The Home-Buying Rush Is Over
The Baltimore Sun reports from Maryland. “The average home price in the Baltimore region fell for the first time in six years last month, reflecting a sputtering housing market that continues to lose momentum. ‘Clearly things are going to get worse, with prices likely falling somewhat, new housing starts slowing and days on market increasing. We’re in for a bumpy ride, but not a fall off the cliff,’ said Richard Clinch, director of economic research at the University of Baltimore.”
“Anne Arundel County sustained the biggest drop, with the average price skidding 6.75 percent, the most since the market started to turn down in the last half of 2005.”
“In May, the number of listings soared to 18,870, the highest since the slump began. New listings outnumber contracts by more than 2-to-1. The flood of new listings, on top of a bloated inventory of unsold homes, has squeezed prices, economists said yesterday.”
“‘Traditionally, this is a time when houses get put on the market, but the fact that there is a huge active inventory from homes that haven’t sold is putting downward pressure on home prices,’ said Daraius Irani, director of the applied economics group at Towson University’s research and consulting arm. ‘Baltimore is not immune to any kind of real estate home price adjustments that are going on in the rest of the nation.’”
“‘Sellers had been over-ambitious with their expectations after five years of double-digit appreciation,’ said Wanda Lehman, a real estate agent in Timonium. ‘The sellers that really want to sell are becoming realistic.’”
“Cindy Stewart first listed her renovated 1923-era farmhouse on 1.2 acres in Lutherville in January for $720,000 after getting it appraised, but has had no offers. She has since reduced the price twice, first to $699,000, then to $675,000, added another bathroom and switched real estate agents, to Lehman.”
“Stewart, who has relocated to start a new job in Florida, said she…is hopeful the right buyer is out there. ‘I’m trying to stay calm, and I’m trying to be understanding about the market,’ a vastly different market from three years ago, when she sold her last home in three days.”
The Free Lance Star from Virginia. “After experiencing rapid growth in recent years, local home sales have slowed and continue to decline in some areas, according to the latest data from the Virginia Association of Realtors.”
“April home sales in the Fredericksburg region fell by 19 percent compared to the same time last year. The Greater Piedmont area, which includes Culpeper, Fauquier, Orange and Rappahannock counties, saw about a 35 percent drop-off in home sales for April, compared to April of 2006.”
“The Northern Neck, including Northumberland County and portions of Westmoreland, experienced the sharpest sales decline, 74 percent in April.”
“‘When you start to go back toward a normal market place, obviously you’re going to have larger declines because of the extraordinary peaks,’ said Lisa G. Noon, the VAR vice president for marketing and communications.”
“The peaks here, and across the country, were caused by a flood of first-time home buyers entering the housing market. Lower interest rates coupled with relaxed lending rules, lead to a generational shift in potential homeowners.”
“‘When we had 25-year-olds out there who traditionally might have rented they saw rates go as low as they did and the opportunity to buy was offered to them,’ Noon said.”
“The growing immigrant population in areas such as Fredericksburg also had housing needs. ‘These folks demanded homes,’ Noon said.”
“But the home-buying rush is over. Stricter lending guidelines have made it harder for first-time buyers to obtain loans. ‘That puts a crimp in things,’ said Todd Perkins, a loan officer with Fredericksburg Mortgage Co. LLC.”
“The stagnate market is affecting the overall value of homes, preventing real estate owners from upgrading to larger properties or ‘to refinance to fix debts or pay off cars,’ Perkins said. ‘The problem is the values aren’t even there for that. So, we’re not able to get them the money that they need because they don’t have enough equity in their homes.’”
“To combat slow home sales, many builders are offering incentives or discounting optional home features. ‘There are lots that are not being built on now, and there are homes that are unsold that are being offered, in some cases, at incentive prices,’ said Harvey Gold, director of public relations for the Fredericksburg Area Builders Association.”
“‘It’s supply and demand,’ Noon said. ‘Right now, there are more sellers than there are buyers.’”
“Noon advises sellers to price their homes accordingly. During the real estate boom, homeowners ‘use to sell for higher-than-listed prices,’ she said. ‘They expect the same thing is going to happen even though the market conditions have changed.’”
My neighbor, in Annapolis, has had his “flipper” house on the market for over 2 years. The latest realtor (his 4th) got the listing the first week of August, 2006. She’s had the listing the past 10 months. Yesterday he had a showing, the only one in over 3 months. Gee, do you think the price is too high?
The last open house the realtor held had no visitors, zero.
Over 2 years. I wonder how long she can go before the lost opportunity costs, mortgage interest, taxes, upkeep, etc… start to eat away at her profit?
Must be a slow learner.
