Bits Bucket for June 25, 2013
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.
About Me
Name:Ben Jones
Location:Northern Arizona, United States
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Cool American Migration visualizer:
http://www.forbes.com/special-report/2011/migration.html
Awesome. Thanks!
“Al I am agreeing that family units are very important to carry on the species. Equally important is career. Conditions right now make it essentially a dichotomy, especially compared to the 1950s when you could COMMONLY raise a family with four children and a stay at home homemaker on one income. If you worked a farm in the 1800s you better reproduce like rabbits.”
Family or career, choose one. And, BTW, you pretty much need 2 people working 10+ hours a day now to even come close to affording the lifestyle that your parents likely provided with 1 income earner or, perhaps, the woman working part time.
For a matter of reference, I grew up in a big house (4K sq/ft) on a farm. It wasn’t fancy, but it was big and we had a lot of property. It was a low cost area in NJ, but, that’s not saying much (NJ taxes are so high that “low cost” is a bit of a misnomer; NJ income tax is close to what my house in FL costs). My mom worked part time for most of our childhood, my father full time. I also have a sibling that’s 4 years younger. My parents were both college professors at a local state school.
Anyway, with that single full time income, we were able to afford a house in NJ, a summer house in NY and all the basic necessaries of life. We had decent cars (not high end, but not falling apart). My parents paid for both my brother and I to go to some private school (elementary) and both of us to go to college.
Fast forward 20 years. My wife and I live in a smaller home in FL. We both work 60+ hours a week. Our household income is 3-4X that of a full professor in almost any college. Neither of us has tenure.
No summer home in NY.
We have nicer things that our parents did (our house is more upgraded, cars, clothes, etc). But, other than that, we’ve taken a massive step backwards. Children? Yeah, right.. With what time? I’ve been working for a few hours already this morning (7AM as I write this) and my wife left for the office an hour ago. The last 3 weeks I’ve spent 11 days on the road. And, even if the magical “free childcare” fairy came down and took care of our kids for us while we worked some 12 hour days; I’m still not sure we could afford to do the things that my parents did for me. No way I could buy another house in the Adirondacks (totally insane prices now). I’m not sure I could afford to fully fund 2 college educations; best case (in state school) looking at over 100K to get both of them through. Worst case, more like 300-400K (2 private schools). The elementary school in our area kind of stinks; the private school (granted, it’s a very well known and very high end school) that’s the alternative is 20K/yr.
So, yes, something definitely happened over the last 30 years. Somehow people who make triple/quadruple what their parents did (at the same age, and after inflation adjustment) can’t afford to live anywhere near the same lifestyle. Something has changed, the world is a very different place than it was when I was born; and, sadly, children have become the ultimate status symbol. The proclivity of the rich and the poor, the middle class need not apply. And, crazy thing is, we’re deep in the top 10% of household incomes, certainly for our area, and also across the country.
We’ve talked about it and may actually do it at some point in the future. It will involve a tremendous lifestyle change though; probably one of us will have to quit entirely (as the other isn’t around enough to even be considered “helpful” let alone a partner). We’ll have to sell our house, cars, and assorted other stuff and move into a much less expensive house (our house today we purchased for about 1.5X our combined yearly income, so it’s not like this is a huge stretch for us; but, with one income and the expenses of a child, it would probably be too much).
BTW, I see this over and over again in my friends. Those who live “as well” as their parents don’t have children and work like dogs. Those who are living “like their parents did” (2 kids and a dog) are struggling, living in homes that aren’t even close to the way they grew up (and, they are typically more educated than their parents are to boot).
Great post. It does illustrate very well what has happened over the years.
Yes something happened; the largest expansion of credit in history. The work araound is to stay off the highway the debt donkeys travel as much as possible. Cash cannot compete with easy credit. Both working 60+ hours a week, you must be in the fast lane and missing everything.
Just west of the Adirondaks you can buy a nice place.
“Yes something happened; the largest expansion of credit in history.”
That would be my guess as well. Also, I’d guess that another big factor is the continuing rift opening between the middle and upper class. But, the result has been relatively catastrophic; the continual falling of middle class living standards; and the sacrifices that people are now expected to make to live a life “like their parents”. Sacrifices, BTW, that were not expected (or even considered) 30 years ago. There are very few jobs that pay 100K+ that don’t require extensive travel (no kids for you), long hours (no free time for you either), and high levels of education/training (your parents better be loaded to get you the skills you need).
“Just west of the Adirondaks you can buy a nice place.”
I still probably could not afford it. My parents have a house directly on a mid-sized lake; boat dock, etc. The starting prices for lots like that in most NY vacation areas are 400K+. My parents bought their house for 60K when they were making (combined) more than that per year. To put it in perspective, to be at the same price/income ratio and buy that house today; we’d need to make north of 750K/yr. That’s a whole different zip code for income (than 60K was 30 years ago).
Over the last 30 years? Yeah maybe, but I think a lot of it is more recent too. I know a lot of people who could not afford to buy the house they live in. That’s not from 30 years ago, it’s people who bought usually in the mid to late 90s to about 2003 (depending on the area).
Don’t buy lakefront. Buy across the lake road at least, with access. Every little town around here has public access.
My solution was to buy an old cruiser and rent a dock. That is the $10,000 solution.
30 years ago was an anomaly. My dad was a mechanic who became a pilot and made 100k per year 1980 money. Retired at 50 and has been living a hater of all liberal government handout lifesyle ever since. He has prop 13 and pays 900 bucks a year property tax on a million dollar home he bought for 60K.
Anomaly. Birth rates will crash here in the US be like reading about eastern europe or Russia.
I’d rather have my 2 kids and watch them play basketball than be rich like my 2 brothers who have no kids. you get used to the kids and the crazy life. and being kinda poor
40 years ago: US manufacturing still considered best in the world. The wealth from when we were the top energy exporter was still kicking around. Higher Education was just starting to be supported w/government funding and hadn’t yet contributed to inflated pricing. Rotating unsecured credit was only extended to those w/an income. Only 25 years after WWII we still valued self discipline and making sure anything we produced was of top quality.
Everything since is just downhill from the apex when all the planets were in alignment allowing us a little temporary nirvana.
Higher Education was just starting to be supported w/government funding and hadn’t yet contributed to inflated pricing.
The biggest source of government support for higher education is probably the funding that state universities receive from state governments. That’s been going on for at least a hundred years.
$139k Oneida Lake
http://www.lakehouse.com/page-284265.html
You’re not gonna get oohs and ahhhs from a lot of people but when I was growing up in New England this is what it meant when you said you had a vacation spot on the lake.
So, yes, something definitely happened over the last 30 years. Somehow people who make triple/quadruple what their parents did (at the same age, and after inflation adjustment) can’t afford to live anywhere near the same lifestyle.
You’re describing Elizabeth Warren’s Two Income Trap, only you are experiencing it on a higher level. In your case, you have ample capacity to downgrade your lifestyle and still be financially cushy — and you know it. The case studies in Warren’s book are those who were barely cushy in fairly low lifestyle, but are now going bankrupt.
I think that was published in 2003. Does it cover the massive increase in housing costs? If not then it isn’t the explanation for what he’s talking about. Maybe some of it, but the biggest cost for most is housing and that crazy runup is all a lot more recent than 30 years ago.
In efforts to assign partisan blame or avoid it we shouldn’t ignore the actual timing of things going off the rails. I know many who cannot afford to buy what they now live in. They all bought pre 2003.
Warren does talk about housing prices, primarily near good school districts. Once you have one two-income family — with the 80’s-style Supermom — competing for housing, then everybody’s got to do it.
Once you have one two-income family
Takes more than one, but yes…once it hits critical mass you have to join them in “the race” or accept that you are no longer in their economic class and adjust your spending and expectations accordingly. I find the second option more pleasant.
” In your case, you have ample capacity to downgrade your lifestyle and still be financially cushy — and you know it.”
Absolutely, I’d never deny that. However, the comparison that I would make is that if we downgraded our lifestyle, we would not be nearly as well off as my parents were at this age with significantly less income. My point isn’t “We’re hard up”, it’s that, compared to 30 years ago, we work a lot longer hours, make a ton more money (even inflation adjusted) and still cannot replicate the standard of living that my parents did.
Because people who draw a salary are not the ones funding either political party. America is now about a) people who own stuff and b) people who are retired. That’s what our budget shows. If aliens arrived on earth and saw the US, they’d think the young had been enslaved by the 50+ crowd.
I’m not sure how you could miss this. And I also don’t know why you don’t join me in going full-speed Romney with your money. You clearly have enough income to be using all sorts of tax loopholes that are available to the wealthy.
When overtaxed was oversharing a bit more, I was able to back calculate his income to $350K minimum. That was assuming that he didn’t receive any income from tax exempt bonds or tax advantaged investments which we know isn’t true since he talks about them.
“…they’d think the young had been enslaved by the 50+ crowd.”
Not hardly. It all about the 1% vs everybody else. Period.
Most of the 50+ crowd I’ve met are struggling as well.
When overtaxed was oversharing a bit more, I was able to back calculate his income to $350K minimum.
And he denies being in the top 1%. So where does that put him and his wife? Maybe somewhere in the next half percent below the top 1%?
