The Echo We Hear All Over The Country
The Mercury News reports from California. “With local foreclosures at record highs, and mortgage availability continually changing, it’s hardly been a conventional year for home buyers and sellers. What will happen this fall is still anyone’s guess. It’s clear that with prices declining in many parts of Santa Clara County, sales generally accelerated this summer, especially among less expensive homes.”
“Many bank-owned foreclosures are selling quickly, and James Nichols, a manager with Prudential California realty brokerage firm in San Jose seen a small flurry of lower-priced condos sell lately. ‘Some are under $250,000. There are great opportunities out there,’ he said.”
“Jeffrey Lo and his wife, Patty, illustrate that the year-end market could go either way in Silicon Valley. ‘We’re still very interested in buying, but we’re still also interested in waiting and seeing,’ Lo said.”
“He knows a few people who have lost their jobs recently and wonders whether Silicon Valley can stay insulated from the faltering national economy much longer. Though he wants to buy, ‘I’m going to step back and not get overly emotional about the purchase.’”
“So far this year, June posted the year’s best sales volume for single-family houses, with 966 changing hands in the county, according to MLS data.”
“But other agents, including Jason Chan Lee of brokerage Silicon Valley REO, said pending sales figures are unreliable. Lately, he said, many pending transactions fall apart, either because the buyers’ loans don’t come through, or because buyers who need bank approval for their ’short sale’ purchases get tired of waiting and move on to other properties.”
The Press Democrat. “Moving to get more affordable housing built, the city of Santa Rosa is taking a major loan from Exchange Bank to help developers buy land and build apartments and homes. The timing is critical, because the housing slump has created opportunities for nonprofit housing developers to rapidly expand their efforts by purchasing land at favorable prices.”
“Just two weeks ago, Burbank purchased a 4-acre site in southwest Santa Rosa from Cobblestone Homes. Burbank plans a 96-unit affordable apartment complex for the site.”
“‘It was an opportunity,’ said John Lowry, executive director of Burbank Housing. ‘There was a sense that there was a scarcity of land. Now there are many parcels available that developers are willing to sell.’”
The Recordnet. “Jose A. Nuno and his wife are first-time home buyers who spent six months working the busy market for a foreclosure house to fit their budget. They didn’t buy a foreclosure, though. They ended up buying a new house.”
“Just in case, they took a look at some new homes, not expecting to find anything that would change their minds. ‘That’s when I started realizing there was not much of a (cost) difference between new and (a foreclosure),’ Jose said.”
“They backed out of the foreclosure purchase and bought a new 3-bedroom, 2.5-bath two-story house in a Manteca subdivision of Florsheim Homes.”
“Models start at about $250,000, and the Nunos bought their 1,500-square-foot Florsheim house for $285,000. The monthly payments are higher than those for the foreclosure would have been, but not by much, Jose said, and the couple wouldn’t have to struggle to come up with thousands of dollars to make the foreclosure house livable.”
“Although foreclosures are touted ‘as the best price in town - pennies on the dollar - some are gross,’ he said.”
“Los Angeles-based KB Home also is reporting lookers and buyers who are checking out new homes because they were dissatisfied with the foreclosure market. The company has introduced home models as small as 1,300 and 1,400 square feet, with price tags starting at about $222,000 in, say, KB Home’s Riverbend development in Stockton.”
“‘We are very competitive on the price side,’ said Marc Burnstein, VP of sales and marketing for KB Northern California. ‘We’ve gone to smaller plans at a tremendous value relative to a foreclosure with no warranty and perhaps huge fix-up costs.’”
The Modesto Bee. “As the economy shrinks, enrollment at community colleges is expanding. Modesto Junior College’s enrollment ballooned almost 4 percent over last year to 18,474 students. Bob Nadell, VP of student services, figures enrollment will break 20,000 this semester. ‘Basically, we’re slammed here at MJC,’ he said. ‘When the economy is strained, a lot of people go back to school to retool.’”
“Prospective MJC student Monica Perez’s father — who was paying her California State University, Sacramento, tuition — told her last month that she’ll have to finance her own education because he lost his job. She hasn’t saved enough this summer to afford tuition, books and living expenses for the year, she said.”
“‘I’m stuck. I don’t know what I’m going to do,’ said Perez. ‘I had a plan. I never thought something like this would happen.’”
“MJC counselor Kim Bailey has heard those words countless times. Often they accompany stories of personal job loss. ‘They’re living in a different day and time financially. I don’t think I’ve ever talked to so many people who have lost everything,’ Bailey said.”
“The Northern San Joaquin Valley’s jobless rate hit 11.3 percent in July. At the same time, the region lost 3,000 homes to foreclosure. Many of those seeking Bailey’s help were in their 30s, 40s and 50s, and thought they’d established their careers.”
“‘Then it’s like, ‘I got laid off yesterday and here I am. I don’t know what I’m going to do,’ she said. ‘Most are feeling desperate. They want some marketable skills fast.’”
