Bits Bucket for February 21, 2014
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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Calabasas, CA Housing Prices Slide 17%YoY; Inventory up 65%
http://www.movoto.com/calabasas-ca/market-trends/
Mostly attributable to Bieber terrorizing the neighborhood with all the eggings and whatnot.
Smarten up Liberace.
LOL
Thousand Oaks, CA Housing Prices Dive 34% Year over Year
http://www.movoto.com/thousand-oaks-ca/market-trends/
Can Movoto aggregate up to So Cal? Thousand Oaks Median price per square foot essentially flat. These headlines are artifacts of small sample size and the natural variation in low inventory.
You realtors are in denial.
Why do you think that is?
Mr. Housing Analyst,
I have been a member of this blog since 2004. I am a housing bear. Your energetic views are appreciated but I’m kindly asking you to relax your assumptions. You are acting as an extremist.
Moreover, my point is entirely valid. You cannot point to a locale and say an inventory of 20 switching to 80 represents a significant change in the marketplace without more context. And all you have to do to see my point about the price per square foot is click the radio button on movoto. It’s clear as a bell. In most of the cases you present, the dramatic price “cratering” is greatly ameliorated when adjusting, crudely, for house mix.
Sincerely,
CCC
To paraphrase the blog owner;
“I was boiling a pot of pasta and I took a sample to see if it were cooked. Then I too another. It was cook”.
Meanwhile…. How far do you want to go with this Realtor?
Punditry on either side serves doesn’t serve the greater good. I’m merely seeking truth.
And we’re here to help you along with that Realtor.
People are still buying around here but I think its slowed down ?
Ventura County CA
Not really. Not at all. Housing demand in Ventura county is down 8% YoY and it’s been falling there for 4 years straight.
See for yourself.
http://www.zillow.com/local-info/CA-Ventura-County-home-value/r_2061/#metric=mt%3D30%26dt%3D1%26tp%3D5%26rt%3D6%26r%3D2061%26el%3D0
From 20 to 80 is actually pretty big, though.
20 to 80 being “big” depends on the variation in the time trend. We should use good principles of data analysis.
I just clicked on the actual link. Inventory is down, not up, in Thousand Oaks. I can see now that you were trying to make the point that it’s hard to say whether prices are up or down with only 16 sales for the month.
Given the fact that grossly inflated asking prices in Thousand Oaks are over 500% higher than reproduction costs (lot, labor, materials and profit), does it surprise you that demand has collapsed?
HA, ha, ha, you are funny. If houses are selling for 500% over reproduction cost, why aren’t builders putting millions of new homes on the market and selling them at a 400% profit? You exaggerate to levels of absurdity and stupidity. Burdbrain thinking. You detract from the quality of this blog with your BS. HA!
It’s quite simple JingleFraud…… there is no demand at that price either.
How about you RenTrollHogwash? Regale us with your “construction” is experience.
General contractor who has built houses.
Now you’re a “general contractor” building houses?
You’re tales get taller by the day.
Paso Robles, CA Housing Prices Crater 34%YoY; Inventory Up a Whopping 1308%
http://www.movoto.com/paso-robles-ca/market-trends/
What seems a greater risk than deflation is the risk that central bankers will take economically damaging measures to avoid it.
China Hard Landing War-Gamed for World Economy
By Simon Kennedy Feb 20, 2014 6:01 PM CT 8 Comments Email Chris Rupkey on Minutes of January FOMC Meeting
The U.S. economy may prove more prone to deflation than the Federal Reserve acknowledges and that may present a reason to keep monetary policy loose, according to a model created by Wells Fargo Securities LLC.
Deflationary pressures have been “relatively high” since January 2010 and now have a 66 percent chance of prevailing in the U.S., according to Charlotte, North Carolina-based economists John Silvia, Azhar Iqbal and Blaire Zachary. Their calculations include factors such as the personal consumption expenditures price deflator, unemployment rate and the Fed’s inflation target.
The model is “useful for policy makers, investors and consumers who can attach a probability with each more-likely scenario of future price trends: inflationary, deflationary or price stability,” the economists said in a Feb. 17 report.
