard were 3 barrels (big oil barrels) of some leaking fluid. There was 2 more barrels in the basement. Probably one of the creepiest stop and looks that I’ve ever seen! Fast forward, it was sold, fixed up (took about a year), resold, foreclosed on, and now back for sale for over a million! I can’t wait to see what DINK buys this.
http://tinyurl.com/2rzsw9
Applecart, you could really upset things if you posted some sort of info that web searchers could tie to this lovely POS. Just the sort of thing that the sellers want showing up on Google.
Ziprealty website lets you post comments about the property. Just sayin’.
Ziprealty website lets you post comments about the property. Just sayin’
Yep - I just thought of that!
Consumer groups call for bankruptcy fix
Subprime mortgage holders need help to hold homes, advocates say
By Ruth Mantell, MarketWatch
Last Update: 12:59 PM ET Apr 12, 2007
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) — Consumer groups called Thursday for Congress to enact bankruptcy-law reform to save the homes of borrowers drowning in the rising tide of subprime mortgage foreclosures and stem the loss up to $164 billion in home-based wealth.
More than two million households in the subprime market have already either lost their homes to foreclosure or hold subprime mortgages that are likely to fail in coming years, according to the National Association of Consumer Bankruptcy Attorneys, the Consumer Federation of America and the Center for Responsible Lending.
The groups want a revision of the federal bankruptcy code to eliminate or limit the provisions that exclude home loans from bankruptcy protection.
“For most of these families, bankruptcy is the only viable option to save their home,” said Henry Sommer, president of NACBA. “This current exclusion is contrary to sound policy, and operates to disadvantage low-wealth and middle-income borrowers as compared to debtors with the wealth to own more than one home.”
http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/groups-call-bankruptcy-fix-aid/story.aspx?guid=%7B0590BD12%2D98B0%2D475D%2D8991%2D9F7597ECEF82%7D
“Be great in act, as you have been in thought.”
William Shakespeare
“While China finished behind Germany and the United States in total exports for the full year, it overtook the United States in the last six months of 2006 and will almost certainly finish above the US in the 2007 totals.
At current growth rates, China is projected to overtake Germany as the world’s biggest exporter in 2008. “
“Love all, trust a few, do wrong to none.”
William Shakespeare
My apologies if posted earlier. Front page of the print version of USA Today:
http://www.usatoday.com/money/economy/housing/2007-04-12-foreclose-cover-usat_N.htm?csp=34
Two observations:
1. Had to search for the story online, wasn’t a headline story there.
2. In the print version, there is a picture of about 40 would be foreclosure investors on the steps of the Fulton County Courthouse looking for that “sweet deal.” Of the 40, all but a few appear to be 20-30 somethings looking for the easy life from RE investing.
I’ll know it’s time to look for investments again when there are only 5 investors on the steps and they’re all in their 50s. (BTW, I’m in my 30s)
from Dictionary.com:
schadenfreude \SHOD-n-froy-duh\, noun:
A malicious satisfaction obtained from the misfortunes of others.
REMEMBER, THOU ART MORTAL, HBBers
Got food?
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070412/ap_on_bi_ge/farm_scene_2
Thanks, troll.
“A malicious satisfaction obtained from the misfortunes of others.”
Could you please site the proper term for rancorous bitterness stemming from the indirect consequences of other people’s stupidity?
foolishness
Just a thought:
If an FB investing in California was able to take additional equity out of her houses and use that money to buy a house in Florida for cash. Now, not being able to pay back the loans in California, she declares BK in Florida (principal residence). Will she still be able to keep her Florida house?
a la OJ
LOL
Getting spooky over at the SDCIA message board. http://www.websitetoolbox.com/tool/post/sdcia/vpost?id=1826166
When everone starts talking like this… well then its time to buy.
Let me get this straight?
So, the entire Homebuilding Sector went up 1.5 - 2.0% today because some crappy little midwestern homebuilder M/I Homes (which is probably going to be bankrupt in another 1.5 to 2 years anyway) reported 1st quarter contracts and homes delivered were down (only) 17% and 15% from one year ago???
This seems to be the “money quote” from the M/I Homes press release, that has the “Goldilocks Theorists” believing all is well in homebuilder land:
“”Conditions in most of our markets remained difficult in the first quarter as our Florida and Midwest regions experienced declines in new contracts. However, we are pleased that our first quarter new contracts exceeded the amount of our new contracts for the last six months of 2006. In addition, new contracts in our Mid-Atlantic region increased 66% over the prior year period, with improvements in each of our three markets - Washington, D.C., Charlotte and Raleigh.”
From the same press release we read that home sales prices are down 3.2% yoy and backlog is down 43% from a year ago. Not exactly a reason to kill the fatted calf, but I guess when your expectations are pegged so low, Wall Street is going to celebrate every minor victory, right(?)
Now, where did that calf wander off to, (and why is it so damned skinny)?
Let me get this straight?
So, the entire Homebuilding Sector went up 1.5 - 2.0% today because some crappy little midwestern homebuilder M/I Homes (which is probably going to be bankrupt in another 1.5 to 2 years anyway) reported 1st quarter contracts and homes delivered were down (only) 17% and 15% from one year ago???
http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/070412/clth021.html?.v=93
This seems to be the “money quote” from the M/I Homes press release, that has the “Goldilocks Theorists” believing all is well in homebuilder land:
“”Conditions in most of our markets remained difficult in the first quarter as our Florida and Midwest regions experienced declines in new contracts. However, we are pleased that our first quarter new contracts exceeded the amount of our new contracts for the last six months of 2006. In addition, new contracts in our Mid-Atlantic region increased 66% over the prior year period, with improvements in each of our three markets - Washington, D.C., Charlotte and Raleigh.”
From the same press release we read that home sales prices are down 3.2% yoy and backlog is down 43% from a year ago. Not exactly a reason to kill the fatted calf, but I guess when your expectations are pegged so low, Wall Street is going to celebrate every minor victory, right(?)
Now, where did that calf wander off to, (and why is it so damned skinny)?
Sorry for the double-post…
Canada has expensive starter homes !
http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/financialpost/homebuyers/story.html?id=c5300acc-1acb-409f-883c-3d566daf53f8&k=5927
Posted on Thu, Apr. 12, 2007
Fed’s focus on inflation pressures market
The Dow’s eight days of advances come to an end with the possibility of interest rate increase.
By RICK BABSON
The Kansas City Star
“The Fed is doing the right thing here, stepping back and putting the brakes on, but not pushing any panic buttons.”
Georges Yared, founder of Yared Investment Research
After a run of eight winning sessions, the Dow Jones industrial average tumbled Wednesday after the minutes of the last Fed meeting revealed another interest rate increase is possible.
The index of blue-chip stocks, which had recovered some of an earlier 100-point drop on shrinking gasoline supplies and rising prices, took another drop as the March minutes of the Federal Open Market Committee indicated the central bank will focus on inflation rather than economic growth.
According to minutes of their deliberations released Wednesday afternoon, “all members agreed the statement should indicate that the committee’s predominant policy concern remains the risk that inflation will fail to moderate as expected.”
IF THE FED KEEPS NATTERING OVER INFLATION CONCERNS WITHOUT EVER ACTING ON THEM, THEN INFLATION WILL CERTAINLY FAIL TO MODERATE “AS EXPECTED.”
http://www.kansascity.com/194/story/67472.html