Bits Bucket For December 5, 2010
Post off-topic ideas, links, and Craigslist finds here.
The Housing Bubble
Examining the home price boom and its effect on owners, lenders, regulators, realtors and the economy as a whole.
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Name:Ben Jones
Location:Northern Arizona, United States
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I already own Berkshire and Microsoft. Pardon my ignorance, but who are the rest (Except Kerry)? I will surely have to click on the the link and make Ben a tiny amount of money. I might even invest in their offerings because real estate is essentially dead, IMHO, for the next 7 to 10 years.
Eh, don’t feel bad. I’m looking at an 90% off offer to invest in a local eats hamburger, courtesy Groupon dot com.
I was just made aware that I can get up to 90% off museum admission. Things are really looking up I tell you.
The trick is to fill up the empty spaces with customers.
If it costs a museum the same amount of money to open its doors whether it has one customer or ten-thousand customers then it makes sense for the museum to accept ten-cents-on-the-dollar for customers would not otherwise come to visit.
Not sure how this would work with, say, hamburgers though because the cost of feeding hamburger-eating customers rises as the number of customers rises. Probably enough money is made with items that are bought ALONG WITH hamburgers, such as fries and soft drinks, etc to make up for what is lost by the selling of hamburgers alone.
That’s why fast food places push their drinks so hard- it’s their biggest money maker. Just selling you a cheeseburger doesn’t make them near as much money as selling you flavored sugar water.
time for the basics - what’s it going to take to keep some degree of BIS?
butts in seats
Out of the shadows; housing report projects another foreclosure wave in 2011
REAL ESTATE AND CONSTRUCTION
By Roger Yohem, Inside Tucson Business
Published on Friday, December 3rd, 2010
Since the housing market crash, distressed homes have fallen into one of two categories: for sale now or probably for sale later. Housing analysts call it the visible inventory and the shadow inventory.
Visible inventory is the known number of homes currently on the market. Shadow inventory, also called pending supply, has been the great unknown. How many probable future foreclosures are out there?
Until recently, few firms have been able to size up shadow inventory with any certainty.
That’s why there’s good and bad news in an inventory analysis by CoreLogic, a data based in Santa Ana, Calif. The bad news is there is a large volume of distressed homes in the shadows that will likely trigger another foreclosure wave in late 2011.
The good news is that Tucson didn’t make the nation’s Top 50 list for shadow inventory. Cities beyond the Top 50 list are neither recorded nor analyzed by CoreLogic, so for now at least, Tucson is off the charts. For 2010, about 10,000 foreclosure notices have been issued through October in Pima County.
Among cities, Miami, Fla., had the highest inventory at 33.5 months. Phoenix was ranked No. 30 with a supply of 13.6 months.
Nationally, shadow inventory hit 2.1 million units in August. Added to the visible inventory of 4.2 million homes, the nation has a 23-month supply of 6.3 million unsold homes available.
Among states, Maryland has the highest supply at 24.4 months. Arizona was ranked No. 20 with a 13-month supply.
Shadow inventory is “seriously delinquent” homes that are not currently listed for sale but will hit the market in the near term, according to CoreLogic.
In 2007, Credit Suisse was the first firm to estimate the volume of troubled adjustable-rate mortgages (ARMs). Starting in 2008 for five years, the firm estimated there would be 10 million foreclosures, caused primarily by subprime mortgages. Many of the problems in today’s market were caused by three-year ARMs that already have reset.
Credit Suisse projects that $1 trillion in five-year ARMs will reset between 2010 and 2011, peaking at $40 billion in August 2011. (See chart accompanying this article online at InsideTucsonBusiness dot com.)
After studying the Credit Suisse data, Fitch Ratings reported that 75 percent of all option ARMs are in California, Nevada, Arizona and Florida.
…
With the re-setting ARMs, the key item to look at is the margin defined in the individual document. Interest rates on ARMS are typically defined as the sum of an index plus a margin. The index varies over the term of the loan, but the margin is fixed.
With the interest rates on the popular 1 year indices (treasuries and libor) being as low as they are, the resets will probably come in around 2.5% to 3% over the index.
Don’t think for a moment that Bernanke and the powers that be aren’t aware of this. In my opinion the resetting of so many ARMs is a major factor in the decisions to keep interest rates so low.
In my opinion the resetting of so many ARMs is a major factor in the decisions to keep interest rates so low ??
Excellent point…They will reset lower than the origination…Basically a refinance without the process…Most importantly, the process of needing a new appraisal…
Dumb question of the day:
Would now be a good time for a qualified buyer to consider getting into a home using an ARM?
As Greenspan pointed out just before he retired, it’s been a very good deal for more than a decade now, but it’s sort of a game of picking up nickels in front of the steamroller.
Of course the worst loans that got people in REAL trouble were the ones where the payment margin wasn’t fixed. How ANYBODY with four brain cells left could have thought that those teaser rates were anything but a gamble for both the borrower and the lender is beyond me.
But, the loans will reset to principal and interest from interest only.
New Term! New Term!
Visible Inventory
3 reasons why the mortgage tax break isn’t a break
Posted by Nin-Hai Tseng, writer-reporter
December 3, 2010 12:13 pm
The plan to eliminate the mortgage tax deduction was widely criticized, but the industry overreacted to the proposal. Turns out it’s not that great for most of us.
…slimming the deduction down some might actually not be such a bad thing and it could save the US government billions of dollars. Here are three reasons why:
It doesn’t benefit the vast majority of American homeowners anyway.
Under the current program, taxpayers who itemize their deductions can deduct the interest on mortgages of up to $1 million for their primary and second homes, as well as on home equity loans of up to $100,000. This overwhelmingly benefits relatively wealthier households since they’re more likely to itemize their tax deductions. Middle to lower income households tend to go with standard deductions.
The deficit commission’s proposal recommended scaling the mortgage interest deduction to $500,000 from $1 million and limiting it to only primary residences and not second homes. The deficit commission also proposed eliminating the mortgage interest deduction and turning it into a 12% nonrefundable tax credit available to everyone – a pitch that some experts including Steve Ott, director the University of North Carolina at Charlotte’s Center for Real Estate says could benefit more homeowners including lower to middle-income households.
“A credit is always a benefit but the deduction is only a benefit to the extent that you itemize,” Ott says.
What’s more, even though mortgage industry leaders say doing away with the deduction could make homeownership less appealing, Chris Mayer, real estate professor at Columbia University, says the program hasn’t proven to encourage home buying. Since the deduction mostly benefits relatively wealthier households, they would own homes with or without the deduction.
…
The wealthy don’t get the full benefit of their deductions on supersize mortgages due to the impact of the Alternative Minimum Tax (which has the effect of limiting overall deductions).
The poor mostly rent.
So who’s left?
“So who’s left?”
Dupes who believe the MID is a benefit to all Americans.
So who’s left? many of my co-workers, with $3,000+/mo mortgages. They earn $100,000-130,000/yr and get refund checks of $15,000+. Is it smart? no, but they think it is.
So what happens to them when the MID is eliminated ??
I repeat myself, but there are two key ways to make eliminating the MID politically feasible:
1) Grandfather in eligibility for those who already benefit from it.
2) Phase it out slowly enough so the price impact is negligible.
“So what happens to them when the MID is eliminated ??”
Their home values would plunge, and they would likely send in the keys. They would become renters, and/or move to where it’s cheaper to live. In fly-over country, even at the beginning of our mortgage, the IRS standard deduction fit our modest situation.
Their home values would plunge, and they would likely send in the keys ??
Now times that by maybe the millions…
“Now times that by maybe the millions…”
Agreed, the inflated housing overhang is incredible.
The inflation gig of the last forty years is over now that globalism has taken a firm grip. We have nowhere to go but downward to become competitive.
+1 rms.
Can’t say it any plainer or more accurately than that.
BTW, it’s odd that no one here ever talks about currency trading, isn’t it? Fungibility of paper is ignored on the HBB.
Herein lies the real problem: Tax code that reams nearly everyone via special deductions. And it’s costly as hell to operate that way.
Leave it to the Feds to waste billions upon billions.
I like David Brooks’ thoughts on how congress/prez could compromise on the tax code.
http://www.startribune.com/opinion/commentary/111292679.html
I really am a Pollyanna . . .
Bill, AMT does not affect the ability to deduct mortgage interest for primary mortgages. But you can’t deduct property taxes.
The only advantage is if the mortgage interest deduction can push your income into a lower tax bracket. Otherwise, the tax savings from the deduction can’t possibly outweigh the disadvantage of having to pay interest.
Of course without the property tax deduction, there are more people who would come out ahead by taking the standard deduction rather than itemizing.
Ronald Reagan had a remedy for the U.S. air traffic controller strike in the early 1980s…
Snap Analysis: Spanish air strike may shatter fragile confidence
By Paul Day
MADRID | Sat Dec 4, 2010 8:25pm EST
MADRID (Reuters) - Images of Spanish soldiers seizing control of paralyzed airports and travel chaos caused by a wildcat strike by air traffic controllers could shatter already fragile investor confidence when markets reopen on Monday.
Spain has been in the full glare of investor attention since Ireland was forced to ask for 85 billion euros ($112 billion) in aid, sparking concerns the debt crisis could spread across the euro zone’s periphery economies.
In an effort to claw back credibility, the Socialist government of Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero rushed in new economic measures aimed at boosting the economy and slashing costs. But the apparent success of these moves could easily unravel after this weekend’s strike.
Controllers walked out on Friday afternoon after the Socialists passed a bill as part of new measures regulating their working hours and pledging to sell part of state-owned airport authority AENA, raising up to 9 billion euros.
“All eyes are on Spain right now due to the financial crisis,” Angel Laborda, an economist at Spanish consultancy FUNCAS, told Reuters.
“If they don’t manage to get this situation under control it could be a serious blow for the government both at home and internationally..”
…
Heads would role if reagan was around.
Reagan firing the Air Traffic Controllers = The starting gun for the “Great Middle Class Screw Job”.
All of us in the aviation business applauded it at the time. Mainly because PATCO was a bunch of arrogant pricks, who thought that the aviation business was utterly dependent upon them.
What we didn’t realize was the way management thinks, which was “think of how much money we can make, if we can do the same thing to the pilot’s/flight attendants/mechanics…..”