There are over two years worth of inventory in Harford County between $400K and $450K at current sales rates, as of April 2007. Inventory levels like this are scattered all around the Balto metro area, yet these oversaturated price points continue to become worse as apparently RE agents do less research then I do and continue to take listings that are overpriced and then sit. They either need to earn their ridiculous commission by counseling sellers about the realities of the current market using hard numbers, not just one comp form two doors down, or start refusing these listings. It will be better for all parties involved, but despite what this article says, it’s not happening. A price drop from $720K to $675K is a measly 6% drop in 6 months. It’s obvious neither of her agents has the guts to tell Cindy Stewart the house is still way overpriced, no matter how nice she thinks it is.
These are probably Johnny-come-lately real estate agents who were minted in the top of the boom and honestly don’t know any better.
Maybe a topless open house would get some lookers?
Tit for tat ?
Neil, the Annapolis area looks like another place where we should stroll into open houses, munching from a bag of popcorn, and being totally non-committal.
Friend in Rockville has already lowered the wishing price on his house twice in the month it’s been on the market. First one was just under 5%, the most recent was a trivial 2.5%. That tells me he’s getting no expressions of interest, and it also says that greed is hard to overcome.
What’s more, the community in Florida where he bought his retirement place last spring (is that great timing or what) has declined close to 20% since he bought.
The best part is the wife is a realtor! She must be truly clueless about the market.
“ First one was just under 5%, the most recent was a trivial 2.5%. That tells me he’s getting no expressions of interest, and it also says that greed is hard to overcome. ”
Jim the realtor has a good bearish housing blog from someone in the industry. He’s an old timer who’s had some good advice. (He’s somehow coordinating with OCrenter’s bubbletracking blog.) His advice? No lookers 5% to 10% overpriced. So dropping in 5% increments isn’t too bad.
The 2.5% drop just insults the buyers. Since he put his home on the market prices have probably dropped 2.5%. This couple needs to get ahead of the market, fast! If they drop below, you will almost always get a little bidding war back up to market.
Oh, that is a popcorn situation.
Neil
“The growing immigrant population in areas such as Fredericksburg also had housing needs. ‘These folks demanded homes,’ Noon said.”
Immigrant (illegal?) population ‘Demanded Homes?’ This sounds like California, not Virginia. And we had the 110% loan to get them into the American Dream.
The illegals are everywhere they have spread out to every State. I know you have many more in California. Here in South Carolina some of our regional Hospitals are saying their systems are being over loaded with them. But hey not to worry we’ll just let the lowly taxpayer foot the bill, what the hell free houses for everyone except for those that play by the rules.
I have to say, I think this characterization is misguided. Pointing to illegals as the source of our ills misses the point. If it weren’t for the fact that the US is currently engaged in an economic race to the bottom then the illegals wouldn’t even be here to begin with. Low wages that Americans won’t work for attracts illegals. Those same low wages prompt people to shop at places like Walmart, which in turn seems to produce more jobs in China than here. Yet asking for higher wages, unionizing or questioning executive salaries is often seen as traitorous to the US. So we’re just getting what we asked for…
The reason the wages are so low is due to illegals. They work for peanuts. People in the US used to do all the jobs illegals now do. So how did it happen they Americans just “won’t do those jobs”. Is it because they pay $5 an hour?
It’s the not the US’s fault that wages are so low in Mexico.
“The reason the wages are so low is due to illegals. They work for peanuts. People in the US used to do all the jobs illegals now do. So how did it happen they Americans just ‘won’t do those jobs’. Is it because they pay $5 an hour?”
Thank you for a dose of truth. These companies pay nothing and provide no benefits, and then they claim Americans won’t do the jobs they’re offering. On top of which, their illegal employees use our welfare and hospital networks at a cost of billions to taxpayers, while the company bosses gush on and on about how essential they are to our economy. No they aren’t. They are essential to the unethical economy these employers are getting rich from.
An economy built on slave labor, privatized profit and socialized cost is about as low as one can go. What happens when the illegals have become citizens and can demand higher wages, and decent working conditions? We already know. Companies will start looking to other third world countries for new slave labor.
By the way, the City of Tampa and the County of Hillsborough both use illegal immigrants for all kinds of work. Our politicians are every bit as crooked and greedy as the previously-mentioned businessmen. But, then, if they had to pay skilled people to do legal work, they couldn’t give themselves so many raises and perks, or hire all their witless friends and relatives who could never find good jobs in the private sector.
BrianB,
1. That wage difference between Mexico and the US has always existed. Presumably the desire of employer’s to pay as least as possible for labor has always existed as well. Yet the problem of illegal immigration has reached a magnitude in the past 10 years that was previously unseen in the United States. So what changed? It seems to me that the basic factor was the liberalization of the Mexican economy in the late 80s and its integration into the first-world global economy. That was an economic move that was very much a product of US foreign and economic policy, mainly through policies acted out via the IMF and WTO. So it seems to me that the current situation is very precisely what the US was asking for through its actions. The same goes for the entry of Asian markets into the first-world global economy, although the jobs are moving to them instead of them moving to the jobs (as with Mexicans).