They say that such a persistently higher probability can highlight a looming threat. In the 1980s, for example, the model would have pointed to the risks of higher inflation, which did mark that decade.
“The recent year’s surge in the deflationary pressure probabilities may offer a justification for the highly accommodative monetary policy,” the authors said in the report.
The Wells Fargo model is more worrying than one created by the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta, which is based on the market for Treasury inflation-protected securities. As of Feb. 14, that gauge said the probability of deflation was steady at zero.
…
Deflationary pressures have been “relatively high” since January 2010
because we have too much debt not enough income
Gee, why would a bank lobby for continuing low interest rates and quantitative easing?
I suggest the damage is already done. It is just a matter of how you want to manage it. Rip of the Band-Aid or gently remove it using a slow measured approach. Lots of quick pain or some measured discomfort over time…..
There is also the question of how to distribute the pain. For instance, plenty of pain has been heaped on retirees who till recently could rely on interest income on cash to pay for living expenses, which is very difficult with ZIRP in place.
Which hairs should spared?
Which hairs should spared?
Hopefully not these hares: http://theweek.com/article/index/256780/how-do-you-weaponize-a-rabbit
Could the hedge funds strategy be working?
Colony American Homes occupancy report:
The Company maintained its funded investment in CAH OP (otherwise known as CAH or Colony American Homes) at $550 million. As of December 31, 2013, Colony American Homes (“CAH”) owned approximately 14,900 homes in nine states and the overall portfolio was 61% occupied, up from 57% occupied as of September 30, 2013. As of February 13, 2014, CAH owned approximately 15,300 homes and the overall portfolio was 66% occupied. During the fourth quarter, CAH averaged approximately 800 renovations and 730 new leases per month while acquisitions averaged approximately 330 homes per month.
Hmm, they seem to be filling the vacancies. And they still seem to be buying more houses, though not at the same pace they were in 2013. Two HBB misconceptions answered.
Way too early to judge what worked…let’s at least wait until a substantial number of investors take the money and run before figuring out who made it through the exit door and who got trampled.
I think this will all be prepped to sell to the Chinese…15,000 green cards for those paying in cash.
you don’t want a Chinese landlord
“Two HBB misconceptions answered.”
Playing the ‘HBB consensus misconception’ card again, are we?
I think there are often many sides and multiple data points to consider. The housing always depreciates crowd is just as misguided as the housing always appreciates crowd.
Housing does depreciate, ALWAYS. Just like all man made items. The notion that it doesn’t is fantasy.
“The housing always depreciates crowd is just as misguided as the housing always appreciates crowd.”
Disagree. But I’ll let someone else fill you in on the reasons that these ‘two crowds’ are not equally in the wrong…
Jingle, you should look up the world “entropy” in the dictionary. If you can read, that is.
Downlow Joe has entered the building.
(building = RAL’s cavernous skull)
You’re not fooling anyone Liberace.
Entropy: the degradation of the matter and energy in the universe to an ultimate state of inert uniformity.
Is that like putting frogs in a blender?
C4G, are you saying housing will never be a good investment because in the end it all turns to dust?
I’m saying you’re an idiot to deny that there is depreciation. Of course there is depreciation–if you do not do any maintenance to a property whatsoever, it will depreciate. Now, the price may tick up or down, but that has nothing to do with depreciation. The actual structure itself will depreciate. Moreover, for accounting reason, if you have rentals you want to acknowledge this fact of the universe because the rules allow you to claim the depreciation to offset profits.
I’m on the record as saying you can make money in housing but that speculating is dangerous, esp. if it’s in some SPS area like Sacramento, Inland Empire, etc.
Male:
1) Can you plaease let us know when their vacancy rate drops to 5% and their returns increase to at least 9%?
2) They’re still buying? Really?
I will.
“Rents Used to Pay Blackstone Leased-Home Bonds Decline 7.6%”
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-02-19/rents-used-to-pay-leased-home-bonds-fall-7-6-morningstar-says.html
As our analysis demonstrated long ago, the corporate landlord strategy is falling.