He also appears to think of himself as being middle class. How many people would consider $350K to be middle class?
“He also appears to think of himself as being middle class. How many people would consider $350K to be middle class?”
People in NYC would consider me “dirt poor”. As, apparently would people in Vancouver, San Fran, and the other “crazy” cities out there. 500K or bust to live a middle class life in those cities.
The only reason that I can live like an “upper middle class” person is because I am in a relatively low cost area (house cost a bit over 100/sq/ft, no income tax in FL, lower overall cost of living), my wife works and makes a good income, and we don’t have children or any major medical problems. Any one of those things change; good bye to the “toys” (and perhaps more).
Can’t speak for the other locations, but I’m pretty sure Vancouverites would consider you quite wealthy. They have very expensive houses but not the incomes to back them up.
From Statistics Canada, median income in Vancity was a little over $67k in 2010, lower than other well known Canadian cities such as Hamilton, Thunderbay, St. John’s and St. John.
Overtaxed:
You’re being ridiculous. If you live in Florida, then it makes no sense to compare your income with New York prices. With that kind of salary, your wife could easily quit and have like four kids. You’d still be flush.
You’re being ridiculous.
But you’ve gotta hand it to him…He’s got that “I don’t have any money” thing down!
“But you’ve gotta hand it to him…He’s got that “I don’t have any money” thing down! ”
I’d love you to find where I said that. Because I didn’t.
What I said is that my wife and I both work a lot more than our parents did/do, make a lot more money, and don’t have a lifestyle that’s appreciably different (except for the hours and non-stop travel) than they did. They were able to buy vacation homes, send 2 children to private schools and college, and still have enough left over. My wife and I can’t dream of having a child without drastically altering (further reducing what we have compared to what my parents had) our lifestyle.
I have plenty of money and a very nice lifestyle. But there are some huge sacrifices that we’ve had to make to get there, sacrifices that earlier generations didn’t make. Those who are like us and have children live a life nothing like their parents. At least my wife and I are close to the affluence they attained. Of course, some of the big things (vacation home being the biggest) are totally out of reach. And our house is smaller (but, IMHO, in a better location).
Forget about income, just compare what people of this generation (on average) have at 40 compared to what people born in the 1940’s generally had at 40. IMHO, it’s not even comparable. The 40 year olds today are working harder (both of them), have less free time, less job security, and more stress. Something negative is happening to this country; I’m not sure I can describe it accurately, but I know that I feel it regularly when I see the comparison between my generation and the one’s that came 30-40 years before me.
But hey, we’ve got iPads. So I guess I should quit my whining!
The 40 year olds today are working harder (both of them), have less free time, less job security, and more stress. Something negative is happening to this country; I’m not sure I can describe it accurately,
Free trade with third world kleptocracies? Trickle-down economics?
Forget about income, just compare what people of this generation (on average) have at 40 compared to what people born in the 1940’s generally had at 40.
You’re not discussing average people. You had the great luck to be born to parents who could afford a vacation home, private schools, etc. Both your parents and you are well above average in terms of income.
“The only reason that I can live like an “upper middle class” person is because — snip — my wife works and makes a good income, and we don’t have children…”
I know a dual income no kids (dinks), and they have nice toyz and travel frequently especially in the winter. We have two children and one engineering income in flyover country, and it has been a struggle, but we’re debt free almost two years now. We know many families who are worse-off, and many have two incomes too. Children mean a scant 401k unless you get a break along the way, which I haven’t seen yet, but I’m far from throwing in the towel.
@polly, yeah I always assumed based on the info provided that he made 300+ and his wife made a lot too, at least 100. Thus my take was, eh, whatever, he bought a $700k house, maybe not a great “investment” but it’ll probably work out OK for him. I’m also not sure why I thougth he was around 40 y/o.
Prejudice? Narrow Mindness?
You’re in the top 1% of incomes, clearly you could find a way if you wanted to do this. At your earning level, it would not be hard to have several million in the bank at your age. You’d need to become less of a worker bee and build up some assets that produce the same income with less effort. Most people don’t have the mindset for this, there is no shame in it. But you’d need to aggressively cut down what you actually do at work. Perhaps redefine your role.
The way I see it, to “win” in America these days at my age (30) you can’t rely on _any_ job-based income to provide the winning formula unless you are literally a pro athlete in a major sport, a movie star, or similar. As you say, 200-300k in income gets eaten up quickly if you want to have that lifestyle you describe.
All the people I know who are happiest and most free don’t rely on a salary from working. Don’t get me wrong, they work, but either in a job doing something they love and in a situation with a lot of control or else they just work sporadically on their businesses. Assets and ownership stake is the way to go in modern America.
We are not top 1%. That’s about 400K income (370 AGI or so).
Several million? Are you kidding me? Even 400K income (combined, which, again, is quite a bit more than we make), there’s almost no way you’d wind up with a “few million” in the bank before your 60+. 400K is going to be, after taxes, 401K, etc about 250K take home. So, to get “several million” you’d have had to save 100% of your salary for the last 10 years? That would be pretty difficult, considering I was in college 10 years ago.
Yes, if you make 400K for 20-30 years, you may wind up with a few million at some point, but it’s certainly not “a few years out”, it’s after a lifetime at high incomes.
The lifestyle that I describe? It’s not like we fly around in a private jet for our vacations.
We have a nice house, nice cars (including one that’s way too expensive, but, I love it, so I guess it’s worth it). But, if you pulled up here you wouldn’t think to yourself “these people are millionaires”. We aren’t, and we don’t live like we are.
For some reason I thought you were in your 40s. Which is why I gave you a free pass on the house and cars.
I also thought you and your wife both made really good money, like better than me and mine, so, whatever - - might as well spend it.
Now I’m thinking, WTF with the house & cars (?!?!?!), you will never be independently wealthy with the way you’re going.
Congrats on being a consumer, I guess. And LOL @ 401k’s compared to IRA stuffing & owning cash producing assets outright. For a Romney supporter you really don’t seem to have looked behind the curtain to see how “job creators” and “makers” really bring home the bacon.
“For a Romney supporter you really don’t seem to have looked behind the curtain to see how “job creators” and “makers” really bring home the bacon.”
Please, by all means, inform me as to what I’m missing.
So, I’m supposed to live in a box and drive a Huffy to work?
Yes, I own a house, and I spend too much on my cars. Isn’t that a big part of the reason that people work hard; so that they can buy the things they want?
Isn’t that a big part of the reason that people work hard; so that they can buy the things they want?
————-
Not to me. But then again, I’m a lot more conservative in my personal finances than you. I work hard so I never, ever have to worry about money and so I can own the profits of the labor and effort of other people. You’re more of a consumer, I’m more of a Romney-ite*. It is what it is.
What are you missing? A lot. The US tax code is carefully put together by business lobbyists and pro-wealth types. I
*in my personal dealings, not in my thoughts on social issues or public policy.
“What are you missing? A lot. The US tax code is carefully put together by business lobbyists and pro-wealth types.”
And I try to take advantage of all the laws that I can. But, when you have 2 people with W2 income, there’s not a lot you can do to skirt that damage. Insane, but, buying a house (load up on debt) is one of the few things that eases the tax burden. Don’t get me started on how insane that is; subsidizing consumer goods is just off the wall nuts. However, I guess there’s something to be said for it; if they didn’t allow deduction of interest on a residence, why wouldn’t my neighbor and I just “swap houses” (even if just on paper), rent to one another and write off the depreciation and costs as a rental expense? Honestly, it almost makes sense to do that now; I can only write off interest, if this was rental property, I could depreciate it and write off other expenses as well.
Insanity.
I’m more of a Romney-ite*.
Oh please, you aren’t even worthy of licking Romney’s boots. Stop comparing yourself to what you will never be.
+1 to all of this, excellent summary.
Most of the 20-30 somethings I know who have kids still receive parental contributions, either cash, private school tuitions for the kids, or mom and dad rent the beach house for the vacation they can’t afford, or free child care (if the grandparents themselves are not still working).
The only people that age that I know who are not struggling are dual income with no kids.
“free child care”
This is a huge one. And if you live in an area with good public schools, you could be looking at a 40K+ swing in yearly expense. That takes something from “out of reach” to “very doable”. We live 1000 miles from our parents. Our public schools are poor. So, we’re looking at 1K/mo in child care expenses (min) and at least another 10K/yr in private schooling.
Having free babysitting is a huge bonus. Add in a job where extensive travel isn’t required (which, in my experience, is rare in the 100K+ job market) and you can see how people have a family and make it work. But, in our situation (which is becoming more and more common) it’s financially nearly impossible to have a child and continue to lead anything that even closely resembles our life today.
Health care costs are a huge contributor to making everyone not in the 1% feel poor. And if you do have kids (which, by the way, I do recommend if you have any interest, it’s a wild ride) wait til you see the costs of family policies. Go back thirty years and see what the average premium was. We do have lots of nice technology that we didn’t have, people who get lucky with genetics and take care of themselves can definitely live longer and healthier than they did, but the hospital charges/ER charges have no basis in reality anymore. No one can afford that.