“People such as Jerry King toiled every day throughout the construction boom. Even when others around him were laid off, King hoped he would be unscathed.”
“‘Our company held on to people for as long as they could and laid me off last. By the time I was on the job market, everyone was already looking,’ said the former Beck Properties home warranty representative, while standing in line at a job fair last week. ‘First, I was looking for the same pay. Now, I’m looking for anything. I just need to make a living.’”
The Press Enterprise. “Business is brisk for repossession companies throughout the Inland area and nationwide that recover vehicles for lienholders after buyers default on their loans, industry officials say. Ray Radford, chief financial officer for Cal Recoveries Co., which has offices in the city of Riverside and in Orange and San Diego counties…would not say how many cars, trucks and other vehicles his company recovers daily. But he estimates that business is up as much as 400 percent, compared with the past few years.”
“And most of the rides his repossessors are bringing in are sport-utility vehicles and big, gas-guzzling trucks. ‘These are the vehicles that are being picked up, because people can’t afford to drive them. They can’t afford to put gas in them,’ Radford said.”
“The number of automobile-loan defaults is up 15 percent to 20 percent over the same period last year, said Tom Kontos, chief economist with ADESA Inc. The business runs about 60 vehicle auctions throughout North America.”
“Kontos attributes that increase to the growing number of Americans unable to keep pace with their adjustable-rate home mortgages. ‘All of a sudden you’ve got a decision to make,’ Kontos said. ‘Can I make my payment on both my home and my vehicle, or do I need to make a choice?’”
“That is an easy decision for most people, said Gary Headland, owner of Bank Vehicle Locators & Recovery Service in Corona. More and more often, those who have fallen behind on their car payments are happy to hand over the keys, he said.”
“‘It’s not dangerous, because they know you’re coming,’ Headland said. ‘A lot of times they say, ‘We expected you to be here earlier.’”
“Headland figures his business has increased about 80 percent over last year. He gets 25 to 30 orders for repossession a day from lienholders. Headland, a former car dealer who has been in the repossession business for a decade, says lenders are to blame for the rise in auto-loan defaults.”
“‘Banks have allowed people to go out there and (borrow) more money than the car’s worth,’ he said.”
“Still, the recovery orders from lienholders keep whirring through the fax machine in the mobile home that serves as Headland’s office. ‘It’s that way all day long,’ he said.”
The Desert Sun. “Bed tax revenues collected across the Coachella Valley ran flat through May, but plummeted in June for all but two cities by as much as 27 percent. Aftab Dada, general manager of Palm Springs Hilton, sees no sign of real improvement until the housing market gets settled.”
“‘Its the echo we hear all over the country,’ he said. ‘Until the economy gets settled, people are being cautious.’”
The Press Telegram. “Long Beach resident Jackie Richardson is one of more than a million Californians looking for work this summer. The search hasn’t been easy. Richardson left her job and moved to Lancaster with her husband last year in search of cheaper housing. But the area was hot and more expensive than she had anticipated. The couple moved back to Long Beach in January.”
“Her husband, Johnny, a cross-country truck driver, found work quickly, but Richardson has had little luck in the last eight months. Richardson said she’s considering waiting tables.”
“‘I feel kind of hopeless,’ Richardson said. ‘I never thought it would take this long. I went from expecting to make $18 to now $7.50 (an hour). At this point, I’ll take what I can get.’”
The Tribune. “First American Title Co.’s San Luis Obispo County division will close its Cambria and Los Osos branches next week, ending a decade-long presence in both coastal communities. Kevin Irot, VP and county manager, said the closures are a reflection of the downturn in the real estate market, which has resulted in a marked decline in business.”
“‘Our business is off more than 60 percent from last year,’ Irot said. ‘And last year it was probably off by about the same from the year before.’”
“Irot added: ‘We were the last title company to keep an office open in those communities. Other companies closed them long ago.’ First American Title, which has 29 employees, has operated in the county since 1960.”
The Pasadena Star News. “DeeDee Akins could see it coming. As an operations manager in the wholesale division of IndyMac Bank, she knew the Pasadena-based mortgage lender was getting hammered by defaults associated with its Alt-A mortgage loans.”
“The hammer fell on July 7 when 3,800 IndyMac employees and contract workers companywide were given pink slips, 400 of whom had worked in Pasadena. Four days later, the bank was seized by federal regulators and put under control of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.”
“‘IndyMac had become very aggressive with the types of programs it was offering to borrowers,’ the Altadena resident said. ‘But the bank was following all the guidelines, policies and procedures the government would accept.’”
‘Los Angeles-based KB Home also is reporting lookers and buyers who are checking out new homes because they were dissatisfied with the foreclosure market. The company has introduced home models as small as 1,300 and 1,400 square feet, with price tags starting at about $222,000 in, say, KB Home’s Riverbend development in Stockton.’