2. It seems to me to be very simple logic to state that if you kick an illegal out of the country but his $5/hour job remains, then another illegal will simply come and replace him. On the other hand, if there are no jobs readily available there isn’t much incentive for someone in Mexico to pay several thousand dollars to be smuggled into the country. This is why things are the way they are, why the immigration/border system is “broken”. People say they want reduced immigration but it seems as if in the end the politicians have calculated that having a broken immigration system outweighs the costs of not having cheap labor.
3. Contrary to popular perception, the jobs that illegals do (construction/retail/meatpacking/fast-food/domestic help) more often than not doesn’t pay $5/hour. While these people may be working under false names and such, if they’re working in a legitimate business then they’re still on the payroll. Most of them do make at least minimum wage. The Midwestern meatpacking industry is a good example of this, prior to the recent raids it was almost completely staffed by illegals who all made between $8-12, well within the legal minimum wage. So it seems to me that the problem is that even if these jobs do pay legal wages it certainly is not enough for most families to live on and is not very attractive to Americans. So theres a solution there…raise the minimum wage and enforce it. Ironically though, the communities where anti-illegal sentiment is highest are also the ones where its hardest to pass such hikes. Thats commie talk after all ;).
We haven’t got any illegals out here Down East on the islands. So for my golf lessons, my mortgage accounting, and my dinner-party catering, I use only employees under the age of 16. All cash and they’re thrilled. My liberal friends would like “us” to be nicer to the illegals…so why are they (my NYC liberal rich friends) here in the whitest place in the US? Hmm.
Because being serviced by 16-year old kids isnt as depressing as being serviced by adults from the third world who work for low wages and probably have economic hardship, duh. They want you to be nicer to the illegals because the current market rate for wages dictates that illegals will form a significant % of the workforce in places like NYC so they want to change the political/legal framework to reflect that and create a more peaceful social sphere.
BW–about the wage level, two points:
a) some illegals are working on farms and earning far, far less than minimum wage. There have been periods where native born (Okies) and legal immigrants (Vietnamese) took these jobs, but right now it’s mostly Mexican “guest workers” and mostly Indios at that.
Because of the desertification on the Mexican side of the border (in part due to US water policies sucking the rivers dry) the poor farmers in Mexico are really desperate. US farmowners know this and so pull stunts like locking them in and basically treating them like slave labor.
b) The most notable feature of the transition from unionized native workers to illegal workers in the meatpacking industry was that the lines were sped up dramatically and OSHA rules were disregarded. This industry hires illegals only now so that they don’t have to comply with any laws. When they are inspected or raided, they have the INS deport everyone, and they hire a new crop of illegals.
US workers would take these jobs–hell, they want their jobs back! But the employers are addicted to labor that has no rights.
Other industries have turned to H1B’s to give them more leverage over employees. It’s not that they can’t find plenty of Americans willing to do the job at that wage. It’s that they can’t fire the American without cause (without risking a lawsuit). H1B’s are “disposable”. On top of that, if you are fired under H1B you don’t have much time to find a new sponsor. (In the industries I speak of, the technical and scientific, it isn’t uncommon for someone to be unemployed for 6-18 months because of the specialization.) This means the employer has great leverage over the employee. American citizens have more options.
By law, H1B employers must show there were no Americans who could do the job. In practice they line up a foreign candidate and advertise for that candidate’s exact skills and qualifications. Then they tell any “sucker” applicants that they are over or under qualified.
Abuse is rampant. This is why Americans are dropping like flies out of science and engineering majors, and especially leaving the graduate programs. The thing is, I’ve heard that Americans are better educated than many of their Indian counterparts (except the ones with American degrees). We should go to India and live like kings! (People with degrees there earn much, much more than the masses.) One problem: India is not on friendly terms with the US and I don’t think they have their own “H1B” program to import foreign nationals …
I just can’t help adding, BW, that I wouldn’t bother trying to defend hyper-wealthy NYC “liberals”. These people are hypocrites through and through. These are the same people who have to take vapors if an Italian family moves into one of the “right” Hamptons, and the same people who won’t broker deals with Jews. You don’t even want to know what they think about Blacks.
The only reason they like illegals is because they aren’t “uppity.”
There’s nothing a plutocrat detests more than uppity help.
a) Very true. The reason I didn’t take farm-hand illegal workers into account in my original post was that they’ve been around in one form or another since the Post-war era. However, they’ve usually been out of sight and out of mind and of not much interest. When most people talk about the illegal immigration crisis they focus on the most recent wave of illegal immigration which tends to be far more urbanized and concentrated in construction and retail and the such. Im not positive but I think it would be fair to say that the # of urban illegal immigrants is now bigger than the # of farm-based ones.
b) I agree with this point. Skirting safety laws and upping production was definitely one of the main reasons for the transition. However, I think my original point still has some validity. I’ve studied the topic a bit and from the anecdotal evidence I’ve read part of the transition is also because the wages offered by these factories to legal citizens simply dont cut it in terms of providing the lifestyle most middle-class Americans expect, at least not when compared to potential jobs in the big-city. So there is a degree of out-migration of the younger white population from towns that are centered around industries like meatpacking, which also leads to an interesting demographic shift — rural middle America becoming increasingly Latino in composition. From what I’ve read, this has resulted in difficulties for these companies in staffing their lines — although I would agree with you in terms of the *source* of this problem. Its similar to what Spike66 says below, there was a forced transition and the government/corporations used the result as their justification for keeping the status-quo. My point was merely to point out that I think illegals are often used as a scapegoat, when the real source of the problem is much deeper.