We just got our renewal for the employees health insurance here–up another 18% YOY. Not sure how things will work out with the exchanges next year, but I still absolutely hate the fact that I have to pay more to cover my employees than Mega-hospital across the street. And, of course, I can’t bill more to make up that difference, so we’ll take another hit to salaries. One step closer to begging Mega-hospital to take us over…the days of the private practice doctor’s offices are numbered.
One of my co-workers is pulling 10’s of thousands of dollars from an IRA to help pay for the daughter-in-law’s baby that was just born two months early, because son and daughter-in-law have junk insurance are are broke, broke, broke. Sad.
One of my co-workers is pulling 10’s of thousands of dollars from an IRA to help pay for the daughter-in-law’s baby that was just born two months early, because son and daughter-in-law have junk insurance are are broke, broke, broke. Sad.
Why didn’t they just file for BK?
Why didn’t they just file for BK?
Middle class pride?
It’s no longer easy to file for BK.
BK reforms of 2005.
It’s no longer easy to file for BK.
BK reforms of 2005.
I know people who have done it recently. It isn’t that hard.
I know people who have done it recently. It isn’t that hard.
If you make more than median income you can’t do Chapter 7 unless you’re “between jobs”.
“The only people that age that I know who are not struggling are dual income with no kids.”
You may be underestimating the extent to which your parents struggled. My folks got a parental loan for the down payment on their house in 1956. They managed to have a comfortable retirement through frugality and good luck (no major crises, good health).
Even with no kids, there are expenses associated with working that consume some of the second income.
“So, yes, something definitely happened over the last 30 years.”
Actually it’s closer to 40-yrs, IMHO.
The U.S. was deeply in debt at the end of the Vietnam war. In addition, LBJ had recently signed the Great Society programs into law, and when the congress over-ruled Nixon and further armed Israel the Arab nations formed OPEC and the oil embargo crushed the economy. The printing press moment had arrived, and Nixon took us off of the gold standard. The early seventies were an awful period economically.
Yes. ^
“So, yes, something definitely happened over the last 30 years.”
Something?
Do you want the full list or the short list?
Here’s the short list:
Deregulation and sending jobs overseas.
Surely trickle-down economics should make the top of the short list. Especially since it basically started a little over 30 years ago.
Occam’s Razor says that’s a heck of a coincidence.
Those two are the core of “tinkle down”.
I have noticed an explosion in the number of white people who have kids and take welfare. They are in their early twenties to early thirties. It’s considered normal nowadays. People take it for granted that you can’t afford kids without welfare.
People take it for granted that you can’t afford kids without welfare.
Without a highly skilled job that requires an above average IQ, that is pretty much true these days. Unless you can get a job as a cop or a firefighter.
Progressive policy makers in both parties favor the ultra rich, the loud and the dependent, everyone else is effed. The dependent and the loud form community organizations, those organizations collect billions to pay off politicians and have army’s of people to demonstrate and apply pressure to local politicians and companies who don’t “play ball”. The rich either buy local, state and federal politicians or user their wealth to get elected.
The lower-middle, middle and upper-middle class have no representation other than voting and paying the lion’s share of taxes and fees. Those seeking election always pander to the great middle class only to vote against their (the middle class) interests on nearly every important issue. So we sit out here and work 60+ hours per week watching the race baiters, gender baiters, gayists, illegal immigrants, radical islamists, welfare recipients, giant corporations, wall street, the fed, super rich elitists and statist progressives of all kinds create the laws that run our lives and absolutely shred the constitution.
Yeah, I’d say there is something wrong.
“Why buy at house at these massively inflated asking prices when everyone knows you’ll get ripped off? Rent for half the monthly cost and buy later after prices crater for 65% less.”
Play with Realtors® and you’re playing with FIRE
Speaking of the FIRE sector…
“Baby’s On Fire” - Brian Eno
(there is something eerily prescient about this song from the 1980s if you read between the lines)
Baby’s on fire
Better throw her in the water
Look at her laughing
Like a heifer to the slaughter
Baby’s on fire
And all the laughing boys are bitching
Waiting for photos
Oh the plot is so bewitching.
Rescuers row row
Do your best to change the subject
Blow the wind blow blow
Lend some assistance to the object
Photographers snip snap
Take your time she’s only burning
This kind of experience
Is necessary for her learning
If you’ll be my flotsam
I could be half the man I used to
They said you were hot stuff
And that’s what baby’s been reduced to.
Juanita and Juan
Very clever with maracas
Making their fortunes
Selling second-hand tobaccos
Juan dances at Chico’s
And when the clients are evicted
He empties the ashtrays
And pockets all that he’s collected
But baby’s on fire!
And all the instruments agree that
Her temperatures rising
But any idiot would know that.
Released in 1974, off of “Here Come the Warm Jets.” One of my favorite albums of all time.
74? Wow, I didn’t get to hear it until sometimes around 1982.
“And never forget…… A single family residence is never an investment. Houses depreciate resulting in loss.”
more rubbish today?
Houses depreciate ALWAYS.
Let a Realtor® take you home, and you’ll wake up with an incalculable financial hangover.
I have a strange feeling you two are the same person trying to act like someone wants to hear your constant rubbish.
Lots of people have become wealthy by owning real estate.
Stocks and homes!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
“Lots of people have become wealthy by owning real estate.”
Those “lots of people” is a fraction of those who paid massively inflated prices for what is always a depreciating asset. In this case, a house.
End result? Massive losses.
Lots of people become wealthy in any Ponzi. Why are you shilling for Real Estate now, after the ponzi has peaked?
I traced your IP address to this location:
http://www.picpaste.com/IMG_20130622_130733_362-zdW3WIVt.jpg
This is where our liar friend azdude(robert) does biz. Fully funded by the housing crime syndicate of course.
http://picpaste.com/pics/86ad3dedec595ef060b3bfbfe2bdc186.1372170001.png
Lots of people have become wealthy by owning real estate.
Lots of people have become wealthier by hitting jackpots and beating vegas, too.
how many years are you folks going to sit around and whine about home prices? You are beating a dead horse. There was a bubble, it popped as we predicted and now your going to sit around for years and whine cause you didnt buy at the bottom?
“Stocks and homes!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”
Such blatant anus-talk. It will actually be humorous knowing that you are gnawing your own limbs off, trying to escape your debt-trap.
make something happen for once and quit talking about how you missed the boat again
I have a strange feeling you two are the same person trying to act like someone wants to hear your constant rubbish.
Housing Analyst is the poster formerly known as “RAL”, an acronym for Realtors are Liars. He also posts using many other handles.
I’m not sure, but I speculate that goon squad may be the poster formerly known as “pressboxboard”.
Goon squad - have you posted in the past on a regular basis using a different handle?
from 2006 to 2009, and it wasn’t pressboardbox.
ben jones knows
I am the poster formerly know as Blue Skye.
Correction: from 2009 to 2011 it was a different name. 2banana christened my current one during the Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker hoo-hah in 2011.
I’m Lou Minatti
I’m Gordon Ramsay…… Mr. Chef to you.
“make something happen for once and quit talking about how you missed the boat again”
I haven’t missed any boat, nor have I ever used that verbiage. But you have. A lot. Which is indicative that YOU feel you really HAVE ‘made the boat’ and accomplished something. Aren’t you just brilliant? You should go give yourself a big hug and a pat on the back. Does your ego masturbation keep you warm at night?
Lots of people have become wealthy by owning real estate.
…by buying cash-flowing properties in the 70s - mid-90s. Since then it’s all been speculation.
I respect the folks who bought multiplexes then, not the tools buying multiple spec houses sight unseen which is what “real estate investing” connotes these days.
how many years are you folks going to sit around and whine about home prices?
How many years are you going to hang around a listen to it?
Housing is the path to riches - for bond traders, not the physical asset owner. The physical asset owner provides the income stream. That’s it. And the Fed and government are interested in the bond markets.
Definitely, there were those realtors already in the business prior to 1999, who could have gotten wealthy flipping the physical asset - had they known when to stop. But many of them did not stop, drinking the Kool-Aid and thinking it could go on forever, thinking that the riches were in flipping the asset and not the bond market. They rode the wave up, and rode it down.
But as with any pot of gold, once the public gets wind of it, the smart money uses them as the mark. The number of Realtors skyrocketed from 800,000 in 2001 to about 1.4 million by 2006. And has been declining since, now at about 2003 levels.
I was reading about how some companies in remote parts of Africa are having routine double-digit gains. “Africa,” I thought - “how on earth would one figure that out?” Scouts from the big financial firms scouting the globe. But now that the public is informed of it, the top is surely near.
Again…
Houses depreciate rapidly
“Housing is the path to riches - for bond traders…”
+1 But only as long as the fed.gov guarantees persist.
The number of Realtors skyrocketed from 800,000 in 2001 to about 1.4 million by 2006. And has been declining since, now at about 2003 levels.
Wow. No wonder housing is so fooked.
Does anyone know the statistics on Lawyers and MBA’s?
Bush was wrong. Lawyers, MBA’s and the Realtors are the Axis of evil.
“how many years are you folks going to sit around and whine about home prices? You are beating a dead horse. There was a bubble, it popped as we predicted and now your going to sit around for years and whine cause you didnt buy at the bottom?”
