Bits Bucket for September 21, 2012
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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The jobs crux
A COMMON theme in the pre-election campaigns of the Government parties was the promise to create jobs. That hasn’t happened. Nearly 14,000 additional jobs were lost between April and June of this year and the only reason the unemployment rate has remained below 15 per cent is because of net outward migration.
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/opinion/2012/0921/1224324230577.html
The Irish do what the Irish do best, emigrate. It would make my Grandfather and Grandmother proud to know over a hundred years after they left its still going on.
Mexico: China’s unlikely challenger
By Adam Thomson
Latin America’s second-largest economy has emerged as a powerful exporter
While winning a bigger slice of the US market, Mexico has diversified its customers. A decade ago, about 90 per cent of the country’s exports went to the US. Last year, that figure fell to less than 80 per cent. Suddenly, it seems, Mexico has become the preferred centre of manufacturing for multinational companies looking to supply the Americas and, increasingly, beyond. Today, Mexico exports more manufactured products than the rest of Latin America put together.
The result of this turnround can often seem counter-intuitive. Chrysler, for example, is using Mexico as a base to supply some of its Fiat 500s to the Chinese market. During last year’s inauguration of the US company’s $500m investment in Mexico, Felipe Calderón, the country’s president, told the nation: “I think it is the first time that a Mexican vehicle, at least in recent times, is to be exported to China … we always thought it was going to be the other way around.”
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/9f789abe-023a-11e2-b41f-00144feabdc0.html#axzz275hfcuw7
wait, I thought the mfg stuff was going to asia…was that just the maquilladora part?
…and Mexican made cars still suck.
Several years ago, my brother-in-law’s job with a U.S.-based multinational was moved from Bogotá to Mexico City. He made the move with his family, and stayed for a time, but he quit and they moved back to Colombia shortly after a severed head was found on the sidewalk not far from their apartment building.
If international manufacturing — as opposed to the maquiladoras, which have existed for awhile — truly is establishing itself in Mexico, I can only imagine the bribes that are being paid. I didn’t read your linked article, but does it mention Wal-Mart? Here’s one article that did:
Wal-Mart’s bribes in Mexico “are a scandal in the United States,” Luis Miguel Gonzalez, editorial director of El Economista newspaper noted in a Monday column. “Here we live in a different way. Over there, there are expressions of indignation … In Mexico authorities take more than 50 hours to react” to the first news reports that made the charges.
Eduardo Bohorquez, the director of the watchdog group Transparency Mexico, agreed there was a striking difference between the United States, where investigations have been launched by congressmen and, reportedly, the Justice Department, and Mexico, where authorities seemed eager to find reasons not to investigate.
http://tinyurl.com/8y79elu
FWIW, Mexico has had an automobile industry for long time. Nissan, GM, Ford, Chrysler and VW have been making cars in Mexico for decades.
And, I would much prefer that we import our crap from Mexico than from China. For one thing it will stem the Mexodus. Also, Mexicans like to spend money in the US. And a healthy Mexican economy will help with the violence and the drug wars.
While the quality of the cars suck, I still have to agree with this.
Better them than China.
So much for Mexico exporting its excess people to the United States. There are plenty of good reasons to stay south of the border. Here are three:
1. Mexico is now the world’s 14th largest economy.
2. Birth rate per woman is down to two children.
3. Educational attainment is on the rise.
Public Higher Ed is basically free in Mexico. It can be competitive to gain admission, though. And unlike here, there is no equivalent of the SAT or ACT tests. If you want to be admitted to the UNAM, you have to take the UNAM’s entrance exam.
One thing that has remained unchanged: wages in Mexico remain very low. Not China low, but still very low.
We’ll still be getting the “Mexodus”. Of all their people who cant get jobs in Mexico.
Ask the FAA what they think of the components coming out of Mexico.
Mexican wages will have to rise to kill off the Mexodus. That said, at least in my neck of the woods, the Mexodus has slowed.
As for FAA compliant parts, I doubt that they are ready to make those yet.
I seem to be running into a lot of people lately who sure won’t let math, statistics, or economics get in the way of their principles.
That’s right. Most of them are house-debtors, real-turds, appraisers and mortgage pimps.
The Atlanta area Applebee’s wait time economic barometer is the ONLY statistic worth noting.
LOL…..
That kind of economic analysis is tremendously valuable. It’s seldom used by conventional economists. No wonder they’re always surprised.
Did you know that the Atlanta area Applebee’s wait time economic barometer, developed by HBB’s own Eddietard and his research staff, was a close contender to the Black-Scholes options pricing model for the 1997 Nobel Prize in Economics?
I miss Eddietards outlandishness. His unique entertaining has been co-opted by a few blog Housing Hookers.
and beloved lab mice…..
One and the same.
“…Atlanta area Applebee’s wait time economic barometer, developed by HBB’s own Eddietard and his research staff, was a close contender to the Black-Scholes options pricing model for the 1997 Nobel Prize in Economics?”
Still,….. more than some people have done who have actually won a nobel prize (***cough, Al Gore *** BO****cough).
OK, I know economics and peace prize are not the same.
… and he did predict Dow 12,000 which everyone (myself included) laughed at. I wish I had seen that coming. Also, with the fed buying 40 billion/month in mortgage assets, they seem to be re-inflating the housing bubble.
Hmmmm….but is it all sustainable? I think I will watch a little while longer from the side lines - even if it means being priced out forever. Rather a middle class retirement than very rich or very poor. I can always go to vegas for that.
Hmmmm….but is it all sustainable?
Depends. How long can you stay solvent?
and he did predict Dow 12,000 which everyone (myself included) laughed at
I do recall that some thought that if there were more QE’s that the stock market would hold up (along with oil and other prices).
“The market can stay irrational longer than you can stay solvent.”
John Maynard Keynes
+1 on the snark, goonpack. But seriously IMO, the U-Haul index is a FAR FAR FAR better indicator than the Applebee’s index. Let me run a random non-bubble –> bubble example:
26 ft truck from Pittsburgh to Sarasota: $1429
26 ft truck from Sarasota to Pittsburgh: $794
To be honest I’m a little
. If the housing bubble popped, why is there still high demand to move to Sarasota? Let me plug in another one:
St. Louis to Vegas: $1771
Vegas to St. Louis: $1737
interesting…
Proves that people move south with money and stuff. They come home broke, or in a box.
I posted some of those mirror image comparisons back in ‘07 and ‘08. Back then, the truck rental rate out of Florida averaged about twice the rate of a truck going to Florida.
Times change.
Population in Pittsburgh proper has been on a very slow decline for decades. My hometown, south of Pittsburgh, has seen growth. Overall, the metro area has been pretty stable in population. I would expect the rates are based on low numbers of rentals.
It would be interesting to see not just the rates, but the actual number of rentals.
“Proves that people move south with money and stuff. They come home broke, or in a box.”
NY Times did a story on exactly that a few years ago except it was specific to NY/FL/NY.
Population in Pittsburgh proper has been on a very slow decline for decades. My hometown, south of Pittsburgh, has seen growth. Overall, the metro area has been pretty stable in population
And what hometown might that be? I was born in Pittsburgh and spent the first six years of my life south of the ‘Burgh in Washington County.
