Bits Bucket For August 29, 2008
Please visit the HBB Forum. Post off-topic ideas, links and Craigslist finds here.
The Housing Bubble
Examining the home price boom and its effect on owners, lenders, regulators, realtors and the economy as a whole.
August 29, 2008
348 Comments »
Trackback responses to this post
- HausDev
- HausDev
- The Housing Bubble Blog
- halo 2 mods
- halo 2 mods
About Me
Name:Ben Jones
Location:Northern Arizona, United States
To donate by mail, or to otherwise contact this blogger, please send emails to: thehousingbubble@gmail.com
PayPal is a secure online payment method which accepts ALL major credit cards.
Links
-
November 2024 M T W T F S S « Sep 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30
Photo Submission: hbbphotos@gmail.com
View the HBB Photo Gallery *updated 4/13/2008
New York real estate tycoon actually a con artist, authorities say
Hochfelder arrested, charged with grand larceny, forgery; received some funding from Robert Bass.
“He was very successful at convincing people he was a successful entrepreneur,” said Mr. Morgenthau. “But he was getting along on borrowed money.”
http://www.financialweek.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080828/REG/808289984/1036
“He was very successful at convincing people he was a successful entrepreneur,” said Mr. Morgenthau. “But he was getting along on borrowed money.”
========================================
Doesn’t this describe most American businessmen, in our looks are everything, substance not so much, way of being?
This spells opportunity for those not taken in by looks but instead rely on substance.
So you’re saying us ugly people might finally have a chance?
The best chance of all. The ugly people are forced to develope alternative methods of getting through life. These alternative methods will last a lifetime.
Those who rely on beauty to get through life are screwed once their gift of beauty fades.
The ugly truth is beautiful.
OK, I should be rolling in dough by now…. They broke the ugly stick beating my @$$ with it.
‘Those who rely on beauty to get through life are screwed once their gift of beauty fades.’
Well, what if you just decide to not ‘fade’?
Well, what if you just decide to not ‘fade’?
And how is that?
Recent reunion, 6 out of the rest didn’t fade. the others had life handed to them in the usual ways.
Signing up now for all those infomercial tricks. lol
This describes the American success story — not just in business, but politics and academia as well.
People who go by more than looks tend to bring up facts - things like “housing does NOT always go up” and “housing prices must be based upon incomes” and other such things.
These people are labeled as not being “team players” and are the first to be let go while the “visionaries” run the company/nation/etc into the ground with their delusions. But, since they look good doing it, nobody seems to mind.
Lucky me, i got looks and brains…
that’s not for you to decide…;)
Beauty is a lot easier to appreciate, than to maintain.
Looks are very subjective. One person may find somebody irresistibly attractive, while another may find that same person not very attractive at all. Guys used to love Julia Roberts. Not me. Nice woman, but she looks like a Mick Jagger/Steven Tyler hybrid to me. Angelina Jolie? She’s just OK in my mind. Carmen Electra and Christina Applegate? Now we’re talkin’! Anyway, different strokes for different folks.
A 6 foot 5 man lords over a 5 foot 8 competitor, when vying for a job.
Thank god I’m over 6 feet, I suppose.
aladdy
I see yer point about “size usually matters” but the larger size isnt always best for every job.
ex; the 5ft 8 dude is much better for a test pilot than 6ft 5.
horse jockeys even more so. but again, I do recognize/agree with yer general comment.
rock on, dude !
Hmm, the money in my business is only lent, never borrowed (by me). But then, I’m not a man. Is that the key difference?
Hey, here’s to McC for choosing a woman. I’d have preferred Sheila Bair (the FDIC chairman), but I’m happier with Sarah Palin than I would be with Pawlenty, Huckabee, or Romney.
Yup
On February 13th, 1933, journalist Garet Garrett wrote:
“This is what is new in this depression, and wherein it departs from history. In previous depressions, a bank that was book solvent and unable to pay its depositors had no alternative. It was obliged to go into bankruptcy and liquidate. A railroad that could not pay its creditors simply went into receivership and was liquidated. And so on. Such a thing as Government going into debt itself in order to assume and underwrite the debts of private enterprise was hitherto unimaginable.”
Today the average American can’t imagine the government NOT assuming responsibility for bankrupt institutions. Even citizens who have done a poor job of managing their own financial affairs are begging for rescue from the federal government. (Read - taxpayer.) Thanks to the pioneering of Roosevelt and his band of academic experts the American habit of self-sufficiency and personal responsibility has been washed away. We are now, for the most part, a nation of subsidized dependents crying to have our bills paid by someone else. Even if we get into a financial mess of our own making we don’t want to pay the penalty. We want a bailout.
Well said.
I was amazed that my kid’s hs book actually admitted the new deal failed- we have a new deal up ahead
You’ve mentioned this several times. Can you give us the citation, maybe post a link to the page where it says that?
He’d probably have to scan the page that he scribbled the comment in on.
I don’t doubt that the assertion is printed in the text. I’d just like to see the book and see what else my tax dollars are going for.
We are now, for the most part, a nation of subsidized dependents crying to have our bills paid by someone else.
“Subsidized dependents” led first and foremost, of course, by corporations that strip-mine our resources, exploit our citizenry, pursue the path of unmitigated greed, preach the Holy Gospel Of The Free Market — and then whine that they require legal loopholes, tax breaks, concessions, protections, and billions in federal aid once the going gets tough.
Harrumph. Some free market.
That isn’t the legacy of Roosevelt, that’s the legacy of Reagan and his lesser contemporaries, who value corporate entities and the investor class above average citizens.
I agree, I don’t recall in 1929 that FDR saved any companies except those in the liquor/bottling industries.
He certainly didn’t save any brokerage houses or banks.
The farmers in the dust bowel didn’t see much help either.
I think the bailout of Chrysler in 1980 sorta set the stage for modern times.
Also, look it up on Wickipedia - The unemployment rate in 1937 at the end of FDR’s second term increased to more than 19% as a recession took hold.
It took WWII to get America rolling.
And the war with Japan: FDR knew beforehand that Japan was going to invade Hawaii. He figured it’s okay for hundreds of Hawaiians and Americans at Pearl Harbor to not be warned and die.
Isn’t that last sentence where the Wikipedia shut-ins usually append the superscript “(citation needed)”?
(But I’m not saying it’s wrong.)
I agree, America did get rolling after World War II. That’s what killing the competition will get you. If Hitler’s scientists had developed the atomic bomb before ours did, Germany would have gotten rolling after World War II, no matter if Calvin Coolidge had been reelected 5 times.
As it happened, Hitler did get Germany rolling from its depression until 1943, but that proved to be a poor economic plan.
Walter Williams
There’s no free lunch
…
‘Dr. Paul Krugman, Princeton University economist and New York Times writer, apparently believes in the machine of the first kind. In his column “After the Horror” (New York Times, Sept. 14, 2001), he says, “Ghastly as it may seem to say this, the terror attack — like the original day of infamy, which brought an end to the Great Depression — could do some economic good.” He suggests that the destruction will stimulate the economy through business investment in rebuilding.
We know this has to be fishy just by asking: Would there have been even greater “economic good” had the terrorists succeeded in destroying buildings in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, Philadelphia, Boston and all other major cities? Of course, you and I know that is utter nonsense. Property destruction always lowers the wealth of a nation. I hope one of Krugman’s students asks him, “If property destruction is good for the economy, why aren’t Beirut and Belfast boom towns?’
“It took WWII to get America rolling.”
Post hoc, ergo propter hoc.
Of course, it probably doesn’t hurt a country’s economic standing if the capital stock of all its major competitors gets destroyed.
Bear, on its face I can’t help but agree.
But then what is economics anyway? A lot of us have never been to the Middle East, and can’t fathom that people living in Beirut can have an economy at all. We don’t understand that it’s actually probably a vibrant one, with manufacturing, raw materials, trade, labor, knowledge work all rolled up into something that we never see on the evening news or newspapers of record. The last time somebody tried to flatten Lebanon, a convoy of trucks a mile long carried away debris and the place now probably looks like The Hague.
I ask what is an economy anyway, because people have to live. The money was stored up somewhere, somwhow, the knowledge is there, people have to eat, wake up in the morning and do something. It’s that “doing” something that constitutes an economy, based on whatever it is.
If somebody directs too much doing something in the wrong direction (building houses or Web enterprises based on inverse logistics, the free market sort of takes care of the results).
That’s right, when the financial pigs on wallstreet destroy the economy we should just let the poor starve on the streets. Well if we move into another great depression I’ll come back and see how eager you are to see the crime and poverty that develope with such an approach. The new deal put people to work and kept them from rioting or committing crime which is what most people would do when they can’t feed their children.
Unrelated but a nice paragraph off wikipedia on the cause of the great depression
Marriner S. Eccles,
As mass production has to be accompanied by mass consumption, mass consumption, in turn, implies a distribution of wealth — not of existing wealth, but of wealth as it is currently produced — to provide men with buying power equal to the amount of goods and services offered by the nation’s economic machinery. [Emphasis in original.] Instead of achieving that kind of distribution, a giant suction pump had by 1929-30 drawn into a few hands an increasing portion of currently produced wealth. This served them as capital accumulations. But by taking purchasing power out of the hands of mass consumers, the savers denied to themselves the kind of effective demand for their products that would justify a reinvestment of their capital accumulations in new plants. In consequence, as in a poker game where the chips were concentrated in fewer and fewer hands, the other fellows could stay in the game only by borrowing. When their credit ran out, the game stopped.
That is what happened to us in the twenties. We sustained high levels of employment in that period with the aid of an exceptional expansion of debt outside of the banking system. This debt was provided by the large growth of business savings as well as savings by individuals, particularly in the upper-income groups where taxes were relatively low. Private debt outside of the banking system increased about fifty per cent. This debt, which was at high interest rates, largely took the form of mortgage debt on housing, office, and hotel structures, consumer installment debt, brokers’ loans, and foreign debt. The stimulation to spending by debt-creation of this sort was short-lived and could not be counted on to sustain high levels of employment for long periods of time. Had there been a better distribution of the current income from the national product — in other words, had there been less savings by business and the higher-income groups and more income in the lower groups — we should have had far greater stability in our economy. Had the six billion dollars, for instance, that were loaned by corporations and wealthy individuals for stock-market speculation been distributed to the public as lower prices or higher wages and with less profits to the corporations and the well-to-do, it would have prevented or greatly moderated the economic collapse that began at the end of 1929.
Wow sounds exactly like what we face today
“That’s right, when the financial pigs on wallstreet destroy the economy we should just let the poor starve on the streets”.
I don’t think anyone should worry to much about seeing the poor starve on the streets. There has always been and always will be charitable people and groups. Long before forced welfare came along.
and there have always been people like Fidel Castro, Che Guevara, Malcom X, Adolf Hitler, etc. to rally those starving people to death and destruction, strangling the goose that lays the golden eggs. I say let’s protect the bird.
Xactly.
The best cure for poverty: Get a job. Develop a strong work ethic early, preferably in your teens and save money. I have a 32 year old nephew who is on economic outpatient care and has been for 31 years of his life. He just watches television.
I grew up in a lower middle class family. Gang fights were right outside my window. One person across the street got his face blown off in a drug deal. I was not born with a silver spoon. I was born to parents who grew up in the Depression.
Many of the people out on the streets are druggies or alcoholics anyway. I have no sympathy for addicts.
“I have no sympathy for addicts.”
Isn’t that essentially what Limbaugh kept saying, opening up someone elses Oxycontin, and viagra?
Just sayin, it rang a bell.
It’s obvious
The best cure for poverty: Get a job
Hard to do when unemployment rate was around 30%
You said I don’t think anyone should worry to much about seeing the poor starve on the streets. There has always been and always will be charitable people and groups.
Yep everyone was well fed during the great depression, nothing to see here.
I’m with you on wellfare, but the new deal put unemployed people to work creating infrastructure for the country. My guess is it prevented riots and a huge amount of crime. I don’t want people to get charity, I want them to get a job, and if the private secter can’t do it than gov should.