Reasons;
-Negative Cash-flow; these “investors” paid massively inflated prices
-Depreciation; Losses to depreciation are eating these “investors” alive
-Inventory; These “investors” have to compete with 25 million excess empty houses
-Vacancy rates; These “investors” are running 50%+ vacancy rates; There is no demand at the price they need to charge just to break even
New Obama initiative tramples First Amendment protections
By Byron York | FEBRUARY 20, 2014 AT 5:48 PM
The First Amendment says “Congress shall make no law…abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press…” But under the Obama administration, the Federal Communications Commission is planning to send government contractors into the nation’s newsrooms to determine whether journalists are producing articles, television reports, Internet content, and commentary that meets the public’s “critical information needs.” Those “needs” will be defined by the administration, and news outlets that do not comply with the government’s standards could face an uncertain future. It’s hard to imagine a project more at odds with the First Amendment.
The initiative, known around the agency as “the CIN Study” (pronounced “sin”), is a bit of a mystery even to insiders. “This has never been put to an FCC vote, it was just announced,” says Ajit Pai, one of the FCC’s five commissioners (and one of its two Republicans). “I’ve never had any input into the process,” adds Pai, who brought the story to the public’s
Advocates promote the project with Obama-esque rhetoric. “This study begins the charting of a course to a more effective delivery of necessary information to all citizens,” said FCC commissioner Mignon Clyburn in 2012. Clyburn, daughter of powerful House Democratic Rep. James Clyburn, was appointed to the FCC by President Obama and served as acting chair for part of last year. The FCC, Clyburn said, “must emphatically insist that we leave no American behind when it comes to meeting the needs of those in varied and vibrant communities of our nation — be they native born, immigrant, disabled, non-English speaking, low-income, or other.” (The FCC decided to test the program with a trial run in Ms. Clyburn’s home state, South Carolina.)
The FCC commissioned the University of Southern California Annenberg School for Communication & Journalism and the University of Wisconsin-Madison Center for Communication and Democracy to do a study defining what information is “critical” for citizens to have. The scholars decided that “critical information” is information that people need to “live safe and healthy lives” and to “have full access to educational, employment, and business opportunities,” among other things.
The study identified eight “critical needs”: information about emergencies and risks; health and welfare; education; transportation; economic opportunities; the environment; civic information; and political information.
The FCC awarded a contract for the study to a Maryland-based company called Social Solutions International. In April 2013, Social Solutions presented a proposal outlining a process by which contractors hired by the FCC would interview news editors, reporters, executives and other journalists.
“The purpose of these interviews is to ascertain the process by which stories are selected,” the Social Solutions report said, adding that news organizations would be evaluated for “station priorities (for content, production quality, and populations served), perceived station bias, perceived percent of news dedicated to each of the eight CINs, and perceived responsiveness to underserved populations.”
There are a lot of scary words for journalists in that paragraph. And not just for broadcasters; the FCC also proposes to regulate newspapers, which it has no authority to do. (Its mission statement says the FCC “regulates interstate and international communications by radio, television, wire, satellite and cable…”)
Questioning about the CIN Study began last December, when the four top Republicans on the House Energy and Commerce Committee asked the FCC to justify the project. “The Commission has no business probing the news media’s editorial judgment and expertise,” the GOP lawmakers wrote, “nor does it have any business in prescribing a set diet of ‘critical information.’”
If the FCC goes forward, it’s not clear what will happen to news organizations that fall short of the new government standards. Perhaps they will be disciplined. Or perhaps the very threat of investigating their methods will nudge them into compliance with the administration’s journalistic agenda. What is sure is that it will be a gross violation of constitutional rights.
http://washingtonexaminer.com/new-obama-initiative-tramples-first-amendment-protections/article/2544363 - 105k -
Hope and Change
“An amendment sponsored by Sen. Dianne Feinstein says that there would be no legal protection for “any person or entity whose principal function … is to publish source documents that have been disclosed to such person or entity without authorization.”
http://touch.latimes.com/#story/la-ol-dianne-feinstein-congress-press-shield-law-20130913/
Dianne Feinstein these days is like a terrifying creature from a dystopian futuristic novel. A mix of Orwell and Huxley characters.