Reason, logic and science are commie ideas!
Remember, “Reality has a well-known liberal bias!”
“Reality has a well-known liberal bias!”
Only Six Percent Of Scientists Are Republicans: Pew Poll
A new study by the Pew Research Center finds that the GOP is alienating scientists to a startling degree.
Only six percent of America’s scientists identify themselves as Republicans; fifty-five percent call themselves Democrats. By comparison, 23 percent of the overall public considers itself Republican, while 35 percent say they’re Democrats.
The ideological discrepancies were similar. Nine percent of scientists said they were “conservative” while 52 percent described themselves as “liberal,” and 14 percent “very liberal.” The corresponding figures for the general public were 37, 20 and 5 percent.
Among the general public, moderates and independents ranked higher than any party or ideology. But among scientists, there were considerably more Democrats (55%) than independents (32%) and Republicans (6%) put together. There were also more liberals (52%) than moderates (35%) and conservatives (9%) combined.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/07/10/only-six-percent-of-scien_n_229382.html
I hope Blue Skye hasn’t gone out for the night. He loves articles like this.
I’m here AS. I really doubt the statistics, having a lot of conservatives who are scientists in my circles of work. Of course, I’m involved in applied science, not the paid think tank here’s your grant if you support our agenda science.
Tucson’s next housing glut...
…is luxury student housing.
I’m already seeing it happen. The existing upscale student complexes are already competing fiercely for a very limited pool of customers.
Case in point: A friend’s son used to manage Seasons, which is located three miles north of the University of Arizona. He got quite a few refugees from another nearby complex called North Pointe. Place had such a crime problem that it was called Knifepoint.
For further elaboration, scroll to the last story on this page.
Key point from the story:
Ward 6 Councilman Steve Kozachik said he had seen recent proposals from Town West for a student-housing complex on the site, which he called “not at all consistent with the master plan” for the area. Kozachik said he wanted to see a viable plan for the property that “fits in contextually with what’s being developed” in the Warehouse Arts District.
The concern over student housing comes as neighbors near the new District on Fifth apartments, near Fourth Avenue and Sixth Street, are having conflicts with the noise and traffic generated by the 700-plus students who have moved into the massive complex.
New student-housing complexes are already in the works on the east end of downtown near the Fourth Avenue underpass.
Kozachik says that student housing makes sense in the downtown area, but he’s concerned about over-saturation.
“I’m not real-estate expert, but I do know that we have 50 to 60 stories of student housing in design … or under construction,” Kozachik says. “You have to wonder at what point you reach that tipping point where you have oversaturated the market.”
Methinks that Ward 6 Councilman Steve Kozachik has pointed out the obvious. Last I heard, Tucson’s rental vacancy rate is up around 16%. There’s also quite a glut of empty rental housing near the University of Arizona.
“…luxury student housing.”
Who could have possibly seen this coming?
Quite a few of us neighborhood activists have seen problems with the luxury student housing boom for years.
Why? Because there are so few UA students who can live in such luxury. Most of our local college students are pretty salt of the earth people. The rich out-of-staters are very much in the minority.
Most new dorms on college campuses are quite sumptuous. Small wonder most colleges charge 8-10K a year for room and board.
If the threat of direct violence in the ghetto was reduced, a lot of students would live there; this is why I suspect the ghetto functions as a price support for non ghetto areas.
I’ve noticed that too. When I attended college in the 1980s, my dorm was one of the older ones and was spartan: my roomate and I each had a bed, a sink, a mirror, and a closet. We shared a desk. There was no carpeting or air conditioning and everyone in the hall used a community bathroom and shower area (there were different ones for men and women, as the dorm was co-ed). I don’t ever remember complaining about anything because I hadn’t expected any different.
The newest dorm on campus, on the other hand, was like a hotel.
Slim, did you get to see the shuttle flyover yesterday?
I took my kids to see it once at DFW on a stopover while being transported cross country. The monarchs were migrating. I imagined them flying over the shuttle as it was parked. They follow the lay of the land, always flying inches above the vegetation and up and over any obstacle.
I missed it. It went south of the University of Arizona, and you know what, there’s a solid line of trees along the flight path as I look out my south studio window.
Slim, did you get to see the shuttle flyover yesterday?
I just saw it a few hours ago, flying over the Bay Bridge. Very cool.
Knifepoint.
Tucson’s real estate bulls are stomping around and making noise again. Super happy-fun comment after this story:
“Awesome time to buy.”
Yeah! Party on!
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly: Update from Sacramento Foothills
In the last 12 months, the numbers of available rental houses in the submarkets I track have doubled. That is correct. In Sept of 2012 there are twice as many available rentals as there were in June of 2011. In June of 2011, people were almost desperate to get into a rental house, as they were in short supply. Some landlords were jacking rents up unreasonably, sometimes 20% or more.
Fast forward 15 months: Rental houses are plentiful and rents are moderating. I am seeing rents come down 5% to 10% below the 2011 high water mark. I am not clear what is causing this change, but it is definitely happening. Perhaps the new trend of syndicators buying up foreclosures to create rental pools is going to back fire on itself as the oversupply of rental houses drowns out the ability to generate cash flow.
I am curious what people are seeing in other markets for rental of SFRs?
Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that there are 30 million empty houses and merely the ownership changed but they’re still empty?????????
I’m seeing a huge glut of rentals here in Tucson. And, yes, we’ve had a stampede of in-VEST-ors who think they’re going to get rich in SFR rentals.
I think they’ll get flushed out right quick. We already have a 16% rental vacancy rate here.
Three strikes and I’m out: California state government, and municipal governments, will not be able to spend as much tomorrow as they could yesterday, and Sacramento is ground zero?
Where’s a good place to look for non-complex rentals anymore? Craigslist is all realtor’d out. I suppose the local weekly may be worth trying.
Here in Dallas I see the occasional house for rent sign. Where do you look in Scrotumento?
My son having just graduated from pharmacy school (Phd) moved from Oakland area to a job in Sacremento and his new rent is half what it was and a safer neighborhood too.
Congrats to your son for graduating with a marketable degree AND for having the common sense to rent!
In other countries Pharmacists don’t have graduate degrees nor are they paid large salaries. Yet another reason why our healthcare is so expensive.
I bet we also have a higher rate of deaths from overdose and drug interactions.
FWIW, catching those is now done via automation. The Pharmacist is little more than a well paid babysitter.
well paid babysitter.
I used to be a good friends with a Pharmacy student in college. He used to say that he was studying to be a legalized drug dealer. Girls used to get a chuckle out of that.
For Colorado: There is retail, research, and Clinical Pharm. the latter is hospital based and is there to keep the Dr. from Rx’ing the wrong drug, wrong dose,and too many drugs not needed.
True but my son works clinics in place of M.D. and goes on rounds with physician to Rx drugs and dosage based on kidney, liver function or what have you. participates in eval of new drugs.
In my area, SFHRs are still way out of my budget.
Phoenix Area Could be Next
I have been looking for rental homes in the NW Phoenix area. It is almost impossible to get a 3 bedroom house for less than $1200, and most are more.