Thank God I got into GA/corporate. At least until last year, job security was great, even if the pay was hit and miss.
One thing I’ve found out about the “Masters of the Universe” is that they have enough cash to avoid the problems caused by their fooking of all of their employees. All the airline customers who used to be their best/most profitable customers are all flying corporate jets now.
Heads would
roletoke even more if reagan was around.Ah, good ol Ronnie.
Welcome to the fruits of his efforts.
The fruits of RR’s efforts were seen during the Clinton Administration. We are now seeing the fruits of Clinton’s two terms and W’s second term.
Banks’ legal right to foreclose is questioned
Families facing eviction over the holidays staged a protest outside one of the homes last week in Long Beach, Calif. (Mark Ralston)
[Sign says, "BIG BANKS TOOK MY HOME"]
By Ariana Eunjung Cha
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, December 3, 2010
The system of pooling and selling mortgages around the world has caused widespread confusion about who owns the loans and raises questions about whether banks in some cases have the legal standing to foreclose, a state judge and consumer attorneys testified before Congress on Thursday.
New York State Supreme Court Justice Dana Winslow said that “standing has become such a pervasive issue” in the cases he sees “that I frequently use the term ‘presumptive mortgagee’ ” to describe the entity trying to foreclose.
Rep. John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.), chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, emphasized that as of last year, about 2.5 million homes had been lost to foreclosure and that projections estimate that as many as 13 million homes will be lost to foreclosure by the time the crisis abates.
“Yet the big Wall Street firms, other mortgage lenders and servicers, and Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac - all of whom received taxpayer bailouts to the tune of billions of dollars over the last couple of years - have in many instances turned a blind eye toward homeowners in similar financial distress,” Conyers said.
Winslow, academics and attorneys defending homeowners described a fundamental problem that goes beyond recent revelations of shoddy paperwork and “robo-signing” in foreclosure cases. They said there is a much broader question about the legality of designating a single company, Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems (MERS), as the holder of mortgages and then trading these loans to investors around the world without updating the ownership documents in local clerk offices.
They said it is unclear whether using this system has stripped those investors of the right to foreclose on homeowners who miss their payments.
University of Utah law professor Christopher L. Peterson said MERS has a “problematic legal foundation” because it undermines state recording laws. Peterson called MERS a “deceptive” and “anti-democratic” institution because it also uses thousands of employees who work for mortgage lenders, servicers and law firms to sign mortgage paperwork in the name of MERS. That practice is also clouding the ownership of the loans, he argued.
“How is a homeowner to understand with whom they can negotiate a settlement, or from whom to obtain additional information, or how to distinguish a legitimate employee from the thousands of mortgage-related con artists and charlatans?” Peterson asked.
…
“How is a homeowner to understand with whom they can negotiate a settlement, or from whom to obtain additional information, or how to distinguish a legitimate employee from the thousands of mortgage-related con artists and charlatans?” Peterson asked.”
Wasn’t a problem when RE prices were going through the roof at someone else’s expense. A half-empty glass sure changes the rules!
Plus, can we just get rid of one word in the English language that I’m really sick of hearing here and elseware: FAIR, like in that’s just no fair.
“FAIR, like in that’s just no fair.”
Let’s get rid of another one while we are at it that I’m really sick of hearing here, there and everywhere: LAW, like in ‘the economic system needs a rule of law to function properly.’
Don’t worry - “law” is in the way out. The Political Class is actively ignoring the law to suit its own ends. The Law is for the Little People.
Timmy Turbo Tax cheat is a prime example. The guy should be in the clink, not Treasury Secretary.
Hearing Republican business people cry about “socialism” and “people should meet their obligations” make me want to laugh.
Evidently, it isn’t “socialism” when you can buy a few Congressman and have the rules changed in your favor.
Business people aren’t any smarter/honest than the rest of us. In fact, they are arguably worse. This latest fiasco with the “Robosigners” is a prime example.
Anyone who knows eighth grade algebra should have been able to figure out that giving a $24K/year, illegal alien strawberry picker a $800K mortgage wasn’t going to turn out well. Unless you got your “cut” up front, and sold the paper to some poor shmuck ASAP.
Then they invented MERS, to process the documents, and avoid all that pesky, expensive work to keep the paperwork straight.
Then, instead of realizing they had a problem with the paperwork, and using it as an incentive to redo the deals, and taking a haircut of some kind up front, they went for the “all or nothing” approach, and pushed the foreclosures…….thus, leading to the discovery that nobody is really sure where the paperwork is, who owns the properties, and who is actually entitled to foreclose.
And supposedly all of our “best and brightest” are working in the financial industry?
The fix will be to lobby/pay congress to retroactively throw a few hundred years of Contract Law under the bus. If they don’t, it will undermine the “social fabric”.
I’ve been thinking about politicians and donations. Seems to me that a politician should be allowed to get no money from ANYONE in any form, while he’s in office. Not even a pen from a corporation - let’s make it easy. This would let him be a representative of the people, and not a representative of the highest bidder.
But then, what about highly moneyed, organized interests who will organize against him if he doesn’t vote their way? Tough f#cking noogies. It’s the political arena, and that’s the game. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose - deal with it. If the people are smart enough, they’ll see through the BS - like in the Meg Whitman case out in CA - or perhaps they’ll agree with the issue oriented ads. The people will get the representation they deserve.
Right now… the system is utterly corrupted by politicians receiving money. To see how ineffectual the government has become - they passed a law to outlaw those dramatically loud commercials, the ones which make you reflexively reach for the remote to turn them down. But - the law will not take effect for two years, while the issue is “researched”. How pathetic is that? In the words of the SNL Bob Newhart skit - “Just don’t do it!” But the government will let it continue for two years because advertisers want it - and likely beyond that.
The Bible says a man cannot serve two masters. This holds absolutely true for politicians. It seems they speak with forked tongue - they say the right things to the people, but they really serve their paymasters.
Neuro -
In addition, I don’t think any politician should be able to practice LAW while in office, either.
I think a Constitutional Amendment ought to be proposed that further specifies limits on lawyers - all types of lawyers in all public and private arenas.
University of Utah law professor Christopher L. Peterson said MERS has a “problematic legal foundation” because it undermines state recording laws.
As I’ve been saying, MERS was *designed* to undermine the law. The robosigners were merely a small part of an illegal system.
“MERS was *designed* to undermine the law.”
Thank you.
“The robosigners were merely a small part of an illegal system.”
Burger King kid executive proxies
The suppoused money saving banksters/F&F MERS scam is going to be a reoccurring Mess and huge Dark Cloud in TitleLand for many years to come.
Sleep well tonight, your MERS Nightmares are just beginning America.
SAFE act passed in 2008 requires mortgage brokers not employed by banks that take customer deposits to have license and be searchable in a federal data base by Jan 2011.
I think this will help some in the future. I knew college kids who were doing mortgages in 2005-6 who had no clue, no ethics, and dollar signs in their eyes.
On the other hands, realtors are licensed. :/
So are county clerks up in arms about this? Or would they just as soon rather see foreclosures proceed?
I suspect the vast majority would like to get the money they’re owed- watch for lawsuits demanding just that. Their personal opinions about the foreclosure process are immaterial. That’s not how we make and enforce laws here in America, at least in theory.
In the Region | New Jersey
For Home Buyers, a Season for Deep Discounts
By ANTOINETTE MARTIN
Published: December 2, 2010
LOOKING for a deal in a down market? As winter sets in, the fruits of desperation — foreclosure sales, short sales, auction sales and deep discounts — are appearing in bountiful number, if anyone out there is hungry for a bargain.
Consider one example, a spacious six-bedroom colonial at 203 Highwood Avenue in Leonia, now on the market for $390,000.
The 90-year-old house, which has two and a half baths, has the obvious drawbacks of normal wear and tear, and an annual tax bill over $11,000. But it is in a community known for fine schools; last year it was on the market for $535,000. A potential buyer’s offer of $490,000 was rejected as too low, according to Reetesh Sood of Exit Platinum Realty, who is now handling the bank sale of the house.
…
$390k is a bargain huh?
These same liars will say the the same thing in Dec 2011…. except the number will be half that….. yet again.
Agreed. Folks in some parts of the country (e.g. Detroit) have already witnessed this year’s bargain turn out to be last year’s falling knife real estate purchase. Coming soon to a local real estate market near you…
I love you, exeter, but there is no way that that house will be $195,000 in one year. But it could be $300,000!
Do you really need to be reminded that it was only 2 years ago that we were still hearing “housing prices always go up”.
I’m sure that last year those homeowners said that “we aren’t going to give away our house for $490,000″.
HA-HA-HA
HAAAAAAAAAAA HAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama on Saturday praised a newly sealed trade deal with South Korea as a landmark agreement that promises to boost the domestic auto industry and support tens of thousands of American jobs.
because we all know how good outsourcing and free trade deals have been for the American worker in the past.
Yup, Americans will make just enough cars until the Koreans reverse engineer the design and make their own cars with slave labor.
If you reverse-engineer the chevy volt you will get a pile of dead AAA batteries and a headache.
…and you’ll find that the batteries are made by Korean company LG Chemical.
In the article it said that South Korean president faced a political backlash for caving into the US on cars.
My guess is the South Korean papers read US president to face poltical backlash for caving in on cars.
The bottom line is we can sell them 25,000??
My guess is that the deal lets Wall Street Rape S. Korea while S. Korea rapes the American worker. So everybody wins.
BFD, IIRC S Korea imported 6,900 USA manufactured cars. 25,000 isn’t a big stretch. What hype over nothing.
I seem to recall that not too long ago, South Korea more or less told Obama to stick it, regarding any kind of trade deal. And then Kim Jong Il threw a bit of a hissy fit and South Korea needed some help. Hmm…
It’s time to tell South Korea to stick it. We should take our troops and go home. Then we’ll see what their attitude is.
After a corruption scandal in 2006, it looked like South Korea might get a handle on its family-owned corporations that control half its economy. In 2010, nothing has changed.
On the other hand, South Koreans for the most part don’t mind, as long as the trains run on time.
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6B212Z20101203
Who’s gonna loan us money then? I thought the whole point of US military was to have Japan/Korea buy our worthless papers.