To be honest I’m not very knowledgeable on the migration of skilled labor with H1B’s and the such but thank you for casting light on that. Its interesting to hear from politicians who say we should diminish unskilled labor and bring in more skilled labor when it seems as if our labor market is usually geared towards the inverse.
“Low wages that Americans won’t work for attracts illegals.”
With respect, I think you have this backwards, though this is the mantra the government wants you to repeat.
Corporate interests pressure the government to ignore border laws and increase the stream of illegal labor. Then they lower wages, ignore pesky things like OSHA and other safety laws, lower any insurance liabilities ( no benefits, and injured workers are just replaced with no cost to the company).
This has gutted whole industries of American workers…see meatpacking for example, residential construction et. al. Of couse the injured workers now are on the taxpayers dime, as are their families, for health care, education, etc.
Privatize the profits, socialize the costs.
And with 12-20 million illegals the government now feels it has the “facts on the ground” to whine that it can’t enforce the laws.
Not disagreeing, especially with regard to the blue collar sector. However, with service industry, it doesn’t take illegals for them to put wages below the level of poverty.
The argument for keeping the minimum wage down was that the min. wage jobs were for teenagers. So we have the teenage mothers in their little hats flipping burgers and feeding their kids with food stamps, and we have the legal immigrant families where every adult and teenager has two jobs (forget about graduating/getting GED).
Minimum wage actually got so low that some service employers raised their wage a bit because they were sick of hiring teenagers who slacked off and stole from the store.
Hotel industry is one of the worst. They pay the bare minimum, and sometimes less. Some hotel/motel owners will actually cheat and not pay the payroll taxes. I know a number of Americans (all women) who do these jobs. They are thankless and physically demanding. Eventually when they become disabled and can no longer work, they have nothing. This disgusts me to no end.
We try to excuse this behavior by putting it all on “bad” illegals, who obviously deserve to be exploited, but believe me, there are Americans of all races doing these jobs. I know because they ride my bus. It SUCKS.
…it doesn’t take illegals for them to put wages below the level of poverty.
That statement defies the rules of supply and demand.
If nobody will work for the wages, then the wages must rise to attract the workers. If the wages can’t rise high enough, then the market has determined that the job isn’t necessary.
This is how this whole mess got started, because “everyone” is entitled to own a home. In jumps greedy mortgage brokers, appraisers, and RE agents, to make sure everyone gets to own a home. I still want to know who is going to buy all these homes, since I think this country has way overbuilt for the number of qualified buyers.
“I still want to know who is going to buy all these homes, since I think this country has way overbuilt for the number of qualified buyers.”
My thoughts exactly. Some are counting on immigrants, legal and illegal, to massively flood the country and buy real estate. Well, maybe, but then again, nothing like a little pandemic to thin the population. And don’t think it can’t happen. The media got their boxers in a wad about the one American citizen with TB, while saying nothing, even glorifying, all the illegals who enter this country unchecked with God knows what undetected and unreported diseases. So now, we see the return of formerly “eradicated” and controlled diseases. Polio, anyone?
I find it amazing how so many deluded people think that immigrants are going to save the US. They on one hand want immigrants to work for low wages, and on the other hand want them to buy McMansions.
I guess they can buy McMansions, like those strawberry pickers in California who got a mortgage on a $750,000 house, but that only lasts until the ARM resets. But since the builder and the mortgage originator gets their profits and fees, that is all they care about, just dump the loan into the bond market and just keep on building and selling.
Most illegals send money back home to Mexico. That doesn’t lend itself to buying a lot over priced real estate.
Sure it does - in Mexico.
Polio is nearly globally eradicated. As for other pandemics, I strongly doubt that even an avian virus pandemic straight out of our worst nightmares would have much of a chance against CDC containment. The media just loves stories like that because they generate fear and fear generates ratings. Its very similar to how people go to the movies to see films where some freakish disaster (asteroid, volcano, etc) destroys stuff…just aimed at a different consumer if you will.
The answer to your question is obvious…people DIDNT think about who would live in all these new houses/units. No one bothered to sit down and do a bare minimum of math, why bother when easy profit is on the horizon? The result is probably that we will simply have an overstock of housing for quite a while, cheap rental units, not much appreciation on homes. I personally dont see anything wrong with that, although I suppose most realtors wouldnt care for such a situation.