IMO the market is getting ready to turn as I have seem many of these remain on the market for a couple of months and one guy was willing to come down in his price (but not enough).
At this point I can save about $200-250 a month if I buy something in the $175k range.
Why save $200/month today when you can buy for 65% off tomorrow?
“IMO the market is getting ready to turn”
LMAO
On that subject, here comes Potterville! If that movie was non-fiction, Potter would be celebrated as a hero — I can see him with his own 501(c)(4) donating to either, or both, of our major-party presidential candidates.
_________________________/
A Wall Street behemoth plans to spend $1 billion on Tampa Bay’s hobbled housing market, dispatching teams of brokers to scour neighborhoods and buy hundreds of homes a month.
But rather than resell the homes, the Blackstone Group is opting to become a landlord, renting the homes to tenants including foreclosed ex-homeowners burned by the housing crash.
Blackstone, one of the nation’s largest private-equity firms, plans to buy as many as 15,000 homes in Tampa Bay over the next three years, many of them foreclosures, capitalizing on decimated home prices and growing rents.
The shopping spree, and those of half a dozen other big investment firms and hedge funds, could radically change the local home landscape, as big-money brokers compete with first-time buyers and mom-and-pop landlords over homes in tight supply.
“It’s a land grab unlike anything we’ve ever seen,” said Peter Murphy, CEO of Home Encounter, the largest manager of rental homes in Tampa Bay.
http://tinyurl.com/9qebslo
That’s a great article… lots of good info.
$1,500 a month on a $150,000 home.
Unlike home prices and rents in large apartment complexes, single-family rents grew during the recession ..
yearly profits of 8 to 12 percent. ..
Bankers are looking at bundling the future payments as trusts or securities to sell to investors, much like mortgages …
Families and first-time buyers stand little chance to compete. Firms like Blackstone don’t need appraisals, don’t mind waiting for short sales, and pay cash on the spot for homes they want.
F@#% the banks, but props for Measton who predicted that the rich would buy up the assets for pennies on the dollar after the crash.
’single-family rents grew during the recession’
Cuz we all know people under financial stress pay more for stuff.
‘yearly profits of 8 to 12 percent’
Sure. Let’s see some financial reports.
These guys supposedly bought 2000 houses in Phoenix. There are probably 6000 houses already in foreclosure in Phoenix right now. 70% of house loans in Las Vegas are underwater. 50% of loans in San Bernardino/Riverside are underwater. I posted a few days ago that $6.8 billion of loans are underwater in Charlotte NC.
These people could raise $100 billion and it wouldn’t make a dent in the inventory. So why the big ruckus from the media every time a hedge fund announces something? Maybe…
‘The shopping spree, and those of half a dozen other big investment firms and hedge funds, could radically change the local home landscape…’It’s a land grab unlike anything we’ve ever seen’
Hurry! Buy a house before they are all gone! Wall Streets a comin’ with bags full of cash!
No way these guys want to be in the landlording business, no way. Slumlording, maybe, which is probably how all that will turn out, if indeed it does turn out.
So they buy up a bunch of property, and although they say they will be renting the homes out, that’s only until they can sell the b*tches. Good luck with that. Nothing says wear and tear like rental property.
Meanwhile, KB home is under siege here in the Tampa Bay area. Not just the one development in Lakewood Ranch, but a number of aggrieved property owners in five KB home developments in the Tampa Bay area have come forward to complain about their rotting residences.
Mostly townhouses.
http://www.wtsp.com/news/local/article/274651/8/More-homeowners-complain-of-structural-problems
“Rotten houses rotting in the sun
Seems I’ve seen that devil fruit since the world begun
Mercy I’m a criminal, Jesus I’m the one
Rotten houses rotting in the sun”
From the song “Rotten Peaches”, with apologies to Elton John/Bernie Taupin.
Blog question… in the post I wrote out the full F-bomb (Banks and Blackstone deserve F-bombs), and it got symbolled in the posting. Ben, did you install an automatic F-bomb filter?
[not that I mind either way, just curious... haven't seen it before.]
Rent or sell, doesn’t matter. If investors buy blocks of foreclosures, they will not hold them off the market. They will clear the market rather quickly. What they buy the houses for will not set market price, rather what they sell/rent them for.
To think that massive clearing of foreclosure inventory will drive prices up is just stupid.
‘did you install an automatic F-bomb filter’
No, I changed it manually. I’d prefer it if posters didn’t spell out profanities.
Thanks Ben! Now that I know, I’ll leave out the profanity to make it easier on you. Sorry.. :blush:
I’d prefer it if posters didn’t spell out profanities.
Can we say F&#$@ ? And what about S%#@? Can we say that? Or my all-time favorite, M^#@-F&#$@?
“So they buy up a bunch of property, and although they say they will be renting the homes out, that’s only until they can sell the b*tches.”
We have a winner.
“Rent or sell, doesn’t matter.”
I’m not sure why this truth is difficult for some to understand. Excess inventory is excess inventory irrespective of who owns it and what they do with it. And when there are tens of millions of excess empty housing inventory, just where do you hide it? You can sell it… you can rent it…. it’s still excess empty inventory.
‘Can we say that?’
Yeah, a curse word, used in the right place and time, can emphasis a point. But I know this one guy who uses the F word 3 times a sentence. He just comes off as a stupid.
Anyway, for the benefit of less regular readers, let’s keep it down and no need to spell it out. If you type ‘ef’ this or that, we all know what you’re saying.
That reminds me of the “human piranha” that Michael Lewis wrote about in Liar’s Poker. I don’t like it when comedians use the f-bomb, because a joke should be funny without that kind of profanity. But speaking of comedy, I would love to hear Bernanke or one of the Fed governors drop that word. It might liven up the typical dissimulating Federal Reserve policy annoucement.
Will they be picky about credit scores? How many of their prospective tenants will have stellar credit? What will legions of foreclosed new tenants do to the rental market?
Slumlording, maybe, which is probably how all that will turn out
That’s my guess. People still need to live somewhere.
These guys supposedly bought 2000 houses in Phoenix. There are probably 6000 houses already in foreclosure in Phoenix right now.
But if they spent one billion dollars, as supposedly Blackrock is doing in Tampa, they could probably buy every one of those 6000 foreclosures.
And the big boyz are big enough to hold inventory off the market if it suits them, unlike most small and medium sized landlords.
lmao….. whatta sly pimp.
” I would love to hear Bernanke or one of the Fed governors drop that word.”
http://www.theonion.com/articles/drunken-ben-bernanke-tells-everyone-at-neighborhoo,21059/
To truly appreciate the humor of this Onion piece, you would have to have set foot in Seward, Nebraska. It is a former frontier town in southeastern NE which for the most part has largely preserved its frontier character. I know it well, as my aunt, uncle and cousins lived there when we used to visit them during my childhood.
A change in ownership of 20 something million excess empty houses means something?