“I thought the whole point of US military was to have Japan/Korea buy our worthless papers”
Yes, the U.S. military is part of the equation.
Throughout modern history (Iran, Afghanistan, Iraq, Panama, Ecuador, Guatemala, Bolivia, etc,) the global corporatist bankers and friends have deployed four main tactics for economic domination.
These are:
1. Send in economic hitmen to bribe and corrupt the politicians and judiciary. The purpose is to create as much debt, and acceptance of increasing debt, as possible within the target area by greasing the skids.
2. Send in jackals - assassins - to eliminate those who can’t or won’t be bribed into the bankers’ game plan of increasing debt. “Plane crashes” are common among recalcitrant politicians.
3. Use or threaten to use the U.S. military and/or proxies to overthrow the government and install a banker friendly one. Until then, they are denouced as unfriendly, rogue or terrorist by the MSM.
4. Insist on never-ending “Structural Adjustment Policies” which invariably privatize the infrastructure to the detriment of the indiginous peeps and balloon indebtedness.
This all has the long term effect of producing exactly the conditions we see worldwide today.
+1 Larry. Let the ROK & Japan see to their own security.
Fed’s Tarullo Calls For National Foreclosure Standards
Revealing that the federal banking agencies have found significant “structural problems” in the mortgage servicing industry, Federal Reserve Board Gov. Dan Tarullo called Wednesday for the creation of national foreclosure standards.
“It has been increasingly apparent that the inadequacy of servicer resources to deal with mortgage modifications - an area that was a point of supervisory emphasis - was actually a reflection of a larger inability to deal with the challenges entailed in servicing mortgages in many jurisdictions and dealing with a complicated investor base,” he said. “For example, foreclosure procedures are specifically the province of real property law governed by the states, and can vary not only by state, but also within states and sometimes even within counties.”
Do any of you have any estimate of the amount of stimulous being created by people not paying thier mortgage and getting free rent?
I know this is having a pretty substantial impact to the economy.People have money to thus buy other items such as cars and flat screens while the banks,the taxpayer really, take the losses.Losses then made up by fed reserve to banks.
Walking Dozzer this morning led me by the neighbor, which it always does who has not payed his mortgage in a couple of years in this neighborhood where the houses are still selling for $280k although most were bought in the $150k range mid 90s and earlier. Anyway, he had the 6 month old BMW out in the street, the Range Rover to the side and was hooking the boat up to the top of the line pick up to go stimulate the economy by putting $3 gas in the boat for a day out on the water, which he does at least a couple of times a month. Nothing but the finest of everything for this VICTIM and his family.
Here is what I don’t get: If he hasn’t paid his mortgage in two years wouldn’t his credit be ruined? Where did he get the loans for the Beamer and the Land Rover?
24 months x $2,000 mortgage not paid = $48,000 in the bank
He paid cash?
Maybe the mortgage is in his name and the toys in his wife’s or vise versa. But they are not the only ones playing this game.
I personally know a couple in La Quinta CA that have not paid on mortage in 2+ yrs. Their house is in a fairly upscale subdivision. The 2 yr old is in gymnastics and gymboree. However, with no current income they are skating by - last I heard a commercial property they’re selling in San Diego was in escrow. If it doesn’t go through it’s dog food. From what I hear many arguments at night…calls from creditors etc.
They also own a property in Atlanta GA. I know another person who owns an anchor in coastal FL. The stereotype is true - the stupid money from California helped run up property values in other states.
You have to live here to understood how much of a religion real estate is. The underwatered are talking about their real estate holdings amongst friends as a form of group therapy, and misery loves company I s’pose.
The hurt in CA is far from over. I also recall last year a co-worker told me she knows ‘many’ neighbors who haven’t paid mortgages in 2-3 years now and living mortgage payment-free. Interesting times.
“From what I hear many arguments at night… calls from creditors etc.”
And thus we see the obvious fruits of deception (aside from the less tangible moral aspects.) Monetary stress is one of the top reasons that marriages break up.
“From what I hear many arguments at night…calls from creditors etc.”
Sounds like no pu$$y either [hehe].
Of course in a very real sense, MERS WAS an attempt to create national standards. The problem is that like many things, regulatory capture is easier to perform at a national instead of state level, so national regulations tend to be pretty weak, at least if they are regulating moneyed interests. Look at what happened when states attempted to regulate banks more tightly than the federal government.
Exactly. It was an attempt to create a weak, ‘national’ standard that would allow them to circumvent the many, more stringent local requirements that had arisen for good reason- as we now see.
Family Evicted Despite Law Protecting Tenants From Landlord’s Foreclosure
MABLETON, GA — It should not have happened:
A family’s belongings in heaps; and the family — Patrick Duff, Sasha Davis and their now 10-day-old daughter Mia — evicted from their rented house in Mableton on Thursday morning, without any warning, they say, insisting they did not know that their landlords had lost the home in a foreclosure on the Cobb County Courthouse steps.
“It says to me that something is very awry,” Karen Gandolfo, an Atlanta mortgage and foreclosure consultant, said on Friday. “It says to me that there’s the possibility that due process wasn’t served.”
Gandolfo said tenants should know that federal law guarantees they are entitled, at the very least, to get a 90-day notice of eviction, once the landlord loses the home in foreclosure.
Duff and Davis said that all their landlords did was try to reassure them that the official-looking envelope delivered to the rental house last month, addressed to the landlords, did not contain some sort of legal notice regarding foreclosure and eviction.
“The landlords actually told us that everything was fine, they said Bank of America had made a mistake,” Duff said.
The rental home was in the name of Carmen Villanueva, but both she and Rafael Villanueva were the landlords, according to Duff and Davis. The Villanuevas are listed as living in a home in a Vinings subdivision.
Gandolfo said that her research on Friday revealed that if Duff and Davis had thought to check public records — and when do any renters ever think to check on their landlords like that? — they would have found out that the landlords actually lost the Mableton rental house in August when the bank took it over in a foreclosure sale.
Yet Duff and Davis said they were paying their rent to the Villanuevas every month, from the beginning of their lease in February until now — even in August, September, October and November, when Carmen Villanueva didn’t even own the house anymore.
Maggie Kinnear of Atlanta Legal Aid told 11Alive News that what happened to Duff and Davis “should not happen anymore,” because of the federal law signed by President Barack Obama in May, 2009 called the “Protecting Tenants At Foreclosure Act.”
“If the tenant has a lease,” which Duff and Davis did, from February, 2010 until February, 2011, “the law says they cannot be evicted after the foreclosure, they can stay on the property until the lease expires.”
If the buyer of the foreclosed house is someone who intends to move into it, then the tenants’ lease is null and void, but “they must receive 90 days’ notice to vacate,” Kinnear said.
Kinnear said that the law firm that handles the foreclosure of rental property is supposed to send a notice addressed to the occupants of the rental house, notifying them of the foreclosure and the amount of time they have before they must move out. Again, the law says they must have no less than 90 days before they must leave.
“If the tenant has a lease,” which Duff and Davis did, from February, 2010 until February, 2011, “the law says they cannot be evicted after the foreclosure, they can stay on the property until the lease expires.”
Hmmmm - I am a FB who has not paid his mortgage for 3 years. The bank finally gets around to evicting me. I signed a legal lease to rent out the house to my friend for $1/month for 20 years. My friend is so nice that he does not even move in and lets me stay there.
“The landlords told us everything was fine……BOA made a mistake”
Sooned to be added to the long list of “Univesally Recognized BS Phrases”, like:
- “I’ll pull it out, I promise….”,
- “Check’s in the mail” and,
- “You can trust me……”
OMG, this is a must read about a family blowing $10mil they inherited. Sorry if it’s a repost — it was referenced yesterday and I hadn’t seen it before:
http://www.vermonttoday.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/BT/20101128/BUSINESS/101129960/-1/CBJ
What scares me is that they “fell back”on education. We can’t all be teachers and nurses, but I guess we’re all going to try.
Speaking of blowing money… if it’s Sunday:
NFLPA to players: Save your pay for possible 2011 lockout (nfl dot com)
The NFL players’ union has advised its members to prepare for a lockout that it expects to come in March, telling players to save their last three game checks this year in case there isn’t a 2011 season.
In a letter to the players that was seen by The Associated Press, NFL Players Association executive director DeMaurice Smith said the union had an “internal deadline” for agreeing to a new collective bargaining agreement.
“That deadline has now passed,” Smith wrote. “It is important that you protect yourself and your family.”
————
I love watching football, but really.
Like they don’t make enough money as it is. 
But I have to give the union credit for advising their players to put away a 6-12 month emergency cash fund in case they lose their jobs.. you know, like the rest of us are supposed to.
“telling players to save their last three game checks”
Wow. Hey maybe try to save their last four, even five…
I wish I could afford to sit out a year on my last three weeks of pay.
One only has to look at our professional and college sports franchises to see how fooked up our priority/incentive system is.
A so-so, league-minimum player with half a dozen felony convictions can do a half-azzed job for 4-5 years in the league, and walk away with a college degree and more money than I will probably make in my lifetime.
Extensive comments made on this one last weekend.
The incompetent boob blew $14 million, much of it on grossly inflated housing in upstate NY and VT which is now selling for cents on the dollar. $250,000 for a camp in Tupper Lake??? I’m dying laughing here. There isn’t a house in all of NY state worth $250k but this dummy proceeded and dumped another $5.6 MILLLION into it. If I were going to spend that kind of money on a house, it wouldn’t be in the middle of depression land. It’s priced at half that amount now according to the article. Anyways, the idiot spent more of his windfall on a car than I would a damn house. Mind numbing.
What’s hilarious is Mr. Martin fancied himself as an author and blew a small fortune on that boondoggle too.
—There isn’t a house in all of NY state worth $250k —
really now.
I s’pose it depends on how one defines worth. Certainly there are many houses in NY I would cherish if i could get them for only $250k, so i guess to me there are many worth that.
I wonder at what price level he thinks homes SHOULD top out at in NY State.
Bile you’re a bonafide retail sucker. “Homes”….. lmao. Pay up.
Hmmm.
He laughs his ass off that anyone would find any house in NY to have a $250k.
Sounds like the guy I want on the other side of the table when playing poker.
