Bits Bucket For May 31, 2008
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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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Name:Ben Jones
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Spanish house prices to drop in value
Spain house prices -2.2% in 08, 33 pct recession risk
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/feedarticle/7550289
Still think the economists are being overly upbeat.
“Still think the economists are being overly upbeat.”
F-cking A right I do. Did you read that stupid article? ” NO CRASH SEEN
Spain’s housing market, a foundation of household wealth which has more than tripled in value over a decade….The government plans to convert some unsold homes into public housing to help cut oversupply.”
And prices going down 2.2% after tripling is a realistic drop? WTF? This is actually another bullsh-t fuzzy article to make people think it won’t be too bad.
And the official numbers we are seeing, around the world, have to be complete crap. Look at what I posted below. The woman I work with has a house in Jersey that is down at least 20 percent. Another co-worker has a house in Jersey down at least 20 percent. His friends have a house down 30 - 35 percent but the mother-f’ers in the papers tell us prices are down maybe 10 percent.
This is all a bunch of f—ing noise. “Analysts said Spanish house prices were 20 percent overvalued but saw only a 15 percent chance of a sharp housing market correction.”
That sure is some doom and gloom article. I’m guessing there’s a 15% chance that these a–holes have a 1% chance of knowing 7% of what is going on.
Apologies I missed the I, it should have read
“I still think the economists are being overly upbeat”
but then they’ve never been known to bite the hand that feeds them.
What a difference a single letter can make when left out of a sentence. You forgot the “I” and you look like a fool. I’m glad to know you didn’t really think that article had any merit. I already had the top off of the Jack Daniels bottle.
It’s the diffrence between two people seperated by a common language. In the North West of England the comment “Still think the economists are being overly upbeat” would be a statement (that I think economists are being upbeat), in the US (and the South of England to be fair) it’s a question. I’ll have to brush up my Queens English and stop comming accross as a dumb Northern Eh By Gum.
“and stop comming accross as a dumb Northern Eh By Gum.”
My f—ing computer just started smoking. Thanks.
You need to watch more american television, that will fix all your language problems.
You don’t need the “I.” You closed your sentence with a period, not a question mark, so most people would read it as [I] still think . . . .” This applies throughout the English-speaking world.
I agree. I read it the way you meant it.
I didn’t have any problem understanding your meaning.
Ever wonder what other “facts” are being fed to us by the MSM that aren’t otherwise so easily refuted by our own observations? Just saying…
That’s for sure. From the above:
Spain’s market differs from the United States in that it does not have a sub-prime mortgage market, the wealth effect of its property boom has been smaller and its construction sector has played less of a role in driving growth, said Ralph Solveen at Commerzbank.
In reality:
America’s house construction industry and housing related industries constitute less than 10% of the economy, whereas in Spain that figure approaches about 20%.
Ninguna burbuja aquí !
The pain in Spain
They may not have had sub-prime here in Spain, but they do love a bank (over)valuation.
Loads of houses and apartments for sale in the english language press down here saying bank valuation (insert really ridiculous amount) will sell for (insert slightly less ridiculous amount).
Since spanish banks would only lend (to non residents) a max of 70% LTV over valuation was very common.
This weeks Sur in English has an article about how many repossessions the court in Marbella is now having to deal with. Apparently lots of foreigners who bought property here are simply not bothering to make payments any more. It also went on to say that HOAs are having problems as so many people have stopped paying their fees.
Who’d have thought…..
last week I checked a Dutch website that lists homes for sale in Spain. Many Dutch realtors are selling Spanish homes on top of their normal business: their Dutch customers often buy unseen (often just from the plan on paper, the idea is to sell to a greater fool before construction is finished), so they can easily sell the crap from their home office in Netherlands.
They had more than 500 new listings for the last week (Note: this is just the homes that are for sale by Dutch realtors!) with a nice graphical representation where the sales are: 99% on the Costas, just a few homes that were far from the coast … I think you can say that on the Costas, the bottom has dropped out of the market and official valuations are useless.
we don’t have subprime n Netherlands either, but that is mostly because subprime is an English word, and we use Dutch language over here
Ingreedients list:
1 part housing bubble
1 part drought
_________________________________________________________
“Barcelona is a dry city. It is dry in a way that two days of showers can do nothing to alleviate. The Catalan capital’s weather can change from one day to the next, but its climate, like that of the whole Mediterranean region, is inexorably warming up and drying out. And in the process this most modern of cities is living through a crisis that offers a disturbing glimpse of metropolitan futures everywhere.”
“Its fountains and beach showers are dry, its ornamental lakes and private swimming pools drained and hosepipes banned. Children are now being taught how to save water as part of their school day. This iconic, avant-garde city is in the grip of the worst drought since records began and is bringing the climate crisis that has blighted cities in Australia and throughout the Third World to Europe. A resource that most Europeans have grown up taking for granted now dominates conversation. Nearly half of Catalans say water is the region’s main problem, more worrying than terrorism, economic slowdown or even the populists’ favourite – immigration.”
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/europe/spains-drought-a-glimpse-of-our-future-833587.html
sorry to burst your drought bubble, but due to unexpected very heavy rainfalls last week, the drought problem is solved for this year; most of the reservoirs in Catalonia are close to full again. Of course this also means that efforts to battle the structural drought problem will be postponed, so it is just a matter of time before the problem will surface again.
Maybe the housing bust on the Costas can help, guess they need less water for watering all those golfcourses, gardens, swimming pools etc.
“Children are now being taught how to save water as part of their school day”
—
Unwashed mases is the new black…
Do all states now and cities now require vehicles to pass emissions inspections?
Back in the day all you had to worry about was a loud exhaust. Nowadays you can’t have any visible smoke and the limits for “invisible stuff” are being tightened.
The days of buying or being given a cheap “hoopty” and driving to work are over because in many places, in order to register your vehicle, you must pass emissions inspection.
One of the best things you can do to insure you pass is to replace these 3 items before your test:
1. Air filter
2. All spark plugs
3. PCV valve
That reminds me of a few years ago i had an 86 chevy celbrity station wagon…It passed emission, but failed the gas cap test. So i had to buy a new gas cap, went back and it failed the emissions test.
And they refused to listen to me…man was i pissed….after repeated calls, I finally gave up and drove to wethersfield ct almost 100 mi each way to get anyone to listen in person…. It took me almost getting arrested for the moron to issue me new emissions sticker. I mean all that bureaucratic nonsense on perfectly good “hoopty” car that failed by a tiny margin after putting on a new $5 gas cap was just retarded.
And they refused to listen to me…man was i pissed….after repeated calls, I finally gave up and drove to wethersfield ct almost 100 mi each way to get anyone to listen in person…
——————————————————
BTW, if you’re pissed now whaddya goin do when you have to start paying a carbon tax?
Michigan does not require an emissions test.
Last I looked, Indiana didn’t require one, either.
Ah, I just looked. It’s only required for the residents of Clark, Floyd, Lake, or Porter counties, all in the northern part of the state.
That’s pretty amusing, considering that the air in northern Indiana is so befouled by refineries and steel mills that when I drove my poor sensitive California car through that region, it set off my “check engine” light, which proceeded to stay on until I was a good couple of hundred miles out of Indiana.
Not required in Floyd or CLark counties anymore. Not sure about Lake and Porter counties
Yeah, some of the Indiana state govt. sites name all four counties, some just Lake and Porter. I guess some bureaucrats need to do some web updates.
Fl use to not anymore..but considering their budget issues..I am sure they will bring it back…we have it here in GA..
..
I have lived in Florida since 1981 and there has never been an emissions test or a inspection sticker required since then.
..
Not true…
http://www.sptimes.com/News/072100/State/Emissions_test_hearin.shtml
The Florida emissions tests weren’t stopped till June 30, 2000, though they had only been required in Broward, Duval, Hillsborough, Miami-Dadem Palm Beach, and Pinellas Counties.
http://www.sptimes.com/News/061500/State/Bush_ends_emissions_t.shtml
..
I was unaware of this apparently obscure, totally ignored, local requirement.
I lived in Tampa for 15 years and was completely unaware of it.
Not once did anyone mention it.
My ex-wifes brother is a cop in Clearwater and he never mentioned it.
Some “law”.
..
Actually, the penalties for not having a sticker were kind of harsh. You mustn’t have been stopped by a policeman in all that time. Your brother-in-law probably took it for granted that you knew about it.
I have lived in Florida all my life. In the 70s, auto emissions checks (along with road worthy checks) were required for every vehicle in the state, with testing stations administered by counties. I don’t remember the exact years the emissions testing spanned. I do remember getting an expired sticker ticket from FHP on my 73 Buick circa 76-77.
The all inclusive testing requirement was dropped sometime late 70s-early 80s because it was determined to be not worthy of the citizen time and expense for so little actual return.
I had many experiences similar to that detailed above by aNYCdj as did everyone. It was a stupid, time consuming, bureacratic, political experiment designed to extract money from the populace.
Not in “Bama”, half the vehicles wouldn’t pass the test.
And 3 quarters of the citizens couldn’t pass an emissions test.
LMAO!!!!
(Kinda like you after some Jack huh?)
No emission testing or even safety testing (brakes, tires, suspension, lights, wipers, etc.) here.
Heard and watched a 30+ year old pickup truck go by and tried to guess (by the exhaust sound) how many of its 8 cylinders were actually firing. Certainly not more than 6. The smell of raw gas drifted to me shortly afterward.
Utah has safety checks but Colorado doesn’t (I think the Front Range has emissions tests). That’s why I don’t switch over to Utah plates, I hate having to get the safety checks, I have a new car and it’s just throwing money away, it’s safe (as long as I’m not driving it).
Friends from overseas comment how cruddy American rolling stock looks, compared to their chariots back home.
Many countries require a warrant of fitness, yearly.
Here in California we get a rectal thermometer up our exhaust every couple of years, and that’s it.
In California, both hybrids and motorcycles are exempt from the smog check. I have one of each, good stuff!
In Ontario, Canada we have the “Drive Clean” program for e-tests and it also applies to heavy duty vehicles and interstate trucks as well transiting through our province. Hybrids are exempt and so are vehicles less than five years old. Most new vehicles never pollute out of spec anyways; it’s the older winter beaters on the road that pollute the most.
No emissions testing and no safety inspections. The lack of safety inspections is probably why auto insurance in AL is higher than you would expect it to be.
Texas in the DFW area is quite strict, but only if you bother to register, test, and insure your car. I think that not doing so is only a problem if you car caught driving through Irving, TX.
Want to beat the car game? Pick up a 60’s car style you like (Mustang or whatever). Put 10-20K into the car, modern brakes, engine, A/C and suspension (all of which is actually cheap to buy and install) and you can drive the car without concern for smog issues in every part of the country. Antique and Classic cars are exempt from these silly laws. You get a great car with modern amenities and look cool too.
the diffence in emmmisions between a cold and hot engine is huge. If you are unsure your car will pass, take it in on a hot day, and do lots of fast driving before the test.
In Maryland they tell you to drive it for at least 20 minutes at highway speed before the test and to keep the engine running if you get to the testing station and there is a line. It pretty much means you have to go in the middle of the day, because you can’t drive at highway speed on the Beltway or most of the other highways around here during commute times.
In California if you have Front BC plates your good. It is amassing
how many Mexican cars are here, and that doesn’t include the low riders from the hood.
peter a,
What are front BC plates?
“What are front BC plates?”
Baja California, Mexico license plates.
Thanks AnonyRuss,
Learn something new everyday
There are two types of license plates along the Mexican border. In Baja, some might say “BC, Mex”, and others will say “Front, BC”. “Front” is an abbreviation of “Frontera” - “Border”. These are license plates that are good in border region. They reason they exist is that not so long ago you couldn’t import cars into Mexico, but border inhabitants were given a dispensation. They were allowed to buy older American registered cars (I think it was 5 years or older) and get the border plates. In order to take their cars in the “interior” of Mexico they had to get the same tourist stickers that Americans needed to take their cars beyond the border area.
Arizona requires vehicle emissions testing every 2 years in Maricopa County (Metro Phoenix) and Pima County (Metro Tucson). Also, parts of Pinal County.
No testing for vehicles under 5 years old or built before 1967.
Institutional money drives up commodities. Think about it. Your money is taken from you forcibly in the form of taxes. This money goes into pension funds for public servants at whatever level (federal, state, local). They will never lose their pensions, btw, while in the private sector, pensions are for the most part a thing of the past. Taxes and inflation is the tribute you pay so that public servants can stick it up your posterior. Nice.
http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/080531/all_business.html
It gets even better. If those (or any other) investments don’t pan out and the pension fund winds up being insufficiently funded, then in most cases its the taxpayers’ general fund that makes up the difference.
Yeah, I read an article about that, walt. Nice, huh?
What infuriates me is that the one group of government workers who we really should support–current military and veterans, particularly those who have seen combat–are routinely screwed over basics: sanitary living quarters, decent healthcare, etc. Far too many wind up homeless or otherwise live tortured lives after serving their country.
Meanwhile the fat, lazy state worker who spends 40 years as a mindless data entry drone is treated to one of the finest retirements in the history of mankind for doing a (invariably half-assed) job that anyone with an 8th grade education (or the equivalent in CA, an Associates Degree) could do in their sleep.