Imagine if 1 in 3 people you knew was out of work, lost there house, and didn’t have enough to eat.
Oh snap!
Yeah, private charity will handle everything. That’s why there was no hunger or despair during the great depression - because private charity took up all the slack and made sure everyone was fed and sheltered. Oh wait…..
Double snap!
Private charity I believe is running low on feeding the poor.
Surprised I did not get cooked here. Disclaimer: I contribute to the American Cancer Society and occasionally the Nature Conservancy. There is a major difference to contribute to a those than to contribute to a possible druggie. I cannot follow a homeless person 24/7 to make sure he does not buy crack or a bottle of whiskey. I can find out the percentage of money that goes toward research or administrative functions in most organizations.
Leave it to the churches to feed the hungry. They naturally try to get to know them so that they can convert the “impoverished.”
Most folks don’t realize that the spectacular growth of American industry in the ’50’s & ’60’s was a direct result of the spectacular growth of American working class wages, brought on by labor unions.
What we have been seeing in the last 30 years or so is the concentration of wealth into too few hands. This has lead to asset inflation as too many dollars are chasing too few assets. It has also lead to the decline in the consumption power of the working classes.
I see a world where the government has no choice but to send tax dollars straight to the middle class to boost consumption since average American wages must decline in a global economy. Both Republicans and Democrats have shown that they are on that bandwagon. Declining wages is leading the death spiral of America. Taxing the hedgies and wall street and shipping cash to main street is our only hope.
Rather than sending the middle class cash at the last minute, wouldn’t it be better to structure law and tax code to let them keep more of their money. The elite have sold the stupid on trickle down economics, despite it’s proven failure.
Instead of cash, why not get the ones out of a job to start working on the roads/bridges, school bldgs etc.
That way, the people would still have jobs, still get paid, and still contribute making themselves and the rest of the US feel productive.
All good comments, MEaston, Jon and DD!
“Most folks don’t realize that the spectacular growth of American industry in the ’50’s & ’60’s was a direct result of the spectacular growth of American working class wages, brought on by labor unions.”
Unions love taking credit where none is due. I have been a card-carrying member of the American Federation of Musicians for most of my adult life, but with my teeth gritted the entire time. The union has monopoly control on a few high profile engagements, for which they pat themselves on the back for the high pay rates, never mentioning their role in eliminating almost all the work for live performing musicians. The vast majority of the gigs I have had in my life were either locally contracted by other musicians, or direct hires by clients, with no input from the union in either case.
Aside from driving up costs with their dues requirements, eliminating work by demanding above-market wages, and making false claims about serving their membership, I can’t think of many purposes served by unions.
You can spot a Keynesian explanation by the magical, unexplainable force that is at the beginning of the story. In this case, “a giant suction pump”.
Cause you know, those giant suction pumps create havoc on an economy. I saw one float by my house the other night. It was headed generally in the direction of wall street I think.
I’ll try to define that “giant suction cup” a little better (though that was not my post, and I’m making assumptions as to the OP’s point).
The suction cup is the rich/powerful directing more money to themselves. This is done via tax schemes (15% cap gains tax being lower than tax on labor), various laws which encourage monopolies (see special interests and their influence on politicians), the “elite” sitting on each other’s boards and giving each other raises, etc.
Once you have money, it’s much easier to make more money…and not even have to work for it!!!
At the same time, bust unions and enact laws that eliminate protections for workers, and you have increased wealth disparity!
As workers’ wages fall below the rate of cost inflation, they used debt to make up the difference.
Oftentimes, you’ll see greater wealth disparity and credit bubbles go hand-in-hand. Just like we have today, same thing pre-Great Depression…
So why call it a “giant suction pump”? Assuming your claim is correct, why not just outright say that bad govt policy (favorable tax laws, formation of corporations, govt protected monopolies) generates poverty and concentrates wealth into a few hands?
Since you are speaking for the OP and on behalf of the economic explanation, is there some advantage to removing the specific liability of the govt in this case and replacing it with the mystical creature which can have no blame instead?
“Instead of achieving that kind of distribution, a giant suction pump had by 1929-30 drawn into a few hands an increasing portion of currently produced wealth.
…
In consequence, as in a poker game where the chips were concentrated in fewer and fewer hands, the other fellows could stay in the game only by borrowing. When their credit ran out, the game stopped.”
Yegads — the man could be describing 2008, except the giant suction pump is nowadays called mortgage securitization.
BTW, Mariner Eccles is an interesting fellow, in case anyone enjoys historical biographies.
1) He was a Mormon Federal Reserve Chairman under FDR, at a time when Mormonism was even more controversial in Mainstream America than it is today.
2) Later in life (in the 1960s), he stirred controversy by expressing alarm over the population explosion, going so far as to advocate the use of contraception, which was threatening to a church which advocates families having as many children as possible. A BYU speaking engagement was canceled over the controversy.
Well, it’s good to get informed here at HBB that I was mistaken.
I now realize that corporations are models of integrity, that the very wealthy amongst us truly are deserving and have never received undeserved favors from the government.
Furthermore, I now realize that the History books I read are all wrong.
There was no social injustice during the 20s and 30s. Rioters were not charged by soldiers with bayonets in our Capitol led by Douglas MacArthur in 1932. Guess all those folks in pictures of the Great Depression brought it on themselves.
The Bonus Army of 2009 will be wanting to get their social security money from a bankrupt country.
The average recruit will be around 65.
Rioters were not charged by soldiers with bayonets in our Capitol led by Douglas MacArthur in 1932.
Good thing we have a government now. You know, to prevent such things. lol
What evidence is there for this? Several banks have already gone under and there will be more. Many billions of dollars in value have deflated away without any hope of government rescue. There was one major bank that got bought out and there are some big loans going around, but a grand bailout isn’t happening in part because the government will never have that kind of money to throw around. The game is over.
And it was exactly that, a big game played mostly by the folks at the top. Exactly who is calling for a personal bailout? Of the wipe outs I am increasingly seeing in California most people never understood their mortgages and can’t understand why toxic products were for sale to ordinary folks. Quite a few of them got taken with hidden fees or document substitutions or some other nasty fraud. What I hear is people upset that regulators let fraud and bogus loans get completely out of hand. Many of these lending products were not “adjustable” so much as they were “bound to explode” on people. Even the bankers were mostly thinking of some kind of quick exit, not a bail out.
Get ready for a new deal, indeed. That is because the entitlement programs are breaking down again. Last time this happened we settled for revenue increases and benefit reductions. There is no way to argue that this will be apocolyptic without going into some kind of it is different now, it is a new economy that doesn’t obey the old rules kind of mode. People who talked like that as the bubble inflated were wrong, and people who overemphasize the correction on the way down are wrong for exactly the same reasons.
Subsidized dependents are much easier to control. Now, stopping commiting thought-crime by reading and get back to watching the latest nonsense about what some celebrity is or is not wearing.
The ECB has been goosing the $ supply like the fed, & the game could be over. Gee whiz, this looks like what happened over here about a year ago…
Spain May Suffer From ECB Loan Curbs as Economy Cools (Update1)
Aug. 28 (Bloomberg) — Spain’s economy, brought to the brink of a recession by surging global credit costs, may find money even harder to come by when the European Central Bank tightens its lending practices.
Spain’s banks have stored up 89 billion euros of their own asset-backed securities, more than any euro-region country, because the ECB accepts them as collateral in auctions, according to UniCredit SpA. Now the central bank wants to change the rules, ECB council member Yves Mersch said in an interview on Aug. 23, a move that may leave Spain holding the bag.
Spain’s banks have relied on cheap money from the ECB to help provide credit to consumers and companies even as the economy is buffeted by a real-estate downturn. Without the ECB, the country would be more dependent on foreign investors, who are demanding higher returns before committing funds.
ECB officials have agreed to adjust collateral rules in response to some banks’ attempts at “gaming the system,” Mersch told Bloomberg News at the Federal Reserve’s annual retreat in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. Axel Weber, another council member, said in an interview published yesterday in Frankfurt that the ECB must ensure its rules are “not abused.”
Fitch Warning
The share of asset-backed bonds in the collateral deposited with the ECB jumped by a third last year. What’s more, the quality of the assets underlying those bonds has deteriorated, Fitch Ratings said in a report in May. Spanish banks are pooling “higher risk” mortgages and consumer loans to back the bonds, Fitch said.
link
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=azae4HCCn2z4&refer=home
and in london:
Aug. 29 (Bloomberg) — Luxury-home prices in central London, the world’s most expensive location for prime real estate, had their first annual decline in five years as buyers were deterred by the prospect of a recession.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601102&sid=a77Zr2.dxrGE&refer=uk
And yet, the US market went way up yesterday on GDP numbers boosted by exports to Europe despite the fact that everyone knows that Europe is headed for a recession and the dollar is getting more expensive in Europe.
Isn’t the market supposed to be forward looking?
Yeah, but only to lunchtime, as in “where shall we go out to to lunch?”
Ah…the fourth level of sophistication. Or was it the third?
GDP numbers were revised upward. Here’s my tinfoil hat theory, everything is going to be rosy until after the election.
The new real estate mantra, from a guy dressed up like a pirate. I find the imagery appropriate.
My business has been GREAT!!-been stressful because I am dealing with banks and outside parties more than before–There are people getting some great deals–they give a little on theirs–more than make it up on the the buy side–ask me to talk with you about this-
I have labeled this concept:
–SELL LOW-
BUY EVEN LOWER!!!!
http://tinyurl.com/5e2nw2
The new STealtor mantra, from a guy dressed up like a pirate. The imagery is appropriate.
“My business has been GREAT!!-been stressful because I am dealing with banks and outside parties more than before–There are people getting some great deals–they give a little on theirs–more than make it up on the the buy side–ask me to talk with you about this-
I have labeled this concept:
–SELL LOW-
BUY EVEN LOWER!!!!”
http://tinyurl.com/5e2nw2
He’s even into other pyramid schemes, like Mona Vie! Haha, what a butt pirate.
Real estate collapse? Bring it on!
http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/news/editorial/story.html?id=8d4c0696-6fd4-46d8-bbea-01bce4d64856
Even rank amateurs have gotten into the traditionally dangerous game of real estate speculation, making huge profits flipping everything from condominiums to suburban homes. For young people, however, this real estate profiteering has made already unaffordable homes unattainable, limiting our options to a sickening selection of overpriced shoeboxes in the sky or downmarket bungalows in the suburbs.
In Toronto, the cost of a single family detached home is $446,781; in Vancouver, ground zero for real estate speculation in Canada, the average price is $753,165.
Oh, Canada, you are seeing your future unfold to your south and yet you fail to heed the warning signs. Do you think Canada’s eventual real estate collapse will rival California’s?
Owe Canada!
Your home and bubble land!
True profit love in all thy sons command
With glowing hearts we see thee rise,
The True North condos price seize!
From far and wide, Owe Canada,
We stand on guard for thee.
Don’t keep our land glorious and free!
Oh Canada, all for a small realtor fee.
Owe Canada, we stand upside-down for thee.
Excellent Tooney!
I like how naturally “owe” fits into the song:
Oh Canada, all for a small realtor fee.
Owe Canada, we stand upside-down for thee.
Thanks alad, I have been humming the Canadian national anthem all day! As a result, my girlfriend has been looking at me stranger than ususal today. Owe Canada, we stand upside-down for thee!
Cirque de Sold, eh?
S.P.Q.C.
I’m in Ottawa Ontario, and still I hear almost no talk about RE bubbles. I wouldn’t call it denial, as you have to be aware of something in order to deny it.
I’m also in Ottawa and I have to say a can see cracks in people’s mentality. You have to remember that a third of this town is employed by the Federal Government so naturally they are going to take a bit longer to grasp at reality. However my gf works in a spa, yes I know it’s a horrible industry in a recession but now more of her clients are talking about how expensive real estate is becoming. They however will continue house shopping because I guess they figure housing always appreciates. Oh well, one little step at a time I guess.