‘We are very competitive on the price side,’ said Marc Burnstein, VP of sales and marketing for KB Northern California. ‘We’ve gone to smaller plans at a tremendous value relative to a foreclosure’
This is a good example of why prices must fall enough so the over-building will stop. As is this:
‘Lennar Corp.’s multiyear, billion-dollar effort to develop decrepit former military properties on San Francisco’s waterfront has tapped a new financing source, underscoring the home builder’s success in doing deals to survive the wretched housing market.’
‘The capstone of Lennar’s megaprojects in San Francisco are Hunter’s Point and Candlestick Point, which were acquired from the city for a nominal fee. Lennar and its partners have agreed to spend more than $1 billion building thousands of affordable rental and for-sale housing, along with parks and a site for a new stadium for the National Football League’s 49ers. The first large phase of the project is to begin in 2010.’
‘In March 2007, the builder and LNR turned heads when they reduced their stakes in a venture called LandSource. An investment vehicle for the California Public Employees’ Retirement System paid about $920 million for a 68% stake in LandSource, while Lennar and LNR each received $660 million in cash from the deal. LandSource filed for bankruptcy-court protection in June.’
‘In December 2007, Lennar sold 11,000 house lots to a venture mostly owned by Morgan Stanley’s real-estate arm for $525 million, which was about 60% less than what Lennar carried the land on its books. Since then, land values in some of the markets where the lots are located have continued to erode.’
The Lennar project in SF is an extremely unusual case. The area being developed has had recognized potential for some time, but it was impossible to make use of the area because there was so much crud in the way. This project will completely replace a revoltingly decrepit public housing project and add what amounts to a brand new neighborhood in a sunny area with easy reach to the rest of town. The only way to do this was to make a deal with SF planning, supervisors, and the community as a whole. Lennar has serious funding problems, but the project as a whole has a lot going for it from the location to the special treatment from planning and all the rest. I’d bet Perot makes a lot of money off this, though I wouldn’t bet on Lennar itself still being around even for the first groundbreaking.
This whole project was put on two ballots for San Francisco voters.
Hunter’s Point? Will razing the public housing do anything about the crime problem? You’d need a deathwish to live there now.
A lot of these builders have no choice but to build if they want to stay in business.
They already own the land, and given land values, they can make more money by building and selling the home than by just trying to dump the lot at 10 to 20 cents on the dollar. Hard and Soft costs are perhaps $100 psf, so in the Manteca example, excluding infrastructure and land costs, the cost for the building was probably in the range of $150k. So, after commission of, say 6%, they netted $268k on the sale, and so they essentially sold the land for $118k for the finished lot.
Let’s just say that they needed to give upgrades of $40k to get the sale. They still got $78k recovery on the finished lot.
In that market today, finished lots are selling for less than $50k (in some cases, far less).
I don’t know of any builders that are putting in infrastructure to finish new lots, but in many cases, building the home on the already finished lot is the best way to burn through their inventory, since the only people out there willing to buy finished lots won’t pay more than ~35% of infrastructure costs for the lots.
Real estate prices are crumbling in the Central Valley, just as the drought is drilling people’s wallets…
=========================================
Tulare County homeowners call drilling companies to find water sources
Business has never been better for Loudie Crisp — but you won’t find her bragging about it. As one of the owners of Visalia’s Crisp Well Drilling, Crisp has been running from site to site all summer as wells throughout the Valley start to run dry. “I received eight calls today,” she said. “Everyone’s running out of water. It’s the worst I’ve ever seen it.”
The problem: A water table that has been steadily dropping throughout the Valley, a situation made worse by the exponential growth during the last decade. And this year’s early spring and hot weather have meant hundreds of homeowners have put in calls to local well drillers —and have been given a spot on the waiting list. “A lot of them have old wells that are too shallow now, maybe 80 to 120 feet deep,” she said.
This year drillers are boring down to more than 250 feet to find reliable water supplies — and in many cases that means drilling an entirely new well. The pipes in older wells can be incompatible with simply drilling an existing well farther down.
The price tag for a 200-foot well can run more than $13,500. “I don’t take payments,” Crisp said. “It’s really difficult because I know people are really hurting now — but they have to pay it in full or use a credit card.”
Crisp is booked solid for the next six weeks — a new record for the 30-year-old company. Other Visalia well drillers are in the same boat.
http://www.visaliatimesdelta.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080902/NEWS01/809020328
I wonder if this Crisp is related to the RE scammers in Bakersfield. After living for several years in that part of the Valley, I know there are a lot of Dust-Bowl era families with considerable presence.
In the past I’ve had a well and it wasn’t so much that it didn’t rain enough in Oregon but more that the neighbor I shared it with was such a PAIN! I called a guy that came out to look at it and he figured 10k tops and that was going 600′!
At the time if you didn’t have cash the drillers had MB’s that did quickie re-fi’s so you could pay them cash. Fat chance of that happening these days?