Thanks for the local info Jingle mail….I suspect your seeing the effects of all the investor activity….You are also heading into the slow season for turnover so I suspect rents will continue to be under downward pressure…
As far as rents in my area, well, lets not even go there…I will say this, the big boys are frantically putting up multifamily complexes…Like always, they will get ahead of the market and I suspect will see some pull back in rent rates…
scdave, It is Jingle “Male”…..you miss half the fun using “mail”….I learned the term “jingle mail” right here on the HBB in 2006!
Gee, I don’t see how people didn’t see it coming. Sacramento’s job market is weak as hell, mostly dominated by Lucky Ducky type gigs. Of course these rentals are going to languish on the market and that alone will force price declines.
The question becomes: at what point do investors begin to decide the slimmer profit margin and the headaches of landlording just aren’t worth it? If this happens, the bottom will absolutely fall out of the Sac market, since investors are the only thing keeping it alive.
Sacramento’s job market is weak as hell, mostly dominated by Lucky Ducky type gigs.
Doesn’t that describe just about any metro area these days?
Since the onset of the Great Recession, I lost one substantial income source and have received almost no raises from a second, despite working harder and better than I did five years ago and facing substantial increases in the cost of necessities such as gasoline and food. And the freelance music world? — Fuggetaboutit!
It seems my personal experience is pretty typical for SD County. And despite a HH income at more than twice the County median, we can’t find a house that works for us at a price we are willing to pay to purchase it.
County residents still struggling economically
Beth Gladstein of Encinitas, who is uninsured, met with Dr. Tonya Adkins on Tuesday at the Vista Community Clinic as her husband, Dan, stood nearby. / photo by John Gastaldo * U-T San Diego
Written by Elizabeth Aguilera
9:03 p.m., Sept. 19, 2012
Median household income fell 3 percent, one in six residents continued to live in poverty and the number of people on government health insurance rose in San Diego County in 2011 compared with the year before, according to data the U.S. Census Bureau will release today.
Vista, Oceanside and Chula Vista saw double-digit percentage drops in median household income and increases in poverty. Every racial and ethnic group also saw its median household income decrease year over year.
Demographers and economists said the number and types of jobs cut during the Great Recession, along with the slow economic recovery, have contributed to the current state of poverty and uninsured patients.
“Many workers have faced wage cuts or minimal or no increases in their earnings. Others have accepted lower-paying jobs,” said Lynn Reaser, chief economist at the Fermanian Business and Economic Institute at Point Loma Nazarene University. “Older individuals, dependent on interest income, have been adversely impacted by the low level of interest rates. Dependence on the ‘social safety net’ of food stamps, unemployment benefits, Social Security and public health care has climbed.”
Median household income in the county was $59,477 last year, down from $61,262 in 2010. The state and national figures also declined.
“It is being felt across a large sector of the population,” said Murtaza Baxamusa, secretary of the Middle Class Taxpayers Association. “The middle is struggling, and that means everybody is struggling.”
…
I am curious what people are seeing in other markets for rental of SFRs
Up, up, up In SF.
A decent shared ROOM in the Mission goes for $900+. WTF?
Are you missing a letter “e” in your name intentionally? Cute, LOLZ.
We’ll see you one Rainbow Flag and raise you one COEXIST sticker.
We’ll see you one Rainbow Flag and raise you one COEXIST sticker.
Are you missing a letter “e” in your name intentionally? Cute, LOLZ.
We’ll see you one Rainbow Flag and raise you one COEXIST sticker.
That’s Mr. H. Dyke to you. And make it 2 rainbow flags, and a bunch of little drink-sized flags for the garden fairies.
Does it all come with a Subaru wagon…non-turbo of course?
You can resist can you liar?
“Fast forward 15 months: Rental houses are plentiful and rents are moderating. I am seeing rents come down 5% to 10% below the 2011 high water mark.”
Can’t get around that old median income and $hitty economy thing.
I am seeing rents come down 5% to 10% below the 2011 high water mark. I am not clear what is causing this change, but it is definitely happening.
Surely you’re joking, Jingle… It sounds like simple supply and demand—and yet you’re not clear on why rents are softening, right after you say that supply has doubled?
I’m confused as to why you aren’t clear on what is causing this change.
California state government, and municipal governments, will not be able to spend as much tomorrow as they could yesterday, and Sacramento is ground zero?
Replied in the wrong place:
California state government, and municipal governments, will not be able to spend as much tomorrow as they could yesterday, and Sacramento is ground zero?
Yes, this is much better….LOL. I see where you meant it to go…and yes the state government is under pressure in Sacramento, but that doesn’t impact the supply of rental houses in the foothills….
California is a microcosm of our federal givernment. Loads of special interests out for their own benifit…public good be damned!
Bye Bye Welfare state….hello Revolution! Neither are good.
No revolution - they will just demand a bailout.
After all, it is only fair…
Good Morning HBBers
COE is Monday, time unkown. We confirmed the house was tented yesterday, wired the dough, packing this weekend, to move everything to storage so we can get the house ready vacant. Thank you all for the support, slaps, advice, and your tales. Tears of joy.
BTW, the earthquake insurance (CEA-Ca Earthquake Authority)was as much as the homeowners insurance, but living in So Ca, we’re buying it. 10% deductible might be a lot, but it is a stop loss.
“Tears of joy”
Dehydration must be setting in by now.
fawkin dying laughing here
EQ insurance is only important if you have a lot of equity…otherwise it is the lenders problem as this is a non-recourse state.
I took out EQ insurance when my equity was 60% in 2005, but dropped it in 2008 when I my equity dropped to 20%. No point.
10% deductible might be a lot, but it is a stop loss
Is there any insurance company that will be able to withstand the carnage of the big one in California….Only the federal government would be able to do it…It would make Katrina look like a small kitchen fire…
Which is why I never bought EQ insurance when I lived in SoCal.
We’re a cash & close, so we are buying EQ insurance. I doubt FEMA will be handing out candy if the big one hits. I’d rather have it than not. I agree with the big pay out issue, but I’d rather have it and fight the claim, than not. One of two awful decisions, I get that. No insurance and you could be SOL completely.
No insurance and you could be SOL completely.
True.
Our house is on bedrock. I studied the liquefaction maps and flood zones.
But if (when) the San Andreas goes, all bets are off. In 1990 they said the Big One is coming in the next 30 years. 8 more years…or less?
The other reason I dropped EQ insurance is when I looked into EQ and my county, there had never been a building damaged here since they started keeping track in the 1850’s…..
sfhomowner
Bedrock, cut or fill, every earthquake is different. In 1994 we lived up in the hills in a two-story. Our block was fine. A home a street away was red tagged, also on bedrock. Who the hell knows the energy flow of an earthquake.
It is an unknown. Cal Tech’s Dr Lucy Jones says it is still a young science. The neighborhood we bought in has soil conditions and all the one-story homes did OK. We bought one of the those homes. We had a chat with the Engineer at the city, and he told us earthquake tales from 1971 & 1994.
I didn’t get EQ for my first year of ownership…am considering now.
Helping me was that the small subdivision that I purchased in had their full Geotech report available at the city. They put plenty of thought into the foundation system…pilings going down 15-20 feet to get to bedrock, geo engineers on-site during construction to confirm the holes were dug deep enough and soil conditions were as expected. Engineering firm is still in business, and very reputable.