BTW, According to Stats Can the average household income is actually higher in Ottawa than Vancouver, yet Vancouver’s real estate is double. I really hope things settle down because I plan on attending UBC next year.
Say, I alluded to this in another post, but on a recent tourist stop in Victoria I encountered:
–a beautiful city
– lots of govmint employees on pensions
– a certain smugness about “it’s different here”
– Very pricey homes, even by Calif. standards.
Disclosure: these are sandals-on-the-ground observations unsupported by empirical data.
Having lived in Canada for 20% of my adult life, I can say that many of them have a lot of hubris about their political system, economic system, and culture as compared to the United States. However, I could detect very little difference in these aspects, even though I lived primarily in the most uniquely Canadian province (Quebec), and briefly in British Columbia. There was a lot of denial from their politicians about the jobs, brain drain, and weakness of their dollar while I was there, but hopefully that has reversed somewhat over the past couple of years. I also hope their policymakers are paying attention to the troubles of their biggest trading partner, instead of crowing about their superiority to Americans in order to pander for votes.
NSO - I am disappointed to report that my recent observations in Canada were no different.
I lived in Toronto for the past year and heard the same thing. Rather than proposing solutions, politicians and regular folks would say about their problems, “At least we’re better than the US,” even when the statement wasn’t true. This mentality scared me - many people weren’t interested in changing things for the better, as long as they could believe the US was worse off.
Problems like economic weakness, the housing bubble, poverty, declining infrastructure, and brain drain are all still serious there. We left Canada for better job opportunities, better wages, and better quality of life - things we had hoped to obtain in Toronto but were mistaken.
It’s going to be real interesting to see how other countries react to defaults? I mean are they going to have mass debt forgiveness, govn’t sponsored loan mods, public coddling for the ‘victims’? Will the secondary MBS holders be more willing to jump back in if the borrower has other incentives to pay, like wage garnishments, judgments, etcetera?
I’ve been voyeuring @ the New Zealand real estate market for some time now, and they only peaked last year, but are showing signs of a rapid trajectory in a number of ways…
Tourism plays a big part in their economy, and NZ is far, far away from the rest of the world, and staycations are so very close, for tapped-out would-be visitors to go to, instead.
NZ is also 1,200 miles of open ocean away from any other human beans, so outside investors are few and far between.
NZ banks are largely owned by bigger Aussie banks, and it’s like a bad version of Two-up* for them. Not only do they get to lose money @ home on homes, but they also get creamed across the Tasman, as well.
*http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two-up
Quality of construction was a problem the world round, but more pronounced in NZ, as it rains an awful lot there….
====================================
Builders have fled, Banks told
Many leaky home builders who are to be “named and shamed” by angry councils have already fled the country, Waitakere’s Mayor has warned
He said seven out of 10 leaky home culprits his council had tried to name and shame had already fled, most of them to the Gold Coast.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/8/story.cfm?c_id=8&objectid=10528950
‘He said seven out of 10 leaky home culprits his council had tried to name and shame had already fled, most of them to the Gold Coast.’
And we can expect quality of things to go up without prices going up too? I think we are seeing how abundance does not equate to prosperity.
Will Canada’s real estate collapse rival California’s?
In Canada, mortgages are not tax deductible, CMHC has just added the requirement for 5% down payment and has eliminated 40 year mortgages. Hopefully the banks are tightening lending standards. Differences between Canada and US will be as great as differences within the US. New York State is different than Florida.
I don’t know though, a man I work with just told me he used the equity in his house to remodel his kitchen. I told him that until he sold his house he doesn’t have any equity. There’s just too much money to be made selling the dream. There is a great deal of resistance to the idea that real estate is a trap.
That’s impossible!
Why, surely there must be some loan out there that can “get you into a house” - for at least a few years until the loan resets and you have to actually pay for the house… and then lose it in foreclosure!
Ninety-nine cents just doesn’t go as far as it used to, and that’s a problem for the 99 Cents Only Stores chain.
Faced with fast-rising inflation and soaring food prices, the retailer — known for never selling anything for more than 99 cents — is reevaluating its pricing strategy. And that could mean breaking the $1 barrier for the first time in the company’s 26-year history.
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-99cents29-2008aug29,0,233268.story
Sorta like MOTEL 6…..
now Motel 35
In resort areas, it’s Motel 79!
Right. Now M6 sez the 6 refers to the price of a second occupant.
I paid $109 for a Motel 6 in Sheridan, WY in the summer of 2007.
Granted, it was probably one of the nicest chain hotels I’ve stayed at and I’ve paid more for worse.
We live on a street with three 99 cent stores. To my great amusement, they have all been having 10% discount sales on everything. We now call them the 89 cent stores.
The 99 cent store is like a tribute to failed products…
Where else can you find almond-flavored canned peaches, or other badly thought out marketing plans?
Hey almond flavored peaches hmmmmm right on top of my donuts…….Its better then s-e-x———
Homer Simpson
‘The 99 cent store is like a tribute to failed products…
Where else can you find almond-flavored canned peaches, or other badly thought out marketing plans?’
Them’s fighting words! I LOVE the 99 cent store. A few years ago I went to a 99 cent store in La Mesa when I visited my sister Rachel, when she lived in SD, and I had the best 99 cent shopping experience of my life. Well, I exaggerate a bit. But it was fun! I got a little metal lunch box with a cute kitty on it, and a whole bunch of bizarro Mexican candy, and the prize of all, a pair of sunglasses I still wear all summer long.
You’d all scream with excitement if you saw them. They’re big and 70’s style Farrah Fawcett glamorous-ish, like in ‘Charlie’s Angels’, remember that show? With a pink tint that fades into lavender going upwards and then blue at the top, with little sparkly bits at the corners. I wore them to a fairly ritzy fundraiser a month and a half ago and everyone admired them and I said proudly, with an air of elegant snobbishness, ‘Yes; they’re from the 99 cent store in La Mesa, you know.’ And then they were admired anew. And you know why? Because it really is how you wear it, that’s why. Plus the sparkly bits are so sparkly.
Oh, I also got some almond-flavored peaches. Delicious!
I owned quite a bit of stock in the 99 Stores, and luckily got out around $15 a couple of years ago…
You think it would do great in this economy, but now it’s around $8 a share.
‘You think it would do great in this economy, but now it’s around $8 a share.’
$8 a share?! I could buy one share, OR, think how many cans of almond-flavored peaches and fantastic sunglasses that would buy!
(8. It would buy 8, yes, I can count. I just mean, that’s a lovely plethora of peaches.)
Anyway, think how deliciously full AND glamorous I could be, all at once.
I went to a stockholder’s meeting in undistinguished Montebello, about 5 years ago, and it was a hoot.
They kept on giving out stuff like strawberry wine from France (awful) and other goods of a like nature. The cream of the crop of the 99 Cent Store, if you will.
I made off with a paper sackful…
I remember when 99 cent or $1.00 stores used to be called dime stores. I guess next they’ll be called $10 stores.
Five and dime stores.
The owner’s 14-year-old daughter allegedly saw Tapley on her knees in a bedroom closet, going through a change jar, police said. A short time later, the girl allegedly saw Tapley going through drawers in a bathroom, looking through the owner’s vitamins, police said.
Tapley, confronted by police with the allegations, denied taking any change from the Stonecroft home. She also maintained that she makes “six figures” from her job and does not need to take someone else’s change.
http://www.connpost.com/localnews/ci_10330937
I wonder if that six figure income is in the range of 5000.00 – 9000.00.
“Police said they later learned Tapley had previously been convicted of credit card theft and fifth-degree larceny.”
Don’t they have an FBI background check on realtors in Connecticut? Even in Florida you can’t get a license to sell real estate unless you pass a FBI background check, first.
“She also maintained that she makes “six figures” from her job and does not need to take someone else’s change.”
Yeah, when I wuz a pup, going to school in Greenwich, Connecticut, there was this girl who lived there, went to private school and came from a very wealthy family. She used to shoplift regularly and show off her “loot” to friends. Real stupid stuff, like scarves and belts and handbags. She didn’t need to shoplift, her family could afford to provide her with anything she wanted. But she got kicks that way.
“…there was this girl who…came from a very wealthy family. She used to shoplift regularly and show off her “loot”… She didn’t need to shoplift, her family could afford to provide her with anything she wanted. But she got kicks that way.”
Reminds me of an old friend from high school with very wealthy parents. He and his father were skiing one day, had lunch, and returned outside to find that their poles had been stolen. So, they stole somebody else’ poles, and thought it was the funniest story ever. I found it repugnant for a man of such wealth to do such a thing, let alone with his son.
Thank you so much for this story. It really makes my day. The schadenfreude is strong in me today.
I’m on my way back to NC from Austin where I spent a week looking for property to lease for our move next month. Ended up buying a nicely improved (aesthetics wise) manufactured home below our means (one of the loan officers even asked why). Figured that with that it would cost for renting similar-sized property in Austin for four years it’s a wash compared to the cost of this property (which I have to say is quite nice, wall plaster, solid oak door, not a single brass knob / ceiling fan in sight). It’s actually nicer (not structurally when it comes down to that) than some of the SFH for rent we looked at in Lakeway neighbourhood.
Congratulations. Wallow in the schadenfreude, you did well.
“The owner’s 14-year-old daughter allegedly saw Tapley on her knees in a bedroom closet,…”
NYCityBoy, there is your opening…
“The owner’s 14-year-old daughter allegedly saw Tapley on her knees in a bedroom closet,…”
Working on her interview skills?
Now I understand how she earned that six figure income….
Maybe she meant: $1234.56.
Or possibly: $>}(*.99.
GM says automakers deserve $50 billion in federal loans:
The automakers have already made considerable progress in transforming themselves and the government should help them proceed faster, GM Vice Chairman Robert Lutz said.
“The American auto industry is deserving of government loan guarantees,” Lutz said
Wrong Mr. Putz, GM does not “deserve” a damn thing. You guys ran a loose ship, didn’t plan ahead got you selves into a pickle and now you want to borrow money from taxpayers based on what? You deserve it? You deserve to go belly up or dig yourself out of your own hole, on your own merit. What’s the matter not man enough or smart enough to handle it?
http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSBNG18419220080829
The big three have been a huge headwind on U.S. economic progress since the Chrysler bailout in the early 1980s. Witness their latest heavy irreversible investment into gas guzzlers just before the world faces a Peak Oil meltdown as the latest piece of evidence.
In general, corporate welfare for too-big-to-fail behemoths crowds out seed money that could otherwise be used as venture capital to help potential 21st century great American companies get off the ground. Too-big-to-fail is a form of economic governance which is destined-to-fail.
Let the big three fail. There are many better ways to invest $50B, alternative energy, for example. These poorly run businesses should either reform themselves or fail. There is no excuse for repeating some of the failed business strategies of the 70’s, especially on a grander scale.
Yeah the Chinese will bail your azz out, but then you will work for $100K a year not $10 million
Fair is Fair!
Ford and GM have been dogs for so long. I’m at a point now where I blame the investors. How have these companies made such short sighted decisions for so long? Why haven’t the shareholders gone nuts?
Why haven’t the shareholders gone nuts? They were already nuts when they held onto their shares. In any case they have little or no say in running the companies.
Which is the other thing that needs changing, and so far, only AFLAC is the only corporation to change the rules.
The rules are now (at least for aflac and should be for all corps) that the masses who own shares have a say in how the CEO etc get paid. Or how much.
I hope I got that right.
All CEO and boards need to have their pay packages restructured completely and not just slip by willynilly without question.
Most of the shareholders (87%, IIRC) are mutual funds. Index funds etc. Few individuals even know they own these stocks.
I blame the unions.
The unions don’t run the companies. It’s not like Ford is staying in Detroit. Their workers are now in Mexico. No, the executives have successfully reamed the arseholes of the union members as well, cutting all those good jobs, and offshoring them. And they have also steered that gigantic ship into the throes of Bankruptcy purely by their own hand. Just look at the recent (2005) decision to scale back hybrid Explorer production… WHAT were they thinking!?! Time to put the old horse down…
Skip:
To a degree yes, but they have been very cooperative in recent years….$140K+ to buy you out plus keeping health bennies for some people was a great deal…
I still think unions are necessary in big factories, or some type of grievance structure to prevent arbitrary firings
Thats really all people want, it for the employer to be fair, if not then a union begins
Well, I think it is only fair that I get a $1 million loan, to be paid back over the next 100 years with more paper promises and no real money. Hey, it’s only fair!