Actually, Polio is making a comeback, especially in Islamic regions, where superstitious clerics tell the gullible that vaccinations are designed to make people sick. This idiocy has now spread to the UK and other areas where heavy Muslim populations have been established.
http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2007/01/muslims_shouldnt_be_vaccinated.php
Islam is the fastest growing religion in Mexico and among Mexican illegals here in the U.S. Palmetto is not raising a false alarm, but a very real one. Disaster movies aside, there ARE world-wide epidemics (how about AIDS, which didn’t exist till the early 1980s and now afflicts tens of millions?), and with the dramatic drop in hygiene standards here in the U.S. over the past thirty years (Are children even taught to wash their hands these days? Do health departments EVER close filthy restaurants, or do they just keep writing citations and warnings?), almost any scenario is possible.
When I was a child, hospitals were literally the cleanest places on Earth, and hospital-caused infections almost unheard of. Today, hospitals are the filthiest places on Earth, and hospital-caused infections in the U.S. alone affect hundreds of thousands of patients every year. I recently read an article in “Outpatient Surgery” magazine stating that many surgical nurses now refuse to scrub before surgery because they don’t want to damage their manicures, so they use hand sanitizers instead–as little as possible, before putting on gloves. Emergency room workers and ambulance crews often don’t change gloves between patients; they wear them to protect themselves, not the public. My own dentist (not any longer) last year came in and, after rising blood off his glasses (from a patient in another room), put his hands in my mouth. This is what PC crap hath wrought: The lowest common denominator is now the highest general standard, and anything above it is considered extreme.
No offense, but to quote your handle I remain quite Incredulous on multiple fronts. What statistics do you feel indicate that “polio is making a comeback”? According to this link: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?cmd=Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstract&list_uids=17035927
polio has been reduced from 350K cases in 1988 to 2K cases last year, a 99% reduction over those 19 years. So what kind of come-back are we talking about here? I don’t think any slight statistical rise indicates a comeback in light of the overwhelming trend. Its true that polio is still a problem in Afghanistan and Pakistan (while the Americas are polio-free), that would indicate that a returning American soldier has far more of a chance of re-introducing polio to the US than an illegal immigrant however.
Another dubious statistic is about Islam in Mexico. According to the statistics I found online about 0.3% of the population in Mexico are Muslim. Thats less than Jews. So its true that they may be the “fastest-growing religion in Mexico” in the sense that 2 adherents converting 30 more represents bigger statistical growth than 20,000 becoming 40,000. Its a pretty dubious statistic and I think if there is any one major religious trend in Mexico backed up by statistics its the conversion of Catholics to evangelicism/Protestantism. Not that it would matter. I certainly would not take the fact that one religious leader in the UK said something as indicative of the fact that A. people are even listening to what he says or following him and B. that if they were it would result in a new upgrowth in infectious disease.
I’m also incredulous about your claims on cleanliness. If anything it seems to me that the growing political correctness of our society (particularly the proliferation of litigation) has resulted in a massive UPSWING in cleanliness. In big cities the practice of “restaurant ratings” that counties give based on cleanliness and health factors has taken hold and due the ease in litigation companies are often paranoid about their responsibility when it comes to health factors. Also, hospitals ARE dangerous in that you can catch infections but not because they’re filthy. If anything, what I’ve read indicates that the increasing use of anti-bacterial soaps and chemicals has resulted in mutation of various viruses that are more resistant than ever. Thats a particular problem with staph. Which is why, if anything, our over-cleanliness is causing a problem not any decline in society.
As for AIDS, thats merely one example of why medical preparedness should always trump politics. A great deal could have been done to contain and analyze the virus in its early stages, but widespread social conservatism at the time halted much of that.
Sorry to be such a naysayer, but I dont think what you’re alleging is grounded in facts. It sounds more like you’re bitter with newer generations and seemingly hoping for something bad to happen.
Forgive me BW, but if you think the world–especially the U.S.–is cleaner today than thirty years ago, you are living in a fantasy. Health departments used to immediately close any restaurant found to be filthy or rat infested; now they cannot close them: They have to issue warnings and the give the owners time to clean up. And as for hospitals being too clean, you have been horribly misinformed. Here are some links:
Concerning hospital filth:
http://tinyurl.com/2wk2qx
http://tinyurl.com/36bzok
http://tinyurl.com/237r47
Concerning Islam in Mexico:
http://islammexico.org.mx/index.htm
http://tinyurl.com/24m7ql
Concerning new Polio cases:
http://tinyurl.com/yqqakv
http://tinyurl.com/create.php
http://tinyurl.com/29ap6u
Yes the Polio numbers are down, despite Muslim interference, but over the past six years the numbers have been going up and down, with new cases almost exclusively in Muslim areas. And if you think Islamic clerics have no influence over the populace, you are not facing reality. Recently hundreds of Muslim clerics throughout the world began calling for the execution of all homosexuals by burning or burying alive. I think it astounding that so called liberals have completely ignored this, but if some idiot bible thumper did the same, they would be spinning on their heads.
“It sounds more like you’re bitter with newer generations and seemingly hoping for something bad to happen.”