Value it has high as possible and I’ll be right there to build it for $40/sq and offload it to suckers like you at a cherished price.
For you that means changing alot of bed pans.
You’re tumor is running in the red today!
I’ll take an oceanfront 4 bedroom/3 bath in Southampton, NY for $250k.
I could probably pick out a couple of dozen houses in the New York municipalities of Garden City, Old Westbury, Rockville Centre, Great Neck, and even Brooklyn and Queens that I’d pay $250k.
New York State has plenty of houses worth $250k.
Nice cherry picking.
Houses are no more worth $250k in NY than they’re worth $125k in North Carolina.
NC has plenty of houses worth $125k.
Repeating realtor lies will never make them fact.
You’re in better company at the website——–> realtor.org
“New York State has plenty of houses worth $250k.”
Probably every house on Long Island.
Hmmm.
So then if a house in NY costs <$40/sq foot, it would be valued at $250k to you?
Per Exeter.
_—-Nice cherry picking.
Houses are no more worth $250k in NY than they’re worth $125k in North Carolina.
—–
Sorry sonny.
Cherry picking is allowed once you invoke “NO house is worth…”
heh hah
According to a bed pan changer.
heh hah.
Anything it takes to help my patients. The side effect of being able to afford “any house in NY for $250k”? Priceless.
As a skilled hobbyist, I’m long experienced in cherry picking, well allowed under your “business model”.
I reiterate. Plenty houses in NY are worth well more than $250k.
heh hah.
Technically, I believe he said “UPSTATE New York”
Out in my neck, $250K is a good down payment on a house in Mission Hills………or buy half the residential property in somewhere like Goodland, Kansas.
We need suckers. No need to reiterate.
Can I cherry pick in NC with a top price of $125k? So many to choose from…
—Per Exeter:
We need suckers. No need to reiterate.—-
Reiterating your obfuscation only entertains me.
I believe no evidence has been put forth that no house in NY is worth $250k.
And, he who said it now objects to “cherry picking”, while those of us who read are well aware that cherry picking is just fine when someone says that “no” anything are worth the price. Finding one item worth the price is sufficient to counter the ludicrous claim.
—XGS-fixer said:
Technically, I believe he said “UPSTATE New York”—-
Accurately, no he didn’t
—Per Exeter: There isn’t a house in all of NY state worth $250k—-
regards
your evildoc
—Per Exeter:
We need suckers. No need to reiterate.—-
Reiterating your obfuscation only entertains me.
I believe no evidence has been put forth that no house in NY is worth $250k.
And, he who said it now objects to “cherry picking”, while those of us who read are well aware that cherry picking is just fine when someone says that “no” anything are worth the price. Finding one item worth the price is sufficient to counter the ludicrous claim.
—XGS-fixer said:
Technically, I believe he said “UPSTATE New York”—-
Accurately, no he didn’t
—Per Exeter: There isn’t a house in all of NY state worth $250k—-
regards
your evildoc.
Your legalism is getting the best of you. But doesn’t it always for most of you.
Now pay up sucker.
Reiterating your obfuscation only entertains me.
Maybe as much as your frequent re-posting the same smug posts.
Remember:
You’re a DOCTOR not a parrot.
regards
you’re funny
Heh, so Rio concedes my points again
regards
your evildoc
And his Bro in Law (Weyrich) burned through $100m!! They are our local heroes.!
What a complete set of idiots. Too bad they reproduced - bad for the gene pool.
Sudden wealth means you have to plan… and that quickly, before the money makes your head spin. In fact, make it now. My plan (for the wealth that will NOT come my way unless something truly bizarre happens) is to figure out the tax liability first; that’s gone. Then half of the remainder into retirement savings, poof. Then 10% of the gross to charity. It goes without saying that all debts get paid off out of the remainder.
THEN and only then do you look at purchasing anything new. In cash. If you happen into wealth you should not have to pay anything on installments. Oh, and don’t quit your job. You can cut back but I think it’s not only a reality check but a way of keeping your resume current for WHEN the money runs out.
Of course, you first have to make sure you know what’s going to actually make you happy, rather than what the consumerist culture says you need. And a $5.4 million-dollar house? Please. Give me that amount to play with and I’ll get a theater built…
Then half of the remainder into retirement savings, poof.
I imagine you know this, but one generally can’t put large sums into “retirement savings”, if by that you mean tax-deferred savings. Of course, you can save as much as you want to outside such a plan, but that isn’t specifically “retirement savings”, just “savings”.
How about “savings towards retirement”? That’s what I meant. Savings not meant to be touched until after you stop working, when “stop working” means at least reaching the commonly accepted retirement age.
They could have put the money (using the 10 million figure) into a trust that gave them a $250,000 per year allowance, putting them in the upper 2% of the population.
And lived on it for 40 years! Tax. Free.
(dear god, why do the morons get the money?)
State Tells Niece To Back Off 100-Year-Old Woman Facing Foreclosure
Agnes Albinger, or “Aunt Aggie” has lived on a 70-acre patch of farmland in Will County for nearly five decades and raised 40 foster children there. Though the farm was debt-free for much of that time, Albinger allegedly took out a $100,000 mortgage on the farm in 2000 and “then began to sign over parcels of land to a trust and also to a company called Phoenix Horizon LLC, which according to state records was formed by Albinger’s niece, Bridget Gruzdis,” the Chicago Tribune reported in April.
Albinger said she remembers signing some papers–but had no knowledge of the mortgage debt. Police have been investigating whether the elderly woman had full knowledge of the papers she was signing, though Gruzdis claims she did. Police are also investigating how Albinger’s niece was able to borrow $700,000 against the property. Gruzdis, who has already presented Albinger with at least one eviction notice, has continued her efforts to sell the property–which will be put to an end this week.
On Friday, the Southtown Star reported that Gruzdis has been representing herself as a commercial real estate agent–but does not have a real estate license.
“Buying and selling real estate require extensive knowledge, good judgement and unquestionable honestly. When someone practices this profession without the necessary license, they are demonstrating they don’t have those assets,” Donald Seasock, of the Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation, told the Southtown Star. A cease and desist order has been issued against Bridget Gruzdis and her firm, Phoenix Horizon LLC.
Since Albinger’s story broke, First Midwest Bank executives halted foreclosure proceedings against her while the situation is being investigated by Monee police. Also, Sen. Dick Durbin’s office and Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan’s office have vowed to look into the matter.
Meanwhile, Albinger’s friend Jim Armstrong has rallied supporters and worked to fix up the rundown farm. More than 100 people have volunteered to help since the story surfaced. Armstrong also started SaveAgnesFarm. com, where he keeps people posted about the situation.
“Shaking down Aunt Aggie”
Filed: “TrueDeceiver’s™” subtitle: “Relatives-as-criminals”
how Albinger’s niece was able to borrow $700,000 against the property.
This exact thing, for even slightly more money happened to one of my deceased Uncles. The “relatives/criminals” bought a condo, and made $120,000 withdraws/single deposits and wiped out the 55 year savings account within 3-4 months, while my Aunt was eating macroni & cheese / jello and playing bingo in a “rest-home”.
So, anyone want to guess how many legal “We-did-no-such-thing!” notices where mailed to Hwy50 over the last 3 years as the closest relatives perSUED a legal rectification of said withdraws? (I’ve been savin’ them for firestarter on a cold bitter winter morning…)
“Police are also investigating how Albinger’s niece was able to borrow $700,000 against the property”
Always keep in mind that both inlaws and outlaws may be hazardous to your health and pocketbook.
There are some serious a-holes in this world.
Sociopaths.
Bank evicts, then offers Boca Raton couple a loan mod
By Kimberly Miller Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Updated: 10:34 p.m. Saturday, Dec. 4, 2010
In hours of congressional hearings last week, the nation’s banks were repeatedly condemned for dual-track loan modification systems that give hope to homeowners seeking lower monthly payments while at the same time foreclosing on their properties behind their backs.
“Unacceptable deficiencies,” is how the acting director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency put it. Failed oversight, ineffective practices and insufficient staffing were criticisms added by other top regulators and legislators.
Boca Raton resident James Strassburger could have told lawmakers all that. He just wishes they were listening this year when One West Bank sold his home at foreclosure auction during negotiations for a loan modification.
Strassburger, 56, and his wife, Deborah, 58, who lived in their home for 19 years, were ordered out in May, holding two yard sales so they could squeeze into a rented apartment.
But the real kick in the gut came in August, six months after the auction, when they got a letter congratulating them for earning a trial loan modification. It was followed by a note alerting them to a hearing that would essentially give them their home back. Their mortgage payment was due Sept. 1, the letter reminded.
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/money/real-estate/bank-evicts-then-offers-boca-raton-couple-a-1099963.html - -
Gotta love the comments
Something wasn’t gelling with this whole thing. So, I clicked around the public records, and it shows that this couple took out over $1,119,000 (yes, that is over ONE MILLION DOLLARS!!!) in loans on this small West Boca home in the nearly 20 years they owned it. We’re talking serial mortgagers here. I wanted to feel bad for the blue collar workers being taken by the banks, but after I saw that, no sympathy for me.
They also bought a condo in 2006 that is now worth 25% of what they paid.
PF
8:53 AM, 12/5/2010
You don’t pay you lose your house. That is it plain and simple. I am tired off paying my mortgage every month and everyone else wants their loans modified.
Yes problems happen but live within your means. How can you lose your house you have lived in for 19 years? Refinanced it and bought new TV’s and boats etc. I want my loan modified too. Why not? Why do you deserve it and not me, because I pay mine on time.Don’t pay the bank takes it back.
Jim
8:05 AM, 12/5/2010
refinanced in ‘06, which is to say they took out a huge chunk of the inflated equity at an adjustable rate (guaranteed to adjust sharply upward after the teaser period ended) and spent the entire wad of cash in one year, then defaulted….. now seeking sympathy in the press.
Frankly, I feel awful that they were forced out of their home after nearly 20 years. But when you do stupid things like incur debt you can’t afford to repay, and use your home as collateral, what’s the choice?
Alan
7:32 AM, 12/5/2010
serial mortgagers
This is what happens in an entitlement culture.
When people are raised to believe that they deserve it, and that someone else should have to provide what they deserve because earning it themselves is unreasonable, what more should we expect?