We still have places (Like Seattle where I’m at) that have a 6/1 Price to average household income ration. We are nowhere NEAR the bottom.
The World Bank spoke and said (paraphrasing) “all this money printing is getting dangerous” and Uncle Fed is listening.
You don’t think the banksters pulling the strings are going to let the dollars they’ve spent so much time
stealingaccumulating become worthless do you? The only way to do that now is to stop printing money and let interest rates float up.Once that happens, the corp banks won’t be have (as much) free money to show as earnings to make the shareholders happy. Now what do we do?
But wait, what’s that? We have a ton of empty houses on our books we can liquidate to raise the missing cash? Well by all means….
So now we have a perfect storm of rising interest rates just as the PTB decide it’s now in their best interest to dump all the houses they’ve acquired.
Aaaaaand BOOYAH. Real estate as an investment becomes a joke.
In a scenario like that I don’t see a 65% drop in price as too unrealistic.
The only factor I can see that would change the outcome would be if millions of high paying jobs suddenly sprang up across the US, right about the time the lollipop forest is in full bloom with bubblegum fields full of candy crapping unicorns and puppies farting rainbows.
‘You are beating a dead horse’
I just did a trashout on a house that’s been foreclosed twice in 4 years. I see purchases in foreclosure as recent as 2011. So just where did these people go wrong? And do they whine when I throw their junk into the dump? I don’t know because they are long gone, lugging their old dishwasher or whatever else they take along for spite. Maybe someday a guy like me will show up on your front door too. And don’t expect any mercy, because in the repo business you do your crying on the curb with your boxes.
I feel like I channeled OlyGal a little there at the end of my last post - I think she would have appreciated it.
I feel like I channeled OlyGal a little there at the end of my last post - I think she would have appreciated it.
Close enough.
Comment by “Uncle Fed, why won’t you love ME?”
2013-06-24 15:26:50
Snowgirl:
I did not understand the article you posted. Is it trying to say that China is having a technical problem, or did they shut down their banking system because it’s broke?
The Chinese economy is having serious liquidity problems. What was the quote yesterday? “It Is Not That There Is No Money, But The Money Has Been Put In The Wrong Place”
And if you happen to be in that wrong place then for you there is no money.
I thought China bought up a ton of US Ts? I really haven’t been following the issue, but I suppose they could always dump the US investments and raise a little cash.
I was a bit distracted the past week but I’m under the impression the Chinese dumped a fair amount of Treasuries the last few days. Internet conspiracy theorists are chattering its related to the power struggle over the Snowden affair. Sounds crazy and unfounded but at this point so much is manipulated I find it difficult to discount completely.
Have to head out. Otherwise I’d google and make sure before posting.
Oooh hey, I didn’t think of that. In addition to the perfect storm I laid out above, now we also have the Chinese dumping bonds / treasuries.
It seems that this would force other bond issuers to offer higher rates to offset the increased yields of the T-bills China Dumps.
Or am I overlooking something?
Just want to thank Beer & Cigar Guy for the great posts yesterday.
You rock, sir!
Sometimes I shouldn’t start drinking so early in the morning… Regarding the Snowden thing, I just want to clarify a little. I apologize if I offended anyone, but I have my hot-buttons too. I love my country and I proudly served in the military to protect it and its citizens. My old dress uniform still hangs in the closet. I’ve walked in 7 or 8 foreign countries and spent more time at sea than I care to think about. I’ve seen enough of other countries to know how good we have it here. I love my country, but more and more often I’m shocked and disgusted by what we allow our politicians (both parties) to do to it. How do you think the Founding Fathers would have reacted if King George had insisted upon reading all mail in the Colonies? Snowden simply verified what OUR politicians were surreptitiously doing to all US citizens, and some people want to vilify him for it. I think that is BS. It is sad commentary indeed that he felt safer in Russia than in the US. Nobody in this country has any reason to be proud of that fact.
Edward Snowden: Doing the job members of Congress won’t do.
It is indeed a sad commentary that he felt safer in Russia than in the US, and I for one am not proud of that at all.
Unfortunately, I fear that now that Russia has him, they’re not going to let him go. I have a sense that something has gone wrong. Putin is not exactly a savory character.
“Putin is not exactly a savory character.”
And Obama is? whoa.
Yes We Scan!
“Yes We Scan!”
THAT is awesome. I’m gonna use it to the hilt. I also like “Yes, We Scam”.
“And Obama is? whoa.”
Not at all, that wasn’t my point. I just wouldn’t put it past Putin, however, to hang on to Snowden until he got as much as he could out of him, and then throw him to the wolves.
Yes We Scan!
I guess the jig is up for Obama internationally. When will he reach the bush level ridicule in the USA?
Yes We Scan!
+ 1000
“I guess the jig is up for Obama internationally.”
ROTFLMAO! That’s rayciss.
When Snowden gets taken out in a drone strike, expect the slack-jawed, mouth-breathing yokels to dance in the streets chanting “USA! USA! USA!” like they did after Watertown, MA was put on police state lockdown.
And how many people were arrested for violating this “lockdown?”
Methinks you’re a tad melodramtic/hyperbolic on that point.
That said, I think the American people have been completely snowed by the barrage of “the REAL problem is the leak, not that your government got caught red handed violating the most fundamental principles that our whole form of governance is based on,” namely that the government answers to WE THE PEOPLE and NOT the other way around.
The entire notion of the government serving the people’s interest (rather than vice-versa) has been utterly betrayed and they want to shoot the messenger.
Stay classy ‘Murika!
“Unfortunately, I fear that now that Russia has him, they’re not going to let him go. I have a sense that something has gone wrong. Putin is not exactly a savory character.”
Putin wants to trade, Edward Snowden for Viktor Bout.
I may reassess my opinion of Home Despot.
Co-founder,Ken Langone on Edward Snowden, “…we should throw him a party.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7rMtKgLMEl8
Know your meme.
If not for the gontractors, US would have had the best governents/bureaucrats/oligrarchs/politicians.
Kick the gontractors on the…!
“Know your meme.”
Government employees are flesh-eating maggots just counting down the seconds until they can retire at age 37 with $450,000 annual pensions and unlimited free refills at 7-Eleven for life.
Government contractors are bootstrapping, rags-to-riches, Tom Vu American dream, tired huddled masses yearning to breathe free, designing and building the F-35 from a Mulberry Street pushcart on the Lower East Side circa 1905, teaching themselves to read FAR Part 15 by candlelight in a drafty garret apartment, crossing the Atlantic via 3rd class steamer passage to ink their names with an illiterate scrawl in Box 15A to enter into Supplemental Agreement pursuant to the authority of FAR 52.243-1 Fixed Price-Alt I.
This never gets old to me.
——–
“Government contractors are bootstrapping, rags-to-riches, Tom Vu American dream, tired huddled masses yearning to breathe free, designing and building the F-35 from a Mulberry Street pushcart on the Lower East Side circa 1905, teaching themselves to read FAR Part 15 by candlelight in a drafty garret apartment, crossing the Atlantic via 3rd class steamer passage to ink their names with an illiterate scrawl in Box 15A to enter into Supplemental Agreement pursuant to the authority of FAR 52.243-1 Fixed Price-Alt I.”
Correction: Box 15A is name and title of signer (Type or print), Box 15B is Contractor/Offeror (signature of person authorized to sign), but you knew that already.
Thanks for fixing that - I was getting ready to file correction form 416-B on your behalf.
Chinese companies are getting more creative in the business of money lending as they struggle to keep profits ticking over in a cooling economy, raising concerns they are adding to the mountain of debt risks building in the world’s No.2 economy.
Big state companies in industries struggling with over-capacity but with easy access to credit are borrowing funds, not to invest in their business but to lend to smaller firms sometimes at several times the official interest rate, part of an informal lending market in China that authorities are taking aim at.
http://uk.reuters.com/article/2013/06/24/uk-china-shadowlending-analysis-idUKBRE95N02U20130624
The great pyramid of China, truly a wonder of the world.
It’s really a Ponzi, isn’t it?
Riot after Chinese teachers try to stop pupils cheating. This article brought a smile to my face, because ever since the modern day global “rise” of China, there’s been all this bloviating about how “smart” Asians are and how they have some sort of superior IQ. This does not bear out with my personal experiences, in fact I’ve found some to be just as smart or just as dumb if not dumber than other ethnic groups. It’s anecdotal, of course. Not to mention I’ve had considerable experience with their crappy products, so I’m not at all impressed.
After reading this article, things finally clicked for me. Cheating is a way of life, apparently. It’s how they get ahead, and I don’t judge them for that, I can understand it, after all, that’s what’s happens at the top here in the US. And Asians are not the ones telling us how smart they are, either, it’s another MSM meme to degrade American citizens, especially in the business and finance area. What they ARE good at is inscrutability, and that can be a true art. Reminds me of that movie Being There with Peter Sellers, one of my faves.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/china/10132391/Riot-after-Chinese-teachers-try-to-stop-pupils-cheating.html
Great quote from the article:
“Outside, an angry mob of more than 2,000 people had gathered to vent its rage, smashing cars and chanting: “We want fairness. There is no fairness if you do not let us cheat.”
there’s been all this bloviating about how “smart” Asians are and how they have some sort of superior IQ. This does not bear out with my personal experiences,
————————————————————–
Thank you. I don’t know when this started, but it sure wasn’t with the white people I grew up around. I probably, like most of you, learned that “smart” is a code word for “clever” when it comes to Asians (it also means sneaky)
One time on a racist blog, after a white guy said “Asians are smarter than white people and have higher IQs…”; I asked him: “WHEN did Asians overtake white people in the smartness department?”