I thought the “mortgage availability continually changing” comment kind of says it all for me. Very uneven, very sporadic. Kind of like well drilling?
The same thing about walking or jogging in bear or lion country, you just have to run faster than the guy/gal behind you: You just have to drill deeper than your neighbor’s well. hehehehehehe
I…drink your…milkshake! I drink it up!
“Jeffrey Lo and his wife, Patty, illustrate that the year-end market could go either way in Silicon Valley. ‘We’re still very interested in buying, but we’re still also interested in waiting and seeing,’ Lo said.”
——————————————-
How exactly do these two half-wits illustrate this…? Anyone?
They illustrate this because they supposedly represent the market, and as such, they are not sure which way they will go. I’m not sure why you are calling them half-wits since they sound like a lot of people on this blog. (They may even have better reading comprehension than some.)
I’m being a little tongue-in-cheek here, but seriously, anyone who doesn’t ALREADY KNOW that the market is headed further down is kinda dense.
They don’t sound like me, that’s for sure. You won’t catch me “making an offer on a townhouse” any time in the next 12 months. Foreclosures are starting to pile up. Why would you want to bail anyone out at this time? Ridiculous.
Why do you call them idiots? His comments seem perfectly sensible. And I agree with you that they illustrate a down market, not an unpredictable market.
“They backed out of the foreclosure purchase and bought a new 3-bedroom, 2.5-bath two-story house in a Manteca subdivision of Florsheim Homes.”
That is just crazy. For those who know Manteca, no further words are necessary.
Let’s just say that for all purposes, parts of the Central Valley compare to inner city Detroit.
And at $285K for 1500 sq.ft. is NOT a deal by any stretch of the imagination.
“And at $285K for 1500 sq.ft. is NOT a deal by any stretch of the imagination.”
Yep. I grew up in Sacramento and didn’t think there was a worse town in California…till I visited Manteca.
My husband grew up in Manteca and will laugh his head off when he hears these prices people are STILL paying there.
Lard of the flies…
My dad used to love the Florsheim shoes, very classy. Wait, or was that the black dudes who broke me into the wonderful world of custodial services as a youth? Maybe it was both, anyway they were nice kicks.
And what happens to all of these dinosaurs, after the repo-man does his job?
It’s the same story for the lenders, as it is for car dealers getting back leased SUV’s, the lenders are way upside-down, as in buried deep.
==========================================
“And most of the rides his repossessors are bringing in are sport-utility vehicles and big, gas-guzzling trucks. ‘These are the vehicles that are being picked up, because people can’t afford to drive them. They can’t afford to put gas in them,’ Radford said.”
How long does an auto lease generally last? Is it two or three years? And can you lease a car for just a few months, then start a lease on another?
Are you kiddin’? Haven’t you been here long enough?
These days leases are for as long as 7 years, and even more un-fuckin’-believably, they let you roll over all the “negative equity” into the next lease.
Of course, all of that is over now that you have pay every penny back.
I’ve heard of car loans that fit this description, but never leases. Rolling negative equity into a lease? I always thought that the idea was to leave the bank holding the bag with their optimistic residual values.
Then again I never would have guessed that people would buy houses with toxic loans either.
Me again. Here’s a little background on why I’m asking the above questions…
Got some down-the-street neighbors who seem to have a thing for new cars. They had a new Chevy for about five months, then poof! It was gone. It didn’t appear to have any mechical problems before it left our street. Now they have a new Saturn.
That’s why I was wondering if there was some sort of ultra-short lease that I didn’t know about.
BTW, these neighbors aren’t too friendly. So, going over to their place and asking what was up with the Chevy — and why it’s no longer around — isn’t an option.
Oops. I meant to say mechanical problems.
There were “pay-option” leases with balloon payment of the balance.
Guess what happened to the “balloon” part!
Yes, this sounds exactly as ridiculous as it is, and nobody here would do it, but you didn’t exactly think that this was a “normal” bubble, did you?
“That’s why I was wondering if there was some sort of ultra-short lease that I didn’t know about”.
Not from the GM Dealer. Their lease programs are dying up fast. GMAC which, remember is now owned by the “hound from hell” Cerberus is cutting loan and lease deals to the bone.
So getting back to original question…
The repo man gets his hundred or 2 per SUV, and the lender has a vehicle worth $5k, that they loaned out $30k on.
It’s a lose-win-lose situation…
“The repo man gets his hundred or 2 per SUV, and the lender has a vehicle worth $5k, that they loaned out $30k on.”
The vehicles go to an auto auction like the huge one in Newark, CA west of the 880. A used car dealer will buy it, and the used car lot will dig-up some loser to sign a contract for 24%, and the detail guy will add the free-hand lettering, “Jose” on the driver door and “Rita” on the passenger side…free of charge. Then the used car dealer will run down to the bank with the contract and discount it for immediate cash, a revolving door of credit!