Excuse me, but it was MY generation that created this monster, so don’t make assumptions. How old do you think I am? If I wanted something bad to happen, I would say nothing and let people do as they are doing with my complete blessing.
You must be new to this blog, or you’d know that for nearly two years I have spoken AGAINST writers who hope for disasters and make Chicken Little predictions.
Now I need to sign off so I can return to the nursing home before the lunch Jello has all been taken.
My second pollio link is a goof. Here is the correct one:
http://tinyurl.com/2l5886
None of that information is credible. What you posted about polio is not actual information as such, just anti-Islam hatemongering. Most of the actual numbers quoted relate to the polio outbreak in the US which was defeated some time ago.
As far as the cleanliness debate goes, it is a fact that we are overly clean and this is one factor causing a huge rise in resistant microbes. The reports about not being able to shut down food service companies, whether they are serving or growing or processing food, is simply not true. There are a variety of mechanisms used by different municipalities and some are more stringent than others. In my county a report of an unrefrigerated container of salsa will get a place shut down until all rules can be confirmed followed.
The sources you use all indicate that you came to fear oriented conclusions first and then came up with stories on the internet that reenforce your fears. This says a lot more about the dangers of modern media than anything else. People who spend more time taking in TV and internet tend to have much more negative views about the world. You are displaying the progress of paranoia as an art form.
All those sources are fine. The only one that can can be questioned a little is wikipedia, and it at least provides footnotes and links.
I posted the links above for BW to address his specific comments, not to build a case.
My background is infection control; what is yours?
We are not overly-clean. And I made no mention of resistant microbes; the ordinary variety are the problem.
My county health department absolutely does not close restaurants with code violations; it hasn’t since the 1970s, which the issue became political.
“You are displaying the progress of paranoia as an art form.”
No, you are displaying what is called inductive reasoning: leaping to conclusions based on a bits of information, and making generalized statements instead of factual ones. I rarely watch television, and spend less time on the Internet than most people. You are also making an ad hominem attack: a standard tactic among pseudoliberals who don’t like another person’s comments. Calling me a hate-mongerer I suspect is projection on your part.
Also from wikipedia:
“An ad hominem argument, also known as argumentum ad hominem (Latin: “argument to the person”, “argument against the man”) consists of replying to an argument or factual claim by attacking or appealing to the person making the argument or claim, rather than by addressing the substance of the argument or producing evidence against the claim. It is most commonly used to refer specifically to the ad hominem abusive, or argumentum ad personam, which consists of criticizing or personally attacking an argument’s proponent in an attempt to discredit that argument.”
People on this blog can click on my links and decide for themselves whether they are credible or not.
BW,
you do seem to have a great deal of confidence in our “protective” agencies, such as the CDC. Did you watch the hearings this week as CDC officials tried to explain their inability to restrain the flying TB patient with the resistant strain from possibly contaminating people here and abroad? Their competence and effectiveness is about what you’d expect from the local motor vehicles dept.
As for the FDA, let’s gloss over the recent news on dangerous drugs approved over the objections of researchers to meet the demands of pharmaceutical corps. Instead, try this one.
The FDA is now lowering all standards of what is “organic’ to meet the demands of, among others, Annheuser-Busch.
No longer will you be able to shop to avoid pesticides, antibiotics, and other “unknow” additives in your food. Freedom to pay more for safer food–no longer will be an option.
From the LATimes this morning…
“With the “USDA organic” seal stamped on its label, Anheuser-Busch calls its Wild Hop Lager “the perfect organic experience.”
“In today’s world of artificial flavors, preservatives and factory farming, knowing what goes into what you eat and drink can just about drive you crazy,” the Wild Hop website says. “That’s why we have decided to go back to basics and do things the way they were meant to be … naturally.”
But many beer drinkers may not know that Anheuser-Busch has the organic blessing from federal regulators even though Wild Hop Lager uses hops grown with chemical fertilizers and sprayed with pesticides…
This proposal is blatant catering to powerful industry players who want the benefits of labeling their products ‘USDA organic’ without doing the work to source organic materials…USDA spokeswoman Joan Shaffer declined to comment…
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-organic9jun09,0,1336066.story?coll=la-home-center
No, I don’t have across-the-board trust in government agencies, not by a long shot. There is no doubt that the FDA is corrupt as all heck and in bed with the pharmaceutical companies, the same people it’s supposed to oversee for our safety. I do have considerable trust in the CDC however. I think the TB-guy scare is an example of how bureaucracies can be so stupid, but I think its a considerably different scenario from say…an epidemic outbreak in the US that the government has to take actions to control. In other words, I probably wouldn’t trust a large government agency to deal wit the details, but when it comes to its greater purpose from what I’ve heard the CDC is well-equipped to carry it out. As for that Busch link, Im totally with you…it would be funny if it weren’t so sad.
Just back from New Zealand and am amazed at the recent problems with food from China. Food from China??!!!! What the hell is going on here? My understanding is that US inspectors cannot get into Chinese processing plants for inspections so we have no way of knowing what is being put in food, quality, etc. The US used to export food. It was our remaining product, after all the manufacturing was shipped overseas. What gives here?