Also helping in my decision was that the homes were built before the Loma Prieta quake in ‘89, but not sold…my neighbor before buying (post Loma Prieta 20+ years ago) hired his own engineers to survey the house before buying, fully expecting to find damage…didn’t find a thing.
Despite this, I’m considering insurance…you never know…
The decline in U.S. life expectancy may have already begun, starting at the bottom (as the decline in inflation-adjusted wages did 40 years ago).
http://www.twincities.com/national/ci_21596558/life-expectancy-is-shrinking-some-americans
Thank God, we may not have to increase the SS retirment age after all….
Land whales to the rescue?
Land whales: People with higher sensitivity to gliodin and the new glutens in dwarf hybrid wheat. I am reminded of the old Star Trek TNG episode where the entire population of a planet is a drug addict without exactly knowing it.
oxide
You must have read “Wheat Belly” and are a fan of Dr. William Davis MD. That book put it together for me, and I found a doc that had the same mindset as Davis. A medical marriage I can live with. I am so much better! Az Slim is on the same page.
Dr. Davis uncovered why so many processed foods have wheat products in them, when they don’t need it. Really great doc and fabulous book.”Wheat Belly”, the website, is fantastic as well.
Az Slim is on the same page.
I don’t eat a lot of wheat. It seems to make a difference.
You must have read “Wheat Belly” and are a fan of Dr. William Davis MD.
I read it, and although I thought some of his ideas were over the top, I quit all wheat in July. I have noticed a major difference. No belly sag, no bloating, better digestion, not hungry. I am now at the weight I was in my 20’s.
That’s true. Lower the life expectancy back to 1935 levels, and the Social Security insolvency issue goes away on its own.
The Harvard economics professor quoted in the article wonders why?
Uneducated people are more likely to be obese. Uneducated people are more likely to be poor. Obese, poor people are more likely to die younger. What’s the mystery in that?
Uneducated people are more likely to be obese. Uneducated people are more likely to be poor. Obese, poor people are more likely to die younger. What’s the mystery in that?
Health-care is a huge part of it. A lot of educated Americans are obese and I’ll bet obese, smoking, prescription-popping Americans with good health-care insurance well out live their poor counterparts with no health-insurance.
The American health-care system is lousy for about 1/3 of the American population. (50 with no insurance and 50 million with Joke health-insurance that covers nothing)
In contrast, Canada’s health system covers 100% of the population, at about 40% less cost and has equal or better health stats in many areas than does the USA.
My friend (an attorney with his own developing practice here in town) and his wife were unable to get any insurer to cover them since she was pregnant and this was considered a pre-existing condition. The funny part was her father - the uber-conservative Obamacare hater - sought to get them a policy and prove those tree-hugging, mamby pamby commies wrong. The only way he could get them coverage was to go on the WA state assisted policy for the working poor. Yeah, the system’s perfect. Let it be.
I know a self employed socialized healthcare hater who pretty much did the same thing, she got onto the state plan because she needed to replace her knees and couldn’t find a private plan she could afford.
Ayn Rand selling out and utilizing Medicare and SS come to mind too. I guess the dollar always trumps principles.
decline in U.S. life expectancy
This brings up two points often discussed on this blog. When people point out the top 10 “happiest” and healthiest countries in the world are Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Netherlands, Canada, Austria etc. - most all social democracies and all with universal health-care some say it’s because they’re small and white. Well here we have a large portion of whites dying earlier in America - and many because their health-care stinks. Just saying “my private health-care is great” doesn’t mean anything statistically. Statistically US health- care ranks well below America’s in many statistics and America spends about 50-60% more per person.
So poor American white’s life expectancy is declining rapidly while poor black and Hispanic’s life expectancy is rising. So much for the exceptionalism of being white and of the US health-care system. But I’m sure Romney cares a lot about these people.
Life expectancy is shrinking for some Americans NewYorkTimes 9/20/12
For generations of Americans, it was a given that children would live longer than their parents. But there is mounting evidence that this trend has reversed itself for the country’s least-educated whites…
….The reasons for the decline remain unclear, but researchers offered possible explanations, including a spike in prescription drug overdoses among young whites, higher rates of smoking among less educated white women, rising obesity and a steady increase in the number of the least educated Americans who lack health insurance.
The steepest declines were for white women without a high school diploma, who lost five years of life between 1990 and 2008…..life expectancy for black women without a high school diploma had surpassed that of white women of the same education level, the study found.
White men lacking a high school diploma lost three years of life. Life expectancy for both blacks and Hispanics of the same education level rose, the data showed.
“We’re used to looking at groups and complaining that their mortality rates haven’t improved fast enough, but to actually go backward is deeply troubling,”
The five-year decline for white women rivals the seven-year drop for Russian men in the years after the collapse of the Soviet Union…
…The latest estimate shows life expectancy for white women without a high school diploma was 73.5 years, compared with 83.9 years for white women with a college degree or more. For white men, the gap was even bigger: 67.5 years for the least educated white men compared with 80.4 for those with a college degree or better.
“There’s this enormous issue of why,”
CORRECTION: Statistically US health- care ranks well below
America’sUNIVERSAL HEALTH-CARE COUNTRIES in many statistics and America spends about 50-60% more per person.The poorer people don’t eat as well for one thing ,and the stress
of being poor with limited opportunity takes it toll also I would think . People are dealing with more toxins than we ever have that are in the food supply ,the air, the soil , and the water .
The Founding Fathers put Corporations in their place and they
made sure they had limited powers, but all that has changed
now.
“The poorer people don’t eat as well for one thing ,and the stress
of being poor with limited opportunity takes it toll also I would think .”
this is the correct answer. KET (Kentucky Educational TV) did a wonderful series on life expectancy in Louisevill, Ky. The expected correlation between income/race and life expectancy was there, but the series dove deep into why.
Turns out the answers were as follows:
1) Stress - turns out the lower you are on the social hirarchy the less control over your life you have. The less choices you really have. You basically have to take what life dumps on you and you have no control over it and no escape from it. Turns out this is what happened to people who were always poor, and people who were doing pretty well but became poor.
The loss of control over one’s life was the #1 reason.
2) Quality of food. When you have limited funds, you need to maximize your calories per dollar, knowingly or unknowingly. That goes a long way to explaining the choices made at grocery stores and restaurants (ie fast food)….. lots of calories for a minimum of cost.
Turns out one of the biggest changes in the food supply in the last century is the calories/cost ratio. Clearly, our bodies have not adjusted to this formula change.
Landmark series on the factors contributing to life expectancy, on PBS if you can ever find it outside of Ky and neighboring states.
Went out to the Bay/San Jose area to the company HQ for a week a few years back. Of course, everyone at HQ were all tanned and fit, unlike all us schlubs from Flyover.
Had lunch out there everyday. Great, healthy food. For thirty bucks a meal. Wonderful, if you can afford it……..you can feed a family of 5 for thirty bucks/meal out here in BFE.
Read “why zebras don’t get ulcers” and you’ll begin to understand the effect of stress on health. Better yet, go onto iTunes and look for “iTunes U” for Stanford and watch Prof. Robert Sapolsky’s class, Human Behavioral Biology. Fantastic stuff…amazing lecturer…epic beard.