Absolutely maddening.
You said everything I’ve been thinking, walt. I’m in a state of cold fury about it. Especially after seeing some of that documentary “Body of War”.
I have 3 words for you. MTA. The TWU has made sure that they have it far better than any grunt that faced rocket propelled grenades in Iraq. It must be tough sitting in one of those little booths with that pissy look on their face all day.
Meanwhile the fat, lazy state worker who spends 40 years as a mindless data entry drone is treated to one of the finest retirements in the history of mankind for doing a (invariably half-assed) job that anyone with an 8th grade education (or the equivalent in CA, an Associates Degree) could do in their sleep.
You mean like the guy at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue?
Is it any wonder the people in uniform get screwed over?
This guy begs to differ…
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3737/is_199611/ai_n8736358
IIRC, some punks did this randomly after seeing it done on a Wesley Snipes movie about a subway theft.
1996
since 1947 gov has tripled as % of gdp
now wives work- to pay taxes
Completely wrong, taxation as % of GDP in US (all levels) is now 27%.
In 1947 it was 22%.
The big difference today is that the middle class pay a much bigger share of the taxes and the rich pay a lot less. In 1947 the highest marginal tax rate was 86.5%
http://www.urban.org/publications/1000556.html
yogurt, don’t get me wrong, I have some sympathy for the idea of high taxes on billionaires (even though I usually vote R party) — BUT, isn’t there some problem of pushing people to “offshore” themselves or their assets, if you try to impose taxes that are essentially confiscatory?
Anyway, the change from 22% to 27% is not a good one! …I’m looking fwd to the McCain Veto Pen, if he’s not just blowing smoke.
Warren Buffett has pointed out that he pays a smaller % of his income in taxes than his receptionist.
The issue isn’t “confiscatory” taxation for the rich, it’s making them pay at least as much of a % of their income as the middle class. I think they can handle that.
I don’t think that there was a big exodus of rich people from the US in 1947 BTW.
isn’t there some problem of pushing people to “offshore” themselves or their assets
Merits of the proposal aside, the argument that some people will choose to break a law isn’t by itself an argument against passing that law.
Good catch Yogurt. He/she/it tried flying that lie here before.
RE: now wives work- to pay taxes
BFD…they’re all employed in elementary schools as “para-professionals in special ed” or “attitude adjustment counselors”
for the state provided health insurance which hubby’s lawn mowing biz doesn’t provide because he can’t afford to purchase it in the private sector.
So it’s a zero sum game.
You say “They will never lose their pensions”, but this never you speak of is a very long time. Money is taken from people for services that the society as a whole demands. As long as we want roads and wars we will have to pay, and it is not at all clear that doing without these things leads to prosperity through savings. Providing the services society demands requires people, people require the going rate, and until recently that has meant pensions. Treating that like some kind of conspiracy doesn’t make sense.
True, but only until 51% of the population is made up of undocumented voters and civil servants…
Not a conspiracy, more a matter of don’t look behind the curtain.
Civil service wages and benefits packages are now higher than private sector jobs in many areas, which is ahistorical. The CS was created to provide slightly lower median wage with benefit of job security, but the formula has been turned upside down.
I understand CS pensions are guaranteed, but crises have a way of revisiting such promises, ie., Vallejo, CA.
Newsday is doing a good job of exposing illicit pensions and double dipping here on Long Island, but they’ve yet to look at the salary burden the rank and file members represent, which is the bulk of where taxes go.
I find it hard to believe CS salaries and pensions are not going to be collateral damage as we roll back the clock to 1998. While we look at certain areas taking 50% price cuts in housing, I think what we’re seeing is the beginning of wiping out all the alleged gains of the last decade. This includes taxes, consumption and quality of life. Do-over!
What is your basis for thinking the clock will stop at 1998?
I agree with many that things are going to overshoot, but in general, the tech and housing booms came after 1998, and in line with NYCboy’s comment below about the “machinery” being dismantled, it just seems that everything wrought by the machinery will have to be given back.
RE: public servants
Lower than used car salemen or even (gasp) real estate agents…
Career Bureaucrat Rises to Prominence in Housing Crisis
By RACHEL L. SWARNS
Published: May 31, 2008
WASHINGTON — The phone calls have been streaming into the Federal Housing Administration for months now — from White House budget officials, Democratic lawmakers and the occasional cable television news producer — all asking for a few minutes with the man in charge… (cont’d)
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/31/business/31fha.html
Lord forgive me — the man in charge is larger than the HB! (see picture).
That’s mean - I know.
Leigh
“Have another jelly donut, fatty.”
LOL
Reminds me of this scene…
http://youtube.com/watch?v=qNIszeXRTOU
Lord forgive me — the man in charge is larger than the HB! (see picture).
———————————————————————
why the surprise? washington is the pork capital of the world.
And this should make us all feel more at ease.
“And Mr. Montgomery, a longtime Bush loyalist who came to the job with little housing experience, has gained prominence as an unexpectedly influential official whose quiet efforts to modernize a stagnant agency has won the respect of Democrats and Republicans alike.”
If both of these filthy parties like him then he must really be a f—ing scoundrel.
Reminds me of the guy in the restaurant scene from Monty Python’s “Meaning of Life”
Mr. Creosote and the wafer thin mint?
He had handled planning, logistics and travel for the White House as well as for Mr. Bush’s gubernatorial and first presidential campaign. He had served as communications director for the Texas Department of Housing when Mr. Bush was governor.
Great…another glorified bell hop with desk clerk potential promoted to bell captain by the Texas mob.
“Helluva job Smirky.”
They wont hire me for these $10 hr entry level jobs because they think i am overqualified!
======================
He had handled planning, logistics and travel for the White House
Can’t wait to see the incompetents who will populate Obama’s cabinet and inner circle. They’ll make Janet Reno look good.
RE: Can’t wait to see the incompetents who will populate Obama’s cabinet and inner circle. They’ll make Janet Reno look good.
Touche, Bill.
How quickly the masses forget.
Heckava job Brownie.
“How quickly the masses forget.”
How can they “forget” what hasn’t happened yet?
Yeah, a surplus is such a difficult burden to bear.
PS I’ll take Janet Reno over Gonzoles who turned our courts into an arm of the GOP. Then used it to prosecute political enemies, like Georgia Thompson and Don Siegelman. Who have now had their convictions overturned. No faster way to loose our democracy. If people don’t have an honest court they will turn to guns.
Has anyone seen Rumsfeld around lately???
Almost as big as the guy in the TaxMasters ad.
Will the falling crane in NYC be the symbolic end to the Housing Bubble in NYC? Fear of a crane falling through your window ( if not prices falling out the window)is a powerful psychological deterrent to buying a condo. In 1990, the only crane working in NYC was taking floors OFF of a building because of stupid zoning. It is in the same neighborhood.
Current owners will try to stop all towers to suppress future supply and maintain the astronomical prices.
No, because developers are a more powerful lobby then homeowners and the city will need all the extra income from new units that it can get its hands on. So long as some one is willing to pay, there will be construction in Manhattan.
The crane crashes, while tragic for the families of the victims, are insignificant in the grand scheme of things.
Small, but not insignificant, as the insurance rep. in the NY Times piece specifically noted. What went unsaid except in online forums is that this is a chilling indicator of how far out of control the corruption has gone. The chain of command for building inspectors was just replaced and yet this crane was being operated in a manner that was obviously dangerous even to casual observers yet failed to alarm official inspectors. London and many other large cities have had construction booms without cranes coming down. Severe, endemic corruption in NYC construction is responsible. There isn’t any other explanation for this kind of needless sloppiness.
“Current owners will try to stop all towers to suppress future supply and maintain the astronomical prices.”
Exactly the opposite is happening. Scott Stringer, prez of the City Council interviewed that the condo construction, which is being done under “Fast Track” regs, must continue. I posted yesterday that the new, less restrictive regs were published Wed, the disaster happened Thursday. The explanation from Stringer is that the city must have completed new construction for the “1 million new residents the city is expecting”. I almost fell out of my chair…This is how the city is hoping to get enough tax revenue to get thru this recession. But where they are planning to find enough new residents with the money to buy these condos was not mentioned.
Even Bloomberg echoed this yesterday, saying there was “no pattern” of problems with cranes.
I think the city and the RE industry wants these suckers built and sold before the reality of the housing crash/Wall Street layoffs hits this town full bore. IMO.
Career Bureaucrat Rises to Prominence in Housing Crisis
WASHINGTON — The phone calls have been streaming into the Federal Housing Administration for months now — from White House budget officials, Democratic lawmakers and the occasional cable television news producer — all asking for a few minutes with the man in charge… (cont’d)
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/31/business/31fha.html
Check out the photo - it’s mean, I know - He’s in charge of the huge HB!
Leigh
- His idea of a balanced diet is a Whopper with cheese in each hand.
- He’s going to fix the oversupply problem by eating the excess inventory.
-He has to be careful when he’s walking around D.C. so he doesn’t tip the city over.
This is fun.
I have no sympathy for any of the bureaucrats. If this guy was worth anything he would tell the world that the FHA shouldn’t be doing what scumbags like Bu$h, Paulson, Dodd and Frank want it to do. Until then, f-ck him and everybody that looks like him. “I was just doing my job,” they said from the dock.
Dang NYCboy!
Pass the Jack! (coffee spewed everywhere).
Toooooooooooo Funny,
Leigh
Hmmm, I don’t get this. If you didn’t have bureaucrats you wouldn’t have government. I don’t like government you say? Then you must like anarchy, tribalism, and savagery.
Look at Somalia, Afghanistan after the Russians, Iraq after we invaded. These are failed states without operating governments.
So, I really don’t mind trashing true idiots - Fun Yuns, Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Hillary, Bill “Cigar” Clinton, McCain, etc. - there are many people who are trying to do right in bad circumstances. If you don’t like bureaucrats, then give me a viable alternative.
Roidy
So if somebody doesn’t like this overgrown bureaucratic machine they must be an anarchist? Wow. I will accept government but in its smallest form. Come to New York City and point out all of these great bureaucrats.
Some say, “keep government out of my bedroom.” I say, “keep them out of anything that is greater than providing the basic infrastructure for society.” There is no f-cking reason we have an FHA, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Department of Education and thousands of other government, and quasi government entities. Let the locals run as much of their lives as possible.
“Tribalism and savagery”. WTF?
“If you don’t like bureaucrats, then give me a viable
alternative.”
I’m still waiting.
Roidy
Roidy,
I think NYCityBoy answered spot on.
Less government=better government.
I’d say bettergovernment = better government.
I’m not ready to step onto the deregulation train, that train takes you right off a cliff.
“If you don’t like bureaucrats, then give me a viable
alternative.”
I’m still waiting.
Where the f-ck did I ever say get rid of these clowns altogether? I’m not that naive.
It’s not A or B. It’s minimizing their power. Giving some goober the power over billions and billions of dollars of mortgages doesn’t seem like a real great plan. This FHA shouldn’t even exist. Bureaucrats might be necessary for a functioning society but giving bureaucrats like this tool and Bernanke the power that they possess is suicide. And that is all Bernanke is. He is a glorified bureaucrat, controlled by the money powers.
I don’t think anybody likes rectal exams but there don’t seem to be many alternatives. That doesn’t mean anybody, except maybe you, is running out to get a rectal exam every third day.
(Disclosure: I have never received, or given, a rectal exam.)
ACH:
If YOU acted on YOUR job like these people do, would you even HAVE a job Monday morning?
That is the problem, its damn near impossible to fire any guvmint worker..
Consider this the 3rd rail bigger the SS…how to change civil service rules so that you can fire a guvmint worker in 90 days or less….one day it will happen and we wont have anything to beeeatch about…..it would be a good trade off.
————————————————
Hmmm, I don’t get this. If you didn’t have bureaucrats you wouldn’t have government.
RE: If you don’t like bureaucrats, then give me a viable alternative.
As a cost saving measure during a budgetary collapse a couple years ago in Maine, all “non-essential” state governmental workers were laid-off 1 day a week for like 3 months.
Surprising unlike the proclamations from the public employee unions the world didn’t collapse.
In fact, you never even knew these thousands of people were MIA.
These bureaucratic dorks could do their wastral work in half the time alloted.
Cut the fat.
Maybe someone could tell him, gravy is not a beverage!
His idea of a balanced diet is a Whopper with cheese in each hand.
———————————————————————–
I kinda disagree with this assumption. He’s look like a minimum of a double whopper with cheese kinda guy to me. <:()
Seriously, he sounds like a good guy. Besides, he is funny.
—
In addition, the agency’s computer systems are so antiquated — the average age is 18 years old — that Mr. Montgomery has joked that he is in the market for Fortran programmers. (To his astonishment, a staff member told him the agency actually does need experts familiar with Fortran, the computer language introduced in 1957 and now rarely used. Some of the agency’s machines have been humming along for 28 years.)
I just realized that I’m the youngest class trained to punch FORTRAN on cards at my university. I’m polishing my resume and holding myself in reserve until all the old duffers die off. Then I plan to go into consulting. I plan to be the only FORTRAN expert programming FHA computers using in-bloodstream nanobots.