Dead silence.
That ended the thread.
I suspect whats occurring is ADVERTISING. Its what you need to do to sell something that is not true.
Another example is the tee-vee commercials with the bumbling, foolish white dad who’s children and wife ( or a random noble negro) make him look like an idiot.
Its just not true.
As far as I can tell, the meme got started in finance and moved to tech, so you’ll see this sort of thing, usually in dog-whistling form, discussed in articles related to those two areas. These days you don’t see it in finance as much, but it’s still very much alive in tech, and I think it’s a way of getting cheaper, more compliant labor.
I recall having a conversation with a fellow who had his own business back in the late 1970s, who said he’d only hire Indian accountants, because Indians “are good with numbers” due to IQ.
Polly’s right, as I recall “The Asians are better than us” DID get started with Japan in the 1980s, I remember it well. More recently, there was all that Tiger Mother horsepuckey, and the model minority stuff that George Zimmer mentions below.
Anyway, the race and IQ thing is a big load of crap, IMO.
“a random noble negro”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_negro
“a random noble negro”
Morgan Freeman?
I am tired of Morgan Freeman and his typical wise old black man roles he plays in movies. I am glad Denzel is a better actor than Freeman.
I am tired of Morgan Freeman and his typical wise old black man roles he plays in movies.
My guess is that he is, too. But it pays the bills.
I hear ya, but Morgan Freeman payed his dues; its quite understandable they made him a “made man” in Hollywood.
He’s an old school professional actor; show up to rehearse/audition on time, know your lines, don’t be hung over… he earned his spot by being a good, solid,reliable, no nonsense actor.
Lots of actors are good, but difficult to work with. Freeman knows this and takes steps not to be one of them. Samuel L Jackson is also an actor who has expressed his annoyance of working with actors who have not done their homework and thereby prolong the shoots.
Morgan Freeman is kind of a hack, but he’s a good hack; reminds me of Robin Trower.
“I am tired of Morgan Freeman and his typical wise old black man roles…”
Next up, life insurance policies?
This article brought a smile to my face, because ever since the modern day global “rise” of China, there’s been all this bloviating about how “smart” Asians are and how they have some sort of superior IQ
I think that what a lot of people overlook here in the USA is that we get Asia’s best and brightest.
The “Asians are better than us at [fill in the blank]” was from the rise of Japan. I don’t see that as part of the analysis with China at all. With China the discussion is about tons of workers willing to live in dorms and work long hours for low wages. And more willing to move in to take their places if they demand too much in the way of work place safety or breathable air or drinkable water.
The “Asians are better than us at [fill in the blank]” was from the rise of Japan.
No, Colorado is right. It was do with the asians immigrants being model minority. They were Engineers and Doctors, stayed out of trouble, saved money, were not loud, etc….
Colorado’s and Polly’s statements are not mutually exclusive. Polly’s right, it did get started with Japan in the 1980s.
“It was do with the asians immigrants being model minority. They were Engineers and Doctors, stayed out of trouble, saved money, were not loud, etc….”
And then there’s Lawrence Yun…
FWIW, I have read of similar stories of academic shenanigans in Japan.
LOL, and I have read stories of the same type of shenanigans in Atlanta.
LOL, and I have read stories of the same type of shenanigans in Atlanta.
It’s a small world after all!
Cheating on tests happens when the results of the tests are really, really important. In some places, a single test can decide where you go to university which determines where you get to work, how successful you are considered in life, etc. In some places the results of the tests detemine whether the teachers get to keep their jobs.
Both levels of importance can be sufficient incentive for cheating for at least some people.
I hear ya jose, but think about this: They were smart enough to sucker our biggest corporations into GIVING them our top technology
Give? Hell, we PAID them to take it!
our top technology
Ours? Yours?
bloviating about how “smart” Asians are and how they have some sort of superior IQ
Just like the bloviating about Africans having lower IQs than Europeans?
Precisely. It’s something that cannot be measured by race, no matter how much some folks may want to.
“Precisely. It’s something that cannot be measured by race, no matter how much some folks may want to.”
Oh but it has been measured by race no matter how much some folks don’t want to accept political incorrect facts.
What’s really going on in California
California imposed a new law on banks innocuously called “Homeowners Bill of Rights” which forces banks to switch over to a judicial foreclosure process, which they can opt to do on their own, but takes a year or more to renegotiate contracts and compensation structures for the foreclosure law firms who do all the leg work for the banks. And while those changes are being made… it makes it appear that foreclosures have slowed down dramatically in the state.
The reality?
Defaults (undeclared) are spiraling upward that yet have to pass through the foreclosure pipeline.
The truth?
California is still the highest foreclosure state in sheer volume and percentage.
The low-down?
Resale housing is still massively overpriced as a result of unprecedented interference by individual states and the federal government. The market distortions will be removed and the down draft will continue allowing the market to correct.
If you play with fire, you will get burned.
another day of this same rubbish?
Refute it Robert.
look at any of the data out there. no need to waste time with this same rubbish day after day.
For a contractor you seem to have a lot of times on your hands.
Then show it Robert.
look it up and quit posting trash on here all day. people are sick of you rubbish data all day.
Show it robert.
constant trash all day long here no credibility
California is still the highest foreclosure state in sheer volume and percentage.
And rising.
Data refuting the “forcing to go judicial” rubbish.
http://www.propertyradar.com/california-foreclosures
These are non-judicial actions. Following a dip at the beginning of the year, foreclosure filings rebounded, but generally still in a downward trend.
If you want to see a state go effectively judicial, look at what happened in Oregon:
http://www.propertyradar.com/oregon-foreclosures
THAT’s what it looks like when a state effectively goes judicial.
Refuting defaults:
Look at the most recent LPS mortgage monitor, non-current loan rates include defaults as well as homes in the foreclosure process. CA is now handily in the bottom third in terms of defaults, down from being in the top 5 a few years ago:
http://www.lpsvcs.com/LPSCorporateInformation/CommunicationCenter/DataReports/MortgageMonitor/201304MortgageMonitor/MortgageMonitorApril2013.pdf
See page 19. Noncurrent loan rates in CA down approximately 30% from last year. Delinquencies (and overall distress) are not rising, they are falling.
Highest foreclosure rate in terms of percentage rubbish:
http://www.realtytrac.com/statsandtrends/foreclosuretrends
CA is not in the top 5 in terms of percentage. Can’t put my finger on volume data.
Yes, interest rates are distorting the market, and are causing prices to rebound faster than they should, but prices hit their inflation adjusted trough per Robert Shiller’s own data:
http://www.econ.yale.edu/~shiller/data.htm
The third paragraph from the bottom has the link to his Excel spreadsheet.
You refuted nothing.
Furthermore, a full 59% of delinquent mortgages in California haven’t received a default notice. This number is rising Why the delay? Because of “Homeowners Bill of Rights” which forces banks to switch over to a judicial foreclosure process.
http://www.theburningplatform.com/?p=40022
Do you see the title of that article? Remember it and go take a look in the mirror. It’s YOU.
Additionally, Inflation adjusted Case Shiller shows prices DOUBLE the long term trend. It’s triple plus some in California.
http://picpaste.com/pics/f77b57b331139f09189dea05a6bfcdbf.1372180608.jpg
You didn’t post a refutation. You posted RUBBISH like you do here every day. What kind of RUBBISH? You quoted David Lereah and his new scam company just a few weeks ago. Today you post LPS garbage? A firm where the top brass are convicted felons?
We see straight through your constant rubbish on here.
1. LPS non-current rate includes delinquent borrowers who are not yet in the foreclosure process. The website you link is from September 2012. Got anything from 2013 (after the Homeowner Bill of Rights took effect)?
2. The graph you post is not inflation adjusted. Professor Shiller’s (from his website) is inflation adjusted.
Duck, weave and LIE.
You post RUBBISH.
PLUS, the 59% and 15 months you refer to are not market statistics, they are statistics on Youwalkaway customers.
RUBBISH
http://www.newyorkfed.org/research/national_economy/householdcredit/DistrictReport_Q12013.pdf
You don’t like LPS? Fine.
Here is the NY Fed credit report. Is that credible enough for you?
Page 21 shows CA’s 90+ day delinquent loans on a steady decline (now below the national average).
Page 23 shows CA’s transitioning into 30+ days delinquent in steady decline.
Page 24 shows CA’s transitioning into 90+ day delinquent in steady decline.
Page 25 shows CA’s percent of consumers with new foreclosures in steady decline.
“defaults spiraling upward” is a blatant lie.
More RUBBISH
Prof. Robert Shiller’s data from his own website? Deemed by you to be Rubbish.
The NY Fed’s data on delinquencies in California? Deemed by you to be Rubbish.