Comment by Rental Watch
2012-09-21 18:21:50
Read “why zebras don’t get ulcers” and you’ll begin to understand the effect of stress on health.
—————————-
Did they check the ones cheetahs were eating?
LOL.
The point quite simply is that the body’s stress related response evolved for short bursts of activity (ie. for zebras to escape cheetahs). Once the danger is gone, the hormones leave the system, and you go on about your day.
When you are stressed out all the time, those hormones are present too frequently, and for too long, which over long periods of time wreak havoc on various systems of your body.
De-stress, and live longer.
Debt makes people cranky. Slavery wears people out. Muddled ramblings about how socialism makes people happy will take years off of you too, or at least it should.
Muddled ramblings about how socialism makes people happy will take years off of you too, or at least it should.
Listen up, maggots. You are not special. You are not a beautiful or unique snowflake. You’re the same decaying organic matter as everything else.
Socialists think they’re special, if only the government would give them the chance to prove it…
Remind us again how much we spent to bail out, er reward for the failure of, Wall St.?
Remind us again how much we spent to bail out, er reward for the failure of, Wall St.?
They should have failed. Moral Hazard and miss-allocation of capital are and were the results, not to mention fascism.
Doesn’t change the simple fact that socialists are weak and entitled…
Compared to the paragons of capitalism?
Seriously?
Doesn’t change the simple fact that socialists are weak and entitled…
You sound dumb.
“If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face - forever” — George Orwell
30 years of permanent job losses and multiple recessions will do that.
All great comments. But as a person who has lived both inside and outside the ghetto, the #1 life shortening stressor Ive noticed is this: You can never really RELAX in the ghetto.
If you stay there long enough, you can adapt to it, but the adaptions you make will be negetive.
I suspect much of the drug and alcohol use is and example. “anything” can happen in the ghetto because there is a lack of force to limit things that should not happen from happening.
That weird “vibe” you get, when you stop at a red light? Theres a reason for that; a good reason.
Also, lots of drugged and “mental” people in the ghetto; there is nothing predictable about them.
You don’t need a study or a PHD to understand that constant anxiety and insecurity is the gateway to all the other medical problems which lead to an unhealthy shortened life span.
You don’t need a study or a PHD to understand that constant anxiety and insecurity is the gateway to all the other medical problems which lead to an unhealthy shortened life span.
Since we got rid of all job security for most people, I think that applies to almost everyone now.
Yes ,and it even applies more for ethnic groups that have
been in this life style for decades and the current economy is making it worse for those populations of people . The stress would be off the charts ,even if you have learned to live with it . Inflation on food prices is going to hit the lower income group really bad . I don’t like what is happening at all .
Muddled ramblings about how socialism makes people happy will take years off of you t
LOL. As if those poor whites who are dying young are lefties.
You know they’re voting God n Guns.
BS. It’s recreational drugs doing them in. Meth, painkillers, tranqs…whatever they can get their hands on and wash down with Jack and Coke. Google “skittles party.”
BS. It’s recreational drugs doing them in. Meth, painkillers, tranqs
I’m sure many die that way, even more from obesity and its complications. But I don’t understand the ‘BS’. I didn’t say voting Republican was killing them. Just that they voted Republican before they died their early deaths. If they voted at all.
Not to change the subject ,but I am seeing more and more news that
the scientist are warning that the new GMO wheat may destroy your liver based on the animal studies . GMO Soy is being linked to
illiness in farm pigs .
A statement from molecular biologist Jack Heineniann of the University of Canterbury in Australia on Sept 13,2012 .
” Genetically engineered wheat contains an enzyme supressor that ,when consumed by humans ,could cause permanent liver failure
(and death ) .
The reason I am mentioning this is because in California voting yes on
prop 37 this Nov .would force the labeling of GMO foods that they don’t want to do .
While I was shocked at the time how they threw toxic loans on the market that created the financial damage ,only for them to get off the hook ,I am really alarmed at all the other toxic products that
Corporation America thinks they can throw at the people . What happened to our regulatory agencies on all levels ? Big Pharma drugs are thrown out apparently without enough long term testing either .
It just becomes more and more apparent that Big Corporations/Banks are doing anything they want and the people are a bunch of guinea pigs for the ever increasing power of BIG MONEY to create harm in the
name of profit ,and when it blows up the excuse is they didn’t see it coming .
I don’t know about you guys ,but I don’t want to be a guinea pig for these madhatters in which the greed knows no bounds .
Wiz, is this GMO wheat the same as dwarf hybrid wheat?
As for the regulations, well, Big Ag wants those regulations gone, ya see? And if the gov doesn’t want to agree, well, they’ll send Jaime and Lloyd to cut your jobs, seee, and your family’s jobs too, ya see.
I don’t know ,but because they don’t have to label this stuff yet
in a lot of locations ,it could be in anything . I don’t trust them because it’s the same thing with some of those Pharma drugs
that end up killing people and they finally take them off the market,but they do major damage while they are on the market.
All I know is that people are getting sicker and sicker ,at a lot younger ages ,and something seems to be awry and it might be the food supply .Corporations seem to have the power to suppress information these days . Monsanto ,pesticide companies have now spent more than 19 million to try to kill
Prop 37 that’s coming up in California .
Wiz, is this GMO wheat the same as dwarf hybrid wheat?
No, they are different.
Over the millennia, farmers and breeders have cross-hybridised grains to breed in qualities considered more desirable. However, formal wheat breeding began in the nineteenth century when single genetic strains were produced by selecting a single plant noted to have desirable properties.
Hybridisation produced dwarf and semi-dwarf varieties in the twentieth century that had longer ears of grain, shorter stalks and that could withstand adverse climactic conditions.
Right ,I think that wheat is different than the GMO ones . A hybrid is different than a GMO .
A hybrid is different than a GMO .
I bet the GMO is a modified version of the hybrid dwarf that’s in common use.
Right alpha-sloth ,they want to GMO as many crops as possible ,so unless they have to label this stuff it could end up in anything . They haven’t had enough long term research on it ,but the short term research is not looking to good . More studies are being revealed that are coming out of European countries . The whole concept of the GMO is weird to begin with in that the insect killer is built into the plant gene …..weird . The big promise was that they would get a much higher yield of crops .
This condo exemplifies the current market in Austin: prices through the roof!
This listing sold for 278k in 09… 3 years later, it’s on the market for $336k… 20% value increase…. Properties have been selling for similar prices in the past few months in the same building
MLS#: 4843136
Beds: 1
Baths: 1
Sq. Ft.: 732
$/Sq. Ft.: $459
HOA Dues: $308/month
Sep 19
2012 Price Changed ACTRIS #4843136 $335,900
Sep 07
2012 Listed (Active) ACTRIS #4843136 $340,000
Nov 12
2009 Sold (MLS) ACTRIS #8607977 $278,390
“This condo has every upgrade you can think of! 1008 was the original model unit for the developer & has over $50,000 in upgrades including a Seamless Glass Shower, Brazilian Cherry Hardwood Floors throughout, Surround Sound Package w/ 9 speakers & an ipod doc, Custom California Closets in entryway & bedroom, Solar & Black out Shades from Tx. Sun & Shade, Upgraded Light fixtures & controls, Screened patio door & Flat Screen tv’s (optional). This condo is a MUST SEE. The view is absolutely beautiful!!!”