WARNING: pdf
http://www.judiciary.senate.gov/legislation/mediashield/Feinstein/ALB13767.pdf
“On page 1, beginning on line 6, strike ‘‘PERSONS’’
2 and insert ‘‘JOURNALISTS’’”
and so forth.
If this even gets a floor vote, we (U.S.) are done here.
Why?
She basically wants to gut whistleblower protections, which are already incredibly weak. She wants an aggressive State to control all of its Information complete opaqueness. You can’t see what a bad road that will lead us down? Really, oxy?
Why? Because Feinie knows that she is in a position to get outed.
Let me spell it out for anyone who doesn’t understand what this represents: It means that they(the government) gets to hide all of it’s corruption and outright criminal activity, and anyone who attempts to expose it will be charged and (likely) convicted as a criminal.
For anyone who still thinks along the lines of “rah rah my party is teh awesomeness and your party is evil” note that both parties are pretty much drooling over this.
Remember, “we the people” OWN our government. It’s our property, and it’s LONG overdue for us to fire our bad employees. The catch: we have to ALL start voting for independent/third party candidates to do it.
This song is dedicated to banker butt licking Dianne Feinstein. The dragon lady with no &&^%$$# heart!- Jello Biafra
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_jy04ACD030
She basically wants to gut whistleblower protections, which are already incredibly weak. She wants an aggressive State to control all of its Information complete opaqueness. You can’t see what a bad road that will lead us down? Really, oxy?”
She just wants to make sure you can’t listen to Rush limbaugh and other bad people
you will still be able to listen to Mortgage Broker ads and other crap though.
But she mad sure that she and her husband made billions from their Chinese friends didn’t she? What an absolute scam this is.
“Or perhaps the very threat of investigating their methods will nudge them into compliance with the administration’s journalistic agenda.”
The MSM did it to themselves. Since the Boosh admin, they’ve demonstrated that they’re all to eager to please and tweet the party line. Maybe they figured if they went along with fed agendas, they’d be left alone. They figured wrong, dead wrong.
LOL, you can always tell what fairy tales the feds want to put out there, because it’s like the main MSM outlets pick it up and put it in the lineup. Russia in the doghouse? Well, CBS, NBC, ABC, FOX and whoever else will be carrying various stories of Russian “carnage” and double dealings and evil acts “against their own people”, etc. Just like Egypt, Syria, Libya, Iraq, etc.
I got to thinking about this, because it struck me that in times past, if there was an economic downturn, the first thing you’d see was staff getting cut at media outlets, especially higher paid, higher profile folks, on air, front page, etc. Because advertisers cut budgets and that sort of thing.
What has struck me is how, since 9/11, not only have there not been any cuts to speak of, and the same smarmy teleprompter readers are still spittin’ and grinnin’ at their audiences, but the media seems to have proliferated. This makes NO sense to me. Especially since advertising budgets have been fragmented by the internet.
My theory is that a lot of higher profile, especially TV, media is actually federally subsidized more than we know. I’m not just talking about PBS here, I understand that. But I think federal money has kicked in to make up the shortfall of advertising budget cutbacks. Hence, the talking heads keep spittin’ and grinnin’, toeing the party line.
Meh. Russia only had one Pravda, much more efficient. Who needs all these chirping idiots anyway? I guess it makes it look like there is variety and choice, when there is none.
Our local newspaper laid off tons of people and is struggling. They put up a pay wall in front of their content, and aren’t sure how to monetize things.
Except I’m not referring to local newspapers here. As far as the MSM and even the feds are concerned, no big loss if they go under.
I’m referring to TV and radio networks that have a national reach, along with their affiliates. Conan O’Brien did a great bit on affiliates all over the country carrying the same copy in a news broadcast, even on a very innocuous story.
http://teamcoco.com/video/newscasters-agree-be-happy
As to newspapers, I would bet that the more nationally read, heavy hitters like NYT, LAT, etc. also receive funds provided they toe the line.