“some sort of ultra-short lease that I didn’t know about”
It’s call Hertz Rent-a-Car (or Rent-a-Wreck for a better deal)
Drove from Griffith Park back down to OC yesterday about 6pm, couldn’t believe the incredible(y) lightness of traffic for last day of big holiday. Notably absent, big SUVs. Wonder what the correlation is between primary vehicle greater than 4,000 pounds, and underwater mortgage greater than 20%? I’m going to go out on limb and guess “High”.
Yeah. I have a friend who drove her daughter from San Diego to UCLA yesterday. She, too, gleefully reported “No traffic!”
Solid stream of traffic on the 15 north out of San Bernardino Friday night. Surprised me. Vegas bound I suppose.
“Solid stream of traffic on the 15 north out of San Bernardino Friday night. Surprised me. Vegas bound I suppose.”
Yep, and it probably started at two in the afternoon. A quick reprieve at Del Taco helps the mood!
I’d be interested to know whether it’s getting more difficult to spot those ubiquitous Land Rovers in OC. Back when I lived in Irvine I could not understand how people could afford these vehicles …
I’ll wager a yes, if only because two of them are in the Portland area as seen by me today.
I heard recently a Land Rover or Tahoe was going to replace the bear on the CA state flag.
California is the Loan Star* State
* Red Ink
i hate getting behind a flock/pack of Tall Station Wagons (aka SUVs) on the freeway. Can’t see around ‘em or the road ahead.
But it is getting a little better. Nw if we can get Californians to give up their useless Tall Station Wagons, we can finally lower our demand for gas.
The builder exec: ‘We’ve gone to smaller plans at a tremendous value relative to a foreclosure with no warranty and perhaps huge fix-up costs.’”
Excuse me, but you don’t determine value, or worth. And using superlatives like “tremendous” should make anyone run the other way.
And to tar and feather *all* REOs as beat up is disingenuous at best.
Besides, all he is warranting is that the sink will drain and the roof is sound. I’m sure the warranty doesn’t cover loss of your down payment - and more - as the spiral down spins.
Not saying I trust the builder execs but I understand his point. If you’re going to buy a Lennar house buy a new house rather than buying a 2003 house that has been trashed and sat abandoned for six months.
Lennar houses are equally bad in 2008 as they were in 2003 but at least you get five more years and no termites.
The builders get out of warranties in bankruptcy so you might not be getting as much assurance as you think.
Same assclowns will start a new company after the bilking the investors, clients and government for as much as they could steal.
James Nichols, a manager with Prudential California realty brokerage firm in San Jose seen a small flurry of lower-priced condos sell lately. ‘Some are under $250,000.
Only a CA Realturd could use “$250,000″ and “lower-priced” in a sentence as though they were interchangeable.
“He knows a few people who have lost their jobs recently and wonders whether Silicon Valley can stay insulated from the faltering national economy much longer”
Layoffs are more frequent events in Silicon Valley then most people are willing to addmit. If we dig ourself a recession, SV will follow head first. I seen several since 1986. They arent pretty in SF Bay Area. The 1991 recession was especially brutal.
With home prices and employee costs so high… outshoring to other cheaper states or china/india, makes a lot of sense.
When that happens prices will fall and stay down permenant, becuase their wont be jobs around to support higher prices.
SV has dug its own cemetary!
The ‘90 recession was combined with the DoD essentially shutting down all the military bases in the bay area–Alameda, Moffett, zeroing out a ton of military and aerospace spending, etc. It also coincided with a lot of the hardware manufacturing leaving the valley. It’s not so much silicon valley these days as software valley.
Prospective MJC student Monica Perez’s father — who was paying her California State University, Sacramento, tuition — told her last month that she’ll have to finance her own education because he lost his job…“‘I’m stuck. I don’t know what I’m going to do,’ said Perez. ‘I had a plan. I never thought something like this would happen.’”
A PLAN?! Was this ‘plan’ that your dad would pay your way and you wouldn’t have to like, think about supporting yourself, working at a job thingie, all that other icky poo-poo ugly-reality stuff? That’s a great ‘plan’, Monica!
Oh, wait…no. It wasn’t.
I paid my own way through school. I had a scholarship and also worked 3 part-time jobs to do it, or I couldn’t have gone to school. That’s it, that’s all. Therefore I got no sympathy for this candy-ass whiny bint.
O, bint is it? Come down off the high horse Oly before you bang that big forehead into a low-hanging branch! Just because you had an Einstein brain and the sort of “moral code” that made the 3 *ahem* jobs possible, doesn’t mean everyone is wired that way. Pass me another Schlitz.
She’s not that smart. I have her green with envy over my IQ.
Riiiiiiiiiiiight.
It’s so true. In fact, I often cry myself to sleep over it. I weep noisily into my down pillow and yank my yellow quilt up over my iggerand head and ask, ‘Why, Sweet Baby Jeebus, why? Why didn’t you make ME as smart as Big V?’