Wow. Just Wow.
NY FED?
Seriously? Like they tell the truth all the time, right?
On one hand, we have both LPS and the NY Fed pointing in the same direction (an consistent decrease of delinquencies in CA).
On the other hand, we have “Housing Analyst” claiming the opposite with no data to support it.
The fact that people are choosing to believe and defend the “Housing Analyst” is shocking. The HBB correctly saw the bubble because of rigorous, data driven research. Has analysis of data been abandoned? Discredit or ignore the data that doesn’t fit your world view?
Is there ANY third party with actual access to the data to support the claim that there are “defaults spiraling upward” in California? Or do people just “know” it to be true…and those claiming the opposite (in this case LPS and the NY Fed) are part of a vast conspiracy?
AND since you are happy to chime in on one of the data sources that HA determines to be rubbish, do you want to make any comment on his comment that Prof Shiller’s data is also rubbish? Or do you selectively try to discredit reason by picking the source that people might most consider untrustworthy?
The problem with your logic is over reliance on these dubious transitory data while ignoring the 800 pound gorilla, i.e, the extraordinary steps taken to produce these data. You know it very well it will end the same way last time around.
The “transitory data” (ie. falling non-current loan rates in CA) has been pretty much in a straight line decline since peaking in early 2010, and dropping interest rates like a rock didn’t stop home prices from falling. What stopped them from falling was cash buyers (ie. making a purchase decision independent of rates).
The rocket upward in prices starting about a year ago is clearly driven by low rates, but not the steady decline in delinquencies, which was due to CA actually working through the distress. As I’ve said over and over again, unless rates rise, we are at risk of another bubble forming in every market, and in some markets (coastal CA, for instance), we have substantially rebubbled already.
The same decline in non-current loan rates did not occur in states that did not allow foreclosures, but still had the same access to low interest rates.
So, do you believe the data to be correct, but caused/affected by Fed intervention?
Or do you believe the data to be faulty?
These are clearly two different things…One believes in a conspiracy theory, which I dismiss entirely–the other is a view that Fed intervention is distorting markets in a way that is making fewer people delinquent, which I cannot dismiss entirely.
I’ll bet that Fed intervention allowed some people to stay in their homes and refinance, etc., but certainly there are others, that despite being able to refinance simply walked away.
Both.
Conspiracy theories have a strange way of becoming facts in this country. Time will tell who’s right but if I were you I wouldn’t quit my day job.
At least you admit to believing there is a conspiracy to provide faulty data.
The biggest conspiracy that I believe is that the Fed is publicly understating their private intentions with respect to the level of inflation they are hoping to achieve.
At least you admit to believing there is a conspiracy to provide faulty data.
It is. NSA is a child’s play compared to financial fraud in this country.
“Rental Watch”,
You’re a corrupt LIAR posting realtor rumor and unsubstantiated rubbish here daily. You’re a fraud. A bonafide and proven fraud.
Today’s “realtor rumor” and “unsubstantiated rubbish” was:
Property Radar
NY Fed
Professor Robert Shiller’s data (from his personal Yale website)
Lender Processing Services
RealtyTrac
Show me one source, a single source that shows CA’s delinquency rate has been rising…just one.
“The Coming Housing Collapse: The Fed, Instead Of Lehman, Owns The Mortgage Market”
http://www.forbes.com/sites/afontevecchia/2013/03/05/peter-schiff-and-the-coming-housing-collapse-the-fed-instead-of-lehman-owns-the-mortgage-market/
There are many reasons NOT to buy a house right now.
1) Prices are massively inflated
2) Rental rates are half the cost of buying at current inflated prices
3) The cost of new housing is a fraction of resale housing in $/square foot.
4) $/square foot prices are falling
…. and most importantly… You’re going to lose alot of money if you buy a house now. ALOT of money.
Phoenix Rental Rates Continue To Slide Lower
http://picpaste.com/pics/3c07144ab0230a1bdf71ea5290074bc2.1372170444.png
Given the massive numbers of empty rentals in Phoenix, expect rental rates to continue to erode.
Wall Street Journal - Some Unemployed Keep Losing Ground:
“The trouble is that the pace is still far too slow to fill quickly the huge hole created by the recession. Even if the rate of hiring doubled, it would take more than three years to get employment back to its prerecession level, after adjusting for population growth … The nation’s 4.4 million long-term unemployed haven’t seen similar gains. Only about 10% of them find jobs each month, a number that has barely budged in the past two years … long-term job seekers are twice as likely to leave the labor market as to find jobs, and many experts worry that many of them will never return to work. That could create a class of permanently unemployed workers and leave lasting scars on the economy.”
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323998604578565253887893738.html
The future belongs to Lucky Ducky
Gotta love this country. No new jobs and we keep offshoring the ones we have. And now we’re threatening to take the foodstamps away.
My brother and I were talking about this yesterday. He described it as the formation of “caste” system in the USA. In effect, we now have our own “untouchables”.
Time for a re-post of this:
http://gawker.com/tag/hello-from-the-underclass
Welcome to the recoveryless recovery
linked from drudge - 76 percent of americans live paycheck to paycheck:
http://m.townhall.com/tipsheet/katiepavlich/2013/06/24/wow-nearly-all-americans-living-paychecktopaycheck-n1626180
Not just offshoring, but also importing an entire underclass of workers who don’t have full citizenship rights.
The land of opportun…. ists.
“Get what you can get for your house today because it’s going to be much less tomorrow for many years to come.”
nonsense
Refute it robert.
your wasting peoples time
We knew you couldn’t refute it.
people can see through your constant rubbish on here
You’re running away Robert.
“Sadly, we have a broad, highly paid group pushing hard for a housing “recovery” which simply doesn’t exist.”
The facts are;
-Homeownership rates are at 17 year lows
-Housing Demand is at 16 year lows
-Housing inventory is massive in the tens of millions of excess empty houses
-Housing prices are grossly inflated
you know the scam so profit from it, quit talking about how you missed the boat again.
We profit every day by working prices lower. Dump those Phoenix shanties while you can.
I have a feeling you arent making any money as usual. posting from mcdonalds today?
We’re quite profitable Robert. All the way down to $55/square foot.
bs you probably cant even swing a hammer
They’re called nail guns robert.
you must be getting a lot of nail in posting rubbish all day.
-Housing Demand is at 16 year lows
And falling.
lmao thats why there is no inventory for sale in s cal.
oh and I know you will bring up all this hidden inventory bs.
It is still not for sale. I dont make the rules.
And 25 MILLION excess empty houses.
http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2013/06/how-another-housing-bubble-was-blown-and-why/
BuildingCom says:
June 7, 2013 at 6:21 pm
Remember…. there are 25 MILLION excess empty houses and this is growing as we continue building more inventory.
Barry Ritholtz says:
June 8, 2013 at 5:51 am
25 million?!? That number seems enormous & shocking!
I am not sure I buy that — Can you give us a source that quantifies how and where those 25M empty homes are? Its huge!
And that 25 MILLION will grow leaving an additional 35 MILLION houses as the boomer generation fades into history.
“Comment by azdude
2013-06-25 08:35:23
…It is still not for sale. I dont make the rules.”
No, you don’t make the rules. And that underscores your unimportance. You are just the shrill hiss of background noise. A single, small dingleberry enshrining the great anus that is RE. And while you claim to be so well informed, prescient and successful in RE, you still find time to come to a forum like this and post obvious lies and smarmy drivel. That doesn’t make any sense.
I don’t think people understood Al’s comment:
Barry Ritholtz seems to question the 25 million vacant home number:
“Barry Ritholtz says:
June 8, 2013 at 5:51 am
25 million?!? That number seems enormous & shocking!
I am not sure I buy that — Can you give us a source that quantifies how and where those 25M empty homes are? Its huge!”
The person claiming the 25 million so far has provided no source. I’m guessing this is our very own “Housing Analyst”…same claim, same lack of supporting data.
” A single, small dingleberry enshrining the great anus that is RE.”
That’s beautiful man, just beautiful.
I like to think of my poetry as my gift to the world. .. Well, that and my spontaneous, modern interpretive dance moves.
“That’s beautiful man, just beautiful.”
+1….. and so truthful too.
Which boat? Oh you mean the Titanic? Ya I just missed on board - I was busy reading the HBB and lost track of time.
Now I’ll go ahead and let you get back to re-arranging those deck chairs…
I was actually brought to the same creative place when the ‘missing the boat’ meme was invoked yet again, but I was thinking of the angle, “chained to the deck of the Titanic”.
What’s so funny about the name, ‘Biggus Dickus’?!?
I have good friend in Rome named Biggus Dickus.
He has a wife, you know….
Her name is Incontinentia… Incontinentia Buttocks-
That was my original choice of username, but Ben said I had to pick something else.
the federal reserve sure held firm!
It’s not September yet.
The UK Guardian’s Glenn Greenwald (who broke the Snowden story) on DC media:
“they are far more servants to political power than adversarial watchdogs over it, and what provokes their rage most is not corruption on the part of those in power (they don’t care about that) but rather those who expose the corruption, especially when the ones bringing transparency are outside of, even hostile to, their incestuous media circles”
http://m.washingtonpost.com/blogs/erik-wemple/wp/2013/06/24/greenwald-beltway-media-types-are-courtiers-to-power/
So, so true. I see John Kerry has suddenly adopted a more conciliatory tone toward Russia. Wonder why? He must’ve gotten b*tch-slapped over something, sure has cooled his jets.