It turns out that my wife DOES remember which computer languages she was “taught” overseas and never used since. (There was some confusion, until she thought hard and finally remembered their names.;) ) FORTRAN and COBOL.
Can you say… GRAVY TRAIN!
FORTRAN? I took that in high school!
Who the heck ever wrote a government administrative system with Fortran? Now Cobol would make sense, but Fortan? Wasn’t that meant for science and engineering applications?
Fortran is still widely used for pure math, engineering applications. It is still the fastest in computation speed and leaves C, Pascal, visual basic way behind. Compared to the 1957 version, I’m sure, the newer versions Fortran 77 and above are really good with sub routines for matrix operations - the key to any decent compution!
Thats true and it is still pretty widely used. Just because something is old dosen’t mean its not good (see the 650 hp small block chevy in the corvette ZR1 - more reliable, lighter weight, more fuel efficient and more powerful than any “modern” engine germany, italy or japan can build).
FORTRAN is now being slowly replaced by Matlab in science and engineering but nothing runs as fast as good FORTRAN. FORmula TRANslation was always intended to be an easy language for scientists and engineers, not computer programmers, to use.
Fortran has been constantly updated through the years. There has been Fortran 77, 90, 95, and 2003 (the latest) which has dynamic storage allocation, matrix operations, object orientation, and parallel processing.
What also helps keep Fortran alive is the great amount of software that is still in use and would be too expensive to convert.
Since when is a political appointee who had a White House job a “career bureaucrat.” I always thought that a career bureaucrat was a long-time, civil service employee, not a political appointee. While a few executive department bureaus are headed by career civil servants (ex: Bureau of Economic Analysis in the Commerce Dept), such cases are the exception to the rule. Generally, the highest position that a careerist can hold is a departmental deputy assistant secretary (about half are career and half are political).
Welcome to the world of stupid journalists and rotten editors. You are absolutely right. I assume this person just means that his previous jobs were managing administrative tasks, whether in state or local government or business.
This is a fun one: Sacramento developer is being sued for $972.5M! Apparently John D. Reynen of Reynen and Bardis Communities thought it would be a swell idea to personally guarantee a loan for their company to purchase thousands of acres of land at the height of the bubble. He has filed for personal bankruptcy protection, declaring $73.9M in assets.
http://www.sacbee.com/static/weblogs/real_estate/
It’s Reynen heavily in Sacramento.
You wonder if he ever took a good look at Sacramento before investing in it! I fear for my life twice a year when I go up there to visit my brother-in-law.
And hearing all the Sacramentans talk about flipping condos was quite amusing. All these middle-class folks thinking it was mathematically possible for all of them to make hundreds of thousands in a few years.
The only thing about the housing bubble that surprised me was that some Big Developers ending up losing big. I would have expected that the people with real investing knowledge would have set things up so that they wouldn’t be among the bag holders.
test
Arson Suspected at House Owned by Rapper
…snip…
“”Earlier this year, Ms. Tompkins filed suit against 50 Cent, whose real name is Curtis Jackson, claiming that he promised her the $2.4 million house more than a decade ago, but that since their breakup he wants to evict her and their 10-year-old son from the home.
Her lawyer, Paul Catsandonis, told The Associated Press that the dispute over the house had become “extremely, extremely contentious” in recent days. Although he declined to be specific, Mr. Catsandonis said there was an “extremely dangerous incident” on Monday “involving the parties in question” while taking a deposition in his Manhattan office”" cont’d…
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/31/nyregion/31blaze.html
Ya just can’t make this stuff up!
Leigh
Just think back to Lisa “Left Eye” Lopez (now deceased) and Andre Rison. Nothing will come of this. The story forgot to mention that the 3 adults impacted will need to rest and recuperate for several weeks and miraculously not one will miss a single day of work.
insurance job all the way
i read fitty was pissed she had her whole extended family living in that “mansion” in Dix Hills long island
this way he gets the appraised value not the 30% off it would get on the open market at this point
glad no one was hurt though
why anyone would want to move to the suburbs thee days is beyond me (i know think of the children)
$4.25 for reg unleaded should do wonders for the surbaban home sales
i know many do not like city living but it is definately better for the enviorment and more convenient
getting in your car for a qt. of milk gets old real fast imo
“glad no one was hurt though”
Phony!
Stop into the city tonight. The girls are going to see Sex and the City tonight. The boys can go catch a few performances in the Village. There’s this donkey act I’ve been dying to see.
I’m just wondering how bad these storms will be.
come to Long island city for some good Thai
serious if you want to do it send me an email
i was supposed to work today but got switched to tomorrow and we are planning on going for thai
and do not worry they serve jack too!!!!!!
make sure you wear your Manolos and the 1st chocolate martini is one me!!
we can put down payments on the 900k 750 sq ft place you and the misses have had your eyes on
kill 2 birds with one stone! it’s a buyers market haven’t ya heard?
A guy at work told me the same thing - all the moms at his other job are getting together to go see SITC. He asked me if I was going to drag my BF to see it. What a joke, I never even saw the TV show. (I would never subject my Billy Bob to that ordeal.)
A DJ on WMMR said about Sarah Jessica Parker:
“sometimes she looks hot, but then again from a certain angle she reminds me of Dee Snider from Twisted Sister.”
Her face always did look a little horsey to me.
Me wife and I went to the movies last night, and on returning to our car, passed an army of alcohol-sodden middle aged females wearing Sara Jessica Parker tutus who were stumbling towards the theater where “Sex in the City” was showing. What a scary scene to behold!
I would rather chew my own leg off than sit in a movie theater through that piece of dung. I saw the show occasionally. It was essentially one joke - look at these really cool women, no man in the world is good enough for them. Possibly sustainable through the depiction of a few stereotypes for 5 or 6 half hour episodes. Anything beyond that? Forget it.
Then again, I am atypical. I would have walked out of Sleepless in Seattle if I hadn’t been on a date (the movie was his idea) at the time.
What’s scary is the fact that middle aged females were sodden with alcohol! That must have been a fright!
‘middle aged’ — is that anyone over 35? you guys make it sounds like sex and the city fans are all grandmas and you guys are all in your 20s! : )
i get confused on this site about peoples ages sometimes and don’t know what people mean when they refer to “middle aged females” . . . I think you have to be under 25 to make remarks like that . . .
How much gasoline can one buy for 50 Cent?
if you own a f 150 you can drive from one pump to the next on that 50 cent
(disclosure-i have put as little as 60 cents in my tank years ago)
times were tough lol
Dang! I finally hit the $50 mark filling my Taurus yesterday, but I felt a lot better than the gal in her old Expedition next to me. She kept clicking the gas on and off from the start so she was probably putting in about $5 which is the new 50 cents nowadays.
I put 7.7 gallons in the top quarter of my wife’s Corolla yesterday. No wonder she fills up once every 6 weeks or so.
Dang MG ya got me beat… i never put less then a WHOLE dollar in my tank….
Sometimes that Whole Dollar (4 gal) of Gas lasted dang near a Month…
————————————————
(disclosure-i have put as little as 60 cents in my tank years ago)
A long, long time ago I once asked for 2 cents’ worth of petrol for a Honda 50 step-thru scooter. Even at the price then (50 cents a gallon) that was a tiny amount.
When the attendant asked if I was joking I told him I was out of fuel, needed to get home, and only had a couple of cents left on me.
He put in 20 cents’ worth and sent me on my way. And you better believe I repaid it (somewhat to his surprise) the next day. He was even more surprised when I told him that the scooter got 130mpg (but only 35mph flat chat), and that I could get to and from lectures for a week on a single gallon.
Come to think of it …
I would go from pump to pump at the gas station and empty the the hoses in to my 1987 Yamaha Phaser. I could almost fill the tank.
Celebrities have a way of influencing the mind set of those that adore them, and if 50 Cent can get rid of a sticky domestic situation with a flick of his bick, imagine how many of his disciples will see the light?
His real name is not 50 Cent?
Perhaps 50 Cents is what the lender will receive back on the dollar of principal lent…
“I Just Want My House”
Two weeks ago, Ken and Laura Weiskopf were waiting for kitchen cabinets to arrive. The Milwaukee couple would then install flooring, add appliances and soon move into their new home on N. 117th St. near W. Brown Deer Road.
But the cabinets never came, and the Weiskopfs soon discovered that the company supposedly shepherding their project hadn’t paid suppliers for the cabinets or for other materials used to build the two-story home.
http://www.jsonline.com/story/index.aspx?id=756962
Thanks for the link Cheez.
We are thinking of building again - not with these butt heads!
“President Homes operates its business by helping people general-contract their home construction.
The company claims to save homeowners an average of 20% by being a “single source” for financing, local subcontracting, design services, budgeting and planning, among other services. The company offers already-designed homes or lets people customize plans with its help.”
Check this out - sweat equity, ya.
http://milwaukee.craigslist.org/rfs/693267968.html
Leigh
What’s craigslist like in your area, anyone? Because here in Tampa Bay, house prices on craigslist are a complete joke, IMO. I mean, do people really think they can get these prices for their property in Florida? All the stupid money has dried up and disappeared.
same thing in ny area palmetto
i bought the local neighborhood rag this morning and it appears the asking prices are going higher -unbelievable
i guess they ask for the moon and give some sucker 10% off so they can feel like they are getting a deal
denial runs real deep in nyc- 5 boros
looks like i may be renting for many years to come
in my area i can say pretty confidently my wife and i are in
the top % of earners (but you would never know)
but we drive our 2002 elantra and rent while these 60-100k tops households are living in these 600k homes
and btw it was super quiet around here on memorial day
no bbq’s to be seen where in the past it was at every other house
i hope these dreamers rot in their shacks as i keep stacking my savings,401k, and other invenstments and oh yeah continue to throw my money away on rent- i will not fund some pension recieving,ss collecting old farts tomb in florida
now i know why some choose to go off the grid (not pay taxes)
how is it that the median income for my neighborhood is 65k but the home start @ 550?
most people here have owned for 25 years or better and there are many retirees and boomers
this area is dying a slow death with no new young famalies able to afford or want to commit to indentured servitude for a shack
you have 2 or 3 generations living under 1 roof
i love my mom but not that much
“i bought the local neighborhood rag this morning”
What does she look like?
she has alot of mileage, but still has 2 teeth so it’s all good
“Any tread left on those tires, or is it like throwing a hot dog down a hallway?”
- Stewie Griffin
Any tread left on those tires, or is it like throwing a hot dog down a hallway?”
——————————————————-
errrr….how about throwing a hot dog down big valley.
stop being gross
Bringing yet a whole NEW dimension to being “on the rag”, as we discussed yesterday…
nothing that new about dumb guy jokes
“no bbq’s to be seen where in the past it was at every other house”
No one seems to break out the grills anymore in our neighborhood. I grilled burgers last night and as usual, I’m all by myself (we live in a circle of 6 homes with patios on the side so you can see who’s out), but my neighbor (who’s working 2 shifts at the mill) gave me a really weird look as he drove by…
i hope these dreamers rot in their shacks as i keep stacking my savings,401k, and other invenstments and oh yeah continue to throw my money away on rent- i will not fund some pension recieving,ss collecting old farts tomb in florida
Sorry! It won’t happen. I too am an extreme saver! But you know exactly what’s going to happen. You’re being taxed to death to support “Harry Howmuchamonth” and his SUV and his granite countertops. And when you retire, the government will think you’re “too rich” to get any Social Security and Medicare so you’ll be on your own, while folks who have saved nothing will be supported. Because we all know that people with no money are more worthy than responsible people with “too much money.” At least that’s what Barack Obama seems to be telling me.
You’re already being screwed:
1. Interest rates are being held low in a crazy attemp to keep house prices inflated. This means if you have $1M in bonds or CDs (in 10 different banks, of course, because of the FDIC limit) the most you can expect to get is about $35,000/year. Do you know how many seniors who saved carefully all their lives have had their incomes significantly reduced by low interest rates? These evil seniors who saved too much are having their money confiscated so that Harry Howmuchamonth and Sally Specuvestor can have a few more months in their underwater house!
2. You used to be able to buy $120,000 a year of “I-Bonds”. Inflation protected savings bonds. The government reduced that to $5000/year. Many people–including me–used to use I-Bonds as part of their long-term savings strategy. That option has been taken away.
The treasury’s offical statement on lowering the limit was:
“To refocus the savings bond program on its original purpose of making these nonmarketable Treasury securities available to individuals with relatively small sums to invest,” the Treasury Department said in a statement.
It’s just another tax on people like you and me who like to save!
3. Weakinging the dollar, and inflationary practices–like pouring “Stimulus Checks” on lower income Americans merely eat into the savings of the few responsible Americans who save money.
While it’s a line I personally won’t cross, you’re going to see a lot of people try to hide savings from the Government for basic survival reasons. And I can’t disagree with anyone who tries this. The Government hates savers. Don’t be so smug that you’re prepared for the future. Unless you have a vault of gold off-shore, the Government will find and take all your savings. You’ll be no better of than someone who saved nothing.
Couldn’t agree more. I stopped looking at Tampa Craig’s List a while ago, people are still dreaming here. Ahhhh, I can’t wait for the day where housing is affordable and homeowners have a f’ing clue as to what is going on. Still years away it seems.