Now that I think of it, why is your name Big V? Is it ’cause your brain makes you fall over from the weight?
Oly-gal don’t you know everyone in CA has a high IQ thats why its so super special there right now….
Big V has confirmed that her screen-name was supposed to represent the shape on a chart of housing prices or sales. Only, she realized too late that she really meant Big L or Big Backslash. Now that we all know her as Big V, she’s not inclined to change it.
No, az_lender, it’s a down arrow, remember?
My parents told all of us kids, if we wanted to go to college we would have to pay our own way. My parents just couldn’t afford the cost to put all five of us kids through college.
did you ever tell them it was a shame they couldn’t afford birth control either?
OH! i kid, i am one of four myself. I fought in the Cold War to pay for my edgeacashun. Nice to see it coming back round again way to go W! I’ll take a cold war over a hot one anyday, you?
Interesting comments about funding for college, I was fortunate I only had to work two jobs plus an athletic (decathlon 6-7 hours per day) and academic (geologic engineering) scholarships to pay for my education. When I finished college, diploma(s) in-hand, everything was paid for. I worked my ass off for years and did not have time for whining.
The whining today from feckless kids comes complete with the urges and wants of professional couch-potatoes, who for the most part are on intellectual life-support, derivative benefits of stupid cheap credit. Perhaps as John Steinbeck’s “Grapes of Wrath” are re-played on iphones with their own myspace web-sites as the feckless lads and lasses of today will finally get-it, in that it requires getting off ones ass to accomplish something in life. The days fogging a mirror or having one tooth in their mouth to qualify for stupid cheap credit (mortgages or college loans) has become a historical footnote.
I was fortunate I only had to work two jobs plus an athletic (decathlon 6-7 hours per day) and academic (geologic engineering) scholarships to pay for my education.
Looxury, pure looxury. When I were a lad stoodyin . . .
‘Perhaps as John Steinbeck’s “Grapes of Wrath” are re-played on iphones with their own myspace web-sites as the feckless lads and lasses of today will finally get-it’
You mean, some dumb bint is gonna’ end up having to nurse an old guy in a barn? Is what I have derived from your post. And I say, ‘good’. Serves them right. All of them. Whoever they are.
Just saying if the parents had used the birth control then said 5 kids wouldn’t have had that question at all. Its kind of more of a philosophical question at that point.
So sad Oly, you should have done a better job in the genetic lottery and earned money the old fashioned way, Inherit it.
‘you should have done a better job in the genetic lottery and earned money the old fashioned way, Inherit it.’
I have often thought the exact same very thing. Instead of getting the exquisite priviledge of being the oldest of eight (yes, I said ‘8′) kids born to a pair of astoundingly freakish and backwards, but very, very, VERY devout Mormons in deep red-rock country Utarr.
My stepson was the same way - we offered to reimburse him on receipt of his grades, to start in community college - didn’t hear a word. Oh well. I was that way too, until I figured out that assembly-line work was boring and not very well-paid.
You mean, like, work? Gag me with a spoon!
My parents also paid all the tuition and fees while I was in college, but since then I have paid all of it back and then some. I don’t know if this story will end the same way but it doesn’t mean the kid is a free loader just by the story told alone.
I also paid for my own school. One thing some people may not realize is that the availability of cheap school loans has also caused a sort of tuition bubble Universities even state schools have not had to be affordable. I hope soon that these loan programs will go away and make it easier for people without money to work their way through school.
I’ve got a pretty narrow view of what Universities should do I might add. They should teach Engineering, Science and the core Arts in History as undergrad degree’s. Teaching, Medicine, PloySci etc should all be handled as post-graduate training or degrees with course selections based on the undergrad degree.
Most of the fluff degrees should be axed. No way are you going to get a real education in four years outside of the core knowledge areas can’t be done at best you can get a basic understanding of one of our main branches of knowledge in four years with a good intro to the others. No time for fluff.
Responsible parents do all they can to provide an education to their children. Having too many kids is not a virtue.
Wow Big V,
Responsible parents teach their children not everything is going to be given to them on a silver platter. I understand and appreciate my education even more since I had to work for it. My parents would have paid for our education if they could.
Just a FYI, birth control pills were introduced into society in the early 60’s after my mom gave birth to the five of us. So where does it say having too many kids is a virtue?
I’m sure your parents were very good, but I think most families are better off when the parents make education a priority.
I agree with you on the making education a priority from kindergarten through high school. After high school, I believe the child now adult should be responsible for some if not all the college education. I’ve seen too many kids not appreciate what their parents did for them.
I’m just asking this… Which of you siblings would you rather not have?
Its just like some weird vibe about having some optimum number of kids and paying for them to go to college… its just not that important.
You didn’t starve. Had to take out loans or work you way through school and maybe, like us brainless bumpkins, go to the community college.