If a Ceo and execs dont’ perform to make a company successful without layoffs, closures etc, then they don’t get paid the big bucks.
And why would you pay someone alot of money to behave badly, to ruin a corp? Ruin so many lives, help ruin USA.
Unions are there for unfair practices by bad bosses.
See Walmart, make your workers clock out and still stay to work a little bit longer,still not getting health coverage cause just shy of working 40hr, 32-39.59 hrs.
If a Ceo and execs dont’ perform to make a company successful without layoffs, closures etc, then they don’t get paid the big bucks. But they get paid the big bucks, no matter what happens to the company. The stockholders are not the real owners.
I know, isn’t it a crime?
Were you raised that way? I wasn’t. I daresay most of us on the HBB weren’t either.
Unions are successful only when other other nonprivileged persons are unwilling to shoot them. That’s how it used to go down in the old days. Which end of the gun will our “new” Americans, from south of the border, be on?
Unions are also only successful with expensive immobile capital, i.e. a mine, a port, a railroad, or large plant. Retail establishments can’t successfully be unionized, with the exception of extremely high turnover rate like groceries.
Market forces at work: physical demand grows as paper price falls below equilibrium.
MUMBAI: Gold is enjoying a modern-day renaissance in the country. From retail sales of 300-400 kgs of gold bar per day at the start of 2008, demand has surged to 3,000 to 4,000 kgs per day.
The demand for the metal has skyrocketed to such an extent that imports for the month of August alone are set to cross 100 tonne. Last August, the country imported 69 tonne of gold.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Business/Gold_makes_glittering_comeback/articleshow/3418861.cms
Aug. 28 (Bloomberg) — Rand Refinery Ltd., the world’s largest gold refinery, ran out of South African Krugerrands after an “unusually large” order from a buyer in Switzerland.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601012&sid=acH4WhPh1WJ0&refer=commodities
Lad, was this you or one of your friends? Come on man, save some for the rest of us.
Oddjob was the buyer, apparently.
Isn’t this what gold bugs have been saying all along? That if only 5-10% of the population would put 5-10% of their investment money into gold, it would absolutely overwhelm the physical market?
I find it very interesting that most investment books published before 1990 recommended 5-10% of portolio in gold, simply as a prudent insurance measure. Not to get rich, but simply because it’s a smart thing to do. Somehow, that went totally out the window after the early 90s.
None of this makes sense, gold is down 20% from its high this year.
Why is gold going down??
Suppose you sell a worthless product (apply directly to forehead!) called fiatscos. There is a competing product that actually works but most people don’t know about it. Would you make your competitor illegal, creating lots of attention and cache for their product? Or would you make it unappealing by driving down the price, while making it unavailable to buy even at that lower price?
Cuz gold is priced in dollars, and the dollar is going up?
Don’t forget to gaze out the windshield while driving…
Economic growth at best rate in a year
Uptick comes amid broader ominous signs
By Michael M. Grynbaum
NEW YORK TIMES NEWS SERVICE
August 29, 2008
The economy expanded at a 3.3 percent rate from April through June, far faster than first thought, the government said yesterday, but the outlook for the remainder of the year remained grim.
Even as investors celebrated with a rally in the stock market, pushing the Dow up more than 200 points, economists cautioned that consumer spending and foreign demand would probably dry up in the months ahead.
With layoffs on the rise, corporate profits falling and the housing slump still in full swing, the report was seen by many analysts as something of a last gasp.
“Don’t lull yourself into complacency looking in the rearview mirror,” said Joshua Shapiro, chief U.S. economist at the research firm MFR Inc. “The view out of the windshield is a lot scarier.”
I am sure the adrenaline from the ’stimulator’ checks has already worn off. What’s next? Bigger checks?
What’s next? Bribes offered to the electorate from candidates.
Well, golly - if they just sent out $1,000 a month, we’d all be set. It’s working well in Zimbabwe - everyone’s a millionaire there!
The Zimbabwe Millionaire next door?
“With layoffs on the rise, corporate profits falling and the housing slump still in full swing, the report was seen by many analysts as something of a last gasp.”
i was shopping with my mom in visalia yesterday and overheard a worker at jc pennys saying the company cut her hours back to part-time. the other co-worker said to her “well at least you still have a job”. every store we went to was completly dead and the shelves were packed, even the 70% off sections. nobody is spending money! wallstreet is TOAST!
just my observations.
nobody is spending money!
Ah, the magic of teaser rates expiring!
Fears are mounting that Russia may restrict oil deliveries to Western Europe over coming days, in response to the threat of EU sanctions and Nato naval actions in the Black Sea.
“They have been told to be ready to cut off supplies as soon as Monday,” claimed a high-level business source, speaking to The Daily Telegraph. Any move would be timed to coincide with an emergency EU summit in Brussels, where possible sanctions against Russia are on the agenda.
“We are not afraid of anything, including the prospect of a Cold War,” said President Dmitry Medvedev.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2008/08/29/cnrussia129.xml
The Russians are sitting on a great hand, a straight flush, and betting accordingly…
Putin looked into ’ssshrubery’s eyes some 7 years ago, and saw a milquetoast masquerading as a man, and wisely said nothing @ the time.
With a hat tip to Jello Biafra, ‘are you ready for the third world war?’
I can’t imagine us going to war, as the Europeans are not going to cut off their noses to spite their faces, and help us, are they?
Georgia & surrounding ’stans are not easy to get to, and our military has a couple of previous engagements they simply can’t break.
Johnny’s got his gun, and is spoiling for a fight (McCain).
“I can’t imagine us going to war, as the Europeans are not going to cut off their noses to spite their faces, and help us, are they?”
Neither could Neville Chamberlain. He said “Peace for our time” (often misquoted as “Peace in our time”) on September 30, 1938 after visiting a famous short megalomaniacal Bavarian Colonel.
That plan didn’t work out too well.
I see a couple of saber-rattlers that want to get it on, but nary a Chamberlain…
Neither could Neville Chamberlain. He said “Peace for our time” (often misquoted as “Peace in our time”) on September 30, 1938 after visiting a famous short megalomaniacal Bavarian Colonel.
I didn’t notice the US declaring war on Russia or anything after the invasion of Georgia…
“Georgia & surrounding ’stans are not easy to get to, and our military has a couple of previous engagements they simply can’t break.”
Israel sold arms to Georgia, and now Syria wants to buy arms from Russia, so Israel says wait a minute. No sweat, just another mess for the U.S. clean-up. Privatize the profits and socialize the losses?
“famous short megalomaniacal Bavarian Colonel”
Famous short Austrian CORPORAL.
The Russians are sitting on a great hand, a straight flush, and betting accordingly
Thanks you SUV drivers and McMansion lovers. Thank you piss poor politicians who cater to these fools. Thank you Big 3 for fighting tooth and nail to keep gas hogs on the road. Thank you big oil for pushing your cocain.
What will it take to make conservation the patriotic duty of every American. I mean it’s clear that financing Iran, Al Queda, Russia, and Venezuela hasn’t been enough. What will it take?
MEaston
Sorry, I like my SUV.
Now is the time to buy calls on oil. Plus we have a storm in the Carribean.
Western countries can seize the accounts of the Russian oil thugs who bankroll Putin. The loot these thugs plundered from Russians may be found in places like London and Geneva. How do you like them apples?
Europe can buy oil on the open market. Prices would shoot up, but how long do you think Russia will last without its primary customer?
China & Russia will be the new world order.
The former has the entrepreneurial skills that were never lost-just misplaced, and the later has the oil can, to keep it going.
Europe is like a hipster version of the USA now, as it produces nicer didily squat.
Who needs em’?
Keep in mind, China and Russia don’t really like each other much. There’s been cross border tension along the Sino-Russian border for centuries.
China wants for China. Russia be damned.
China possibly, but not Russia. Russia is losing close to a million people per year. In the long term what Russia did was incredibly stupid since the Chinese could use the same reason to take over Far Eastern Siberia. (Russia has an illegal immigration problem in Far Eastern Siberia that makes ours look tiny.)
Europe needs the Russkies for oil and natural gas. By taking Georgia the Russkies have control of all the major pipelines to Europe. It could be a three dog night in Europe if they want to play games.
Worldwide it will be a population depopulator.
Winter, but similar to the summer when the heat wave killed thousands.
“Western countries can seize the accounts of the Russian oil thugs who bankroll Putin.”
Who do you think controls the oil?
Step on Mr. Putin, go to jail. Western countries are firmly held by the balls. “When you’ve got ‘em by the balls, their hearts and minds will follow.” Senator Robert (Bobby) Kennedy
(President Nixon had it framed and hanging in his office.)
“We are not afraid of anything, including the prospect of a Cold War,” said President Dmitry Medvedev.
Why would he be afraid, with a nimrod at the helm of an overextended, rapidly disintegrating “superpower”?
Putin was trained as an observer or people in his previous life as a KGB agent. As Aladin mentioned, Putin read the tea leaves correctly when he sized up the chest-puffing Keystone Kops who run our fading empire. Unlike many other belligerent or power-hungry nation-states, Russia has both the ‘nads and the firepower to take advantage of the situation.
“Russia has both the ‘nads and the firepower to take advantage of the situation.”
You underestimate the capacity of the United States military, Grasshopper.
We designed our military technology to fight imaginary Soviet technological capacity. Much like our overreaction to 9/11 we overreacted technologically during the cold war. Soviet bravado was just that. Bravado. As an example, that’s why one of our tanks can take out multiple Russian tanks. Computerized targeting etc.
The taliban don’t have fancy gizmos but they seem to have our number.
Only because the United States is too politically correct to wipe out the whole lot of them with one fell swoop.
The USA’s biggest problem militarily is NOT how many of our own soldiers and citizens we are willing to get slaughtered. Rather, it’s that we won’t kill the other guy.
We’ve turned into Europe. If we get steamrolled because we have no backbones, then we deserve the get steamrolled.
That’s how the world works.
All that weapon wizardry is wonderful, but how do you suppose we’d get it over there?
Logistically, it’d be like the Russians trying to maneuver their armed forces into northwest New Mexico, right under our noses…
There are thousands of illegal aliens a month crossing the border into New Mexico.
I’m not too sure we would notice.
Uhh actually, recently it sounds like illegal aliens are leaving in droves due to a bad job market for them. See, the bubble crash is good in more ways than one!
You guys seem to hold onto the idea that all illegal aliens crossing the mexican/us border are all mexicans.
The facts line up more like, the USA is seeing alot of folks from S.AM, and many from the middle east coming through the back door. Wanted criminals from the Middle East. But we keep yammering about the mexicans…
Just look at the map, we aren’t going to do squat for either the Georgians or the ’stans.
Even if we wanted to, none of the European contries we would have to fly over or pass thru would be willing to let us do so.
The Euros aren’t going to do squat either. They might boycott the import of Russian cabbages, or the export of Renaults or Volkswagens. I’m sure the Russians are losing sleep at night worrying what the Euros are going to do.
Um, dude, New Mexico is a state in the US. It is not a part of Mexico.
I did not mention the nationality of the people crossing into New Mexico, USA in my post.
You seem to have overestimated our moral authority, our Fearless Leaders’ strategic capabilities, and the ability of our military to be many places at once given finite human and capital resources.
And the aliens truly from S.Am and central Am, and mexico are definitely leaving.
It seems to be alot quieter around these parts.
Our border fencing could actually be a problem for Meskins’ trying to sneak back home…
En Garde!
Viewed through the rear view mirror with 20-20 hindsight, it appears the San Diego economy has been in recession all year and, big shocker, the downturn is due to problems in the housing market.
Can anyone suggest a good baked crow recipe?