Unfortunately the Syracuse area realtors think Craigslist was made for them. It’s a little work to find the true FSBO. I’ve seen a few that would make me look if we were further into this downturn but most are still priced in ways I wouldn’t bother with.
In other parts of the site, like furniture, I’ve found the number of items for sale has really skyrocketed in last few weeks. I think it could be a little late for departing college students to be the reason but I’m not sure as graduation week was about the time I saw the uptick.
Have to laugh.. In my old stomping grounds..we have a gated community where the listings went from 19 homes to 25 homes 2 weeks ago..most of the homes were showing price decreases UNTIL the additional homes were added(which decided to go the way of the BOOM prices!)…so what do several of the idiot realtors do RAISE the prices of some of the homes!
This week, they reduced the prices back down, INCLUDING the ones newly listed!
Stupids..
Nearest Craigslist for us is Tuscaloosa and it’s hard to see the houses for the “for sale” signs there…
I stopped looking at Craigslist and only use MLS now. Craiglist has become the home of greedy sellers who wont take their agent’s advice to drop the price so decided to, or were forced to, fly solo, or have no equity so they are doing it bare bones.
Theoretically it could be used by those that hate real estate agents and want to cut them out of the deal, splitting the money that would have gone to a commission with the buyer, but i dont see the happening. Mainly just greedy azzes.
Craigslist for W. Colorado is a joke, it’s overrun by RE agents and greedy FSBOers. If it’s on CL, you can guarantee it’s vastly overpriced. And it’s the same stuff, over and over and over. It’s like they think if they just keep listing it, they’ll eventually get a sucker.
OTOH, it’s kind of a form of schadenfruede to get on there and see the same houses. There’s one on there that I contacted to see if they’d rent it, and they said no, it would be sold before I could move into it - that was 6 months ago, still there, empty, for sale, no suckers.
Ah, beautiful sunny Saturday, think I’ll go for a hike - while all around America FBs work on their houses…mowing the lawns, fixing things, trying to squeeze more money from their pocketbooks to pay for the darn thing.
They do that here, too. Re-listing their crap every day, or even several times the same day. You can flag these multiple listings as spam, but it takes forever working backwards to find all but the originals. If Craiglist charged newspaper rates for the listings, maybe they would stop.
And the prices, even for rentals, are outlandish. Evidently, a lot of speculators are trying to cover their costs with rents two, three, and four times what they should be. I don’t know if anybody is biting.
I notice that some posters are now boasting that their rental units have been approved for Section 8! That must thrill buyers and renters who got in before the policy change. The housing bubble is providing a new generation of slums that cities might otherwise have had to build themselves.
I was wondering where you were Tim.
I am in Denver currently, but have ties to Washington DC and Atlanta, and work in the national project finance group mainly muni-financings. Thus, while I live in Denver, I may move anytime and follow many markets.
Craigslist for Chicagoland is overrun by agents too - more agents than FSBOs, I’d guess.
On Craiglist they more frequently come right out and say if its a short sale, preforeclosure, or foreclosure. They don’t like to use those words on the MLS/Realtor.com.
It would be good if Craigslist would allow refining the selection of seacrh criteria on Real Estate similar to the excellent method they use in the Cars & Truck search; i.e. selecting By Owner only if so desired.
I had another nice conversation with the woman at work that now has both of her homes for sale. The house in Jersey is sitting there like a rock. It seems they now have it listed in the upper 600s. At the peak it could have gotten about 850. But prices are only down 3 or 4 percent. Pull this leg. It plays Ode to Joy. How many people could really afford a house in the high 600s? I would guess that market grew 10 times what it should have been during the Mania.
So she says to me, “we might just pull it off the market and wait out the downturn.” “Holy f-cking sh#t”, I replied (without the lines or special characters). “Have you been listening? This thing isn’t coming back. The machinery that allowed this mania to happen has been dismantled. It’s gone. There is nothing, short of the Asians falling for this scam yet again, that can bring it back.”
Terror was in her eyes. “I know. I know,” she said. But even when she gets it she doesn’t want to believe it. Her head is caught in a vice and she thinks if she thinks happy thoughts the vice will stop tightening. I have now told her, several times, you need to find the price where it will sell and get rid of it. I sure hope she listens. Something tells me that retirement becomes a more and more distant prospect for her and her husband, with every passing day.
sigh, NYC, nothing you can do about it. It’s like how you trap monkeys, by putting a bunch of nuts in a jar, with the mouth of the jar being just large enough for the monkey’s hand, but not large enough for the monkey to grab the nuts AND pull them out. So the monkey just stays there with his hand wrapped around the nuts, even when the trapper approaches.
A lot of these FBs are just monkeys holding onto their nuts.
Palmy, I don’t know what you have planned for Saturday night but you can count me out.
All kidding aside, NYC, I’ve come to the conclusion that people who are in denial about the price of their homes deserve whatever comes. In a way, I kind of like the idea that they’re fooled by all the spin, because if they think their house is worth that much and they can’t get that price, it’s got to make them feel like a loser. I’m pretty much at the point where if someone says their house is worth some ridiculous wishing price, I’m inclined to agree with them and wonder out loud why they are such a loser they can’t get that price.
Yep. I have $63.38 in a savings account. At least I don’t try to pretend that it is worth $4,627.00. The woman at work looks like the houses for sale is killing her. Her husband is the roadblock to getting them sold. He wanted them in the first place.
Marriage works best when there is no debt. I have found that out firsthand. All of the people dying to buy on this blog can have it. My wife and I will rent that mother-in-law apartment on the back from you. As long as I can crank up my Strat every once in a while I will be happy.
“Marriage works best when there is no debt.”
Great observation!
I’ll expand a bit: One’s life works best when there is no debt.
Combo honey, are you long any stocks?
Tx, same question.
Only one: IBA. Bought it some years ago for under $10, 1/2 of book value. Plan on keeping it forever, or until the fundamentals of the business goes south (which I doubt will happen).
NYCboy:
Or when you are both on the same page on how to pay it down.
———-
Marriage works best when there is no debt
Marriage works best when there is no debt.
“Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen nineteen six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds ought and six, result misery.”
– Charles Dickens –
David Copperfield, 1849
I feel it necessary to correct your syntax. “Vise” not “vice.”
You’re welcome.
The amount of gloom I am hearing around me is just astonishing me. I still hear some happy talk but the reports from around the country are turning darker and darker. I don’t even bring this stuff up. We went to see a customer yesterday and he started talking about how bad things were getting. He acknowledged that Brooklyn and Manhattan are the only things holding the City up. How long can that last? I don’t think it can last forever.
Whether in a vise or a vice, somebody’s nuts are getting squeezed pretty darn hard. I’m trying my best to avoid that. It’s nearly my birthday and my wife told me I could take them out of her purse and play with them for 10 minutes on that day. I’m excited. So are the cats.
leave those poor pussies alone!!!
nyc boy if times get tight with your $63.48
you can rent a room in my apartment i have 3 bedrooms
we need the 2 extra bedrooms for our scrapbooking empire
and my beanie baby collection
and the visiting in laws
be warned my dog does not like sudden movements
Vise as in Vise Grip (like if you have too much Jack Black)
Vice as in the Vice Squad in Saudi Arabia (the Morals Police)
The calender is their executioner. Theres a huge number of these fools in denial. Carrying costs are slowly eating them alive. Now that the spring selling season is a bust, I expect another wave of foreclosures soon.
The next set of large price drops comes in October or November, just like last year.
To me this a good example of “clapping for Tinker Bell”. You must believe. This is also where it will eventually get real bad once the majority of believers finally realize that Tinker Bell isn’t real. Once that happens and it will happen. Katie bar the door…
“Terror was in her eyes. “I know. I know,” she said.”
She knows…but she can’t act on it. That reminds me of the times a couple years ago now when I sat at my computer w/a growing pitt in my stomach as I read from insiders just how totally out of control this thing had gotten.
As people explained tranches, of how they were sliced and diced and crap was sold as AAA, of reverse red lining, of Countrywide’s boiler room tactics, of rating agency and appraisal fraud, it almost seemed like the system has gone mad.
So on that note, I can forgive people w/huge amounts of money on the line for their “deer in the headlights” stage. The facts are just so unbelieveable the first time you fully focus on the truth.
Another thing is it’s easy for HBBers to forget we’ve processed this nastiness over years. (I’m almost bored w/how long its taking to unwind since I’ve found the blog.) We can’t expect the ones just tuning in to “get it” so quickly…..it would be like tuning into “Lost” for the first time.
“it would be like tuning into “Lost” for the first time.”
Hey, just what exactly do you mean by that???
Television show!…ya know I’d never pick on ya!
(Forgot to put the smiley face by that comment.) But when did they name a TV show after me?? Guess I’ll have to get a TV and watch it. Must be about squatters…
“This thing isn’t coming back. The machinery that allowed this mania to happen has been dismantled. It’s gone.”
That’s the money quote of the day.
Off topic a little -
Offshoring of call centers to India. Comical skit.
Click watch movie
http://callcentermovie.com/
About spit my coffee out. The call center clip was too funny. Don’t miss the end.
very funny
My life was better before watching that.
Hey Palmy,
Here’s one listed in Milwaukee!
http://milwaukee.craigslist.org/rfs/701985053.html
Leigh
Here is another chuckle!
http://milwaukee.craigslist.org/rfs/701830979.html
Leigh;)
“Sleeps: 6″
Yeah, if they midgets or porn stars.
Slowly step back from the Jack
Did you guys catch this part?
“The reason that I’m selling is because I want to buy a condo in Mexico.”
Guess he wants to cash in and realize his gains. (Bleepin’ $154k for 438 sq ft in Wisc. People are smart!….shakes head)
Mornin’ Leigh! Nice catch. When ole’ Palmy talks about paying cash for a little concrete block shack in Florida, that’s pretty much what I’m talking about, except for the putrid color. Power bills were pretty low. Back in the day, you could “snap up” one of those for $50,000 in a nice, modest little neighborhood and live quite well, if you weren’t too concerned about status. His tax assessed value is a joke. These will be $30,000 by the time all is said and done. There’s a neighborhood near here that is all concrete block shacks like that one. At the height of the bubble, wishing prices were about $175,000. AS IF! Now, they’re asking about $125,000 with the “short sales” in the $90,000s. LMAO!
And a good morning to you Palmy!
14 years in NW FL — Talk about crazy.
Sure do miss the slow life, but not the hurricane running
Leigh
“At the height of the bubble, wishing prices were about $175,000. AS IF!”
Actually, it is worse than that. Before I got burned out by the neighbors in my apartment complex, I lived across the street from a fellow who was remodelling a concrete block shack like that. Gutting it and changing the garage into another bedroom, etc. Putting a little “fucco” entry facade on the front, put on a new roof. Lipstick on a pig. His realtor convinced him he could get $225,000. LMAO!
I spoke to an old friend in Charlotte yesterday. It appears Charlotte, too, has cracked. Granted he is in Northwest Charlotte. Not a very nice part of town. He is trying to sell his house for $149k. He paid $137k five years ago. It is 2,200 square feet. The neighborhood is ringed with foreclosures. Obviously, he will get less than he paid for the place. Rentals are becoming popular in his ‘hood. He needs to get out now.
Charlotte is so massively overbuilt, especially with higher end homes. The amount of construction was amazing. For all of you Yankees with dreams of the Carolinas dancing around in your gray matter, beware. Urban sprawl is killing the formerly popular areas such as Charlotte and Raleigh/Durham. The places are overbuilt and getting more overbuilt every day. But they love Yankees. If you move down, make sure to tell the locals everything they are doing wrong. That gun rack in the back of their truck doesn’t mean anything. Really!!!
charlatan.
noun
1) a person who makes elaborate, fraudulent, and often voluble claims to skill or knowledge;
2) one who professes to enjoy living in Charlotte
That is why we chose to live in the city we do here in GA…it is horse country and the city passed ordinance saying no commerical except in one small area designated and every house, regardless of size must be built on a min 1 acre lot(alot of older homes mixed in with some new ones)..five min off the main drag full of shops and overbuilt lots and I am in the country setting..love it!
What town are you in? It used to be that way in much of Atlanta, especially Buckhead, where I lived.
I remember 3 acre yards and gorgeous trees even when I was a teenager, but now, most everything is crammed. Odd that the local qualities that make people want to move somewhere are the very ones they often destroy by actually doing so.
My grandparents and assorted aunts and uncles moved to Durham in the mid ’60s, when it was still sleepy tobacco country. Even in the mid ’80s, things were changing fast in the Triangle.
Much of the area is unrecognizable to me now.
Between the Rock and a hard place
Northern Rock is to more than double the number of people who work in its debt management department over the next year, the BBC has learned.
The move to redeploy staff suggests the bank is expecting to see a huge increase in the number customers who are struggling to pay their mortgages
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7426677.stm
It’s a debt end job, but whatever.
For the local ones who insist there is no peak oil - now walk the walk and buy one of the XT models to spite us peak oilers: http://tinyurl.com/3dxe99
Peak gasoline prices?