This is the result of our Great Society. Great, ain’t it?
Conflating a house purchase with items people already paid for like SS and Medicare is desperation beyond description.
Not understanding that the two (the Great Society mindset and the ease with which people today so readily and wontingly default on mortgages) are inextricably related shows a lack of knowledge.
Ok. How about the guy that misspells the word “wantonly” demonstrate how mortgage defaults and SS/Medicare are “inextricably” related.
Please use simple vocabulary for all of us that lack knowledge so we don’t have to correct your atrocious spelling and embarrass you once again.
I feel bad for you, exeter. I really do.
I’d feel bad too if I were run from something so straight forward.
Why run?
This is what happens in an entitlement culture.
This is what happens in a low opportunity, crony-capitalist, winner take all culture.
Morals and ethics are much more influenced top-down than bottom-up.
This is the result of our Great Society. Great, ain’t it?
This is a result of greed, and the examples set by those at the top.
(And Won-Ton irresponsibility)
For once I agree with you, Rio. It IS the fault of those at the top. The ongoing error of their uninformed, elitist ways has manifested itself through the poor behavior of the masses.
I couldn’t have said what you said any better. Thanks.
CoSpgs4, you just described 90% of ALL the CEOs and politicians and a vast majority of small business owners.
So everyone else figures “Good for the goose, good for gander.”
2006 - Truly the Year of the Stupid.
More like the whole damn decade.
2006.
The year I sold off my paid-off Silicon Valley house and skipped town with a million in my pocket. What’s stupid about that?
What is this GROUPON? All the banner ads on the HBB point me to GROUPON?
Is it just me?
It is a sad thing when our conversation turns to the ads on the website. Is this the calm before the storm? What inning are we about to enter?
Well if you get 90% of on local eats , it tells me that the local food joints are desparate to get customers and they are willing to let go 90% of the revenue.
Thats the way I see
The are hoping if they give you a free meal you will like the place and continue to eat there (at full price)
Could work on a good place with reasonable prices and good food - atmosphere.
Wiki-up “Groupon” and you’ll get to read all about it.
Is it just me?
Well, I’m seeing ads for purses with birds on ‘em, the exact type Mr. Cole was looking to buy for a x-mas present…(Hwy looks cautiously around to make sure a “certain person/recipient” doesn’t see’em over his shoulder…)
I tried a few groupons when I was younger, but it only ended with jealousy, resentment, and ultimate break up.
Rimshot, btw.
The “rimshot” was too much information.
Well, he did say “rimshot”, which brings to mind comic punctuation; as opposed to “rim job” which brings to mind what might happen in a motel with the group-on experience.
Always glad to help fellow HBBers on the path toward enlightenment…
Uh, I meant, like: snare snare tom splash
Pervs, all of you.
J6P has been groupon packed. The result so far is just scattered anger but mostly denial.
I watched Osama Bin Bernenke on TV testify before Alan Grayson that he didn’t know exactly where the stimulus money went. Grayson laughed in his face but that was as far as it went.
We now know that Bernenke knew it went to the European Central Banks to secretly “save the world economy.”
Isn’t that contempt of congress?
I’ve just sent a letter to my recently elected tea partier congressman asking the same question except with this caveat…what are you going to do about it?
Thank you, Zeus, for being a responsible patriot. I mean that in all seriousness.
How much of our tax money has ended up in Soros’ hands, or that of his compadre dictator brethren? I mean that in all seriousness, too.
Maria,
Its how Ben makes money to keep the HBB on the web. Many internet companies do the same thing, get lots of visitors and then sell the ad space.
That’s why internet advertising is putting the old newspapers out of business.
Just click on the ad, take a look and if it looks good go ahead and buy it [or use it]
Lip
Pardon me, would you have any Grey Groupon?
Preacher walks up to a group of young slackers and asks them “pardon me, do you have a pray groupon?”
Goes good with morning coffee:
“I threw a potato at him, but I missed him by an inch,” Kawka said.
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-pearl-harbor-train-20101205,0,156446.story
Maybe I will move to LA.
WESTSIDE NOW
Headlines from L.A.’s Westside
Detectives unsure if man who killed himself was involved in Ronni Chasen killing
12/03/2010, 2:25 p.m.
‘Bling ring’ member sent back to jail, faces heroin charge
12/03/2010, 12:53 p.m.
Grudge match: USC stadium bombed with paint — UCLA blue and yellow
12/03/2010, 9:23 a.m.
Hit-and-run driver fatally strikes woman in West L.A. [Updated]
12/03/2010, 8:39 a.m.
Santa Monica man sentenced in beating death of girlfriend
12/02/2010, 4:51 p.m.
MTA says changes to proposed rapid bus lane won’t jeopardize funding
12/02/2010, 3:26 p.m.
Neighbor says suspect in Ronni Chasen case was an ex-convict
12/01/2010, 11:11 p.m.
Employee at Jerry’s Deli in Westwood diagnosed with hepatitis; patrons urged to seek vaccinations
12/01/2010, 7:22 p.m.
A ticket instead of a court date for infractions in Santa Monica
12/01/2010, 12:29 p.m.
Maybe not.
You missed this one….they went to a football game and a hockey game broke out!
A drunken brawl in a Rose Bowl parking lot before the USC- UCLA football game Saturday sent two men to the hospital with stab wounds and three people to jail, one of them on suspicion of attempted murder, authorities said.
The fight started about 4:30 p.m. in parking lot 1 on the north side of the Rose Bowl, where dozens of people had been tailgating and drinking since 6:30 a.m. in advance of the game that evening.
Police called to the scene found 50 to 75 people fighting, said Cmdr. Darryl Qualls of the Pasadena Police Department. It took more than 15 minutes to break up the brawl, resulting in minor injuries to two officers, Qualls said.
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-usc-ucla-brawl-20101205,0,1093391.story
Class out the….
Fed wants to strip a key protection for homeowners
WASHINGTON — As Americans continue to lose their homes in record numbers, the Federal Reserve is considering making it much harder for homeowners to stop foreclosures and escape predatory home loans with onerous terms.
The Fed’s proposal to amend a 42-year-old provision of the federal Truth in Lending Act has angered labor, civil rights and consumer advocacy groups along with a slew of foreclosure defense attorneys.
Since 1968, the Truth in Lending Act has given homeowners the right to cancel, or rescind illegal loans for up to three years after the transaction was completed if the buyer wasn’t provided with proper disclosures at the time of closing.
Critics say the proposed change by the Fed would render the rescission clause useless. The Fed proposal would require homeowners who seek a loan rescission through the courts, to pay off the entire loan balance before the lender cancels the lien.
“This, of course, would be almost impossible for most consumers to do because they can’t come up with the money until they get out of the loan. And they can’t get out of the loan until the lien is released,” said Barry Zigas, director of housing and credit policy at the Consumer Federation of America. “None of us are quite sure what purpose is being served by this proposal or what prompted it.”
The Fed’s proposal is part of an ongoing effort begun in 2005 to review and update rules and guidelines for disclosure in the rescission process, said Kathleen Keest, the senior policy counsel for the Center for Responsible Lending. That effort, which includes a review and update of the forms used for rescission, pre-dates the housing-market meltdown and the recession, she said.
The Mortgage Bankers Association, the main trade group for the real estate finance industry, hasn’t taken a position on the issue or submitted public comment to the Fed. But “we are inclined to support the direction the Fed is headed,” said John Mechem, the MBA’s vice president for public affairs.
“As Americans continue to lose their homes in record numbers, the Federal Reserve is considering making it much harder for homeowners to stop foreclosures and escape predatory home loans with onerous terms.”
First they bailed out Megabank, Inc to save the arses of the banksters who helped put millions of American households into homes they can’t afford. Now they want to further screw the most vulnerable households in the foreclosure game by tilting the playing field further in the direction of the banks they summarily made whole through bailouts.
Which brings me back to my question of yesterday: What are the prospects for turning the Fed Chair position into an elected post? By making allocation decisions which negatively impact the financial status of millions of American households, they have gone far beyond their mandate of keeping employment high and providing for a stable currency.
The only hope is to have Ron Paul as house banking sub-committee chair. The GOP elite are jockying to keep him off of it.
Stay tuned.
I hope the elite gets out the way so Sarah pAlien gets nominated.
How about a Sarah Palin / Ron Paul ‘End the Fed’ ticket? You have to admit that one could be very interesting!
I am sure this is being used improperly by FB’s who have not paid in years and stands to create a huge problem where the loan is less than 3 years, which is probably a lot of them.
That said, I am opposed to anything that weakens our already poor rights as consumers further in America.
You still think we have rights?
You have ONE right. To a lawyer. But only if you can afford it.
Cannot connect the dots on this article.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-12-05/branson-says-oil-may-hit-200-a-barrel-without-new-clean-energy-policies.html
article: “We are going to have the mother of all recessions if we don’t sort out our energy policy fast,” (richard of virgin) Branson said earlier yesterday at the World Climate Summit in Cancun. “We think we’ve got it bad today. In five years time unemployment could go to 15 percent without any difficulty at all in America.”
me: Branson says without alternative renewable energy, oil goes to $200 barrel and US unemployment rises? Fossil fuel reserves are still good and US has lots of alternative fossil fuels. What is changing in five years? If oil goes to $200 barrel then alternative sources become cost-effective and problem solved, right?
“We are going to have the mother of all recessions if we don’t sort out our energy policy fast,”
Is he advocating for abandonment of the current drive to force companies to use renewable energy, in order to provide short term economic stimulus? Because we already have a mother of a recession, and driving up costs by forcing companies to use clean, though expensive, energy will make the recession worse.
Does that clear up his point?
You would think, but rather Branson is advocating renewable energy. Lots of mixed thinking it seems and not sure what his motives or message is.
Branson’s airline burns a lot of jet fuel. Converting a lot of the demand in the transportation industry (on someone else’s nickel, preferably) to green/alternative energy takes away some of the upward pressure on oil prices.
What nonsense.
Clearly, this guy is a Global Warming adherent now searching for an alternative way to dominate and dictate.
Fear is now his chosen strategy in place of faulty science.