S.D. economy in recession, expert says
Hiring remains weak; job losses are still high
By Mike Freeman
STAFF WRITER
August 29, 2008
Escalating job losses and the decaying housing market weighed down the local economic outlook once again in July, leaving little doubt among economists that the region is in recession.
The University of San Diego’s monthly report on leading economic indicators fell again in July, led by plunging consumer confidence, a jump in job losses and worries about the national economy.
The USD index has fallen for 27 of the last 28 months.
“I would say the local economy is in a recession right now,” said Alan Gin, an economist with USD’s Burnham-Moores Center for Real Estate. “The unemployment rate is 6.4 percent – the first time we’ve been above 6 percent since the 1990s.”
Hiring remains weak, and the pace of job losses continues to be high. While housing and construction have been the main culprits behind job losses, unemployment is increasingly spreading to other sectors, such as auto sales and some retail divisions.
“We’ve got a lot of job losses in the county,” Gin said. “For the first seven months of the year we’re down” in terms of year-over-year job growth.
…the intensity of the housing downturn has overshadowed any gains by other sectors, dispelling the notion that San Diego’s economy was too diverse to suffer much in a recession.
Gin used to endorse that theory. Not anymore.
“It turns out the damage from housing, the loss of employment from housing, is much more severe than I would have thought,” he said.
Remember how tourism was supposed to help the diversified San Diego economy weather the housing market headwind?
Fewer flock to beaches; some blaming ban on booze
By Michael Stetz
STAFF WRITER
August 29, 2008
Labor Day weekend should lure plenty of folks to San Diego’s beaches. But don’t look for the same crowds as last year, if the past few months are any indication.
Beach attendance is down this summer from the previous two summers, hurting some businesses and feeding the debate over the city’s recent beach alcohol ban.
Some blame the ban for the drop-off. Others say there has been no heat wave as there was two years ago, and point out that the economic downturn is keeping some would-be tourists at home.
In July 2007, 4.06 million people visited San Diego city beaches, according to the San Diego Lifeguard Service, which estimates crowds. This July, the number dropped 17 percent to 3.38 million.
May, June and July all saw decreases from 2006 and 2007, according to estimates.
I hear the Over-The-Loan Tournament is really popular this year, in San Diego.
The defense industry is in the midst of saying adios California, and the fleet is obviously going to be downsized @ some point, and after the smoke clears, just what viable upper-income and/or large scale employers will be left in Tijuana-adjacent?
This happened in the early 1990’s as General Dynamics and others closed shop and moved to cheaper pastures. The San Diego economy went into convulsions.
Part of the convulsions the San Diego economy went into included a six year period of housing price declines. If we are on the same schedule as in the early 1990s, then housing prices should bottom out here by 2013 or so, as SFR prices did not start seriously falling until the onset of the Credit Crunch last summer.
But it is also possible that bigger bubbles take longer to deflate; witness the 15+ period of falling Japanese real estate prices from 1990-2005+ as a leading example.
“15+ year” (need more joe…)
Can’t everyone just flip houses to each other at ever-increasing prices?
Oh, wait… we tried that, and failed.
“Mission Accomplished!”
More Business news ShareThis
Zoom Airlines grounds planes, will file for bankruptcy
By Penni Crabtree
UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER
5:09 p.m. August 28, 2008
Zoom Airlines, San Diego’s only overseas airline service, has been zapped.
Yet another Zoom & Doom story?
Pensacola, FL
There is a 5,000+ sq. foot house in our neighborhood going into foreclosure. Most of the houses are just ordinary middle-class homes. However, there are a few mcmansions here and there. The foreclosure house was bought in 1999 for about 220K. Several years ago, we met the “owners” and they proudly told us that they bought it as an “investment”. The house was recently listed on the MLS for 750K. I drove by the other day and there was a big U-Haul truck backed up in the driveway. I guess its a sign of the times - mcmansions and U-Hauls.
The unthinkable has happened.
http://www.nysun.com/business/unthinkable-happens-manhattan-apartment-prices/84900/
“Recently released city records indicate that apartments in prime Manhattan neighborhoods are selling for less than their purchase prices — a phenomenon that until now was virtually unheard of in the seemingly invincible New York City real estate market.”
“Among the apartments selling for a loss is a unit at 80 John St., in the financial district, which recently sold for $590,000, much lower than the $720,000 selling price in January. At 515 West End Ave., on the Upper West Side, an apartment recently sold for $2.1 million — $50,000 less than its 2005 purchase price. There are also apartments currently on the market that are listed for below their previous purchase prices: A three-bedroom condominium at 166 Duane St. in TriBeCa — the wealthiest ZIP code in America, according to Forbes magazine — is on the market for $4.495 million, well below the $4.7 million paid for the unit in April.”
“This clearly indicates that the market is not what it was,” the president of the real estate appraisal firm Miller Samuel, Jonathan Miller, said.”
Oh my — it sounds as though the denial stage of the housing bubble stages of grief may finally be ending in Manhattan.
I believe Hell just thawed
Perhaps Hell just began to chill?
Sheesh, if hell is unfrozen, then we can all go to the beaches now in the Artic. It is happening, I saw it..
I wonder if NYC will really start reeling.?
“Recently released city records indicate that apartments in prime Manhattan neighborhoods are selling for less than their purchase prices”
I had to do a double-take on that one…
I still to this day don’t understand how so many people can buy a $1-2 5 million dollar apartments/houses and then have to sell it 4 months or a year later.
You would figure they had some decent savings, or some idea their job or their wife will last more then next year.
———————————————–
which recently sold for $590,000, much lower than the $720,000 selling price in January.
A new MBA, moves to the city, thinks he’s on the fast track to stardom. Buys a fat pad on a fat salary. Gets laid off. Panics. Now a math teacher upstate, demoralized, but works with 25 single women in their 20’s. Spends five great years dating them and their friends. Gets married, lives happily ever after with summers off.
Losing that apartment is the best thing that ever happened to that guy.
Love the story.
Would that be you?
I wish it was me (don’t tell my wife).
I had a friend go through a similar story. Lucky bstrd.
Well,
Isn’t it lucky that you and your friend found the woman of your dreams?
“Well, Isn’t it lucky that you and your friend found the woman of your dreams?”
Not if it’s the same woman.
What does it profit a man to find the woman of his dreams if she is looking for the man of her dreams, and he ain’t it?
tresho,
That just tells me that she really wasn’t the woman of his dreams.
I can say the same thing. What does it profit a woman to find the man of her dreams if he is looking for the woman of his dreas, and she ain’t it? The man ended up not being the dream come true.
Sounds like you’re pretty good at math now!
I think folks on this blog cannot imagine the overcapacity of apartments in TriBeca.
There’s a building on Church and Warren that’s looks line nobody is living there for years (no plants in windows, blinds down etc)
And the construction continues! Waiter! Another round of financing please!
The white elephant known as Tribeca Space!
Yeah $8,000 a month for a 1 bedroom and barely room to fit a king size bed.
And what is with the tiny single kitchen sink ours is double the size and its way too small.
British and Spanish Data Indicate Multiple Economic Troubles
Public Finances Hurt U.K.’s Ability To Boost Growth
By NICHOLAS WINNING
August 29, 2008; Page A10
LONDON — The U.K. economy may be slowing even more rapidly than expected, with retail sales growing at their slowest pace in at least 25 years and house prices falling more sharply than at any time since 1990.
Tumbling house prices, slowing wages growth and widespread concerns about job security are taking their toll on consumer spending, the driving force behind the 16-year run of economic growth that ended in the second quarter.
…
The Nationwide Building Society said the price of a typical house fell 1.9% from July and 10.5% from the August a year earlier, marking the biggest annual decline since the fourth quarter of 1990.
3rd Down, time to punt.
Nah, just give up a safety. And win the game on a refs call.
Hmmm….
safety-break?
I remember a bowl game many years ago where the undefeated team was plaing for the JC championship. They had 4th and long on their own 2 yard line with 5 seconds on the clock. They were ahead by three points. They punted.
You guessed it. A blocked kick fallen on for a touchdown in the endzone by the other team. (loser was Ricks college, cerca 1990)
The good news about the U.S. banking sector: They are not alone in their plight, and misery loves company.
REAL ESTATE
Home-Sales Data In Spain Spell More Gloomy News
A WSJ NEWS ROUNDUP
August 29, 2008; Page A10
MADRID — Spanish home sales and new mortgage approvals fell sharply again in June, signaling continued pressure on Spain’s once-flourishing home-building industry that fed the country’s decadelong economic boom.
Home sales fell at an annual rate of 29.6% in June, while the number of new mortgages fell 37.7%, data released Thursday by Spain’s National Statistics Institute, or INE, showed. In May, annual home sales plunged 34.3%, and the number of new mortgages fell 36.2%.
Spain had been among the euro zone’s hottest real-estate markets, but house prices fell for the first time in a decade between April and June as chronic overbuilding and eight-year-high mortgage rates added to the impact of the U.S. subprime credit crunch.
The housing bust also spells bad news for Spanish banks, especially its system of local savings banks, which generate roughly half of the country’s lending and deposit-taking. Moody’s Investors Service earlier this month cut its ratings on five large and medium-size Spanish savings banks, noting “the rapid deterioration in asset-quality indicators.”
Merrill’s losses in 18 months are quarter of profits over 36 years
By Francesco Guerrera in New York
August 29 2008
“…Since the onset of the credit crunch last year, Merrill has suffered after-tax losses of more than $14bn as its balance sheet has been savaged by almost $52bn (£28bn) in writedowns and credit-related losses.
Merrill’s total inflation adjusted profits between its 1971 listing and 2006 were about $56bn, according to figures from Thomson Reuters Fundamentals and an FT analysis of reported earnings….
Merrill’s historical profits were adjusted for inflation using a method from academic website http://www.measuringworth.com.”
FT
Merrill was a good target for this type of schlock reporting. They used to make moneys. But adjusting earnings to inflation to try to prove a point is BS.
Like all good reporting the headline is white noise, the meat is “The size of the losses at Merrill and other Wall Street firms underlines the risks of an investment banking model that relied on complex securities and cheap leverage to drive profit growth.” The model is broke and cannot be repaired, there is no profit growth. It is now survival of the fittest.
“The model is broke and cannot be repaired, there is no profit growth.”
Spot on — time to scrap the newfangled model and find a better one.
“The model is broke and cannot be repaired, there is no profit growth. It is now survival of the fittest.”
Good one, hoz. Music to my ears. It’s a model I’ll be happy to see go the way of the Edsel. Who in your opinion would fall into the category of “the fittest”?
And just as a side note, I recall back in the day when investment gurus used to urge putting one’s money in a company that offered a good product or service. THAT is the underlying value of any company, in the end. But that seems to have been forgotten, sadly. I am, for example, watching the juggernaut Ebay falling to its knees through the destruction of its core business, at the behest of Wall Street and its managment, who ascribe to a cockamamie theory called “Disruptive Management”. LOL!! Is that what they teach in business school these days?
YES they teach you NEVER answer a phone, NEVER answer an email properly, Never give any information about a job, or how many qualified people you have for the position…I get the impression that i am the ONLY one qualified a lot of the time…
Lying dishonesty is the norm in today’s hiring policies
Oh and NEVER EVER let a real live Adult talk to you, you must have tons of clueless Paris Hilton clones with fake boobz who cannot answer any of your questions.
Yes the lack of professional standards is astounding when looking for a job today.
I even got yelled at like i was a 20 year old retard for walking in and asking politely for a job it was 4 blocks away from my apartment …and it was for an auction site that raised money for aids and homeless people
http://www.housingworks.org
Well we now have over 30,000 SLV.
Renting is great.
“…over 30,000 SLV.”
?
the silver ETF. Just remember, Mormon Tea, it is still paper.
30k Pieces of Silver?
Don’t be sold out by the paper Judases…
Demand physical. Hold it tight.