Gas prices got you over a barrel? Look overseas
Drivers in Turkey paying $11.29 a gallon, France $10
By Angela Charlton
ASSOCIATED PRESS
May 31, 2008
PARIS – Americans are shellshocked at $4-a-gallon gas. But consider France, where a gallon of petrol can run almost $10. Or Turkey, where it’s more than $11.
$10 a gallon?
Coup d’Gas
Coupe D’ Ill…
Check out the hybrid trucks. Advertised fuel savings of $5k or better per year appear conservatively estimated. As usual, markets soften even the harshest of transitions.
Briefing
Energy
Double, double, oil and trouble
May 29th 2008
From The Economist print edition
Is it “peak oil” or a speculative bubble? Neither, really
The article still did not explain why there is no world peak oil, or that world peak oil is imminent. China is trying to get 50% increase in oil production for the Olympics? Okay. After that, they will gain 40 million new motorists for the next two decades, same with India. Then what?
Also the article mentions the high cost of oil will lessen demand. By how much? And how will that counteract tens of millions of new motorists on Earth’s roads in the next two decades?
Very authoritative article. I’ll keep my Pengrowth stock.
What Hillary Wants
“She wants to be president. Duh. And if it ain’t gonna happen this year, then her central objective is to make it as likely as possible in 2012.”
“There are those who say the hard feelings of this race will cripple her with her colleagues. What a crock. Having campaigned in all 50 states and won millions of votes in the process, Clinton will surely be the most sought-after fund-raiser in all of Democratic politics besides the putative President Obama. She will take the lead in the upper chamber on passing health-care reform, which will not only give her a shot at a place in history but a chance to make up for epic failure back in 1993–94. And, with the incumbent Obama sure to be the standard-bearer in 2012, she will set her sights on 2016, when, after all, she’ll be just 68 — three years younger than John McCain is now”
http://nymag.com/daily/intel/2008/05/heilemann_what_hillary_wants_a.html
I think this writer nailed it. Sadly it appears we’ll never be done with Ms Hillary because she’s going to run until she croaks.
“Clinton will surely be the most sought-after fund-raiser in all of Democratic politics besides the putative President Obama.”
Didn’t she have to lend her campaign $5Million recently? How is that a top fund raiser?
I’m just not convinced about her.
Roidy
She can galvanize the support of big money Democrat donors to contribute the maximum to a high number of individual campaigns. Her problem was that after those people could only contribute up to ~$5k.
She’s like a hack Eva Peron, that just won’t go away.
“Don’t cry for me Americanos…”
Mark Steyn: Sexism, not Obama, beat Hillary
“How else to explain why their gal got clobbered by a pretty boy with a resume you could print on the back of his driver’s license, a Rolodex apparently limited to neosegregationist race-baiters, campus Marxist terrorists and indicted fraudsters, and a rhetorical surefootedness that makes Dan Quayle look like Socrates.”
http://www.ocregister.com/articles/boy-boys-girls-2056513-women-obama
Seriously gals, Hill isn’t the right woman for the job. I’d vote for TXC57 (when did the 57 get in there?) in a minute.
No kidding, her baggage made it an uphill battle.
If we have to honor the race and sex cards, here’s my picks: Condaleeza Rice, Walter Williams, Thomas Sowell. Any of them for Pres. But since I vote by purity toward the issues rather than purity for the race/sex, the best person for the job of President is Ron Paul. He’s still running for President, by the way. It’s individual liberty that is my aim.
I do not consider myself a racists, however I do not think an Afro-American can win a presidential election. I suspect that things have not gotten bad enough yet that the majority of the public would so vote. However, things could get a lot worst economically that all bets could be off and he or the local dem dog catcher would be elected (or A. Hitler).
Hillbary nomination futures are on sale at deep discount prices! TxChick — this market is right up your alley…
BTW, these election futures are giving Obama almost as high odds on winning the D-rat nomination as they are giving McCain to win the R-can nomination.
I am sorry to say, that O will be a single termer. No matter who is the Prez, he will take the blame for the US financial condition. Looking forward, it will be argued that it was Bill and shrub that caused the problem, but its O’s problem to solve, and it can’t/will not. H will run in 2012 and win her party’s nomination (read JCarter).
Could this be the most rapid ever increase in U.S. home affordability?
United States
The housing market
Dropping a brick
May 29th 2008
From The Economist print edition
There are some choice comments below this story, such as this one:
This is a non-story. Everything reverts to the relationship between household income (A) and mortgage amount (B). Multiply A by 3.5 and that’s the maximum for B. This has been true for generations and only changed from 2002 through 2006. Real estate is wildly overpriced and needs to keep falling until it reaches traditional equilibrium. Then we’ll stop having idiots earning $45K a year buying $600K houses in California.
In my generation, it was 2.5.
I thought the rule of thumb was 2.5 x your income, not 3.5. ?
We are all richer now, and can hence afford to buy homes that cost 3.5 times our incomes (or is it 10.5 times?).
35% of the population traditionally didn’t buy houses at all. That 35% isn’t exactly equivalent to the bottom 35% of the income distribution curve, but it is much closer to the bottom than it is to being scattered evenly. Taking out the people who didn’t buy at all skews it so that the affordability for the population doesn’t exactly mirror the afordability for an individual family.
Gotta be careful with those statistics.
I have to wonder if Mr Biggs saw that home price graph in the linked article from The Economist before making his bold prediction? Of course, bold but incorrect calls are often forgotten, while bold and correct calls are forever recounted.
It appears that AG’s 2005 prediction for housing prices might stay on the record for a while, though: “A DESTABILISING contraction in nationwide house prices does not seem the most probable outcome…nominal house prices in the aggregate have rarely fallen and certainly not by very much.”
Analyst’s Bold View: Worst Is Over
Wall Street veteran Barton Biggs has probably made as many predictions as Nostradamus. Some calls were dire and many accurate — he correctly predicted the bursting of the tech bubble. In a recent interview, the 75-year-old says the worst is over for the economy and the stock market.
Why do greater fools listen to old koots like this guy?
“In May 2004, he said crude-oil prices, then $49 a barrel, would collapse. They didn’t, and since have surged. Those who bet big with Mr. Biggs lost big.
Now, Mr. Biggs, 75 years old, believes the worst is over for the economy and for the stock market. While the market is likely to move sideways for the rest of 2008, he says there will be no recession — and with the remaining poisons purged from the system, stocks should move upward next year.”
British Group Largely Maintains Libor Procedures
By CARRICK MOLLENKAMP and LAURENCE NORMAN
May 31, 2008; Page B6
LONDON — Under scrutiny about the accuracy of the benchmark London interbank offered rate, the group that oversees the rate system decided Friday to leave it largely unchanged.
After reviewing the Libor system, the British Bankers’ Association said it would leave intact the 16-bank panel that reports borrowing rates to calculate Libor in dollars. The BBA also said it would step up policing of the panel’s banks to make sure they contribute accurate rates. It gave no further information, saying details of the new policing system would be published “in due course.”
The BBA sped up the annual review after bankers expressed concern that rivals might be understating their true borrowing costs to avoid looking desperate for cash. The association said it would eject any bank that had deliberately misquoted borrowing costs.
The BBA’s decision not to take more radical action disappointed some market participants, who have noted various flaws in Libor, which forms the foundation for payments on trillions of dollars in mortgages, corporate debt and financial contracts world-wide.
“They’ve moved the deck chair an inch to the right on the Queen Elizabeth, when the question in the age of the aeroplane is whether they need ocean liners at all,” said William Porter, a credit strategist at Credit Suisse Group.
Scrutiny of Libor has come from various quarters, including Wall Street analysts, academics, economists and central bankers worried about a lack of confidence in the benchmark. Thursday, The Wall Street Journal published a study showing that many banks on the Libor panel were reporting rates significantly lower than what another indicator, the market for default insurance, suggested they should be.
Among other criticisms of Libor is the fact that the dollar Libor panel includes largely European banks, making a rate widely used in the U.S. susceptible to financial troubles in Europe. Also, the financial crisis has made banks unwilling to lend to one another for terms of more than a week, yet Libor panel banks still report borrowing rates for terms of three months to a year.
You kinda get the idea the same minds that brought us Lucas Electronics in British cars in the 60’s, were the brains behind Libor?
A few jokes of the era:
“If Lucas made guns, wars would not start either.”
“Why do the English drink warm beer? Lucas made the refrigerators, too.”
Lucas singlehandedly brought down British Leyland IMO (simple explanation) but, I sure loved my Spit’s and MG’s, wish I had either one of them now.
I once read an article where someone who had worked as an engineer at Lucas wrote about the attitude of BMC (later British Leyland) towards them. Every time a contract was negotiated the buyers would hammer away on price, with quality hardly ever mentioned and CERTAINLY not something BMC would pay even a minute amount extra for.
Well they got what they paid for, and they lost an entire industry in the process.
And the best Lucas joke from that era has to be “Lucas; The Prince of Darkness”.
A Lucas headlight switch has three positions: Off, Dim and Flicker.
My California Special Mustang has Lucas driving lights.
Mike
Q: Why don’t the British make stereo speakers?
A: They couldn’t figure out how to make them leak oil.
From the New York Times.
We’ve reached Stage Bargaining™
Can capitulation be far behind?
BWAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!
i read that yesterday
the buyer was way too nice
The NY Times suggests that a key reason behind sellers’ reluctance to drop their prices to levels the market will bear might be the hope for a bailout which resumes large scale lending standard debauchery. I personally have thrown this suggestion out in some previous posts, but now I begin to doubt it, as I don’t believe most sellers are that well informed.
A more likely story is that underwater sellers are (futilely) trying to hold out for a price that would enable them to pay off their mortgage. This has been the case in past real estate busts, and I don’t know why this time should be any different.
From the straw man seller’s letter in the linked article:
“I should point out that your data draws on what has already happened in the housing market. Instead, I’d ask you to consider what’s about to happen.
One big reason for the falling prices is that it’s harder to get mortgages. Lenders went from giving money to anyone with a pulse to demanding higher credit scores and larger down payments. All sorts of buyers simply couldn’t make the numbers work anymore.
That may now change. Starting June 1, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which buy mortgages from lenders and help make it possible for them to lend more money, are loosening restrictions on the sorts of loans they’ll buy in many markets. That is supposed to make it easier for people to buy a home with a down payment of 5 percent, or even less. Many more qualified buyers should mean more bids, and I’m willing to wait to see if it turns out that way.”
Many more qualified buyers doesn’t mean more bids. As we’ve repeatedly pointed out here even if you gave 0% interest, you’re not going to be able to find a buyer who can just pay back the principal.
That’s pretty much “game over” by any rational definition.
And all the p*ssing around with paying $10K downpayments, and closing costs and all that garbage is not exactly going to make a dent in these $800K monsters that they are talking about in New York. And that’s a 2-bdrm condo.
BWAHAHAHAHHAHHAHAHAHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!
“As we’ve repeatedly pointed out here even if you gave 0% interest, you’re not going to be able to find a buyer who can just pay back the principal.”
I could not agree with you more, though I frankly find it astonishing that an army of East Coast PhD economists who teach at tony institutions are either confused on this point, or else are so compromised that they are willing to pretend to be perpetually confused on this point in exchange for a large paycheck.
The only way I could see a return to pre-2005 lending standard debauchery would be to resume making low-doc and liar loans, and the companies that were the biggest peddlers of these mortgage time bombs are for the most part either under severe current regulatory scrutiny or out of business.
Having seen these jackasses (including some Nobel-istas) in action, this is almost certainly true but I would argue you’re attributing too much political intelligence to them.
What I’ve observed is that they really fail to make “chained deductions” like true scientists. They have an overwhelming tendency to spend all their effort on trying to statistically prove “A implies B” rather chaining their efforts to derive that “A implies B implies C …” down to a conclusion which is either trivially true, or trivially false.
They also have tendency to get tied up in irrelevant arguments (”maybe they can have equity in their old house”) to which the response would be (”who’s the first time buyer then?”), etc.
A complete and utter failure to see the totality of the problem.
Inability to pay back principal at 0% interest is pretty much a trivially true proposition given income and price data.
Why they can’t follow the chain down to a conclusion is anybody’s guess.
On that same note, they also have a total tendency to state in concrete terms how a process manifests itself.
I will get down on my knees and weep, the day an academic economist correctly describes to me the entire causal chain of how inflation and deflation happens (and yes, I want to know every single institution along the way, and every single legal detail up and down that chain. It’s not as easy as Chapter Whatever in Samuelson’s book.)
I propose adding a post script to the straw man buyer’s letter:
…
It will be tempting to view my low bid as an insult. Please don’t make that mistake. Your home is genuinely appealing, and I wouldn’t have written this note unless I was serious about buying it. Getting a firm offer in this market is an accomplishment. So congratulations!
Oh, and one more thing. You presumably need someplace to move. My guess is that you’ll find these same points compelling when it’s your turn to buy. You just might succeed in buying for a better price, too.
I look forward to hearing from you soon.
Yours Truly,
The Realist
P.S. I have to ask that you agree to come back on a regular basis to feed the squirrels.
You know, you’re so much more fun when you’re angry (at others.)
Fire in the Belly and all that!