BW,
with respect, I think C-Span may replay the CDC hearings before Congress this week. I think after listening, you may want to revise your opinion. Whatever it’s reputation might have once been, it is not now run by competent or efficient people. If you have the time, do check the evidence.
Steve,
money. Nothing more. Much of our food, even what is grown here, is shipped to China for “processing”. For example, apple juice. Other additives, used to stabilize or add bulk to processed foods, are imported from China, without inspection (best example, white gluten–it bulks up everything from bread, to cookies to twinkies). Even the FDA admits it inspects less than 1% of edible items imported from China. The result–melamine and glycol in pet food –(causes formations in kidneys the size of small rocks and kills animals). But glycol (used in anti-freeze) has now been found in toothpaste processed in China (Crest and Tom’s of Maine are made and processed in the US). Seafood, esp. shrimp, is raised in pools with chickens living on wires directly above…salmomella and other horrors are reported.
Protecting the food supply has largely been abandoned by the US Gov’t. Major corps. have too much invested in China and cheap sourcing to allow for safe food. See Annheuser-Busch and their strong-arming FDA to include chemical additives and pesticides as acceptable for “organic” labeling.
The realtors and lenders agents talk about how they got people into homes for the last 6 years ,but so much of the buying became a investment scheme that resulted in extreme overbuilding .
I’m sorry but the real estate industry putting 25 year old young adults into overpriced condos/houses ,with payments that were going to skyrocket ,was taking advantage of the youth IMHO. Also ,putting illegal immigrants into housing based on fake SSN numbers and short term employment in the construction field was also wrong . You add to this body count the thousands of people that came on buses to buy or on line for investments called the “traveling locust “and the other second and third home buyers and you end up with 5 million extra houses that need to have long term stable owners . And the builders keep building more houses thinking that the market will rebound .This housing boom was all about creating a market for investment and the excess buying is showing up now in the form of exhausted demand with investment dumping adding to supply .
“The Northern Neck, including Northumberland County and portions of Westmoreland, experienced the sharpest sales decline, 74 percent in April.”
Colonial Beach is a nice little Potomac River town in this area. I stopped at a coffee shop there in the fall of 2005 and talked with a local; her exact words used to describe the boom going on were “10 years ago you couldn’t give a home away in Colonial Beach!”
Guess things are headed that way again…
Thanks, Patch, for making a relevant post. For a second there, I’d thought I’d come to http://www.Immigration.Bubble.Blogspot or something. Sheesh.
Colonial Beach is a neat little place. It has had a spectacular run up, to be sure, for what it is. The town’s history is also one of boom and bust, for sure.
Since this is the Virginia thread, here is my report from Norfolk Virginia on what appears to me to be the wheels coming off of a Condo project. I don’t have any inside information and am just reporting on what I see of the project as I pass it in a boat.
The place is called the Spectrum and is located on Willobough Spit in Norfolk just off of I-64.
http://www.norfolkspectrum.com/
It’s supposed to be a 200 million-dollar luxury condo project. They tore down a motel, restaurant and a boat storage building and are building condos. When the project first started they had dozens of workers on site, tearing down the old buildings, driving new foundation pilings, building breakwater and bulkheads in the harbor. However the last couple of months the project has just a couple of workers on site, they appear to me to be sub-contractors finishing up the bulkhead installation. The condo foundations however have not been touched in at least two months and there is no cranes or other heavy equipment on site to actually build the condos.
So it looks like Norfolk has lost a motel, a restaurant and a boat storage building and has gained a dusty partially finished condo site.
Hampton Roads/Williamsburg prices seem to be bifurcated. On the one hand, there are real signs of capitulation in the asking prices, including for new home sales, and numerous price reductions on existing homes for sale. On the other hand, most of the new listings I see are still firmly in the “2005 wishing price” category. (How many unsold Va. Beach condos does it take till people get the point?)
Williamsburg seems to be holding up a little better because of the retiree money coming in.
One good Nor Easter or cat 3 hurricane and they will get flooded….
They cant be more then a few feet above high tide.
Yeah, the site was flooded when the remnants of a Cat 1 hurricane went through a few years ago. They have built up the site a bit and improved the breakwaters but a Cat 3 hurricane would really tear the place up.
High Noon in Virginia…
“‘It’s supply and demand,’ Noon said. ‘Right now, there are more sellers than there are buyers.’”
Good to see the “silent Bubble” of the Maryland-DC-NoVA region getting its time in the spotlight. Still too many dingbats around my area saying, “Oh, well, $600K for a starter townhome is reasonable because of the location.” I guess everyone in Maryland makes $200K to $300K a year, right?
This was in reference to the wild new development in Howard County called Maple Lawn. Fun place. 4-story townhomes jammed together start at $600K, and I think the single family homes that are also jammed together start at $900K. That seems perfectly reasonable! They supposedly have affordability programs - toxic loans no doubt - for some of the homes to let “poor” people buy them. Care to guess what a “poor” person makes according to these programs: about $65K to $85 a year. Uh, huh… yeah, this is going to end well!