It’s going to be a tough, bumpy ride, soon. After we get our next JOKE of a president (we so desperately need a viable 3rd party) and Christmas #’s reveal 90% of Americans are in a stopped up pooper without a plunger…
Like JP Morgan said, “Gold is money and nothing else.”
JP Morgan’s been dead for a while. Things have changed.
Gold is just like housing. It’s only worth what someone is willing to pay.
If things get as bad as some predict, I’d rather have canned goods and ammo. But that’s just me. Try eating gold. Or carrying it around.
Ammo & canned goods in the Bronx is the plan, eh?
Canned goods and ammo/guns are definately worthy- if not more than gold & silver in a dire crisis where NO commerce happens at all, if you don’t have a stock pile of ammo/food- well it’s your own fault.
I’m just suggesting that in a bartering system gold/silver will reign and increase in value. If you need additional supplies along the way how comfortable are you in trading your ammo/food? Better have some liquid moo-lah.
I’d rather have a pocketful of gold and a firearm than canned goods to barter with. A typical can holds what- 12/oz of kibbles at a cost of $3-5. 12 ounces of gold is worth $9600… silver is $160…
Just because JP Morgan is dead means squat. Try convincing 6 billion people gold is worthless. Then get back to me.
Carrying around physical gold is a better plan?
In the theoretical scenario, NYC bankrupt, real doom and gooom stuff. No money, no police, no rule of law….I’ll go armed and you go with gold. We’ll see if I still have my guns and you still have your gold. In the Bronx.
Now I REALLY hope things don’t get that bad. But FDIC already needs money and what did they bail out this year…9 banks?
Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Bob Lutz at GM asking for gov’t loan(bailout)…NY State and California in a budget crunch…3.2 Billion dollar Jefferson County Al bond s failing going for chapter 9 BK like Vallejo Cali….
Buy gold! It’s “real money!” Wooo hooo!
Actually I’m buying popcorn…..
test
“Try convincing 6 billion people gold is worthless. Then get back to me.”
C’mon. I can start with my kids. Given the choice between gold coins and mylar Spongebob balloons, the balloons win!
Like back in 2001 (paraphrasing here) when an Afghani was asked what he would do if he colleted the $25,000,000 bounty for Bin Laden. He said something like “I would buy 100 balloons!” The money meant absoloutly nothing to him. Incomprehensible.
Of those 6 billion you think love gold, how many would think they were rich simply taking a #2 on a real toilet and reading a newspaper in some trailer park here in the US of A. A majority of them.
JP Morgan, just sent out a massive formal mailing to ask if I, and all my coworkers, wanted to sign up for their money management program. Unfortunately I have my 401 with my corp with this co, can’t help it until I turn 55 to switch financial co’s.
But I found it interesting as all the banks have some
itty bitty problems.
July consumer spending weak, inflation jumps
http://biz.yahoo.com/rb/080829/usa_economy_income.html
Personal income tumbled unexpectedly in July and inflation-adjusted spending shrank at sharpest rate in four years as the effects of the government stimulus package wore off, a Commerce Department report on Friday showed.
Consumer spending, which accounts for about two-thirds of national economic activity, rose 0.2 percent, as expected, the slimmest gain since February, after gaining 0.6 percent in June. However, inflation-adjusted spending dropped by 0.4 percent, the sharpest slide in four years.
I guess that slowing economy isn’t reducing inflation as promised?
Just thought I would let everyone know what I am hearing in Atlanta.
The Southside of town is supposed to be utter toast. All building in the area, other than some smaller commercial projects, has stopped. There are thousands of vacant lots just sitting there, and these lots will not be built on for years. What a waste of what was once pretty land.
The Northside of town, which had been faring better is starting to feel the impact now. Nothing is selling. The Gwinnett County newspaper that runs foreclosure notices for that county had 81 pages of foreclosure notices for September. There is a big new subdivision under construction in Forsyth County, with large (about 3000 SF) brick front houses starting at $220,000. These are pre-bubble prices that people can actually afford. Most of the other new houses in that area of similar size are $350,000 to $550,000. The builders holding those higher priced houses in the area are now SOL.
One really huge Atlanta based SE regional builder is rumored to be dead in the water. I haven’t seen or heard anything about this from the local news outlets, so I can’t publish the name.
“One really huge Atlanta based SE regional builder is rumored to be dead in the water. I haven’t seen or heard anything about this from the local news outlets, so I can’t publish the name.”
Initials = JW?
It would be news if the builder wasn’t in trouble.
Wonder how my ex’s cousins husband is doing. Supposed to be a General Contractor building McManshons north of ATL, making gazillion bucks/year. Ex kept asking why I was such a dumbass by not joining in. Wasn’t interested……..most of the guys I’ve run into over the years working construction suffered from “Alligator Mouth not backing up the Hummingbird Ass” Disease.
Real Estate Investors Invade California
If the real estate market is in a meltdown, California real estate investors haven’t gotten the memo. In fact, residential real estate investment activity has grown over 65% in the past year alone.
http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/real-estate-investors-invade-california/story.aspx?guid=%7BA187912B-E2B3-49F1-ADCB-6D04AEA5CB8A%7D&dist=hppr
Buy RightNow or be priced out forever! So are these investors taking advantage of the situation or are they being taken advantage of? Beware the invasion of the real estate snatchers!
Pump & Circumstance
e-CON 101
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=moL4MkJ-aLk
This is fantastic news, especially when coupled with the recent C.A.R. report that California home prices fell by 40 pct year-over-year for the first time in history. Pretty soon a whole generation of California real estate investors will be parading around with Joshua trees protruding from their behinds, as they chant the mantra, “Real estate is the worst investment.”
About a month ago I posted that some friends of mine had to list their house on the market after learning that their 80-20 fixed-adjustable was really an 80-20 adjustable-ballon. They just went from 2 teacher salaries to 1 (to be a stay at home mom) and were 10K underwater in my estimation…
Well, they managed to find a greater fool!
Last tuesday their baby came along with a buyer! The one and only person to look at their 2 bedroom townhouse in the two weeks it was on a market flooded with similar houses.
Now get this, the buyer (a young woman with the help of her parents) is offering them more money in exchange for them paying all of the closing costs. Now they just have to get the house to appraise for 5-10K above market value…
If all goes well then in 30 days they will be renting a 2 bed-room place for a little over 1/2 the monthly cost of their current mortgage.
Wow. That is great (for them).
For getting it appraised at a good value, have they thought of a 4 carat doorbell knocker? Wallpapering with 50 dollar bills? Proving an oil reserve in the back yard.
Iraq safer than Ohio Banks?
The spread of Iraqi bonds is narrower than for notes of Ohio banks National City Corp. and KeyCorp, suggesting Baghdad may be safer for bond investors than Cleveland.
And rightly so! Iraq has a source of income in the future to pay off the debt. Where are the funds to pay off the bank debt?
On a relative basis, not including risks from currency translations, the US is far from the safest country to invest moneys. Including currency translations the US is in the top 10 countries to invest.
Iraq is a hard money country. The US is a soft money country.
If Sheila’s gig with our FDIC has to be cut short for some reason, maybe there’s a position in the Iraqi FDIC, for her?
http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/refresh/graphics_at2+shtml/085328.shtml?tswind120#contents
After Gustav (Mahler?) and Hanna (Montana?)merge over Florida, will there be anything left in Florida to save? And which is more terrifying, a Hurricane named Gustav or Hanna? “Watch out here comes hurricane Gustav!” or “Watch out here comes Hurricane Hanna!”
The later versions of the Messerschmitt ME-109 fighter planes, were called “Gustav”.
The leading ace of the war shot down 352 planes, flying one of these.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erich_Hartmann
How about Hurricane Dmitry or Hurricane Vladimir?
There is scuttlebutt that the Prezzy may not attend RepubCon on Monday, when he’s scheduled to speak. The Gustav/Hanna hurricane may make landfall in the US on that very day, and our Prezzy doesn’t want to get caught flatfooted (again) almost exactly three years after the Katrina debacle.
Republican officials said yesterday that they are considering delaying the start of the GOP convention in Minneapolis-St. Paul because of Tropical Storm Gustav …
The threat is serious enough that White House officials are also debating whether President Bush should cancel his scheduled convention appearance on Monday, the first day of the convention, according to administration officials and others familiar with the discussion.
For Bush and Republican presidential candidate John McCain, Gustav threatens to provide an untimely reminder of Hurricane Katrina.
Link
A black president or a female vice president. Some people are going to be VERY unhappy with this election!
(Fortunately, I am not one of them.)
Sarah Palin just announced as McCain’s VP.
McSame & McDame !
Sarah Barracuda: “That petrified oak has a stroke & I’m answering the “red phone” @ 3am”
Form city council member to… mayor… to…”I’m the Decider”
Quess that kinda takes the wind out of the Republican argument:
“He’s not experienced enough…”
With Kids names like this….she may help McSame win the state of California.
The baby naming book publishers will have to print an update revision.
She also has three daughters: Bristol, 17; Willow, 13; and Piper, 7.[8] On April 18, 2008, Palin gave birth to her second son, Trig
You conveniently(??) left off the 18 yr old son going to serve infantry in Iraq.
I was talking to all those folks who like to think that only Californian’s create the latest Hampton’s my baby’s name is better than your baby’s name.
You point on one of her son’s going to (Maybe/maybe not) Iraq has a twin:
Biden Son’s Service In Iraq Complicates Succession Question
Beau Biden, 39, is the state attorney general. Since he was elected to that post in 2006, he has been viewed in Delaware as a potential inheritor of his father’s Senate seat. But the younger Biden is also a captain in the Delaware Army National Guard’s Judge Advocate General’s Corps, and he is scheduled to head to Iraq on Oct. 3 for a deployment of roughly a year.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/08/25/AR2008082502144.html
Don’t forget Biden’s son is also going to Iraq.
I don’t like either party and will vote for Cynthia McKinney, but I think McCain made a smart move. If the Dems lose this election, they really have to look in the mirror and ask themselves if they have some sort of persecution complex, because it seems that they constantly sabotage their own party’s chances.
I mean, Joe Biden? What a lame choice. He and Joe Lieberman were the two biggest supporters for Iraq war in Congress.
It’s like John Kerry never mentioning the supremely unpopular war while running against Bush. Why would anyone do something like that unless, deep down, they really wanted to lose?
Michael Palin would have been a MUCH better choice. Those “Bring Out Your Dead” skits with McCain could have really brightened up the campaign.
This is as close to free moneys as I have seen!
Short Hillary.
http://www.intrade.com/jsp/intrade/contractSearch/
Hoz, what’s the deal with the spread between what you can buy and sell for? Some of them are quite significant.
Lack of liquidity. A tight market reflects depth. A wide market reflects gone on vacation.
Buzz in Alaska: Sarah Palin, our governor, is the Veep pick for John McCain.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/30/us/politics/29palin.html?_r=1&hp=&adxnnl=1&oref=slogin&adxnnlx=1220022111-N3Pfe1563yktfPG1Vc5QRQ
I think that the Republican Party just had a “Dan Quayle” episode:
Does history repeat or echo?:
“At the 1988 Republican National Convention in New Orleans, Louisiana, George H. W. Bush called on Quayle to be his running mate in the general election. Quayle was chosen to appeal to a younger generation of Americans and his good looks were praised by… Senator John McCain, who said “I can’t believe a guy that handsome wouldn’t have some impact.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Quayle
There is about a 99 pct probability that Palin is brighter than Quayle, and 100 pct probability that she is better looking.
She is a good looking lady… That hunts, fishes, Lifelong NRA member, Etc… I had never heard of her, don’t watch the circus that closely.
This is bound to upset the moonbats, not to mention Hilary, her party pissed on her head, and picked an old white guy.
There is a 99.9% chance…she will make “young republicans” wet there pants!
Buzz in Alaska: Sarah Palin, our governor, is the Veep pick for John McCain.
It’s done from what I read. Smart move I think, if you’re for the Repubs. O.B. picks comb over Joe and claims he’s for ‘change’. That will not help him.
Of course I wouldn’t vote for either one so all in all it makes no difference to me.
I’m blown away that Ted Stevens wasn’t the pick to be veep.