IF??? We set about a national energy policy which advocated spending some $2 trillion over the next decade (small potatoes compared to the wars we are waging or bankers bailouts and even smaller potatoes compared to the massive cost yet to come as unemployment continues to rise and more and more debt goes bye bye) we could literally place solar panels on the roof of every structure in the United States and be virtually energy independent.
How?
First solar investment will skyrocket and efficiency will move from 21% where it stands today to 30+%. The cost of manufacturing the panels will fall 80% and the people we put to work will form the basis of the next wave of prosperity in the United States. The big losers? Big Oil and Big Energy, so it will never happen. But how great would it be if it did eh?
So, there would never be Big Solar that operates much like Big Oil and Big Energy does today? Big Solar wouldn’t have its own set of corrupt interest groups and policy wonks?
Funny how human frailties only seem to infiltrate select companies and industries.
“National Energy Policy”……….if that isn’t “socialist”, I don’t know what is. (Snark off).
Don’t worry about socialism. ALL Energy companies have invested wisely in your elected officials so the only thing we will see are price increases and continued Oil dependence as we should in a capitalist society without competition. Wait isn’t that still socialism? OOPS my bad!
Well GH, first off, China tends to buy our more successful solar panel manufacturers. And move them.
Second, you can FULLY self power the average 2000sqft house for the price of new, loaded SUV. Right now. (wind and solar combined)
For the price of a nice new small new car you self power your house for most of the year. Right now. (either just wind or just solar)
Even just using passive solar water heating can cut your costs enormously.
But not every location is suited to using either of those.
And people would have the Escalade or new boat than save money. Just like they would rather vote the party back into power that green lighted keeping tax breaks for offshoring their jobs.
You can’t fix stupid.
“…would RATHER have the…”
*sheesh*
Like I said this will not happen. With mass scale prices would fall substantially, and remember energy prices will go only up.
Here in San Diego we pay by far the most for Electricity usage which goes over about 1000 KW a month - in other words don’t run your air conditioner in summer. After that point each KW costs around 50 cents, so to cut your bill by 2/3 you only need to cut the top off your usage.
That said, I would imagine we would import ALL the solar units from China and bring over hundreds of thousands of illegals from down south to install them, so no it would not benefit your average off-shored worker at all.
LikiWeaks
This is kind of scary, though. The minute they threaten a megabank, they go after him like Bin-Laden. Systemic-risk is at stake, I suppose, so the truth must never be known. Reminds me of the movie “Fugitive”.
I was thinking he was more of a Jason Bourne figure at this point than a Bin Laden type. I have a hard time envisioning Bin Laden as the target of an international rape investigation…
This is too cool…
WikiLeaks goes underground … in a bunker deep in Sweden
Glenda Kwek
December 6, 2010 - 4:21PM
Hounded by cyber attackers and dropped by its American server, internet activist site Wikileaks has turned to a Swedish company located in an underground nuclear-proof Cold War bunker to host it.
Bahnhof’s serving and hosting centre looks like it was plucked right out of a James Bond movie.
Steel and glass doors frame its entrance, which is carved into the hard rock of Vita Bergen - The White Mountains - in the centre of Stockholm, Sweden.
Step into the former shelter, which was reopened on September 11, 2008, and you are greeted by harsh white light reflecting off high granite walls.
As you walk towards the office area buried 30 metres underground, two old German submarine engines lie along the narrow tunnel-like corridors - repurposed as emergency back-up generators. Beside them, the submarine’s emergency horns emit a loud buzzing noise when pressed.
There are three levels of back-up for the servers, which are housed in a 1200 square-metre area decorated with wall plants, artificial waterfalls and a 2600-litre saltwater fish tank.
Above the main room a long, suspended glass corridor leads to a round see-through meeting room bolted directly below the ceiling, with a moon-map fur rug covering its floor.
“The business we do needs ultra security,” Bahnhof’s chief executive Jon Karlung told Data Centre Pulse in 2009.
“We need high-tech facilities to protect our equipment and also make our clients safe and secure in this environment, so it is ideal for serving and hosting business.”
…
GOP ready to battle EPA, the OC REGISTER
“We’re not going to let EPA regulate what they’ve been unable to legislate,” Rep. Fred Upton, R-Mich., told Politico.com. Upton, who hopes in the new Congress in January to become chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee, and other key Republicans will seek to block or effectively nullify controversial regulations.”
While the EPA has done tons of good in the last few decades, they are pushing the envelope with new regulations that will have many “un-intended consequences”.
One Example: Petroleum marketers, companies that store, sell and distribute fuel to our C-Stores, small businesses and farms are having to replace any old “aboveground” fuel tanks that are not double walled. So even if an old storage tank is not leaking and has never had a problem, the companies have until mid 2011 to replace them ALL.
Result: Small companies either have to comply [which means investing many $$$] or they go out of business. A company that I know in southern NM will have to “invest” about $1,000,000 to replace all of their old tanks. When I asked the owner how they would do it, the boss shook his head and said he can do it, but it would be tough.
Un-intended Consequences:
1] Smaller, less fiscally able companies go out of business.
2] Many employees loose their jobs.
3] Costs rise for the distributors, so they have to raise the cost of fuel.
4] Increased costs of fuel soak up money that we could spend on other things.
5] The loss of competitors creates larger companies, reducing the effect of market prices.
6] New companies find it harder to gain access to an industry since they need so much more money to get started.
7] Environmental improvements are minimal while the costs skyrocket, which pretty much describes what always happens when the EPA gets involved.
IMO we need less federal government PERIOD.
Peace to all,
Lip
Yeah, but………
It isn’t exactly a surprise that the EPA has been working in this direction.
As far as “smaller competitors”, around here all of the “smaller competitors” were run out of business a long time ago…….by the major oil companies. The only people that will benefit from a repeal of this reg around here are BP, Phillips, and QuikTrip’s suppliers/subcontractors.
Exactly.
As for less government, how’s that poison:
dog food
baby formula
salad
meat
toothpaste
drug
etc.
…working for you?
As for less government, how’s that poison:
its the princable,
I want the goverment OUT of the melamine in my chineseian food-type products !
Well well…its only a poll but is entirely possible future given how things are shaping up in the other parts of the world. Got Mandarin or Hindi ?
LONDON - China is set to become the world’s most important center for innovation by 2020, overtaking both the United States and Japan, according to a public opinion survey to be published on Monday.
China is already the world’s second-largest economy, after establishing itself as the global workshop for manufacturing. Now it wants to move up the value chain by leading in invention as well.
Today, the United States ranks as the world’s most innovative country, with 30 percent of people surveyed taking that view, followed by Japan on 25 percent and China on 14 percent.
Fast-forward 10 years, however, and 27 percent of people think China will be top dog, followed by India with 17 percent, the United States 14 percent and Japan 12 percent, according to the survey of 6,000 people in six countries done by drugmaker AstraZeneca.
The shift is not because the United States is doing less science and technology, but because countries like China and India are doing more — a fact reflected in a spike-up in successful Asian research efforts in recent years.
A study last month from Thomson Reuters showed China was now the second-largest producer of scientific papers, after the United States, and research and development (R&D) spending by Asian nations as a group in 2008 was $387 billion, compared with $384 billion in the United States and $280 billion in Europe.
Here is the link.
http://www.cnbc.com/id/40516712
More creative minds than mine can have some fun with China and software innovation.
Breaks after three logins
….what else?
Actually, we ARE doing less R&D. And we also suppress a lot of science and technology because it would disrupt the current marketplace.
Fair Game
So That’s Where the Money Went
By GRETCHEN MORGENSON
Published: December 4, 2010
HOW the truth shines through when you shed a little light on a subject.
Such is the message from the massive document drop the Federal Reserve made last week. The Dodd-Frank law forced the Fed to disclose the recipients of $3.3 trillion from emergency lending programs put in place during the crisis days of 2008, so the taxpayers who paid for those rescue efforts now know whom they were helping.
Not that we should expect to receive any thank-you notes from these institutions for rescuing them from themselves.
Still, it’s good to know who got what at the bailout banquet. This helps us understand how expensive it is to live in a nation where big, politically interconnected financial institutions are not allowed to fail — even after they mess up in the most catastrophic of ways.
The Fed data showed that the biggest recipient of taxpayer assistance was, naturally, Citigroup. It was followed closely by Morgan Stanley, Merrill Lynch and Bank of America. Goldman Sachs was also a large beneficiary during the darkest moments of 2008.
Remember that the Wall Street firms were imperiled by their excessive use of borrowed money, which generated huge paydays when the cost of those funds was cheap and the values of the assets they were buying were rising at a steady clip. After the bubble burst and financing evaporated, the firms were able to tap into a lending program created by the Fed in mid-March 2008 after Bear Stearns collapsed. It was called the Primary Dealer Credit Facility.
The program allowed firms to borrow at low interest rates — ranging from 3.25 percent when the program began to 0.5 percent when the last loan was made in May 2009. The firms had to post various securities as collateral when they borrowed, and some of those securities were risky indeed.
Last week, the Fed provided spreadsheets identifying the companies that used the credit facility each day. Changes in these borrowings offer a window onto how quickly panic tore across Wall Street in September 2008.
For example, there were zero borrowings during August and even in early September, when Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac collapsed. But on Sept. 17, the day after the government rescued the American International Group with an $85 billion infusion, borrowings from the facility neared $60 billion. Lending in the facility peaked at $156 billion on Sept. 29, the day the House of Representatives voted down the Treasury’s bank bailout plan.
IT is interesting to review the borrowings of specific companies. Right after Lehman failed, for example, Morgan Stanley began tapping into the credit facility every day; it didn’t stop until early March 2009. Morgan Stanley’s borrowings peaked at $61.3 billion on Sept. 29.
Between Sept. 15 and Nov. 26 of 2008, Goldman Sachs also tapped the facility each day. The company began by borrowing $2.5 billion; its peak was $24.2 billion on Oct. 15.
By Nov. 10, Goldman’s borrowings had fallen to $7 billion; that was the day the New York Fed said it would make Goldman and other A.I.G. trading partners whole on credit insurance they had purchased from A.I.G. on troubled mortgage securities. Under that deal, Goldman received $5.6 billion from the Fed.