Something really stinks about all of this. When you have an economic downturn where advertising budgets get cut, combined with fragmentation by the internet, and yet all these more high profile, major outlets are just burgeoning with talking heads and “news stories”, sum ting wong.
This could be a serious assault on the 1st amendment..
GOOGLE ACCUSES WND OF ‘HATE SPEECH’
http://www.wnd.com/2014/02/google-accuses-wnd-of-hate-speech/#WK2LzM6QbUHJlROR.99
The 1st amendment concerns government limiting speech. Last time I checked, GOOG was no a government entity.
GOOG might be silly for doing this, but it’s not a 1st amm. issue in any way, shape, or form.
Last time I checked, GOOG was no a government entity.
Considering its NSA connections, I am not entirely convinced Google might not be acting as a government agent. It is an interesting question, if a private entity attacks someone because a government entity wants to attack a news source behind the cover of a private entity has a first amendment violation occurred? It is a good bar exam or law school exam question and I would answer it in the affirmative but would examine all the reasons why it is not an attack.
If GOOG is acting with NSA as part of a voluntary agreement, it still isn’t a 1st amm. issue.
The NSA and the government’s activities are the problem. If they are coercing GOOG that is entirely different than what appears to be going on here. What seems far more likely is that GOOG wants to “clean up” its search results to curry favor with liberal interests. Which is disgusting for very different reasons.
If GOOG is acting with NSA as part of a voluntary agreement, it still isn’t a 1st amm. issue.
I have to disagree. The police cannot evade 4th amendment protections by getting a private citizen to conduct a search. If someone is acting as an agent for the federal government it does raise constitutional issues.
This from Lawyers.com discusses the fourth amendment analysis, I am unaware of cases that discuss this issue in the first amendment context but if the government and a private party conspire to impede another party’s first amendment rights it is a problem, whether the government through Google crossed the line here appears to be more a question of fact than of law since it is possible for government to violate the constitution using a private party:
Private Person Working for the Government
Despite the general rule that the Fourth Amendment doesn’t apply to private parties, the Fourth Amendment does apply to a “private” search or seizure if the person making it is an “instrument or agent” of the state. In such a case, the person’s actions are “state actions” under the Fourth Amendment. For example, a private citizen who agrees to wear a “wire” and record conversations with a criminal suspect is a state actor. So, the recording of the conversations and any search that’s made of the suspect’s person or property based upon evidence obtained from those recordings have to satisfy the Fourth Amendment’s protection against unreasonable searches and seizures.
Whether a private party is in fact an agent or instrument of the state or government depends on government’s participation in the private party’s activities. The courts use specific tests for determining when a search is truly private or when it’s a government action is disguise. However, the facts and circumstances of the specific case are critical to the determination of whether a search was private or not.
Some of the biggest factors the courts look at when determining whether a search is private or constitutes state action include:
•Government knowledge and acquiescence in the search, that is, agents are aware of the proposed search or seizure beforehand and allow it to happen
•The motive of the person conducting the search. For example, a bounty hunter who seizes a wanted suspect and searches his belongings isn’t a state actor because the bounty hunter’s actions were for his own gain and benefit rather than an effort to assist law enforcement
•When the government got involved in the case. In other words, if the government is in the middle of an investigation when it contacts or enlists the aid of a private person, a search or seizure by that person will likely be found to be state action
•The extent of government’s participation in the search, such as when law enforcement agents ask someone to conduct a search or give him specific instructions on how to make the search
It’s probably not a first-amendment violation. However, if we ever get full transparency into the questionable use of government time/money/influence, then it could be the end of certain political careers. Maybe even jail time for a lot of people, and this includes perhaps the participating family members of certain politicians. That’s why Feinie is so worried about people who disclose improperly classified documents that reveal government misdeeds.
It’s probably not a first-amendment violation.
Saying something is probably not a first-amendment violation is different than saying you cannot have a first amendment violation since the actor is a private party. Air America on paper was a private corporation. Obviously it was nothing but a CIA front. Google is not in that category. However, the extent of its connections to the U.S. government is not entirely known. How much money they may have received through a black box program to help create its data collection system is not really known. Whether they may have promised to share data with the federal government to obtain contracts etc. is not really known. It does not surprise me that they are thinking of creating war robots, they seem to have more “spook” connections than most private companies.