Ted Stevens: “Palin can eat me!”
Sarah the Barracuda: “with pleasure!”
Sarah Barracuda might be spot on:
Not only does she eat “moose ” burgers…she eats fellow Republicans:
“…appointed Palin Ethics Commissioner of the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission,[15] where she served from 2003 to 2004 until resigning in protest over what she called the “lack of ethics” of fellow Alaskan Republican leaders, who ignored her whistleblowing complaints of legal violations and conflicts of interest.[5] After she resigned, she exposed the state Republican party’s chairman, Randy Ruedrich, one of her fellow Oil & Gas commissioners, who was accused of doing work for the party on public time, and supplying a lobbyist with a sensitive e-mail.[16] Palin filed formal complaints against both Ruedrich and former Alaska Attorney General Gregg Renkes, who both resigned; Ruedrich paid a record $12,000 fine.[5]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Palin
Any more scoop on her trying to get her ex-brother-in-law fired from being a state trooper?
Every politician has a Billy Carter (or Neil Bush) relative…
I’d heard that she fired the state Police Commissioner because he would not fire her ex-brother-in-law.
Sounds like her and Alberto Gonzales would get along quite well.
The cynicism of this pick is breathtaking. We will either have a black president who has less than 3 1/2 years’ experience as a junior Senator or a female vice president who has less than 1 1/2 years as governor of a highly atypical state. Who, prior to that, was the mayor of a small town.
Spare all of us the comparisons to JFK. I earnestly hope that they will have the stature of a JFK–who had eight years in the Senate by 1960–but the basis for hope is pretty slim. Kind of like a shot in the dark. If Lloyd Bentsen were debating now, he might well say: “I knew JFK. I worked alongside him. And you [Senator Obama/Governor Palin] are no JFK”.
I think the comparison to Bush-Quayle is right on. And McCain’s gesture may well be sufficiently attractive to pull off a chunk of Hillary’s women. Good afternoon, President McCain.
McSame & McDame… to the Republican Party:
We’ll make Ross Perot look like the pissy, mangy, flea bitten dog of Texas “reform” that he is…we’re not your Shrubs Republican father…we’re gonna drag every one of you old dog Republicans thru every bush popper shrub on the West Texas plain…and when we’re finished teaching you’all our “new” ideas …you’ll thank me!
“In less than two years in office, Palin has made cleaning up the Alaska Republican party — which has been buffeted by a wide-ranging federal corruption investigation — into a top priority. In the process, she has angered many in the state’s old-guard. In a particularly brash move, Palin earlier this year put out the equivalent of a political hit on Young, who has served as the state’s lone House member for 35 years, by encouraging Lt. Gov. Sean Parnell to jump into the GOP primary against the incumbent.
“Palin was asked about her efforts to root out corruption in the GOP. She said: “You’re absolutely right on the cleansing that’s needed in our party, in the Republican Party.”
Funny, not even a wimper over at Limpbaughs about McDame, however, he does have at the top of his page: “I don’t know what I’m talking about…I have no experience!”
“If Lloyd Bensen were debating now”
Wine Country Dude:
Having had the benefit of hearing her speak for the first time, and watching my wife in tears (unusual for her) I might disagree with you. The Ivy League elitists will be trashing her but many of us see our own daughters and families in her. This could end up being a good pick. We shall see.
Give the governor a harumph…
There is a huge demand for both gold and silver right now in India and North America. North American shops are completely bare of silver. Indian shops are empty of both silver and gold. Even the Indian banks don’t have any gold or silver…Investor oriented shops are bare, and the U.S. Mint has suspended coin production.
http://seekingalpha.com/article/91357-the-disconnect-between-supply-and-demand-in-gold-silver-markets
Oh Cali -
Foreclosure green lien program to keep lawns lush
The Associated Press
Article Launched: 08/29/2008 06:02:04 AM PDT
LAKE ELSINORE, Calif.—A “green liens” program to keep foreclosed property lawns lush has been approved by the Riverside County water agency serving Lake Elsinore, Wildomar, Murietta and Canyon Lake.
The Elsinore Valley Municipal Water District program approved Thursday allows banks, lenders and owners of foreclosed properties to place a lien on foreclosed properties to keep the water meters on.
Bills would be repaid when the home is sold. The program ends Dec. 31, 2009.
The water agency estimates there are 2,500 homes in some stage of foreclosure in the 96,000-square-mile district.
This will end well.
Leigh
http://www.mercurynews.com/breakingnews/ci_10334330
There is a huge demand for both gold and silver right now in India and North America. North American shops are completely bare of silver. Indian shops are empty of both silver and gold. Even the Indian banks don’t have any gold or silver…
…Investor oriented shops are bare, and the U.S. Mint has suspended coin production. All available supply seems to be reserved for industrial users.
http://seekingalpha.com/article/91357-the-disconnect-between-supply-and-demand-in-gold-silver-markets
Amazing…
In the midst of the worst drought ever (not the worst from a lack of water perspective, but the idea that are 40+ million of us now, using around 120 gallons of water a day) in California, they want to keep the grass green?
Gangrene has set in, all over the mindfield…
It is absolutly INSANE waste of time and money and resources to have grass in Lake SmellSomeMore. That place has been and always will be nasty. I went to that lake once to test a boat and I would not touch the water in that sespool.
Keeping the water on may green up the lawn but will also help the weeds grow tall, and then who is going to mow the grass? Are they just going to water the front lawn and let the backyard go brown? More silly unthought out pap from your local ‘we feel your pain’ government officials!
Any pet dish, tuna can, flower pot, etc. that is in the range of a sprinkler would be a potential mosquito breeding ground.
This is simply outrageous.
“The Elsinore Valley Municipal Water District program approved Thursday allows banks, lenders and owners of foreclosed properties to place a lien on foreclosed properties to keep the water meters on.”
This is simply outrageous given the ongoing drought. How much credence should the public give pleas to conserve water when they see cr@p like this happening? It’s about as infuriating as San Diego letting a broken fire hydrant spew water for five hours last week, wasting nearly 4 million gallons of water.
I still say, do what they did several yrs ago during drought..
Spray paint the lawns green. Once. It will stay, for petes sake,
it rarely rains around here. Well, here it doesn’t, but Elsinore..
Otherwise they are wasting water.
In a variety of ways, it is after all Elsinore.
The Ranks of the Ultrawealthy Grow
http://finance.yahoo.com/taxes/article/105638/The-Ranks-of-the-Ultrawealthy-Grow
The IRS also reported increases in the number of people with a net worth between $10 million and $20 million: 79,000 people qualified for this group in 2004, up from 77,000 in 2001 and 51,000 in 1998.
At least the current administration has been beneficial to one income group. You can’t say he’s been a complete failure!
Tax breaks and bale outs for the elite
Inflation and alternative minimum tax for the middle and upper middle class.
Oprah, move over…it could be the Sarah & Nancy show:
Congress has wrestled with the issue of presidential succession throughout our history. Why? Well, between 1901 and 1974, five Vice Presidents have taken over the top office due to four presidential deaths and one resignation. In fact, between the years 1841 to 1975, more than one-third of all U.S. Presidents have either died in office, quit, or become disabled. Seven Vice Presidents have died in office and two have resigned resulting in a total of 37 years during which the office of Vice President was completely vacant. (Details here.)
The Present System of Presidential Succession
Our current method of presidential succession draws authority from:
+ 20th Amendment, Article II, Section 1, Clause 6
+ 25th Amendment
+ Presidential Succession Law of 1947
President and Vice President
The 20th and 25th Amendments establish procedures and requirements for the Vice President to assume the duties and powers of the President
The 25th Amendment also provides a method for filling a vacated office of the Vice President. The President must nominate a new Vice President, who must be confirmed by…. a majority vote of both houses of Congress.
Who would Sarah pick for VP? Limpbaughs or Ann Coulter?
Or she could resign and let Madame Pelosi have a whack at it.
Matt, what you’ve never heard or witnessed a “cat” fight!
Sarah the Barracuda:
“That’s ‘itch is wearing the same dress & shoes as mine, I’ll show her… I’ll have six kids, I’ll name her McPlame”
Cactus,
I’m in Phoenix right now today thru Sunday. Want to get together for coffee at Starbucks on Chandler blvd Saturday morning (August 30)? 8:30 a.m.
46th and Chandler. I intend to bike there on my black mountain bike. I’ll have a bike helmet with me in case I’m inside waiting. Probably one of the few bikers there and I’m 5′11″ tall and will have those special bike shoes with cleats. Don’t worry about asking everyone if their name is Bill!
If you don’t show up, no problem. Probably won’t be back on HBB to look for your response before then. I’ll probably hang out there until 9:00 am to see if you show up or not.
- Bill
I know the place 8:30 yea i’ll be there very close to my old rental house.
cactus
Sorry, OT but , you have got to be kidding
about this Gov for VP choice.
IMO, it’s a shrewd political move and I think it will make McCain get elected. I am voting for Bob Barr still. I don’t trust McCain. But I know he is a great politician - much better at politics than Osama Bin Biden (er Obama) and not at all a statesman and not good at all for America. He will make all illegal aliens instant citizens and that will mean 12 million more voters for socialist programs.
IMO, it’s a shrewd political move and I think it will make McCain get elected. I am voting for Bob Barr still.
I think you are right Bill, shrewd political move by McCain. B.O. and his sad pick, did him no good at all. The ‘change’ crowd are now the ‘no change’ crowd.
I’m still voting for Ron Paul.
I am voting for Ron Paul, too. But I think McCains move just locked it up for Obama. McCain criticizes Obama’s lack of experience and gets a woman with far less? I think more Republican’s will be disillusioned with this move than Democratic women will all the sudden switch their votes just because Palin is a woman.
While she’s certainly not the worst pick McCain could’ve made, neither is she the best.
Choosing Palin screams “gimmick” to me. It’s a choice that effectively negates what may have been McCain’s best talking point — that Obama is too inexperienced to lead. What does that make Palin, then? How can McCain continue to make that claim when his second-in-command is an utter political neophyte? Furthermore, she doesn’t deliver many crucial electoral votes, as a Jindal (Louisiana) or Tim Pawlenty (Minnesota) may have done.
Funny thing is, as limited as Palin’s experience is, she has more experience running a government than Barack does.
She is manager of the largest state with arguably the greatest potential for natural resources. She was manager of a city. Barack was the manager of nothing, and has no background as executive of anything.
My previous post hasn’t appeared yet, but as an addendum:
In terms of nominating a woman, there are a number of much more qualified GOP’ers he could’ve tapped, including Kay Bailey Hutchison, Elizabeth Dole, and Olympia Snowe.
Perhaps the youth factor swung the decision, I dunno.
But I think the luster will wear off this VP pick pretty quickly.
I think they are all pro-choice…
Please - - - Snow and Dole are commie libs.
Perhaps the youth factor swung the decision, I dunno.
But I think the luster will wear off this VP pick pretty quickly.
Not only will it wear off fast but it might piss off a bunch of female republicans. The GOP just tossed aside a group of well qualified women for a younger woman with no experience, except for being an ex beauty queen.
and the fact that she is actually a real conservative… unlike most in the modern GOP…
Have you watched his face when introducing his pick?
Don’t you see when he reads the prompter and it must be saying, “smile now”, so he mechanically does?
This pick isn’t for women at all. It won’t do McPain a bit of good. He can’t even smile naturally around her. He isn’t the least bit impressed or pleased with his pick. It is a strategic pick that will fail him.
Unless the machine is in full lie mode.
Who’d really want to sacrifice their future career as a politician, by being involved in anything the elephant brand is offering up for leadership, currently?
That’s how you end up with dead-enders like her…
Yup. Almost as silly as the two choices we’ve been given for President. In the blue corner, Changy McChange! In the red corner, Samey McSame!
Monty Python couldn’t have written a better sketch for this upcoming election.
(McCaininator knocks on door, door opens…)
Sarah Connor Palin?
He inquires…
Filed under:
Inflation has some odd behaviors?…or…Realtors are dirty rats?