Glenn Greenwald did us all a public service and he’s very right about the DC media.
It’s not just the DC media…..it’s basically ALL media.
Digging for, and reporting the truth is hard work. Especially when you have to butt heads with the government types who have a monetary and/or legal reason to keep things “classified”.
It’s easier, and more lucrative, to be a lap-dog.
Greenwald, a progressive, also called the housing bubble in about 2004, and started in on Obama about the time he appointed Geithner and Summers. Another American patriot living abroad.
“It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary (basis of power) depends on his not understanding it.”
Upton Sinclair
“or basis of power”
Wish there was an editing version of this software!
Yup.
Senate Bill Incentivizes Employers To Fire Americans and Hire Amnestied Immigrants.
Under the Gang of 8’s backroom immigration deal with Senators Schumer, Corker and Hoeven, formerly illegal immigrants who are amnestied will be eligible to work, but will not be eligible for ObamaCare. Employers who would be required to pay as much as a $3,000 penalty for most employees who receive an ObamaCare healthcare “exchange” subsidy, would not have to pay the penalty if they hire amnestied immigrants.
Consequently, employers would have a significant incentive to hire or retain amnestied immigrants, rather than current citizens, including those who have recently achieved citizenship via the current naturalization process.
Fact is stranger than fiction
Why does the stock market bother me so?
http://www.lpsvcs.com/LPSCorporateInformation/NewsRoom/Pages/20130625.aspx
New LPS “First Look” data on delinquencies and foreclosures. Full report due out by July 8th.
This is as far as I had to read to be fully convinced that their ‘data’ is contrived and manipulated horseshit. Do they help the government calculate CPI and Unemployment numbers as well?
“Lender Processing Services (NYSE: LPS) delivers comprehensive technology solutions and services, as well as powerful data and analytics, to the nation’s top mortgage lenders, servicers and investors. As a proven and trusted partner with deep client relationships, LPS offers the only end-to-end suite of solutions that provides major U.S. banks and many federal government agencies the technology and data needed to support mortgage lending and servicing operations, meet unique regulatory and compliance requirements and mitigate risk.”
Is this David Lereah and Angelo Mozillo’s company?
LPS is a corrupt mouthpiece for NAR/MBA/NAHB who we all know cannot be trusted to tell the truth. Furthermore, LPS’s CEO is a convicted felon.
The fact that our resident housing pimp “rental watch” quotes these corrupt organizations simply suggests “rental watch” is even more corrupt.
“George Zimmer For President”
You’re gonna like the way you look?
He guarantees it!
Fat, lazy Americans, refuse to live in factory dormitories. This is why we can’t bring manufacturing back to the US.
Apple employs 43,000 people in the United States and 20,000 overseas, a small fraction of the over 400,000 American workers at General Motors in the 1950s, or the hundreds of thousands at General Electric in the 1980s. Many more people work for Apple’s contractors: an additional 700,000 people engineer, build and assemble iPads, iPhones and Apple’s other products. But almost none of them work in the United States. Instead, they work for foreign companies in Asia, Europe and elsewhere, at factories that almost all electronics designers rely upon to build their wares.
Apple executives say that going overseas, at this point, is their only option. One former executive described how the company relied upon a Chinese factory to revamp iPhone manufacturing just weeks before the device was due on shelves. Apple had redesigned the iPhone’s screen at the last minute, forcing an assembly line overhaul. New screens began arriving at the plant near midnight.
A foreman immediately roused 8,000 workers inside the company’s dormitories, according to the executive. Each employee was given a biscuit and a cup of tea, guided to a workstation and within half an hour started a 12-hour shift fitting glass screens into beveled frames. Within 96 hours, the plant was producing over 10,000 iPhones a day.
“The speed and flexibility is breathtaking,” the executive said. “There’s no American plant that can match that.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/22/business/apple-america-and-a-squeezed-middle-class.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0
Slavery is illegal in the United States. Why should a US company be allowed to profit by selling slave-made goods to US citizens?
Slavery is illegal in the United States.
Outlawing slavery was a gross violation of property rights.
Why is this a slavery? They can walk out of the jobs if they please.
No they can’t. There is no free labor market in China, as all corporations and land are owned by the state. Instead of having a minimum, China has a maximum wage for a given job. If they walk off the job, they can’t just find a better one.
You better learn something before you open your mouth.
Hi sad panda. It’s me, your uncle. Do you remember what I taught you about being polite? I think you should rethink and rephrase your retort.
PS
Just because I’m rude, doesn’t mean you can be rude too. I’m the uncle, and YOU are the panda.
“The speed and flexibility is breathtaking,” the executive said. “There’s no American plant that can match that.”
It’s true. But we can do anything for the right price. The problem is that they want it for free.
They wouldn’t have needed it in the first place if they had settled the design a few weeks before needing to start production.
Yeah, I know. But in tech this happens a lot. To the point that it makes more sense to get good at it than to continue to complain that it shouldn’t have to be this way.
OT question for the HBB brain trust:
George Zimmerman has told his version of what happened the night Trayvon Martin was shot.
If you suspect his story could be false, what specific part of his story do you challenge?
For me personally, its the part where he claims Martin jumped him on the way back to his car.
Why do I find this suspicious?
Because it seems like too much work, even for a “thug” to go through because it lacked a clear benefit for Martin. I really wonder if Zimmerman took a “short cut” which cut off Martin and forced the confrontation?
Its difficult for me to imagine successfully evading a person (who could be a thug) who is following you, in order to jump them when its clear they gave up and are heading back to their car?
Why not just go home?
If Im fearful enough of you to hide from you, how can I be brave enough to jump out and fight you?
If Im not afraid to fight you, why don’t I just turn around when you are following me and ask you “what do you want?”
Thats easier than hiding?
To me, this is the weakest part of Zimmerman’s description of the event; the idea that Martin “got away”, then decided to come back and attack Zimmerman.
You just don’t do that in your own neighborhood. Why? Cause thats where you live.
You gonna wear a disguise everyday after that?
WTF?
A couple of possibilities:
• Zimmerman came back around near to Martin’s hiding place. Martin might have thought he was going to be seen once Zimmerman got back to his vehicle, thought a good offense was the best defense and attacked.
• Martin’s fear might have turned to anger after seeing that Zimmerman didn’t seem like a dangerous opponent.
This is a tragic case. Martin was minding his own business. Zimmerman was trying to secure his neighborhood in the face of rising crime. Sometimes a chain of events in an accident start well before the incident. At some point it becomes checkmate - no other outcome possible.
If Zimmerman had gone home, Trayvon would be alive.
No resistor…If Trayvon wasn’t a THUG he would never have been suspended from school and would have been safe at home with his mom in Miami……..there is no proof he was that cute kid that night.
How may times was Trayvon arrested? Like ol Zim?
My sense is that he deliberately provoked Martin. After that, I have no clue what happened. Seems like two hotheads got into it, but that’s only what it seems like to me.
I lived in Sanford for two nightmarish months at the height/turn of the bubble, one of the biggest mistakes of my life. Scummy place with scummy people who think they’re all that. It’s the only place where I’ve ever been panhandled on my front porch, not to mention I had a ringside seat to two guys engaging in fisticuffs right in the middle of a neighborhood intersection, it was like they came out of nowhere. I made the mistake of forgetting to lock my car one night and it was rifled through, although there wasn’t anything to take. And that’s not even the half of it. The “business people” there, except for this one mechanic who took mercy on me, are positively feral. Especially the realtor from whom we rented a real POS apartment.
It looks all charming on the surface, kind of like a gift-wrapped turd. Sanford was cruising for a bruising and it got it, and I have to say, it couldn’t have happened to a nicer town.
Just 5 weeks later…..
Updated: 3:39 p.m. Wednesday, April 4, 2012 |
Police: Pregnant woman, men hurt in drive-by shooting; 2nd shooting in 1 week
http://www.wftv.com/news/news/local/police-2-men-pregnant-woman-hit-during-sanford-sho/nMJj3/
a gunman in a silver car fired more than 30 shots from an automatic weapon,
Trayvon Martin took place on the night of February 26, 2012,
“…It looks all charming on the surface, kind of like a gift-wrapped turd…”
Well said, young man- well said. I’m in Orlando. I have no dog in this fight, but I have lived in ‘lively’ cities for many years and legally carried a sidearm for almost 2 decades. It is too bad when anyone has to die for a worthwhile cause, much less a stupid reason. At this point, I think there was plenty of stupid to go around, but I think the evidence so far supports several things.
1. Zimmerman did not ‘execute’ Martin as the defense may claim. If he had intentionally stalked and killed Martin, it would have been much cleaner.
2. Zimmerman did not break his own nose or bash in the back of his own head. He was involved in hand-to-hand with a young man over 6′ tall who at one point was obviously beating his ass.
3. Zimmerman did not need to follow Martin. He could and should have stayed in his car as an observer while on the phone with the PD and let the uniforms handle it. That was not smart.