BTW, while this article is hopeful about NASA turning a corner, I cannot reconcile why NASA’s ground based data is so different from satellite data, it is like they are measuring two different earths. Up to about six months ago they always were very close albeit with a warming bias by NASA:
http://www.principia-scientific.org/breaking-nasa-u-turn-admits-global-warming-bias-on-sun-s-key-role.html
Air America? Are you sure?
The original one not the left wing radio network.
From Wikipedia:
In August 1950, the CIA secretly purchased the assets of Civil Air Transport (CAT), an airline that had been started in China in 1946 by Gen. Claire Lee Chennault (of Flying Tigers fame) and Whiting Willauer.[1]
In 1951, the parent company of Air America’s forerunner, Civil Air Transport (CAT), was reorganized. The owner, Chennault, was approached by the CIA, who bought out the company through a holding company, the American Airdale Corporation. Under this agreement, CAT was allowed to keep its initials and the company was reorganized as Civil Air Transport, Inc.
On October 7, 1957, American Airdale was reorganized to add another layer of obfuscation to its ownership. The new Pacific Corporation became a holding company for Air Asia Company (Air Asia (Taiwan)), Ltd; Air America, Inc; Civil Air Transport, Inc; Southern Air Transport; Intermountain Aviation; Bird and Sons (known as BirdAir); and Robinson Brothers. CAT attempted to change its name to Air America at the same time, but objections from Air France and American Airlines delayed the name change for two years.
Air America’s slogan was “Anything, Anywhere, Anytime, Professionally”. Air America aircraft, including the Curtiss C-46 Commando, de Havilland Canada DHC-4 Caribou and Fairchild C-123 Provider, flew many types of cargo to countries such as the Republic of Vietnam, the Kingdom of Laos, and Cambodia. It operated from bases in those countries and also from bases in Thailand and as far afield as Taiwan and Japan. It also on occasion flew top-secret missions into Burma and the People’s Republic of China.
WND (World Net Daily) and Infowars often discuss the same topics, but they are not the same. WND is a fascist-Zionist slobbering Israel-loving website that caters to the mouth-breathing knuckle-dragging “Christians” who believe that the Jews must be gathered in Israel for the second coming and the Rapture to occur. So yes, WND is guilty of hate speech.
Funny goon I never got that impression.. so what would you say about this website?
http://www.barenakedislam.com/
But hate speech is not a crime, so WND can’t be “guilty” of it.
For instance:
But hate speech is not a crime, so WND can’t be “guilty” of it.
But it is a good example on why I object to any attempt to criminalize “hate speech”. It can become anything the government does not like. WND does have a fundamentalist Christian view on matters. However, that should not be crime. I do not understand how people can believe the world is less than 6000 years old but I cannot understand how people can believe that the AGW computer models are correct since they have been so in accurate for decades. In both cases I believe that “religion’ trumps science but neither view is hate speech.
Dan joe goon ….my take it’s about 3 words put together black, mob & violence and google’s attempt it eliminate it from search results.
Then trying to cover their azz by wrapping around google’s ad sense..saying their clients dont want to be associated with “hate speech”
“I hate climbers.”
Nepal is always as possibility:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/nepal/10653549/Nepal-tightens-controls-of-climbers-after-Everest-brawl.html
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/belgium/10643861/Shameless-Belgian-PM-appears-topless-on-television.html
I do hope this does not catch on. Can you imagine if Hillary is elected president and engages in such behavior? I will suffer PTSD.
hope and change
‘the congressional budget office estimates that 40 percent of people ages 18 to 34 need to sign up for health insurance to defray the costs of coverage for older, sicker people, but so far those figures in colorado and nationally are half that number.
about 30 percent of colorado exchange users are 55 to 64 years old — the oldest group of people before medicare kicks in. census figures show that age group is about 12 percent of the colorado population, so older people are signing up at nearly three times the size of their population.’
http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_25195975/young-avoid-coverage-colorado-posing-problem-health-care
Probably doesn’t help the stats that CO has healthier young people who generally wait to get married & start families. If it was Kentucky or Georgia, there will be more health problems and young families to cover.