Rat meat in demand as inflation bites:
http://www.reuters.com/article/oddlyEnoughNews/idUSBKK27922820080828
Grrr.. Here in Hampton Roads (Southeastern Virginia / Norfolk / Virginia Beach / Newport News) the paper had a story today:
http://hamptonroads.com/2008/08/julys-home-sales-still-down-last-year-median-price-steady
“July’s home sales still down from last year, but median price is steady.”
I wonder what the people get for their money.
peter schiff:
http://www.safehaven.com/article-11101.htm
“Although the report contained many other negative data points, including increased inventories and a spike in foreclosure sales, it was the slowing declines that got spotlight. Talk about grasping at straws.”
Nice line, Peter.
Comment by Professor Bear
2008-08-27 06:12:53
MSM financial journalists are grasping at the straws of a slowing rate of decline, and seem happy to downplay the record price drop that just played out over the past year, including the obvious implication that the incentives for foreclosures, walkaways and short sales just increased considerably.
US house price declines slowing
By James Politi in Washington
Published: August 26 2008 14:52 | Last updated: August 26 2008 19:21
US home prices posted a record annual decline of 15.9 per cent in June, but the pace of monthly falls slowed significantly, offering hope that the ailing US housing market is edging towards a rebound.
Frankly I am happy to share my insights with anyone who cares to read them, though the echo effect is at once flattering and shocking.
PB, it is the wknd and amazing how so many are on the streets this afternoon. And at the gas pump.
Yesterday you coulda bowled down 111 or any street for that matter, now, it is just us, trying to stay cool inside.
What was your point? Echos ?
The passage from Schiff’s article that I quoted (enclosed in double quotes above) was very similar to my comment dated 2008-08-27 06:12:53. The sentences highlighted in bold were too similar for me to believe the similarity was coincidental, in fact.
So at a cost of zero dead and zero wounded, the Chinese get access to Iraqi oil…
Smart move. Walk softly, but carry big cash and population sticks.
Worth noting: If the symbiosis continues, this move could work out to the advantage of U.S. consumers who like cheap manufactured goods (which use inexpensive oil as an input).
I’m sure the 30,000 or so maimed and wounded will take some solace knowing they can buy a prosthesis, canes or wheelchairs from Wal*Mart @ the lowest price, always.
All the dead iraqis must be pleased as well.
I imagine the Chinese would have had access before we spent a trillion or so dollars and wasted all those lives. The war itself took oil off the market, and consumed vast quantities of oil.
MEaston
Sorry, I like my SUV. Are they still legal?
..Chinese get access..
It’s understandable that this will upset those who suffer under the mistaken impression that the USA/coalition’s efforts and purpose was to gain access to Iraq’s oil.
Let’s keep it in the sound bite mode:
The “end” result= “We die…they buy!” …or….”We pay…they play!”
Next: Sudan / Cuba / Panama / Nigeria
Those Communist Chinese, very tricky wabbits.
The door is wide open for whoever wants to invest in Iraq. Where’s the trick?
As for a growth oriented speculative investment, i am hard pressed to find one as attractive as Iraq, where the only logical direction is up.
What are the limits for a newly capitalist free market smack dab in the middle of the backward Arab nations? Given 10 years they will likely be the economic hub of the entire region.
China might be among the first willing to take the gamble but they certainly won’t be the last.
Having bid against the Chinese in Africa and seeing the benefits that the African nations receive from ‘0 Political interference’, we are trying to work on an uneven playing field, uneven at our choice and to our disadvantage.
China (and I love the country) is effectively practicing economic colonialism. The US (and I love this country the most) and allies (screw the French) practice/practiced imperial colonialism.
Imperial colonialism kept Africa and South America in poverty for years. China is buying the rights to the resources without caring about Political policies. Economic Colonialism. Intrinsically tied to China and dependent on China for survival.
I like to get my hands dirty, and reading the print edition of the L.A. Times is my modus operandi…
It’s been on quite the diet, and continues to shrink away in size and content.
The advertising section is wafer-thin, like a super-model. Many sections that used to be 3 to 5 columns, now use a 1/3rd of column.
The Tribune Company (owner of the LA Times and the Chicago Tribune) doesn’t seem long for this earth.
They’re hemorrhaging ink everywhere.
Annualized rate of decline in gold price based on August rate of decline:
((835.20/(835.20+89.20))^12-1)*100 = 70 pct
METALS STOCKS
Gold ends slightly lower as dollar gains vs. euro
Metal falls nearly $90 in August, the biggest monthly loss in 25 years
By Moming Zhou, MarketWatch
Last update: 2:44 p.m. EDT Aug. 29, 2008
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — Gold futures ended Friday’s volatile trading slightly lower with gold posting its biggest monthly loss in 25 years, as the U.S. dollar rose against the euro, reducing the precious metal’s appeal as an alternative investment.
Gold for December delivery edged down $2, or 0.2%, to close at $835.20 an ounce on the Chicago Board of Trade. Gold rose 0.2% this week. For the month, the precious metal lost $89.2, the biggest monthly loss since at least 1984, according to FactSet.
An unannounced extrapolation! None for oil, though?
Gold is my extrapolatee of choice when no new housing data is available.
“Annualized rate of decline in gold price based on August rate of decline:
((835.20/(835.20+89.20))^12-1)*100 = 70 pct”
Professor Bear. “I like him. He’s silly.”
Now go re-read this article that helped get me into gold in October 2001 and have a nice weekend!
http://www.itulip.com/gold.htm
Do you have any articles to read that helped get people into housing in 2001?
2001? That was great time to buy housing! Wish I would’ve even now. Lot’s of things I wish I would have bought back then. Euros. A European vacation. Foreign stocks. Life was good with a strong dollar even though it was off it’s highs.
If wishes were fishes…..
Ya gotta point… though 1996 turned out to be an even better time (as we lucky California newcomers eventually figured out)
time to buy?
Falling prices are a sign that a bottom will soon be at hand, whether the asset in question is gold, stocks or houses…
you are being facetious
Usually.
(Lack of) Integrity Bank of Georgie we hardly knew ya. RIP.
FDIC Fridays are becoming so much fun!!!!!
http://www.fdic.gov/news/news/press/2008/pr08074.html
Integrity Baank with $1.1 billion in total assets….
and the new bank willing to take: (drum roll please)…will purchase approximately $34.4 million of Integrity Bank’s assets. The rest are deemed worth a lot less.
Assets for a bank are loans outstanding.
Enter Queen playing:
Another One Bites the Dust
Integrity bank?
really?
Sheila & Corp’se are making sure the cadavers are spread out far away from one-another, as to not cause a stink.
Wikipedia…it’s a tool, use it. Just don’t become a Scientologist about it.
Wikipedia Edits Forecast Vice Presidential Picks:
“In the days leading up to Republican presidential candidate John McCain’s running mate announcement, political junkies glued to broadcasts and blogs for clues of McCain’s veep choice might have done better to keep a sharp eye on each candidate’s Wikipedia entry.
“Just hours before McCain declared his veep choice of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, her Wiki page saw a flurry of activity, with editors adding details about her approval rating and husband’s employment. Perhaps more tellingly, some of the same users editing her page were almost simultaneously updating McCain’s Wiki entry, adding information dealing with accuracy, sources and footnotes to each.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/08/29/AR2008082902691.html?hpid=topnews
Wiki is followed by so many and updated so often it is almost a source of daily news. Major developments, like a celebrity death or sporting event results seem to be available in an instant…
Speaking of Palin, McCain just stole about 90% of the woman-vote.. can this be legal?
women are not so stupid…remember Geraldine Ferraro?
Geez Joey,
Give women more credit. Believe it or not we can think and vote who we think will be the best for our nation.
What McCain did was solidify his conservative base with nominating Palin. He was not going after the women who voted for Clinton. He needs the conservative base. She is a conservative. I think it was a brilliant move on McCain’s part. I won’t vote for the ticket.
Fannie and Freddie doubts grow
By Saskia Scholtes in New York
Published: August 29 2008 20:10 | Last updated: August 29 2008 20:10
Shares in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac fell on Friday amid concerns foreign investors were reassessing their exposure to the troubled US mortgage financiers’ bonds and guaranteed securities.
Bank of China this week revealed it had cut its portfolio of securities issued or guaranteed by the two government-sponsored enterprises by a quarter, or $4.6bn, since the end of June. The sale underscored signs of nervousness among foreign buyers of Fannie and Freddie’s debt.
…
Federal Reserve custody data on Thursday showed foreign official and private investors reduced their holdings of agency debt for the sixth consecutive week.
Bill O’Donnell, analyst at UBS said: “If this recent theme of cooling passions for GSE’s debt becomes a longer-term trend, then it could be problematic for the GSEs given that the central banks have taken . . . roughly 30 to 60 per cent of new GSE issuance in recent months and years.”
Leaders
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac
Fire the bazooka
Aug 28th 2008
From The Economist print edition
It is time to nationalise America’s mortgage giants—and then to dismantle them
Finance & Economics
American banks
When sorrows come
Aug 28th 2008 | NEW YORK
From The Economist print edition
Commercial banks prepare, reluctantly, to take centre stage
EVERY episode in the credit crunch has had its dramatic flourish. There were the defenestrations at Citigroup and Merrill Lynch late last year; then, in March, the Bear Stearns fiasco; the humbling of UBS; and now Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, a tale of hubris that might impress Shakespeare himself. What next?
…
Nor have investors grown any more confident about their ability to price the banks’ toxic mortgage-backed assets: Merrill Lynch’s cut-price sale of collateralised-debt obligations in July has had few imitators. Lehman Brothers has tried unsuccessfully to sell a pile of iffy securities backed by commercial mortgages all summer.
The woes of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac weigh on these efforts. Bankers feel obliged to advise clients against snapping up distressed securitised assets until the mortgage giants are put on a firmer footing, says one. And banks themselves are exposed: paper issued by the mortgage agencies accounts for roughly half of their total securities portfolios, estimates CreditSights, a research firm. American banks own much of the preferred stock (a hybrid of debt and equity) that the two firms issued. They were attracted by the preference shares’ combination of a low risk weighting and decent yield, says Ira Jersey of Credit Suisse, but have seen their prices tumble on fears that they will be wiped out if the government moves to prop the agencies up. Although only a few regional lenders would be seriously hurt by this, it would add to the pain of many. JPMorgan Chase has just become the first bank to write down its holdings, saying it may lose $600m, or half the value it had put on them. That may start a trend.
Worse, banks have come to rely on issuing their own preference shares to raise capital, and will find that harder if holders of Fannie’s and Freddie’s paper suffer losses. Banks have raised a total of $265 billion of capital since last summer, says UBS. With much of that issuance underwater, investors are understandably wary of throwing good money after bad.
Contagion also spreads through the market for credit-default swaps. Banks have busily written such insurance contracts on Fannie’s and Freddie’s $20 billion of subordinated debt, which sits below senior debt in their capital structures. If the debt’s holders suffer losses in a bail-out, triggering a “credit event”, banks that had sold the swaps would face huge payouts. The amounts involved are “impossible to calculate but far from trivial”, says one sombre analyst. As the bard wrote: “When sorrows come, they come not single spies, but in battalions.”
Finance & Economics
Buttonwood
A Nightmare on Wall Street
Aug 28th 2008
From The Economist print edition
Why the credit crunch has lasted so long
LIKE a Hollywood monster that is impervious to bullets, the credit crisis refuses to lie down and die. The authorities have bombarded it with interest-rate reductions, tax cuts, special liquidity schemes and bank bail-outs, but still the creature lumbers forward, threatening new victims with every step. Global stockmarkets are suffering double-digit losses this year, and credit markets are once again gummed up.
For investors who cut their teeth in the 1980s and 1990s, the persistence of the crisis must be a surprise. Prompt action by central banks, after Black Monday in 1987 (when America’s stockmarket fell by almost 23%), or following the collapse of Long-Term Capital Management, a hedge fund, in 1998, suggested it was always worthwhile to “buy on the dips”.