“Dear Seller,
Pull your head out of your f-cking a$$ and realize that your house isn’t that special. I will buy it but not at that ridiculous f-cking price you currently have on it. I will give you 73% of the asking price. Every day that you sulk, and don’t respond, the offer will go down 1%. And by the way I want you to replace the carpets, patch up the windows and get rid of every f-cking trace that your little mutant offspring ever dwelt within the house.
Now quit your crying, wipe that stinkface look off of your face and let me know as soon as possible. I am mailing sixteen other letters out at the same time I mail this. First one to dislodge their head from the rectum wins. There is a $hitload of dreamers out there that would love to have my offer.
Best Regards,
NYCityBoy
p.s. I plan to eat every squirrel I can get my hands on.”
I have to go make some coffee now so next time I split a gut, I also drench my keyboard…
NYCityBoy…it seems like you have adapted well to NYC culture and your US Army SERE Night Training Course in Newark, NJ appears to have paid off
SERE (an acronym for Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape)
As well as the liberal use of strong analgesics…
D-rats in CONgrass want to use subsidized insurance to encourage more hhs to locate in the path of future hurricanes, and ask the rest of the country to pay the subsidy.
Taxpayers May Face Hurricane Tab
Congressional Democrats want to nationalize a chunk of the insurance business that covers major storm-damage claims, which would essentially backstop the giant insurers in case of disaster. Critics say states with little or no hurricane risk could end up footing the bill for damage in flood-prone areas.
CROSS COUNTRY
A Market Solution to Hurricane Risk
By JAKE HALPERN
May 31, 2008
If you look at what is happening now with melting in Greenland and Antactica. The glaciers are sliding into the ocean and the rate of sliding is accelerating. 30 feet of sea level rise is “in the bag” within 30 years. If anyone is really thinking about where they want to live long term; i suggest avoiding any state that has any coastline.
I am thinking of investing in coastal Greenland real estate. There is a beautiful country under all of that ice, and my grandchildren might be forever grateful to me if I get in the Greenland investment game from the inception.
There are lots of parts of beautiful Greenland that are not currently under ice.
Although the weather’s a bit nastier than San Diego.
In 2005, you couldnt find a single credible real estate agent who would predict that california prices were due to drop 60%; but that doesnt mean that it wasnt inevitable.
GHGs continue to go into the air at ever increasing rates. In spite of all the new talk about climate change, emission rates are increasing not decreasing. The amount of GHG gas in the air and rates of increase are exceeding the most pessimistic models. Most of the climate models assume that GHG emission rates will stay the same or go down; but actually they are increasing.
If all of antarctica and greenland melted, the sea level would rise 300 ft. And there is no reason to believe they wont eventually melt. Glaciers are moving into the ocean, and the rate of movement is increasing. Huge chunks of the ice shelves in antarctica are falling off into the sea; 20 years before expected.
In my opinion, its too late to stop global warming. At this point you need to determine how to protect yourself and family; and this would include living on high ground and far away from the hordes of coastal refugees. Maybe when all the nations of the world have seen their coastalcities inundated; then humankin will take serious action. Maybe we can save the icecaps by putting massive amounts of particulates into the air to block out solar radiation. I fear that New Orleans is a model for what will happen to every coastal city in the world.
“In 2005, you couldnt find a single credible real estate agent who would predict that california prices were due to drop 60%; but that doesnt mean that it wasnt inevitable.”
I hope this was not intended as a response to my challenge to find a single credible scientific report predicting 30 ft sea level rises in the foreseeable future. The notion that used home seller opinions and peer reviewed scientific research are comparable information sources is quite a hoot.
“And there is no reason to believe they wont eventually melt.”
Are you expecting the earth to soon tilt on its axis so the sun can have a better shot at that Greenland ice field?
‘30 feet of sea level rise is “in the bag” within 30 years.’
This is such utter bullshit. Could you scrape up a single reputable scientific source that says sea levels will rise by 30 feet any time in the foreseeable future? My guess would by that you cannot.
I think there are some reputable sources that expect a rise of around 30 feet, not in 30 years but in 100-300 years; that’s a major difference. Still, if 30 feet is going to be reality there is not much you can do about it in countries with large river deltas like Netherlands, Bangladesh etc. Another issue is that many of these countries will also have increased heavy rainfall in the near future (also due to climate change), making the problem worse.
Authorities in Netherlands seem to be alarmed a bit by the latest scientific reports because even the conservative estimates for sea level rise over the next 25-50 years are now higher than the high estimates of just 5 years ago (mostly due to strongly accelerating meltoff in Greenland).
well, the Dutch for sure are not worried, after a nearly 1000% rise in homeprices over the last 20 years or so their housing bubble keeps inflating. According to official estimates the Dutch dikes are safe up to a 2-3 feet increase in sea level; anything more and all bets are off, which means that about 75% of the Dutch land are (including more than 90% of homes) will be literally under water.
you would think that some people would start worrying about their investments in Dutch real estate, but no sign of that …
Banks Fumble At Operating Hedge Funds
By Gregory Zuckerman and Jenny Strasburg
Word Count: 795 | Companies Featured in This Article: Citigroup, J.P. Morgan Chase, Goldman Sachs Group, UBS, Morgan Stanley
Getting into the hedge-fund business seemed like a no-brainer for big banks just a few years ago. Clients were hankering to invest in such funds, most banks had deep experience lending and trading with them, money was pouring into the industry and growth seemed assured.
But on the heels of a run of recent embarrassments for banks that operate their own hedge funds, or buy stakes in funds, the foray is raising questions.
Citigroup Inc., Bear Stearns (absorbed into J.P. Morgan Chase & Co.), Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and UBS AG have seen hedge funds that they started or invested in run into problems amid the credit crunch. That has led to billions of dollars of losses for the banks’ clients or for the banks themselves.
Now, some are asking whether top-performing hedge funds, which often have an entrepreneurial streak, can succeed within a huge financial institution.
Who’d of thunk that opening a new division in MegaBank, Inc and calling it a hedge fund would result in a less successful outcome than running a small, lightly-regulated investment operation under the radar screen of regulatory authorities?
The bankers.
They all thought they could ape Goldman’s strategy without ever asking if that strategy was right for them.
Wait till the kaboom’s start happening in the Prime Brokerage units. That’s the next flashpoint IMO, and it’s totally “below” the radar of the Feds.
That is for sure. There is no way to deep six it.
Hoz, what’s your estimate for when the kabooms in the Prime Brokerage units start?
Thanks!
We are in the very early innings (3rd) of the first game of a double header. The loans of August will set off the next wave of bank trauma. Lehmann’s quarterly report is typical of the industry. In the report, Lehmann says the CDOs are probably worthless, but it is keeping them on the books at 80% of par. Dark matter is unbelievable.
“In the report, Lehmann says the CDOs are probably worthless, but it is keeping them on the books at 80% of par.”
Sounds like a problem of financial market hypoxia.
How soon do I have to cash in on my meager stock market gains this year before this next shoe lands on The Street?
Megabank is busy wallpapering over hedges…
I don’t think you understand the number of zeroes involved, and I don’t mean the politicians in DC neither.
Losses are hidden behind the wallpaper? Here I had been thinking all them elephants were hidden beneath the living room rug…
It’s no fund wallpapering over a hedge, let me tell ya.
If you think that’s hard, try wallpapering over an elephant sometime.
This rule change could serve to accelerate the crash, by soon enabling buyers to obtain better information about falling knife prices. Sadly, this news could be a death knell for the six-percenters.
Realtors Agree to Stop Blocking Web Listings
By ERIC LICHTBLAU
Published: May 28, 2008
WASHINGTON — The Justice Department and the National Association of Realtors reached a major antitrust settlement Tuesday that government officials said should spur competition among brokers and ultimately bring down hefty sales commissions.
The deal frees Internet brokers and other real-estate agents offering heavily discounted commissions to operate on a level playing field with traditional brokers by using the multiple listing services that are the lifeblood of the industry, government officials said.
The Justice Department sued the National Association of Realtors in federal court in 2005 on antitrust grounds, charging that its policies were stifling competition and hurting consumers. That case was scheduled to go to trial in Chicago in July.
The settlement “is a win for consumers, certainly, who will now have the benefit of unrestricted competition,” Deborah A. Garza, deputy assistant attorney general for antitrust, said in an interview. “There inevitably will be more efficiency and more competition in the market.”
Real estate agents earned $93 billion in commissions in 2006, with a median commission of about $11,600, Justice Department officials said. Internet brokers, offering pared-down services, provided average rebates of 1 percent on commissions that normally ran 5 or 6 percent, translating into thousands of dollars per sale.
Consumer advocates hailed the settlement as an important and somewhat surprising step by the Bush administration, which has staked out a position on many antitrust issues seen as favorable to business interests.
“I was very pleasantly surprised,” said Stephen Brobeck, executive director of the Consumer Federation of America, which tracked the case. “Given the reluctance of anyone in Washington before the Justice Department to improve competition in the real-estate industry, this settlement represents a milestone.”
This is the real “wages of sin”.
Just like the laughing at the dollar for the Fed.
RE: Bail-out for Floridians
Just a precursor of what’s in store when the ‘O Bama crowd comes to town.
Still waiting for the credit card debt moratorium.
Stimulus checks add tiny boost
Income growth, spending by consumers up slightly
By Martin Crutsinger
ASSOCIATED PRESS
WASHINGTON – The first round of economic stimulus checks gave a boost to personal incomes in April, but a huge question remains: Will people spend the checks quickly enough to keep the economy afloat?
“Will people spend the checks quickly enough to keep the economy afloat?”
United States
The economy
Stimulus and shopping
May 29th 2008 | WASHINGTON, DC
From The Economist print edition
Good news for bargain basements
…
Congress passed its fiscal stimulus package in February, promising most Americans $600 plus $300 more for each child in income-tax rebates—and a hoped-for hefty economic boost along with it. Think-tankers predicted an increase in annualised GDP of between 0.8% and 3% in the quarter in which the Treasury started distributing the cheques, which it did at the end of April. But now that the cash is at last flowing, where is it going?
Retailers are promising big discounts for Americans who spend the rebates in their shops. But surveys find that consumers are planning to spend only somewhere between 20% and 40% of the rebate. The rest will go towards paying down debt or into savings accounts.
Indeed, lean business inventories indicate that retailers do not expect to see a surge in sales. And anyway, the dollars that are spent rather than saved may not go where they are most needed. With food and oil prices both sharply higher since Congress approved the stimulus package, 17% of recipients now plan to allocate their rebate money to these necessities, according to the National Retail Federation, a trade group. That’s great news for grocery stores, its spokesman says, but not for struggling big-box retailers.
The American consumer, once a bulwark against economic malaise, is increasingly reluctant to spend. An index of consumer confidence compiled by the Conference Board, a New York-based research group, hit a 16-year low on May 27th. Americans have not been as worried about the future since 1978, it found, with a record proportion expecting their incomes to fall. Rising commodity prices are not the only worry. The labour market is weak, with continuing jobless claims at a cyclical high. Home prices are still falling (see article). And the Federal Reserve reports that banks continue to tighten their lending criteria. More Americans worry about inflation, which could deepen these problems. Such negative consumer sentiment indicates that real spending is at risk of starting to decline for the first time since the recession of 1990-91.
From the article:
“Despite worries that consumers may end up using their stimulus checks to pay off credit-card debt rather than spending the money to boost the economy, analysts said they believe about two-thirds of the money will get spent this year, enough to keep the overall economy in positive territory, as measured by the gross domestic product.”
Why the huge disparity between the opinions of the no-name analysts and the writers at The Economist magazine?
I think they are holding up my stimulus check trying to decide if they are supposed to withhold my $200 interest and penalty first. The nerve
We still haven’t got a nickel from the bastards.
I wonder how many homes in our country are being financed by thin pieces of plastic, and nothing more?
House of Cards
You know, as a kid growing up in W. Colorado, we always got the movies and styles way behind the rest of the world. We’d see the trailers for a new movie and then the movie would show up months later. Well, looks like the same with the housing bust. From today’s Grand Junction, CO, paper (http://tinyurl.com/5hmrk9):
“Residential building permits for new construction are down 39 percent for the county and 48 percent for the city, and some say it is just the beginning of a slide that could last a few years in the local housing market. Others say the national economy is starting to affect the Grand Valley. And some are optimistic it is just a temporary slowdown.
“We are in a down slide. I see it getting a lot worse,” said John Davis, owner of Blue Star Industries, a local home builder. “We haven’t hit bottom yet. … We are already starting to lose builders.”
Davis said he remembers the dark days of the early 1980s and is prepared for their return.
“I would really be surprised if we don’t go down 50 percent this year — for a couple years,” he said. “I don’t know what is going to stop it. We are still going down. The only good thing about the market is the rentals. Rentals is booming.”
There were indications from 2006 to 2007 that the local housing market was beginning to slip, said Tucker Adams, regional economist and president of the Adams Group.”
Two anecdotes from Absecon Island (Atlantic City area), NJ, but chores need doin’ and can’t wait for Local Observations.