Hey, Brett, long time no post! Welcome back!
Thank you. A lot going on at work and in my personal life.
I hope you’re doing well!
I read the blog almost every day, but have very little time to respond!
Brett,
Imagine the ensuing collapse when reality hits.
It looks like TX is in for a world of hurt in a big way.
I’ve been in an out of Texas over the last few years and the bust didn’t really hit the RE market. While there was some affect, it was mostly just soft sales and stagnate to slightly depreciating prices, which appears to be over thanks to the new shale oil and gas boom.
It did affect the job market, but not like in most other states. The result being stagnate wages.
Austin however, is indeed unique. It is both a huge college town and the state capital. This means there is an almost never ending supply stupid money from the “playas” and wannabe “palyas” and SXSW hipsters.
There is also an amazing amount of street beggars.
It didn’t grossly inflate overnite and it won’t roll back to early 1990’s levels overnite either.
Austin however, is indeed unique
So is Boulder. No state capital, but yes large university. And hipsters. And trustafarians. And street beggars. And exorbitantly overpriced real estate.
It’s where the bedwetter libtards with Gender Studies degrees from Brown or Cornell go to COEXIST in a city that’s 95% white. Think Portland but with a suntan.
“It’s where the bedwetter libtards with Gender Studies degrees from Brown or Cornell go to COEXIST in a city that’s 95% white. Think Portland but with a suntan.”
In Austin, it’s mostly musicians and high-tech engineers/scientists…
Additionally, UT Austin is a much better university than the University of Colorado - Boulder
Additionally, UT Austin is a much better university than the University of Colorado - Boulder
Agreed. UT Austin is one of the best main-campus state universities in the country.
…and law. UT Law.
Austin was cool before around 1990. And so was Boulder before 1970, we’re told.
Austin was cool before around 1990.
Yeah, I lived there in the mid-90s, and it already seemed past its prime then. High rent and too many posers. But when I see pictures of it today, I don’t even recognize it. No one lived downtown when I lived there. No one. There were no apts or condos there. And the whole place did still have a small town feel, that I don’t think remains.
So maybe I was there ‘back in the day’.
I visited Austin one time in 1989 after the oil bust.
My friend drove us by streets that were filled with foreclosed houses. Maybe 2 out of 3. The banks had spray painted the mortgage numbers on the garage.
So it is surreal to hear tales of Austin as the site of such RE froth.
This property sat and sat on the market last fall and winter. We looked at it and decided it was too small. It was listed at $399K.
9 months later it’s back on the market (pending) at 599K.
It didn’t really need any work when we saw it at 399K, and had new floors, paint, appliances, etc., so it’s hard to imagine what all they did when they “renovated”. It was empty when I saw it, but the new pics show it staged and they put some sod in the backyard.
But look at this rollercoaster:
Sep 14, 2012 Pending (Contingent - Show)
Sep 05, 2012 Listed (Active) $598,000
May 10, 2012 Sold (Public Records) $365,000
Dec 08, 2004 Sold (Public Records) $685,000
May 25, 2000 Sold (Public Records) $487,000
Nov 22, 1994 Sold (Public Records) $180,000
Ah, yes. Another day, another bootstrapping friend of mine complaining that his house, for which he put down 3%, is underwater and he wants to move. Another boot-strapper who complains of government largesse and deadbeats gaming the system. “What’s that? I might qualify for HARP?”
Oh, how the mighty boot-stappers have fallen.
Oh, how the mighty boot-strappers have fallen.
I never saw a wild thing sorry for itself. A bird will fall frozen dead from a bough without ever having felt sorry for itself.
Somehow less profound in G.I. Jane.
But the sentiment holds…
What does a bird look like when it is feeling sorry for itself - as opposed to when it is happy? Sounds like projection to me.
Are they even capable of felling “happy” or “sad”?
And after looking at it, as one qualifier for HARP eligibility, the LTV only has to be > .80?? Is that right? Why shouldn’t the current LTV have to be 1? By definition you’re not underwater below 1 and if you’re still making payments, and have been current for the past 12 months, what’s the problem?
All of sudden, just because he WANTS to move (says he needs a change after 10 years in the place) distribution of the wealth has become acceptable.
Juvenile hypocrisy never stopped a conservative. In fact, they thrive on it.
Well, it seems to correlate more with the human condition than the ideology (as I think NE’s poem was suggesting), but I will agree that the hypocrisy the past few years (as if in defense of their guilt at what happened 2003-2008, IMO), has been decidedly displayed more on the right side of my circle of friends than the left.
Oh, how the mighty boot-stappers have fallen.
Remember, it’s only a handout when it benefits someone else. If it benefits you then you’ve obviously “earned it”.
If it benefits you then you’ve obviously “earned it”.
Have retirees earned their social security check?
[spoiler alert] Yes.
They paid into the system and rightly expect to receive something back. The bigger question is should the retirement age be increased, detrimentally affecting later generations, to the benefit of existing beneficiaries? Now we’re talking entitlement…
Agreed. But I was referring to “bootstrappers” who receive more “welfarish” forms of government aid. Like maybe a SNAP card during a period of extended unemployment.
http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/more-americans-added-food-stamps-find-jobs_652837.html
Recent article on zerohedge:
Athens Municipality Runs Out Of Cash; Suspends All Operations
The municipality of Acharnes in northern Athens has decided to suspend all of its operations after running out of money. The municipal council met on Thursday night and voted to stop providing anything other than basic services because of its inability to pay employees’ wages and regular expenses.
Where’s Combotechie? It’s all about the cash-flow… unfortunately for the central bankers of the world, they’re pushing on a string when they expand the monetary base. Got cash-flow?
No good paying jobs == no taxpayers
No taxpayers == gov’t shuts down
gov’t shuts down == can’t do business as essential services are not provided.
It’s good to see how austerity is working out in Greece.
It’s good to see how austerity is working out in Greece.
Coming soon to a theater near you… [thank you Helicopter Ben, you lived up to your moniker]
Coming soon to a theater near you… [thank you Helicopter Ben, you lived up to your moniker]
Self-contradictory.
Ben’s not dropping money on the street, he’s dropping loans. If you can’t borrow, you don’t have enough cash to keep the party going.
Insane public unions = higher and higher taxes with less and less work being done.
Until one day (in Athens and coming soon to Chicago, Cleveland, Philly, Detroit, etc.) the government collects lots of taxes and NO CITY services are performed.
Why?
ALL OF THE MONEY goes towards public union goon pensions and benefits.
Public servants? The parasites just killed their host.
What will happen when behavioral economics run into physics?
http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/guest-blog/2012/09/21/arctic-sea-ice-what-why-and-what-next/
This is the best article I have seen that fully describes the macro effects of what is happening in the real world.