Not attacking you here cause I understand your feeling but there is this other side to what you are saying that is kind of ugly.
Friend has one kid, and was smart enough to take her name off his loan docs/ student stuff. Otherwise, hell he couldn’t even get his lazy ass out of bed to caddy at an exclusive Chicago club and make potentially $240 per day, at least on wknds, untaxed. Once or twice, but not regularly would he get out of bed to work and network.
After spending a tiny bit of time with this/him, generation, NO.
I would say Hell no. YOu pay for your own damn education. and if your smarty pants divorced daddy from Harvard won’t get involved. then NO, Hell NO.
Boy I would have been a tough mommy.
When wifey and I got married this was one of the things we talked about extensively and we came up with what to us seemed like a good plan.
We decided that daughters would be our responsibility to pay for through undergrad, as long as they held their grades up, and until they got married, at which point they became the responsibilty of the husband.
Sons would be required to work to pay their own way through school.
5 daughters later…
And yes, we planned on 5 kids.
I don’t get your point of view. My daughter has a college plan that I helped her craft - I pay, she works for spending money minimally. She continues to get $30K/yr scholarship, I pay the difference, books & supplies, medical and care packages. Her uncle pays rent & food (dad died so uncle graciously pays). She embraces her opportunity and thrives at a college that requires enough thought, reading and participating that a job would be a hindrance. There’s no sliding by or slacking where she is. And the deal continues through grad school. I paid for baton twirling lessons so college seems reasonable.
As I’ve said before I was a jock. Yep, I know lots of folks don’t like us but I won a football scholarship to a large university and kept it for 4 years. And I was good at the game, not enough for pro ball though. But I knew that even in high school.
I was good in one subject though and did very well in it. Math. For some reason I never had any trouble with the subject although the last few courses in college were tremendously difficult. It took me 5 years in all but I finally graduated with a BA in math and eventually became an actuary.
So, there are different ways to get thru college.
…flurry of lower-priced condos sell lately. ‘Some are under $250,000…
Hang on folks, it’s going to hell in hand basket when condos go sub $1/4mil
–
“He knows a few people who have lost their jobs recently and wonders whether Silicon Valley can stay insulated from the faltering national economy much longer.”
Nop. Silly.con Valley will sink into deeper depression than the nation some time during 2009H2. When the tech Scams tank 80%+ from the recent highs it would be all over for the housing market there. How soon people forgot 2001-03.
Jas
The American Dream, version 2.008
========================================
“Her husband, Johnny, a cross-country truck driver, found work quickly, but Richardson has had little luck in the last eight months. Richardson said she’s considering waiting tables.”
“‘I feel kind of hopeless,’ Richardson said. ‘I never thought it would take this long. I went from expecting to make $18 to now $7.50 (an hour). At this point, I’ll take what I can get.’”
Let’s see… $7.50/hr works out to $15,600/yr gross, and assuming there are no illnesses or unpaid time off. That means Mrs. Richardson by herself qualifies to buy… virtually nothing in the state of Clownifornia.
I sure hope her husband’s trucker job pays well.
Are you kidding? She qualifies for a jumbo loan at least. No need to verify income, these are happy days!
“She qualifies for a jumbo loan at least.”
She also needs to tell the loan officer that “Me no read the English language.”!
Richardson left her job and moved to Lancaster with her husband last year in search of cheaper housing. But the area was hot and more expensive than she had anticipated. The couple moved back to Long Beach in January.”
Oh I hate that when I move to a new place and it’s hot. I mean it’s not like you can find that stuff out ahead of time.
“Oh I hate that when I move to a new place and it’s hot”.
Yep it sucks when that happens, and these people are supposed adults. I imagine their offspring if they have any whine just as much.
We had some Yankees visiting us one July here in South Carolina and on more than one occasion they would say, “I had no idea it would be this hot”. Imagine ‘hot’ in the South in the summer? The only thing between S.C. and hell in July & August is a screen door.
I thought that was weird, too. The cost of living is also readily available on the internet. These guys must be of the Casey Serin school of thought, where you just stop thinking, then jump in head first.
‘Oh I hate that when I move to a new place and it’s hot. I mean it’s not like you can find that stuff out ahead of time.’
Oh, I know! That is, like, super mysterious, when that happens.
hot and windy like its a desert or somthing
I don’t know any waitpeople who only make 7.50 in CA. They get paid minimum plus tips and its possible to earn a very decent living in some restaurants - more than her trucker husband will earn.
Since McDonalds doesn’t hire waitpeople, I’m assuming she really means waiting tables? Don’t know whether IHOP is hiring though…………….:-)
“… and it’s possible to earn a very decent living is some restaurants…”
All you need to do is find a restaurant with customers.
In my travels, I have met entire families who lived in the truck. BTW, if you’ve never been inside of a cross-country truck cab, you’ll be surprised. They’re really quite roomy.
“I’ll take what I can get.”