Meanwhile, here in Glen Burnie, I saw signs advertising nearby new homes “starting in the low $500K.” The median household income in Glen Burnie is $52K a year. Nope, no Bubble here! Everyone wants a half-million dollar house in a old, blue-collar town and everyone can afford it, too!
I just can’t wait until E-Mortgage Solutions goes out of business. They are a local, slimy, sub-prime etc. lender in the area that is advertising on the morning news. They have great ideas, such as: “Paying off your home is a bad idea because if you pay it off you could end up like the little old ladies in New Orleans who paid off their houses and then lost everything. It is much better to not pay off the loan and instead take the equity out of your house. Call us and we’ll show you how!” Yes, they actually said that on TV! Argh!
I used to post regularly on MD/VA/DC, but like with these latest reports, the local papers aren’t covering it much. Where is the Post and the Times with this data?
At the beginning of May, the Sun had three articles within two weeks extolling the resistance of the local housing market to national price declines. And even in this most recent piece, you’ve got economists saying the worst is yet to come, yet the opposing view is represented by (surprise) RE agents! Last summer, when sales volumes really started to plummet, the Sun ran a series about how our region is going to run out of houses. Really, that’s what they wrote.
I don’t pay any attention to the Wash Times, but as far as Maryland and Virginia are concerned, the Post concentrates on the fairly near-in commuter areas. Not necessarily inside the Beltway, but fairly near in. I don’t think the Post considers Baltimore and Annapolis to be their responsibility.
However, I heard about a transaction in Old Town Alexandria, third hand, from someone at work this week. One bedroom condo listed at about $395K. Someone gave them an offer of $305K and it was accepted. Now that is a lowball. Too much for any one bedroom as far as I’m concerned, but good to hear.
The Post had a story about a couple with a house in Capitol Hill and a bunch of investment properties recently. They must be in the journalism as anecdote stage. Reporting on hard stats will come later.
The Real Estate Editor is Maryann Haggerty. She likes to say that “buying for only 2 years is speculative”, but beyond that, she’s a perma-bull for real estate.
Interesting that this is adjacent to Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Lab. I believe they are Howard County’s largest employer, and the jobs at the lab (naval weapons, space, and biomedical engineering) do pay very well, but still the prices for Maple Farm are outrageous. Shoot, over in Montogomery county, they have townhouses and single family homes adjacent I-270 and I-370 going for $600,000 and 1.1 mil respectively with a splended view of traffic. Across the street is Washingtonian Center with a drainage sitch as centerpiece and the yet-to-be developed Crown Farm which was sold I believe for over 500 million dollars.
As someone who went to college in Baltimore, I gotta say:
$500k+ in Glen-effin-Burnie?!?
Next thing you’ll tell me is that there are luxury condos going up on Greenmount…
“Silent bubble?” I think it was, hence my two year-old tag. Anybody see the Forbes Mag report on major metro areas the other day? It put DC 5th most overpriced in the nation and second only to Miami on the East Coast. So our little neck of the woods is more overvalued, relative to incomes and rents, than both New York City and Boston. Whoda thunk?
My mother has inherited a house in Bellflower in LA county, and she has a moron on the hook who has bought it. However, he is changing his loan…blah blah blah. Bottom line, she has sold the house and has received no cash, and he is suppose to have the money next week…it is very frustrating to say the least. I have been hounding her to sell this since last Summer, it is a long story a lawyer dragged her feat. Hopefully she sells it to this flip tard quick.
I posted this stat in Bits and Buckets too. I thought it was interesting, but I think it’s a little low.
Baby boomers retiring. There are 77 million Americans born between 1946-1964. One-third have zero retirement savings. The oldest are 61. The only cash they have is equity in a house, so they must sell.
Here’s a quote I found on the web. If it’s true, and really I think the number is higher than 1/3, anyone who thinks boomers are retiring to the south or anywhere better start looking for other buyers. I’d say half are going to be living on social security and working a part time job to make ends meet. I think way more than half have heloc’d their houses way beyond what they are worth. There won’t be any equity to cash out of them.
Rappahannock County, VA
Active Listings: 80
May Sales: 2
Sloooooooooow . . .
You’ll find retarded prices out there. A shack on an acre might be asking 400K or more. ‘Tis silly. They were the last to feel the effects of the bubble, and thus the most reluctant to lower prices, in my opinion.
http://www.mris.com/reports/stats/monthly_reti.cfm
Ah yes, Maple Lawn. I got a bunch of gardening equipment (including a 42″ 1-year old riding mower) from a guy that was selling his SFH and buying a condo in ML. I paid $350 for the stuff I got. He didn’t care, since he was closing in the next week, and would be dumping his handsome profit into the ML condo.
Long story short, his property shows up in the local rental market a few months later. Failed to close on sale. Wonder who cuts his grass now?