…
Add to Portfolio
* Citigroup Inc
* Bank of America Corp
* Goldman Sachs Group Inc
* Federal National Mortgage Assn
* American International Group
* Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corp
* Barclays PLC
* Morgan Stanley
Go to your Portfolio »
The only hope for any type of fiscal stability is to pass the 28th amendment. The REPEAL amendment.
Strip Wall Street,inc. and Washington Disease of their centralized power.
Keep dreaming.
Wow. Even the msm is not buying the banksters’ bs anymore. Read another critical article on WSJ yesterday.
Is MSM waking up? Or, them just trying to regain some credibility back?
“Is the MSM waking up? Or, them just trying to regain some credibility back?”
Think ratings: Ratings is all the MSM thinks about so to understand what drives the MSM you have to think of ratings as the MSM thinks of ratings.
The MSM wants to reward Joe Sixpack by annointing Joe with victim status. The MSM wants Joe to understand that what has been done to him financially is in no way due to any fault of his own. Joe wants to be told that what happend to Joe was brought down upon him by others rather that something that he brought down upon himself.
Joe is a victim: These are the words Joe wants to hear and these are the words that the MSM will feed to Joe because these are the words that will inspire Joe to tune in to the MSM enmass and thus satisify the MSM’s rating requirements.
Joe Sixpack is not going to put up with forking over money to the MSM and being told in return that he is an idiot. But he will put up with being told he is a victim.
In fact he wants to be told he is a victim. He want to be told that NONE OF THIS IS ANY OF HIS FAULT. The fault lies - in total - with a lying cheating unscrupulous low-life somebody else.
Be that as it may. I am just happy to see the NY Times providing new ammunition for FB’s to use in their food fight with Megabank, Inc. This is getting to be too entertaining to bear.
Got popcorn?
“This is getting to be too entertaining to BEAR.”
Hold it, just a dad-burned minute, Pilgrim!!!!!
This HBB junkie ain’t a’gonna let y’all get away with that pernaciouuuus pun!!!
Remember though - the MSM is funded in large part by advertisers. They’re not going to bite the hand that feeds them to any significant degree. If an outlet has no large Wall Street ad buyers, then perhaps it will speak truthfully.
Financial Services
Eerie Similarities Surround European, Wall Street Crises
By Matt Egan
Published December 03, 2010 | FOXBusiness
You’ll have to excuse many in the markets if it feels like that old Bill Murray movie “Groundhog Day.”
The panic gripping European bond markets in recent weeks is scarily similar to the fears that brought Wall Street to its knees two years ago.
In each case, asset bubbles imploded, financial markets seized up, leaders denied the extent of the problem, markets targeted the weakest link and taxpayers stepped in to save the day with bailouts that failed to address moral hazard.
“It’s eerie how similar that process has been. It just does not instill confidence,” said Peter Kenny, managing director at Knight Capital Group.
Both crises, of course, also share a parallel root cause: too much debt.
The U.S. was blindsided by a housing slump that left highly-leveraged Wall Street banks on the hook with toxic mortgages. Likewise, many European countries like Greece and Italy have racked up large amounts of debt, while Ireland experienced a housing bust that led to a bailout of its banks it could hardly afford.
Panics Spread, Denials Ensue
It’s also striking how each financial crisis preyed on its victims, going from one weakest link to the next.
In 2008, Bear Stearns, Wall Street’s smallest investment bank, became the first to experience a crisis of confidence, resulting in a fire sale to JPMorgan Chase. Six months later, the crisis claimed its next victim: Lehman Brothers, which became the largest bankruptcy in American history.
Similarly, last April Greece was the first European nation to see its bonds tumble and credit default swaps spike to such a level that it was forced into a bailout. It took seven months for the next weakest link — Ireland — to agree to its own rescue.
In each case, the bond markets didn’t stop there. On Wall Street two years ago, the markets targeted Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley and even Goldman Sachs next. Seeing the writing on the wall, Merrill quickly agreed to be swallowed up by Bank of America and Goldman and Morgan converted to bank-holding companies.
This week Portugal and Spain sought to prevent the crisis from spreading to their nations, with Spain enacting a new package of reforms on Friday aimed at raising revenues to pay off its steep debts.
“While it may be panic, I think it may be well placed in some cases,” said Charlie Geisst, a finance professor at Manhattan College.
…
US housing data lift local stocks
Saturday, 04 December 2010 00:00
By Krista Angela M. Montealegre, Reporter
Local share prices extended their gains Friday on the back of another strong rally in Wall Street because of higher pending home sales. At the Philippine Stock Exchange, the composite index added 27.58 points, or 0.66 percent to 4,176.48, while the broader all-shares index gained 14.45 points, or 0.51 percent to 2,864.76.
Gainers beat losers, 66 to 50, while 58 stocks were unchanged. A total of 696.89 million stocks worth P5.51 billion.
“This is a snapshot of a holiday rally since all those overseas concerns have already dissipated,” Astro del Castillo of First Grade Holdings said.
…
A Joyless Jobless Report
Those dreadful new unemployment numbers are even worse than they look.
By Annie Lowrey
Posted Friday, Dec. 3, 2010, at 7:05 PM ET
The latest unemployment numbers are less than encouraging.The latest unemployment numbers are less than encouragingUnemployment clocked in at 9.8 percent in November, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, up from 9.6 percent in October. More than 15 million Americans remain jobless. And 6.8 million Americans report being out of work for more than six months. These are terrible statistics no matter how you look at them. But in some ways, the headline numbers do not go far enough in capturing just how bad the labor market is.
…
It’s doesn’t go far enough because there would be riots if the real numbers were presented to the public.
Sign of the times. What happened to all those “flip and get rich” shows on A&E???
——————
‘Storage Wars’ (New A&E Show on storage bin auctions)
New York Daily News | December 1, 2010 | David Hinckley
“Storage Wars” follows four men on a California circuit of storage-locker auctions, which are like small-scale repo operations. Somebody rents a storage locker, throws stuff in and for some reason stops paying the rent.
After three months, the storage company breaks the lock and sells whatever’s inside to the highest bidder - in this case, usually Darrell, Dave, Barry or Jarrod.
One more reason to cancel my cable subscription. Some nudity and violence is all I want in my TV. Is it that hard?
That would call for creativity, which costs money.
“Reality” shows are FAR cheaper to make.
Fact.
What would the experts here think about this situation? We live in a nice established, older (some call historical - but there is nothing old enough in Jax, Fl to be historical) neighborhood. He paid about $950,000 for the 3,500 square foot house on the water (small lake/pond) that everyone was killing to be on. He bought the house at very top of market in 2005 and a year later was transferred. It was on the market for about 18 months while he was gone with no sale. He moved back in and has had it on the market ever since with price declines every 3 to 4 months to where last I heard he now is asking $500,000 (I also heard $450,000 is just days away).
The house is a very modern looking thing in a very traditional area. Previous owners had seen too many HGTV shows and done crazy, very personal renovations to it. Even during the silly prices, it sold for $100/sq ft more than any other house in our area. I wouldn’t pay $250,000 for it.
He is a doctor and likely can afford the payments. I’d just take it off the market and consider it a heavy anchor and very expensive lesson. Many people around here say they’d just mail the keys in if they didn’t have cash for the banks to go after on a deficiency lien.
I think he’s a highly educted person who should have known better, suck it up and live in it and forget your house being an “investment”.
What would you do?
Aside from “Don’t get in that situation to begin with”?
If he really wants to sell, he should price it at least 10% below the current “market” price. At least. He should be able to get one good lowball offer with that pricing strategy.
Actually, I think pricing 10% below is a good strategy regardless. If your property really is stellar, you’ll get multiple offers, but otherwise the thing sells.
What would you do?
Don’t pay the mortgagre for three years and live rent free
Get the bank to pay me $2,500 to not destroy the place before moving out
Then demand a short sale
Then demand for a loan modification
Cause I am a victim
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/economics/8182554/Bernankes-QE3-faces-stiff-resistance.html
Bernanke supposedly facing “stiff resistance” to QE 3, i.e. funneling trillions more inkjet bucks to the banksters to cover their bad bets. Here’s a prediction: after a token show of resistance from the Wall Street-owned Republicans, they’ll roll over just like their Wall Street-owned Democrat counterparts. The only question is how much payola they’ll demand from the TBTF banks in return for their political seal of approval.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/comment/ambroseevans_pritchard/8182605/Chinas-credit-bubble-on-borrowed-time-as-inflation-bites.html
China credit bubble about to burst? Attention Wal-Mart shoppers: your Chinese-made crap is about to get a lot more expensive.
For those interested, “the Bernanke” is slated to be on 60 minutes tonight.
The interview was filmed on Tuesday. Bernanke has already said the gov’t isn’t done with quantitative easing.
QE2, QE3, QE4, QE5, QE6, QE7, …
It’s turtles all the way down, folks!
That explains the rally last week. Chosen few definitely knew what he said.
Saw it. I thought I heard him say cash is king..
Business
Sunday, Dec. 05, 2010
Strapped shoppers lean toward layaway plans
By Roddie Burris - McClatchy Newspapers
COLUMBIA — Holiday shopping’s in full swing, building perhaps toward a merry climax at retail outlets.
For many shoppers, that will mean paying the final few installments on their layaway plans.
Laying away, the practice of purchasing merchandise over time rather than paying for it all at once, without interest charges, has made a comeback over the past few years, industry experts said.
Pam Norkett stood in line at a Kmart store last year for more than three hours to pick up items placed on layaway.
The James Island resident and her husband, John, both working two jobs to make ends meet, plan to buy on the installment plan again this year for their two teenagers.
Twenty-five percent of holiday purchases at Charleston area Wonder Works toy shops will be through layaway. “That’s a lot,” owner Christine Osborne said.
The idea of an all-cash Christmas in America may be as elusive as a glimpse of Santa himself. But more holiday shoppers intend to avoid a New Year’s debt hangover this year.
Shoppers say that instead of credit cards, they will be using debit cards and cash. Seven in 10 shoppers plan to use one of those two methods to pay for holiday purchases, according to a survey by the National Foundation for Credit Counseling.
Of course, what consumers say they will do and what they actually do could be quite different.
It helps to meet the needs of credit-starved shoppers and customer-starved retailers, and it’s a throwback to an all-but-gone business era that was marked by much scarcer dollars for families to live on.