Local weekly entertainment rag has listed for $279,900 a condo in converted 1950’s beachfront motel. No. of bedrooms not given; I suspect it’s a studio. This place is a mess. Friend of a friend was stuck with one of these and had nothing but trouble with his seasonal (winter/summer) tenants and those of other owners. Last tenant I heard of moved about a year ago partly because of constant bickering with other tenants or owners over assigned parking spaces. After tenant moved out, friend of friend was surprised to receive penalty/bill from Condo Assoc. for numerous times when his tenant’s parents squeezed into studio for weekend with their very loud lap dog. Similar studio now billed as “Your Refuge at the Shore.” I don’t think so.
Wife is a librarian and, this week, encountered older couple from the old ‘hood whom she knew on a “How are you?” basis. Wife asked about the ‘hood and couple seemed upset as they reported about monthly or seasonal rentals on either side of their place. Seems that owners have put into each place yuppies of kind who live and work during week in Center City Philadelphia and party ’til they drop on weekends at the shore. Problem is these yuppies have many like-minded friends who are in and out of the places from Thursday through Sunday nights, parking in older couple’s driveway, “F** this,” and “F## that,” from dusk ’til dawn. But, hey– I guess the owners will do whatever it takes to crack that mortgage nut.
Have a nice weekend.
Are you in Margate?
Last tenant I heard of moved about a year ago partly because of constant bickering with other tenants or owners over assigned parking spaces.
When I owned rental units, a lot of my time was eaten up mediating tenant disputes.
Do not miss.
Older couple should put up a sign that says “Private Parking, Violators will be towed” and find a company that will do it and charge the yuppies to get their cars back. Check with town to see if there are any rules about how big and visible the sign has to bo or if the town or state requires the cops to be notified first. Seriously. They need to at least maintain their property rights. Flood lights on motion detectors would be a good idea too.
My wife wanted to consider large apartments in Houston after 7 years in a 1200 sqft/capita house. Then I showed her the review of her top internet researched choice showing the totally molded out ventilation… Problem solved. Plus she likely now understands warnings for house purchasing, and inspections.
The slow death of CNY….
Is this house for $379k on 1.7 acres really worth $18,886 in taxes? This neighborhood is no where near any water. My gawd, you could give the house to someone and they’d still be responsible for $1574/month before utilities and maintenance. Sadly this house price point isn’t even considered high for the area. I’m not sure how it got nabbed w/that tax bill.
http://cnyhomes.com/Listing/Search/info.cgi?mlnum=188773
http://cnyhomes.com/Listing/Search/info.cgi?mlnum=187213
This house is on the water across the street from and overlooking the lake. The tax bill is only $7k as opposed to the one I listed above with the $18886 tax bill and no water for miles. Same size lot, somewhat smaller home. The real difference? Different counties and 40 min commute to Syr vs 15 min. Who knows, perhaps Erieville is behind on their assessments?
Ya know for $11k a year tax savings, I’d pay for the gas.
We were interested in the properties in Briars Brooks. Then we observed half the people are selling at any given time. It seems like most of the people want out of this development. Some of these houses came on the market with a price tags of over 500K. The foreclosed houses have dropped in price to around 375K. There are no trees in this development. It appears like soul less cul-de-sac dormitory with 3500 sq.ft houses.
No Thanks.
Question: Why do the local RE forum posters defend housing aggressively?
Compare that to about $1200 a year for a house at that price point here… The tax payment is a house payment for a 250K home. SHUDDER!
no thanks. I will continue to rent.
yeah, me too, denquiry, but just sayin’
Lying on a loan application is OK now, unless you are a lender? WTF?
Are Borrowers Free to Lie?
Lender Held Responsible for Vetting Data on Home Loan
By AMIR EFRATI
May 31, 2008; Page B2
In a ruling that backs borrowers even when they have lied on loan applications, a federal bankruptcy judge held that borrowers who inflated their income to get a loan don’t have to pay back a bank because the lender should have noticed a “red flag” about the deceit.
The case, which the Oakland, Calif., judge called “a poster child for some of the practices that have led to the current crisis in our housing market,” places responsibility on the lender for vetting information in loan applications.
“Lender Held Responsible for Vetting Data on Home Loan”
I would have written it “for not Vetting Data”, but then I’m not from head-screwed-on-backwardsville.
Amazing! The federal judge who made the ruling was appointed in 1987, under Regan! I was ready to blame the Democrats.
That’s pretty much traditional common law. A misrepresentation that’s not relied upon is not fraud. Fraud requires that the victim relied on a material misrepresentation or omission. Since stated-income lenders, in practice, did not use income in their underwriting, any misrepresentation of such income was irrelevant to the credit decision. If the misrepresentation was irrelevant then it would not support a finding of fraud.
Thanks! This does make sense, though you’d think there would be some consequences for lying on a mortgage application.
Yep, I can see that ruling on stated income loans ,but what about loans that were not stated income loans that were riddled with fraud or bogus pay studs and phony tax returns ?
There can be if the loan is a “federally-related mortgage loan.” Under most US statutory, not common, fraud law reliance is not an element. So if you lie about your income on a loan originated by an FDIC insured institution or an FHA/VA loan then you have committed a federal offense even if your income was not part of the underwriting process. If the loan was originated by a mortgage banker and was not FHA/VA then state law, or lacking specifics, common law, prevails.
The lesson to be learned is that you should consult a lawyer before you commit any action that might be a fraud.
Less Fed, more free market! Get the banking sector leeches out of our wallets and let our country get back to work.
Long live Adam Smith! Long live Milton Friedman! Long live American freedoms!!
Let’s Try Market-Oriented Market Reform
By BERT ELY
May 31, 2008
The demands for more government regulation of financial markets are growing louder and more insistent in the wake of the housing meltdown. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, for example, wants Congress to give the Federal Reserve broad new powers to monitor the financial markets so that it can quickly identify new threats to financial stability when and if they emerge.
But it is naive to expect the Fed to be an omniscient predictor of financial trends. It is even more naive to think that the Fed would have the political will, and clout, to neutralize potentially destabilizing forces before they cause financial havoc.
The mess in the financial system today is the result of previous government rules that pushed markets in the wrong directions. To prevent another crisis we need to change the rules, aligning the incentives of financial players with optimum market outcomes.
Dear Prof,
I am concerned about FDA and the the quality of Drug enforcement in the US.
I understand that approx. 80% of the raw materials used in the US drug mfg. business is imported from overseas with little or no quality control by our mfgers or FDA.
I believe like you that there needs to be alot of deregulation, however in some govt. areas greater supervision is required. I believe that greater controls should be imposed on the financial system and the medical system. These are two areas that are critical to the well being of the US. IMHO
I overheard a conversation yesterday at a car dealership. I was in the dealership with a friend during lunch who was buying a small part for his truck.
Anyway, while waiting on him to pay, I saw a couple guys both older than me, one in his late 50’s and the other was an old timer. The younger guy was telling the older that “when the government was getting involved in all these foreclosures, they aren’t doing it to help the people, they are doing it to help the banks!”.
Just wanted to share. I’m off to a fish fry.
Phillygal: “Are you in Margate?”
Just got back for one mo’ quick peek before I clean birdcage. Yes, I am in Margate. The days of the Barbary Coast and Merrill’s 10 for 1 beers are long gone down here. The partygoers now drop big bucks on overpriced drinks without blinking an eye and keep raving ’til dawn on I don’t know what. The Animal House bungalows are pretty much all knocked down, replaced with vinyl sided McMansions much more suited for Philly suburbs. One chore I have to do today is batten down hatches for thunderstorms forecasted for late this afternoon. I’m dying to see how remarkably cheap looking roof on nearby McMansion fares.
Here is an idea that might appeal to some of the more glittery-eyed posters on this board. Being a bear rather than a prospector, I see this article as an indicator of an incipient gold price crash due to a future supply glut juxtaposed against waning dollar devaluation hedge demand.
United States
The new gold rush
Miner ‘09er
May 29th 2008 | ANCHORAGE
From The Economist print edition
A price of $900 an ounce is quite an incentive
STEVE HERSCHBACH has seen it all before. There is a number, he explains, at which greed overcomes fear, and rationality goes out the window. “Last year the price of gold hit $700 an ounce and I thought it was going to take off, but it really didn’t happen,” says Mr Herschbach, an amateur prospector for more than 30 years and owner of the Alaska Mining and Diving shop in Anchorage. But when it broke $1,000 earlier this year, “Well, we’re in the middle of it now. Everyone hoping to make a buck has suddenly come out of the woodwork.” The price has fallen back a bit, but is still over $900.
My efforts at finding a Golconda in lode bearing rivers in the Golden State requires a budget of around $25.
Gold Pan: $15
6pk of beer: $10
Yeah, but the $15 goes to the same industry that made money the last time. See, waiting for the turnaround really DOES work! No wonder Seattle prices can Only Go Up.
You forgot to budget for a rain smock and bug repellent.
I’m already smock-tested.
Aladinsane,
You either have the sharpest and quickest wit in town or you are drunk every time you get in front of your key board.
So which one?
The HBr’s wants to know!
I’ll tell you @ 4:20
Drove by AK M&D several times yesterday in search of a reconstructed battery for my ‘91 Previa; sad to say, the store is out of business, overshadowed by a new strip club, which the owners said in an Anch Daily News article, reflects ‘family values’.
I bought a gold pan at M&D for visiting relatives; I prefer buying gold futures at/below 200 day EMA, dollar-cost average into gold mutual funds or purchasing a zillion shares of producing junior golds at less than a buck (at least back in 2003), rather than applying neurotoxins to discourage female mosquitoes searching for cholesterol to make estrogen-like hormones so as to ovulate.
The best way to get rid of moskies is to quit breathing.
Really, the carbon dioxide you exhale is their homing signal.
“The best way to get rid of moskies is to quit breathing.”
Well… That’s got it’s drawbacks too..
At some constructions sites (and parties), a large bottle-fan apparatus baited by a CO2 cartridge is used - the bottle can fill up in a few hours in the summertime!
Talk me down guys:
http://cnyhomes.com/Listing/Search/more_photos.cgi?mlnum=193057
An old house w/a porch on 10 acres close enough to a lake big enough to put a decent sailboat on…..ugh…..shakes….crumbling resolve….
What a maintenance nightmare not to mention the life draining tax bill.
Talk her down…umm…wiat another 2 years and you will be able to buy it for cash?
When the zombies come you won’t want to be living in New York.
Can’t help you–I think its gorgeous.
I think it’s great too, but I’m with Polly. HOLD OFF…and buy for cash in a year or two. I love upstate NY too, but at the least, you need to see how much the taxes are jacked up in the next year or two to cover falling revenues.
Pete Peterson’s $1 Billion Bully Pulpit
Robert Lenzner 05.30.08, 6:00 PM ET
http://www.forbes.com/2008/05/30/federal-finance-blackstone-oped-cx_rl_0530croesus.html?partner=yahootix
“…Peterson wants to do something about these liabilities, these crushing fiscal obligations that will have a deleterious impact on our economy and our place in the world unless we act…”
IMO Mr. Peterson is the person most responsible for putting the country in this mess. His asset stripping as well as his pension fund robberies directly lead to the current problems. Now he talks a good story, but there is a special place in hell for the man.
I would guess he has aligned his bets so that when and if the gubmint “does something,” he will make out like a bandit (similar to Pimpco’s CEO’s strategy).
PB,
Mr. Gross does what any reasonable investor does. Yes, Mr. Gross will make a lot of moneys investing on the side of the governments, like me has put a lot of his investments in Brazilian government bonds (Less than 2 years maturity). He writes his positions up every month and any person can invest like PIMCO. PIMCOs fund has beaten the S&P500 funds for the last 25 years.
D: see my scenario on the make whole doctrine in Sovereign Debt Obligations.
If you are not actively purchasing these instruments..you are missing out on getting paid.
Who is D?
Sometimes I think Im too abstract, but it really isnt complicated. Apologies for the intrusion.
It is all your fault Vozzie! If you stayed away from the Pale Ale, and just bought more Westport - you could retire. lol
I dont know what your talking about, Im sideways into TMM…. for the lucre, for the glory.
listen up hozzie,
you are a straight shooter and I like that, I tried to be one on this here blog, but I got called arrogant a couple times by not uncommon pithy posters….now I tone it wayyyyyy down, and make it real hard to understand.
anyway, I actually search out your posts, and I read A LOT of blogs…
I find occasionally that I get a strong pingback when I pull off a really juicy one…and even then Im ususally hammered on corn squeezins, cuz
Im just a dumb hillbilly..YEEHAW…
Finished balancing my books for May! Time for a Lienie’s Big Butt
hey Jas Jain:
got a long dated put and call for sale on GM….interested? How bout Sprint? GE? no even better….MBIA……long dated deep in the money.
aahhh, its good to be the king. How bout some treasuries and Francs……got gold?
Lucre for the glory? Treasure bath, Im going to have a treasure bath, TREASURE BATH!!!
seriously, its all win/win…. just show me the panic on currency corner with policy shock as it relates to securitization within globalization.
ive already said too much
Voz,
You gave me Westport Innovation for the gas account I set up for Lars! It is up 50% this month. Lars thinks he knows what he is doing. I thought I talked to you about being a hillbilly, you are an ex arizona, ex california commie living in Oregon (No Italian/Swedes allowed). Do they even allow quads to ride into town? barbaric state. Yes Grupo TMM is going to treat me well for a number of years and Formation is about to make the major move. One of my sons is going to teach snow boarding lessons at Mt Hood this year. Maybe I’ll go visit him. He leaves Mon.