PS: How come no one on the HBB pointed out the incredible rise in the home builder stocks? I guess we have convinced ourselves that stock prices doubling in 9 months is like some climate deniers pointing at the antarctic as proof that global warming is a hoax. I am beginning to doubt the collected wisdom of the board.
PPS: I won’t risk a nickle in a home builder stock right now but wish I had 1 year ago.
I never saw the rise because I have nothing to do with home builders anymore. I learned my lesson 30 years watching them makes fortunes, build muti-story home offices and then go bankrupt not too long after.
US Homes or Fox & Jacobs ring any bells?
Good find on SA. That article is an excellent and very current summation.
Wasn’t US Home bought out by Lennar?
Quote from the article:
several thousand years ago, when orbital mechanics maximized Arctic warmth, the area around the North Pole is believed to have been roughly 4 degrees Celsius warmer than it is today and covered in less sea ice than today.
Making predictions off of imperfect models using linear analysis is wrought with peril…
The thing to focus on is rate of change. It’s like compounding interest and to some degree tends to build momentum over time.
Humans can handle a little more heat spread over the next 50-100 years but I doubt the rest of the biosphere will adapt as fast. Do you think their explanation of the jet stream patterns are correct?
Usually, but…
The Heisenberg Effect is being proven mostly wrong. The Higgs Boson has been found. Quantum computing is a reality. Quantum entanglement is also a reality and has now been proven reproducible with increasing ranges of artificial transport.
I use these examples because at one time, (within my lifetime) these were once considering unfathomable and unsolvable “chaos” sciences. (re: chaos theory)
Science is quickly becoming VERY accurate at ever increasing ranges.
I am beginning to doubt the collected wisdom of the board.
It’s being bullied and harassed out, by those who, while accusing other people of talking their book, are actually talking their own. Their constant, misguided aggression distorts the conversation.
Spoken as one who likes to play the bully himself I do believe.
I do believe.
Seeing as you’re such a reliable defender of the powerful from the weak, and of the abusers from the abused, I’m sure you do think that way.
And all the world’s religions predict a special place for people like you.
Interesting. Will voter ID laws turn out to be a get out the vote measure for core Democratic constituencies? 538 Blog had an analysis on the effect of voter ID laws and concluded a 1-2% shift to Republicans. Perhaps it will be a 1-2% shift to Democrats instead.
http://xfinity.comcast.net/articles/news-politics/20120921/US.Elections.Black.Women/?cid=hero_media
Also in the article:
You don’t see voter suppression in the one party states. Everyone wants you to vote there, for the incumbent.
They only try to suppress votes in places where votes mean something.
‘ “We are not going to give back one single inch. We have fought too long and too hard,” said Reese, 45, coordinator of the Columbus-based Ohio Unity Coalition, an affiliate of the National Coalition on Black Civic Participation.’
I don’t want them to have to give back even one micron, unless they’ve been illegally voting in the past. Of course we have no way of knowing that since ID’s were never required before.
Happy,
Yeah, the actual voters registered might go up for the Dems, but the Dems won’t be able to cheat as easy.
King County Voter Fraud
Workers accused of concocting the biggest voter-registration-fraud scheme in state history said they were under pressure from the community-organizing group that hired them to sign up more voters, according to charging papers filed Thursday.
To boost their output, the defendants allegedly went to the downtown Seattle Public Library, where they filled out voter-registration forms using names they made up or found in phone books, newspapers and baby-naming books.
http://seattletimes.com/html/localnews/2003808207_votefraud27m.html
From the article (2007, BTW): “None of the phony registrations led to illegal voting.”
And:
“King County Prosecuting Attorney Dan Satterberg says the defendants’ aim was to make money, not influence an election outcome”
This was as more of a fraud on ACORN than it was on the elections.
Interestingly, Washington went to all mail-in voting in 2011. All counties except Pierce (Tacoma) had gone to mail-in voting by 2009.
“Dems won’t be able to cheat as easy”
Where is the evidence of cheating, let alone evidence of Dems cheating?
BAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
So then why are the democrats FIGHTING it tooth and nail if it benefits them????
Because the democrat party ALWAYS seems to be on the “receiving end” of massive voter fraud.
In fact - they have come to reply on it to win elections…
Interesting. Will voter ID laws turn out to be a get out the vote measure for core Democratic constituencies? 538 Blog had an analysis on the effect of voter ID laws and concluded a 1-2% shift to Republicans. Perhaps it will be a 1-2% shift to Democrats instead.
Democrats see the laws as a voter suppression effort. But you knew that.
What makes this article interesting to me is that it may backfire and result in increased motivation for Democrats to get out the vote in swing states.
Where is the massive voter fraud?
What kind of voters are being suppressed by the laws? Voters that are not eligible to cast a ballot, either not citizens or felons, maybe even some animals and dead people. I think the Democrat party is on the losing side of this issue big time.
Voter authentication is very important to preserving the integrity of the vote.
Opponents say that voter fraud has never been a problem. My response is, “How on earth would you know? You haven’t been trying to authenticate voters in the past.”
It’s been reported that blacks were dissuaded from voting in the past, in the south. However, today, we have a black president, and most of the country is not the south.
The Ohio Secretary of State had pushed to reduce poll hours only in the cities and to keep extended poll hours in rural areas. Do you not see a problem with that?
Link for Ohio poll hours controversy
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/news/ap/politics/2012/Aug/15/elections_chief_sets_uniform_voting_hours_for_ohio.html
That seems to be a problem. Seems to me the polls should be equally accessible to all.
My response is, “How on earth would you know? You haven’t been trying to authenticate voters in the past.”
As seen above in Lip’s link to invalid registrations in King County, elections officials are always looking for voter fraud.
An interesting analysis on RealPolitics of why neither party should want the Presidency.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2012/09/21/state_of_the_race_part_3_winning_by_losing_115526.html
Oct. 1 will be National Draw Mohammed day. Don’t forget!
Can I talk like a pirate as well? That was so much fun the other day!
More housing news from the Grand Canyon State:
Supply of Vacant Houses Remains Swollen
Key point from the story:
All the evidence suggests that little progress has been made so far in absorbing the large numbers of vacant units and that migration flows remain depressed.
“Mortgage cops taking tough stance”
“Office of Inspector General on the prowl for strategic defaulters”
http://www.chicagotribune.com/classified/realestate/foreclosure/sc-cons-0913-strategic-default-20120913,0,4134066.story
A snippet: “These are not just borrowers who made a personal, strategic financial decision not to pay. In some cases, they remained in their houses for months or even years, living free on the government’s dime — and yours and mine — before moving on. In other instances, they profited handsomely by renting their properties to unsuspecting tenants, collecting rent for many months but never paying lenders.”
“Laws are like a spider’s web, in which the smaller prey are caught, but the larger ones break through and escape.”
What’s wrong with strategic default I wonder? You hand over the keys and walk away per the contract. But - if it hurts the bank… well, our laws and government actions are all designed to take from society and funnel to Wall Street. To protect Wall Street. So that’s what’s wrong with it.
“The Times did not confirm the details with anyone at Blackstone’s headquarters in New York City.”
http://www.tampabay.com/news/business/blackstone-groups-says-its-looking-at-tampa-bay-for-rental-properties-but/1252829