But the Great Recession and a dearth of jobs have combined to give the practice of laying away a new lease on life.
“It’s extremely profitable for us,” said Jennifer Weld, a Kmart store manager in Columbia. “Customers can even put our clearance items on layaway, and right now we have a huge amount of toys and electronics [in storage].”
Kmart, the national retail giant that re-invented itself after the rise of Wal-Mart, is one of several businesses that stuck with layaways as other retailers abandoned the practice, which analysts say can be expensive for retailers to maintain and difficult for them to administer.
Now, Kmart touts the program in its advertisements and even makes the service available online.
Layaways aren’t for everybody, though.
“There is an increase in the popularity of layaways, but it depends on the type of retailer,” said Marianne Bickle, director of the University of South Carolina’s Center for Retailing. “I don’t think layaways will become popular again.”
…
“…layways….as other retailers abandoned the practice, which analysts say can be expensive for retailers to maintain and difficult for them to administer.”
What a load of bull.
The real and ONLY reason is that retailers want you to use THEIR BRANDED credit cards.
December 05, 2010 | Business
Layaway back in retailers’ lexicon
Various purchase plans let stores respond to reluctance by shoppers to pile on debt
by Max Jarman - Nov. 25, 2010 06:14 PM
The Arizona Republic
After two frugal years, consumers are expected to open their wallets and spend again this holiday season. But instead of reaching for their credit cards, as they did before the economy tanked in 2008, they are pulling out their debit cards or paying for their purchases with cold, hard cash.
To accommodate shoppers’ new reluctance to add debt, retailers are returning to practices that were in place before the explosion of credit cards in the 1970s and the boom-era proliferation of consumer credit.
They are offering layaway plans, no-interest payment options and more.
Jennifer Toby of Phoenix has many of her children’s Christmas presents on layaway at Kmart.
“I’m a single mom on a budget, and layaway’s been a lifesaver this Christmas,” she said.
She was shopping with her mother, Roseanne Toby, who said she was glad to see layaway plans making a comeback.
“In these hard economic times, people depend on them,” she said.
…
Kmart is the only place I know that does layaway.I think they will be out of business soon as walmart just tramples them further into the ground.
Good! Layaway is a great way for people to shop AND save. It’s also a way to curb entitlement enthusiasm.
Another reason to keep shopping at Kmart, even though layaway is hardly a necessity for me.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/culturevideo/musicvideo/8174693/Motorhead-beat-up-bankers-in-Christmas-single.html
This one’s for you, PB. Aging rockers Motorhead beat up bankers in their latest video.
I feel better knowing Hillary is looking out for us not
Hillary Clinton revealed America’s deep anxiety over China’s growing economic power and hold on US finances by asking Australia’s then prime minister: “How do you deal toughly with your banker?”
The question, at a lunch with Kevin Rudd last March and reported in a US Department of State cable, underscores the evolving and often difficult relationship between the world’s superpower and an increasingly mighty China. It is the largest holder of US treasury bonds, with around $870bn. Tensions are also highlighted in an economic dispatch, written by the US ambassador to Beijing last January, warning of a “rough” year for relations between the two countries and accusing China of hubris.
“… accusing China of hubris.”
Lol. How about accusing the U.S. of stupidity.
“How do you deal toughly with your banker?”
Another lol: How is it that China became the U.S.’s banker? Did China SEIZE the financial initiative or did the U.S. simply HAND IT OVER TO THEM?
We truly are a nation of dummys.
Let’s see … let’s send to China over a quarter-of-a-trilion dollars a year in the form of a trade deficit, lets close down our factories HERE so things that we buy - and wages that are earned - can be made and earned THERE, and let’s send over all our R&D expertise to China while we are at it.
the fed is actually the largest holder of us treasuries, not china.
http://www.hulu.com/watch/110317/saturday-night-live-china-cold-open
SNL nailed the US-China relationship with this priceless skit. Debtors have little room to lecture their creditors.
Bernanke is on 60 minutes right now…
party time.Just corked a bottle of wine so I can relax and not laugh so much.
Just watched the bernake skit.He said the fed is not printing money.they are getting the money from thier reserves.Not sure where thses reserves come from?
Own private reserves? Where is this free, secret money coming from? BB must have a golden goose hidden in the basement of the federal reserve.
Thats what I’m thinking.Member banks are required to have a % of their deposits on reserve at the fed.I’m not sure if there is a public source to see how much money they have at any given time, cue ron paul.
Ben said they werent printing money.just like bill clinton that is technically correct.they have computers these days to do transactions.
I just dont believe they had all this money in their reserves that they are buying all these treasuries from the primary dealers with.
Something is wrong here.
“Ben said they werent printing money.”
Doesn’t that depend on what the definition of weren’t is?
‘I just dont believe they had all this money in their reserves’
Without commenting on if they printed this amount or not; why wouldn’t they have that much tucked away? They charge interest on trillions they create out of nothing for decades; no audits - ever.
Somebody should look into this…
Point is…it’s still not Ben’s money to give away.
Seems the Unabomber’s house is for sale…Very Secluded the ad says.
http://tinyurl.com/2boxue2
It’d make a great tourist stop. You could sell tiny little letter bombs to the kids. Mom and dad could drink ‘bloody manifesto’s’. Could be a gold mine.
2nd home / vacation home buying opportunity?
Marsh on Monday
Dec. 6, 2010, 12:01 a.m. EST
The double speak of central bankers
Commentary: Wikileaks shows King to be something of a player
By David Marsh, MarketWatch
LONDON (MarketWatch) — Not everything that central bankers say should be taken at face value. Anyone in charge of issuing paper currencies — that most virtual and improbable of concepts, lusted after by all, manipulated by a few, understood by no one — has to have more than a thimbleful of actor’s blood coursing through his veins.
…
Questionable assumption numero uno: The stock market recovers all by itself — look Ma, no intervention!
Since the market is no longer vulnerable and sentiment is solid, doesn’t that mean the Fed can end its QE threat now and let the market stand on its own two feet?
Debt crisis in Europe unlikely to sideline stock buying
Last week’s recovery of the S&P 500 index to levels reached in early November shows Wall Street’s ability to hold on to gains or quickly recover from losses.
December 6, 2010
Europe’s sovereign debt crisis will still hang over global markets this week, but on Wall Street investors will not be afraid to bet on stocks.
Wall Street last week showed its ability to hold on to gains or quickly recover from losses despite Europe’s debt woes, suggesting that investors are confident of a sustained rally.
“When things don’t fall apart on bad news, you know that the market is no longer vulnerable,” said Randy Frederick, director of trading and derivatives at Schwab Center for Financial Research in Austin, Texas. “The overall sentiment is pretty solid.”
…
Op-Ed Contributor
Europe’s Piecemeal Failure
By ALISTAIR DARLING
Published: December 5, 2010
London
WHEN I look at events in Europe today, with Ireland getting bailed out and talk of crises brewing elsewhere on the continent, I am reminded of the weeks leading up to the banking crisis in 2008. As the credit crunch began and banks found it increasingly difficult to get access to funding, policy makers faced a choice: deal with the problem in a piecemeal way, or address the root causes immediately.
For too long many policy makers opted to fudge their approach; they dealt with the problem bank by bank and refused to recognize the system’s fundamental flaws.
As a result, we saw Lehman Brothers go bankrupt, Bear Stearns bought up in a fire sale and a major British bank come within hours of collapse.
During that summer I realized that unless we put a firewall in place to prevent the crisis from spreading, we would face a catastrophe in the banking sector and the wider economy. That’s why I took the controversial step of injecting billions of pounds into the banking system to stabilize it. By tackling the fundamental problem, the lack of capital in banks, we stopped a meltdown. It was drastic action, but I have no doubt that it worked.
The same approach is now urgently needed for European economies. It is not enough for the euro zone nations to bail out each economy as it falls into a crisis — they must address the root causes of the continent’s problems.
…
It is not enough for the euro zone nations to bail out each economy as it falls into a crisis — they must address the root causes of the continent’s problems.
So they’re going to stop spending money they don’t have and return to a sound monetary system with full gold coin convertibility? Wow!
Bloomberg
Asia Day Ahead: Hedge Funds Drop Most in Six Months on Europe
December 05, 2010, 7:48 PM EST
By Tim Smith
Hedge Funds Drop Most Since May as European Crisis Worsens
Hedge funds declined the most in six months in November as the European debt crisis pushed stock markets lower across the globe. The Bloomberg aggregate hedge fund index fell 1.5 percent, the most since May, when a sudden selloff in stocks known as the “flash crash” prompted investors to cut risk. Long-short equity funds, whose managers can bet on rising and falling stocks, dropped 1.6 percent last month and gained 6.1 percent since the start of the year.
I visited Yorktown last summer. Lots of stately colonial-style homes; very beautiful location.
In a landscape of foreclosed homes, auctions make quick work of sales
By Elisabeth Hulette
The Virginian-Pilot
December 6, 2010
NORFOLK
The auctioneer shouted home prices at breakneck speeds Sunday morning.
Bids flew on a three-bedroom Gloucester home, and in just seconds Ken Frantz of Yorktown had spent $150,000.
It may have looked like a snap decision, but it wasn’t.
Frantz and his wife had carefully examined the house in the weeks before the foreclosures fire sale run by Auction dot com at the Norfolk Waterside Marriott. They knew the area’s property market, projected home prices and how much work the house needed.
That’s how they snagged the property for $108,000 less than its assessed value.
“It’s a more honest way to sell homes,” Frantz said of the auction. “There’s no games.”
He paused.
“There’s games after. The bank can counteroffer. But we’ve been through that process.”
Auctions are growing in popularity as a way to buy real estate, according to Auction.com.
Banks need to unload foreclosed properties fast, and buyers come hoping to get a great deal. Sunday’s was one of about 300 auctions that Auction.com will have hosted nationwide by year’s end.
It works like this: Buyers bid either in person or online. If they win, they immediately complete their financing and closing.
It’s like a regular real estate transaction, but lightning-quick.
Of course, things can go wrong. If the auctioneer settles for a price that’s too low, the bank can refuse it. Sometimes the winning bidder doesn’t qualify for financing and the house goes back on the market.
And worst of all, sometimes buyers don’t realize their properties need major renovations until they’ve already closed.
…