Here’s on thing that puzzles me.
I’ve never heard any lawmaker, Attorney General, etc, wanting to try to get money out of the Realtor (TM) industry!
In fact, it would be a great opportunity to essentialy sue and legislate this industry out of business.
I”m of the (minority) opinion that the FBs (Harry Howmuchamonth and Sally Spectuvestor) should cover the bulk of the losses. Making the taxpayers pay to keep them in their homes (in which many have invested nothing with 0% down) is disgusting and immoral IMHO. And forcing banks to take cram-downs is nearly as bad.
But there’s one other culprit other than the greedy borrowers: the R-E industry. These licensed professionals were telling people that prices never go down, that houses, condos, condo-tells, etc, we’re good investments. They were telling people to buy now or be priced out forever. They were convincing people that they can afford things they couldn’t possibly pay for because some affordability fairy would wave her magic wand and let you refinance (this never made any sense to me!)
So why can’t we have a congressional investigation, a court case, whatever it takes, and get a settlement akin to the tobbaco settlements? Why isn’t every R-E company in the US that has anything to do with this made to pay all its money.
Then take what you can get out of them and find every FB that may be somewhat “innocent”. This means no 100% or 125% financing, no HELOCs, no second or third homes, no lying on mortgage application etc. (You’ll get rid of 90% of them!) Take this 10% of FBs and divide the money collected from the R-E agencies to see if that can keep them in “their” houses.
Then you’re done. Don’t rely on taxpayers to keep deadbeats in their house. Stop throwing tax breaks at them. Stop forgiving mortgage debt.
This would punish the group–other than the FBs themselves–most responsbile for this, and leave the taxpayers alone.
I’m sure the majority of Americans would like to see all Realtors (TM) out of work! You’d think a politician who tried this would be popular…
How about class action suits against the NAR, CAR and other organizations who preached “real estate always goes up”? I would think these trade groups might bear culpability for convincing many greater fools to buy homes they cannot afford, but I am not an attorney…
I’d really love to see NAR and their state organizations tied up in a class action suit during the next 10? years of decline. I’m not wagering on it but outside of a select group of individuals, I know of no other group that needs to be taken down hard.
My heart isn’t bleeding to bad for the real estate people who (1)set up crooked deals ,(2)encouraged people to by properties they could not afford ,(3) scared buyers into buying , or selling (4) threatened appraisers if they didn’t hit the mark,(5) lied about comp information or bids on property (5) skirted their duty to prevent fraud ,(5) set up cash back fraud and incentive schemes ,(6) helped borrowers submit fraudulent loan applications (7) engaged in double escrow sales to spike the price of housing ,(8) lied to borrowers about future value and ability to get refinancing ,(9) conducted National advertising campaigns telling the public it was a good time to buy , or other faulty advice ,which is investment or tax advice they had no business giving ,(10) withheld vital document from the lenders on the full terms on the sales transactions ,(11) created myths and lies to hide the nature of the Ponzi-investment real estate scheme to justify the way they were selling absurdly inflated property and toxic loans ,(12) took kick-backs from builders and lenders agents to screw the borrower (13) did not protect buyers or seller legally and engaged in one-sided contracts that produced compromising situations for buyers and sellers ,(14) did not disclose known material defects and knowledge of local conditions ,(15)and all the other breaches of fiduciary duty against the real estate buying public .
Didn’t hear to many commissioned sales people objecting to the foul play that they witnessed daily . Strange that there wasn’t more whistle blowers ,but rather they all started chanted the same lines and cheer-leading and doing the same thing ,with the exception of a small percentage .
Is there a chance at least some of the behaviors you mention above could be considered illegal?
Yeah, but the NAR itself doesn’t have much $$$. You need to go after Century 21, Remax, etc.
Got some PR stuff today from a RE person in W. Colorado, she says things are moving like hotcakes under the 200k price range, so I open the RE mag she sent and can find only 3 properties under 200k. Then she goes on and on with the crap about how it’s a good time to buy, etc. etc., then says, “I’ve included a little gift for you…”
HOT DOG!!!! FOUR - count ‘em - FOUR 1 cent stamps!!! WAHOOOO!!!
This song by the Samples (a 90s band from Boulder, CO) is dedicated to all used house salespeople, here’s to YOU…
Summertime
well the trust was broke
’cause the words were wrong
and faith is weak
but the wind is strong
well I don’t know much
and I don’t lie
when the cold wind blows
in the summertime
well I won’t look back
because we made it here
to find that truth
was founded on lies
in the summertime
Really? I got tipped in stamps once during college (worked at hillbilly Chili’s, so nasty), and they left more that that. And this was in 1998! So toothless hillbilly > realtor.
I saw the Samples a few times.
This just in:
My private health insurance just went up 42.00 a month.
No problemo!
It’s my way of being a demo-cat without voting for O’bumma.
Written by John Adams to his daughter on the subject of choosing a husband.
“An honest, sensible, humane man, above all the littleness of vanity and extravagances of imagination, laboring to do good rather than be rich, to be useful rather than make a show, living in modest simplicity clearly within his means and free from debts and obligations, is really the most respectable man in society, makes himself and all about him most happy.”
Dream husband.
The most rapacious overtly-Christian small business man I ever worked for gave us new employees copies of George Washington’s Rules of Civility (Which he had cribbed in part from some Frenchman - whatever.) Just the 15 or so most pertinent to business were presented, not this complete list:
http://www.nationalcenter.org/WashingtonCivility.html
These supplementing kindergarten socialization can take you far.
I believe that it was TR that assisted in the first Civil Service effort in NY. (ie., the police. He required training in weapons and other police type thingies).
The rationale was to get pols out of the running of govt. Set up an independent and qualified group of public employees to perform public service. Part of the solution was to insulate public servants by the rules that you complain about!
Unfortunately, for what reason, politics has again re entered the govt’s civilian servants…Good job Brownie…
Did you watch the Rules Committee of the Dems today?
I am sorry to say, the Dems are permanently split between two groups-Women(51% of the pop.) and Blacks (15%).
As a moderate and a Dem, the Dems have “grabbed defeat from the jaws of victory”.
I am no Kevin Philips, however, we are witnessing the destruction of the Democratic party in the US.
The Reps are no better off. Mc will , if he wants to win, will further distance himself from GWB. The end result, there will be flight from the Dems to Reps.
IMHO
I do not want to be anti-PC, but history is taking place before your very eyes.
How does that old saying go, ” do you believe what I say or your lying eyes?”
WASHINGTON — Democratic party officials said a committee agreed Saturday on a compromise to seat Michigan and Florida delegates with half-votes after Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton failed to get enough support to force their positions through.
Clinton’s chief delegate hunter Harold Ickes angrily informed the committee that Clinton had instructed him to reserve her right to appeal the matter to the Democrats’ credentials committee, which could potentially drag the matter to the party’s convention in August.
“There’s been a lot of talk about party unity _ let’s all come together, and put our arms around each other,” said Ickes, who is also a member of the Rules Committee that approved the deal. “I submit to you ladies and gentlemen, hijacking four delegates … is not a good way to start down the path of party unity.”
The Dem party is now split and dead as a governing party in the US. You will now see “white flight”.
The Reps. party will also be affected by the influx of new members.
My prediction for what its worth. Two parties, one Anglo/citizen and one minorities/illegals.
I guess you can thank GWB for this earth shattering event. Yes, GWB will go into the history books, but not for the reasons he had hoped for-the restructuring of the political parties.
I think that you might be right. But in the back of my mind, I’m also thinking that if the GOP can survive Watergate, then the Democrats can survive Clinton/Obama. It may cost them the 2008 election, though.
Historically, a very similar election occurred in 1824. The country was dominated by the Democratic-Republicans and four candidates ran in the general election. John Quincy Adams had the support of New England, while Henry Clay and Andrew Jackson split the Middewest and South (the fourth candidate, Crawford, suffered a major stroke, but won VA and his homestate of GA). Jackson convincingly won the popular vote (41% to Adams’ 31%), but only had 99 of the 131 electoral votes needed to secure election.
As per the 12th Amendment, the election was turned over to the House of Representatives. With support of Clay (then Speaker of the House), Adams secured the support of a majority of state delegations to win the presidency.
Jackson and his supporters were outraged and called Clay’s deal with Adams a “corrupt bargain” (Adams appointed Clay to be Secretary of State, which at the time was tantamount to making him the heir apparent). Like Obama, Jackson was very much an anti-establishment candidate running against a relation of a former president. The long-term consequences were the formation of what became the modern Democratic party (Democratic-Republicans becoming the GOP) that dominated southern politics until the mid-20th century.
I don’t know if the current disputes will ultimately lead to massive reallignment of political interests. But it should be noted that the various coalitions of both major parties are beginning to splinter. For Democrats, the bitch of it is, there’s very little substantive difference between the two. They articulate very similar points, albeit Obama with more charisma and Clinton with more detail. The substantive differences between the religious right (Huckabee), libertarians (Paul), and neoconservatives (McCain) are much striking. Yet it appears that the GOP factions will stick together (e.g., Bob Barr is running as a third-party candidate rather than Ron Paul).
Based on what Ickes said today, it seems as though Clinton is prepared to take the fight to the convention to dispute the MI/FL punishment. Which as an amateur political scientist, I find exciting and fascinating.
I’m finishing up a graduate seminar at UC Davis in political behavior, taught by the chair of the department Robert Huckfeldt (he helped introduce dynamic modeling to the discipline in the late 1970s/early 1980s). For anyone interested, he cowrote a book in 1989 (Race and the Decline of Class in American Politics) that analyzed the fragile balance between racial politics and the working class. It’s a very interesting read and he predicted that it would ultimately prove to be an unsustainable coalition. Very topical for a book written 20 years ago.
Has the holy grail of physics been found?
Cold fusion success in Japan gets warm reception in India
Bangalore, May 27 (IANS) Researchers in Japan have given a live public demonstration of their cold fusion device, a historic experiment that is likely to revive global interest in this controversial method of energy generation that was earlier debunked as nonsense. A report in the California-based New Energy Times says the tabletop device built by Osaka University physicist Yoshiaki Arata and his associate Yue Chang Zhang continuously generated excess energy in the form of heat and also produced helium particles.
“The demonstration showed their method was highly reproducible,” the report quoted physicist Akito Takahashi, one of the 60 persons from industry and universities who witnessed it, as saying.
The demonstration held on May 22 has drawn immediate praise from Mahadeva Srinivasan, a cold fusion pioneer and formerly associate director of physics at the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC) in Mumbai….
Arata, who is the recipient of Japan’s highest award, the Emperor’s Prize, is the first person to have performed thermonuclear fusion research in Japan. Arata and his colleague Zhang have been reporting their work on cold fusion at various conferences and in Japanese journals for the last 10 years….”
So the guy is not a mope from Utah, reproducible experiment…guess we’ll be paying royalties to Japan.
http://www.thaindian.com/newsportal/sci-tech/cold-fusion-success-in-japan-gets-warm-reception-in-india_10053182.html
I stopped into costco for a quickie, and some guy in the aisles was selling world savings real estate owned houses. reo’s for short.
I got the list. It’s in creepy areas. But Im seeing lots for under 200k.
Also, vacant -TBD? To be dumped?
http://www.sdforsale.com
A quick what? Maybe I should join.
Numbers Racket
Why the economy is worse than we know
KEVIN PHILLIPS
Harper’s Magazine v.316, n.1896
1may2008
And in other news, I broke a fingernail.
Associated Press
Countrywide spent $249,000 lobbying in 1Q
Associated Press 05.30.08, 10:40 AM ET
WASHINGTON -
Mortgage lender Countrywide Financial Corp. spent $249,000 in the first quarter to lobby on regulations and legislation affecting mortgage lending.
The Calabasas, Calif.-based company, which agreed in January to be acquired by Bank of America Corp. (nyse: BAC - news - people ), has been hit hard by the housing market downturn, as mortgage defaults and foreclosures skyrocketed.
Its chief executive, Angelo Mozilo, was grilled by House lawmakers in March after receiving more than $120 million in compensation and sales of company stock last year while Countrywide’s fortunes plummeted.
Only $250k? I can understand the outrage in Washington. How dare a major corporation not contribute more in a last-ditch effort to save itself?!? Have they no respect for the institution?
Looks like Godzilla already bled all the potential lobbying funds out of the company…
Countrywide is like Hillary - neither is going to go away quietly.
Lately, I’ve been writing my local Reps. (I always send real letters, not email), telling them to worry about the TRUE VICTIMS of the Housing Bubble.
People like this, for example
http://www.cnn.com/2008/LIVING/wayoflife/05/28/renters.booted/
(Renters who get booted because their landlord didn’t disclose the property was in foreclosure.)
While there’s some talk in this article about some “northeast legislators” introducing legislation to protect renters, I’ve never seen any swift definite action.
This should be criminalized,immediately and the landlords sent to jail.
If Congress can rush through the “Deadbeat Specuvestors Forgiveness Act of 2007″ which gives FBs 10s of thousands of dollars in tax breaks, they certainly can rush through legislation to protect actual VICTIMS.