We now have a $7.50 minimum wage. How many new companies are going to be created in our state, or country, for that matter with that kind of overhead, overhead.
I’ve got at least three startups I’d like to startup with jobs for entry level workers. I can’t bring myself to pay that much money to a no/low skill employee, not to mention SDI, workman’s comp, OSHA compliance, etc.
This state and nation are smothering the economy with the pillow of regulation. Who benefits? Those who allow their workers to be, “exploited”. Chindia, Sudamerica, et al.
“MJC counselor Kim Bailey has heard those words countless times. Often they accompany stories of personal job loss. ‘They’re living in a different day and time financially. I don’t think I’ve ever talked to so many people who have lost everything,’ Bailey said.”
————————————————————–
Later-day Tom Joads need not travel halfway across the country to get to California, they are already there…
Gas is down to 3.77/gallon where I live. Good times are here again, I’m starting to think about that shiny new Yukon…
“Gas is down to 3.77/gallon where I live. Good times are here again, I’m starting to think about that shiny new Yukon…”
And a low-down 3/2 with a three car garage!
Don’t do it. In the long term, the trend will be for far higher gas prices. If you buy this thing and the price is 5$/gallon next summer, what will you do?
“Moving to get more affordable housing built, the city of Santa Rosa is taking a major loan from Exchange Bank to help developers buy land and build apartments and homes. The timing is critical, because the housing slump has created opportunities for nonprofit housing developers to rapidly expand their efforts by purchasing land at favorable prices.”
“Just two weeks ago, Burbank purchased a 4-acre site in southwest Santa Rosa from Cobblestone Homes. Burbank plans a 96-unit affordable apartment complex for the site.”
So who is going to determine the price of affordability?
So who’s going to provide the jobs so people can “afford” this “affordable housing”? Great Depression 2.0, here we come…. Dorm housing for all!
From the Mercury News article: “Once the long Labor Day weekend is over, Silicon Valley residents who want to buy homes will start hitting the open-house circuit in earnest, real estate agents say, eager to make purchases before the holiday season begins.”
Is there any time of the year when real estate agents DON’T say “last month was slow because of seasonal factors, but sales will pick up soon because…”?
I should like to see any evidence that autumn typically has a brisker sale pace than August. As far as I am aware, August is one of the busy months, and things cool down after Labor Day because many buyers don’t want to disrupt their children’s schooling.
My prediction is dwindling sales volumes and accelerating price declines, starting in September and lasting through Spring. Just like last year.
I haven’t seen anything from Perkins lately. San Jose and Silly Valley was supposed to be bullet-proof!
was –> were
I submit the echo is heard all over the planet. Are there any holdouts on the decoupling theory who would care to disagree?
Asian madness
Published: September 2 2008 09:26 | Last updated: September 2 2008 20:47
Forget the subtleties of the decoupling debate – Asia seems to be reverting to type before investors’ eyes. This week alone has seen riots, threats of intervention to support vulnerable currencies, cuts to growth forecasts and gyrating equity markets. Such madness was thought to be consigned to the tail end of the last decade. Even a year ago, as the western world slipped into the first subprime cracks, Asia was supported by the view that the region could now look after itself.
Markets point to slower growth ahead. Yet Asian equities are the worst performing stocks on the planet year-to-date. Most markets have fallen by between a quarter and a fifth.
‘Tis mere noise.
(Uh, that’s a joke.)
–
De-coupling of the brains, yes. The worst of the global depression would be first seen in China and India and later in Dubious, Europe and the US.
The global growth since 2003 was fueled by the US housing bubble. We are shifting into the reverese gear.
Jas
You mean the world wide housing bubble.
We the people of the entire Earth are coming to grips with the fact that housing prices do not always go up and eventually the bill comes due.
We need a new bubble if only Greenie spam were here
I thought maybe it would be food and gas but alas the American consumer is done without easy credit or more stimulus.
still flipping homes in AZ For Sale: $285,000
http://www.zillow.com/homedetails/8140478_zpid
SELLER JUST INSTALLED BERBER CARPET THROUGHOUT HOME AND ALSO PAINTED THE INTERIOR. KITCHEN OPENS TO FAMILY ROOM.MASTER BEDROOM HAS OPEN MASTER BATH WITH SEPARATE SHOWER AND TUB. BACKYARD HAS PEBLE TEC POOL AND A BLOCKWALL WHICH OFFERS TOTAL PRIVACY. WONDERFUL NEIGHBORHOOD AND IS CLOSE TO GREAT SCHOOLS. FAMILY ROOM HAS FIREPLACE
Last sale and tax info
Sold 03/24/2008: $235,000
2009 Property Tax: $1,935
50K profit for a quick flip , only if it sells. Days on Zillow: 88
Once these flippers clear out then we see what is really selling
Heard on cable news from one of the talking heads:
If you’re losing your house, go dress a moose.
(I suspect political implications)