4. Martin was no choirboy. He was a wannabe thug, problem-child who had discipline issues. That is no excuse for anyone to be murdered, but it does speak to his temperment and probable actions that night.
5. Martin was obviously not compliant or helpful that night and did not have the presence of mind to act as a ‘guest’ or ‘good citizen’ in that strange neighborhood where he was a visitor. That could escalate things and reinforce Zimmerman’s perception that Martin did not belong and was up to no good.
I think that they were both idiots and made dumb decisions that reinforced and compounded one another, rapidly escalating the confrontation from verbal into violent physical action. With Zimmerman getting his ass beat and not knowing if or when it was going to end (Unconsciousness? Will I wake up a parapalegic? Will wake up at all?) he probably went for his sidearm and all bets are off at that time.
It is a sad situation, but one that I could see becoming more common. The whole ‘urban thug’-hoodie thing is not a fashion statement, its really just stupid and dangerous. Idiots are emulating the dress and behavior of an avowed criminal element who glorifies violence, drugs and crime through song and media presentation. If you expend significant effort to dress like a criminal, act like a criminal and talk like a criminal, then don’t be surprised when people treat you like a criminal. Often, when you play stupid games, you win shitty prizes. To be more specific, when its 88 degrees in Florida and everyone is sweating in just shorts and tee shirts, but someone wearing a black, long-sleeved, hooded sweatshirt concealing their face starts toward you across a parking lot with their hands concealed, then you had better have a plan. Is that profiling? Someone dressed abnormally for the environment, with their face concealed, like a violent thug from a movie? Try walking into a bank dressed like that and wander around in the lobby for a minute. Let me know how that works out for you.
Knock knock.
Who’s there?
A defense attorney with a very weak case to present.
Interrupting cow
Martin was a gangsta who dealed in guns and drugs. Your analysis of “what I would have done” is irrelevant. You are not him.
How many times was he arrested for assault like ol Zim?
Or arrested at all?
“On a recording of the call, Zimmerman could be heard at one point telling the dispatcher that Martin had taken off.“Shit, he’s running,” Zimmerman said. At almost the same moment, the audio captured him taking off his seat belt, opening the door to his vehicle and getting out to follow the teen.”
If this and only this is true, Mr. Zimmerman was not standing his ground that night, he was hunting. I don’t care if the kid was suspended from school, I don’t care if he was a thug, I don’t care if he had sold drugs and guns. That night he went to the store and was going back where he was staying as an invited guest.
Nick R. Martin July 19, 2012, 1:12 PM
George Zimmerman’s interview on Wednesday night with FOX News host Sean Hannity made it clear for the cable viewing nation that his story continues to shift in small but important ways.
From inside his vehicle that night, Zimmerman, 28, called the police and asked them to come out and investigate what Martin was up to. He had no idea that Martin was staying in the neighborhood with his father and his father’s girlfriend and was walking back from the store.
On a recording of the call, Zimmerman could be heard at one point telling the dispatcher that Martin had taken off. “Shit, he’s running,” Zimmerman said. At almost the same moment, the audio captured him taking off his seat belt, opening the door to his vehicle and getting out to follow the teen.
Authorities have said Martin ran because he was afraid of Zimmerman and that the neighborhood watchman chased him down, confronted him and eventually shot and killed him.
But on Wednesday night’s broadcast, Zimmerman changed his story from what he told the dispatcher that night. He also said there was no way Martin was afraid of him. Here’s part of the transcript prepared by FOX News:
HANNITY: Why do you think that he was running then?
ZIMMERMAN: Maybe I said running, but he was more —
HANNITY: You said he’s running.
ZIMMERMAN: Yes. He was like skipping, going away quickly. But he wasn’t running out of fear.
HANNITY: You could tell the difference?
ZIMMERMAN: He wasn’t running.
HANNITY: So he wasn’t actually running?
ZIMMERMAN: No, sir.
HANNITY: OK. Because that’s what you said to the dispatcher, that you thought he was running.
Zimmerman went on to say he was “going in the same direction” as the teen to watch where he was headed but was not “actually pursuing him.”
http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/07/george_zimmerman_changes_story_fox.php - 191k -
If this and only this is true, Mr. Zimmerman was not standing his ground that night, he was hunting. I don’t care if the kid was suspended from school, I don’t care if he was a thug, I don’t care if he had sold drugs and guns. That night he went to the store and was going back where he was staying as an invited guest.
When people start to realize that their own teenage son- white or black- might be pursued/’going in the same direction’ of a Zimmerman.
Looks to me like a child was stalked by an adult.
http://bcclist.files.wordpress.com/2012/05/trayvon-martin-george-zimmerman-map-911-call-timing-v-2.jpg
In other words, Trayvon saw that he was being noticed, so he decided to take off. But that’s not all he did. After taking off and losing Zimmerman, he then turned around and ambushed Zimmerman. Maybe because he felt like a puss? Gangstas don’t run from no chubby neighborhood watchmen, yo.
That is what the 911 call indicates. After following Martin for a while, Zimmerman said “I lost him”. The fight occurred after that.
And BTW, just because Trayvon was in the nabe staying with his dad, doesn’t mean he wasn’t involved in any break-ins. Just because he bought some skiddles, doesn’t mean he wasn’t checking out the various houses in the neighborhoods, trying to see which ones might be good targets.
There is, in fact, no PROOF of who started the physical assault. Anyone can blame Zimmerman for not going home and minding his own business (even though he was the watchman). Anyone can blame Trayvon for being a generalized thug. What one needs to convict on a murder charge is proof. That isn’t there.
There’s also no proof he was involved in break-ins nor that he “circled back around” (yet).
But there IS proof that ol Zim was previously arrested TWICE for assault.
And that Trayvon was NEVER arrested.
If it quacks like duck…
Spook? Anyone? Is there some place I can watch a replay of the day’s testimony during fair access hours so I don’t exceed the cap on my cruddy ISP’s download limit?
Thanks.
Up, up and away…
Treasuries Decline as U.S. Data Support Case for Fed Tapering
By Cordell Eddings & Jeff Marshall - Jun 25, 2013 2:18 PM PT
Treasuries fell, pushing 10-year yields toward the highest since 2011, as data showing gains in U.S. durable-goods orders, home prices and consumer confidence boosted the case for the Federal Reserve to slow bond purchases.
Government securities stayed lower after the U.S. sold $35 billion of two-year debt to below-average demand. Ten-year yields rose for a seventh day, the longest since March 2012. Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke said last week policy makers may reduce bond buying under their quantitative-easing stimulus strategy this year and end it in mid-2014 if economic growth is in line with their projections.
“You’re starting to see some data today that represents the view the Fed has in their forecasts,” said Jason Rogan, director of U.S. government trading at Guggenheim Partners LLC, a New York-based brokerage for institutional investors. “If you continue to see strong economic data like today, the assumption is that the Fed will be closer to tapering.”
The U.S. 10-year yield climbed seven basis points, or 0.07 percentage point, to 2.61 percent at 5 p.m. New York time after falling six basis points earlier to 2.48 percent. It touched 2.66 percent yesterday, the highest since August 2011. The price of the 1.75 percent security due in May 2023 slid 19/32, or $5.94 per $1,000 face amount, to 92 18/32.
Current two-year note yields increased two basis points to 0.41 percent. They reached 0.43 percent yesterday, the highest since July 2011. Thirty-year bond yields rose eight basis points to 3.62 percent.
Treasury trading volume at ICAP Plc, the largest inter-dealer broker of U.S. government debt, declined 12 percent to $478 billion. The 2013 average is $320 billion.
…
What’s another 2.5% down in gold, given the magnitude of losses already sustained?
It sounds like there may never have been a better time to buy the dip, going back at least to the 1920s! Try not to let denial about your gold losses cloud your vision about where prices go from here.
Asian Stocks Rise as Gold Slumps With Metals; Won Gains
By Richard Frost & Glenys Sim - Jun 25, 2013 10:21 PM PT
Gold led declines by commodities and the dollar strengthened for a sixth day as better-than expected U.S. economic data supported the case for the Federal Reserve to pare monetary stimulus. Asian stocks advanced, while those in Shanghai slipped.
Cash bullion dropped 2.1 percent to $1,251.45 an ounce at 2:07 p.m. in Tokyo, heading for its worst quarterly performance since at least 1920 with a 22 percent plunge. Silver sank to an almost four-year low and copper slid more than 1 percent. The MSCI Asia Pacific Index (SPGSCI) climbed 0.8 percent, while the Shanghai Composite (SHCOMP) Index slid 1.3 percent to its lowest level since January 2009. Standard & Poor’s 500 Index (SPX) futures dropped 0.4 percent. The Dollar Index reached a three-week high.
…
Got bovine brains?
June 25, 2013, 8:30 a.m. EDT
Worst is yet to come
Commentary: There is still too much bullishness
By Mark Hulbert, MarketWatch
CHAPEL HILL, N.C. (MarketWatch) — Bad news: The bottom of the decline that began one month ago has not yet been seen.
That, at least, is the conclusion that emerges from a contrarian analysis of stock market sentiment. Simply put: Bullishness remains too prevalent.
…