Hope and Change
“President Obama defended Obamacare and called signing up for the health care program “just part of growing up.”
http://m.weeklystandard.com/blogs/obama-signing-obamacare-just-part-growing_781710.html
Loan Complaints by Homeowners Rise Once More
By JESSICA SILVER-GREENBERG and MICHAEL CORKERY
February 18, 2014, 9:16 pm
A growing number of homeowners trying to avert foreclosure are confronting problems on a new front as the mortgage industry undergoes a seismic shift.
Shoddy paperwork, erroneous fees and wrongful evictions — the same abuses that dogged the nation’s largest banks and led to a $26 billion settlement with federal authorities in 2012 — are now cropping up among the specialty firms that collect mortgage payments, according to dozens of foreclosure lawsuits and interviews with borrowers, federal and state regulators and housing lawyers.
Wanda Darden of Riverdale, Md., has been bounced among three separate servicers since January 2012. Each time, the mix-ups multiply. “I either get conflicting answers or no answer at all,” said Ms. Darden, who is 62.
The servicing companies defend their track records, saying they have had success in keeping borrowers in their homes. Ocwen pointed to its investment in customer service, while Nationstar emphasized that it assisted 108,000 homeowners with some form of modification or other repayment plan in 2013.
A Montana couple, Guy and Michelle Herman, thought they had finally won an agreement with their lender to reduce their mortgage bill and save their home after more than three years of fighting foreclosure.
A few months later, however, their mortgage modification appeared to have vanished. Their lender, Bank of America, had sold the right to collect their monthly mortgage payments to Nationstar in July.
“I feel like we got so close to the dream of keeping our house and suddenly it’s gone,” Ms. Herman said.
“If these companies can do a better job rehabilitating the borrower, that is a good development,” said Wilbur Ross Jr., a board member of Ocwen, which says it offers more subprime mortgage modifications than many peers.
But some borrowers say that dealing with the specialty servicers is even more vexing than working with the banks, especially when long-promised loan modifications don’t materialize.
The Hermans of Columbia Falls, Mont., said that despite almost daily calls to Nationstar, they still could not get an explanation of how their permanent loan modification from Bank of America, which reduced the balance on their mortgage by nearly $80,000, could disappear.
“I don’t even know how to get a human on the line,” Mr. Herman said.
But the dynamic of that business has changed, in part, because the specialty servicers are buying the rights to collect payments at discounts, along with the loan advances — the money that the servicers pay to investors to cover any delinquent payment. The sooner the servicer can make the loan current again, the sooner investors pay back the servicers’ advance in full. That kind of arbitrage could incentivize servicers to offer modifications that cause borrowers to default again, investors say.
Borrowers like Ms. Darden of Maryland, meanwhile, must contend with the changes in the market. “I just don’t know how much more of this I can take,” she said.
http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2014/02/18/loan-complaints-by-homeowners-rise-once-more/ - 54k -
“Wanda Darden of Riverdale, Md., has been bounced among three separate servicers since January 2012. Each time, the mix-ups multiply. “I either get conflicting answers or no answer at all,” said Ms. Darden, who is 62.”
Riverdale = dump. I doubt the banks even want those houses back. Even Oxide will concur in this.
Even the Riverdale Calvert historical mansion is a bit of a dump. But I’d rather fix up one of those houses than buy an overpriced condos with a prime view of the IKEA parking lot.
But I’d rather fix up one of those houses than buy an overpriced condos with a prime view of the IKEA parking lot.
But you can eat cheaply at the IKEA cafeteria and make those mortgage payments. It beats Ramen noodles since you can stay Paleo.
….and it won’t take much effort to get your new furniture home…….
Hope and Change
“President Obama’s forthcoming budget request will seek tens of billions of dollars in fresh spending for domestic priorities while abandoning a compromise proposal to tame the national debt in part by trimming Social Security benefits.
With the 2015 budget request, Obama will call for an end to the era of austerity that has dogged much of his presidency and to his efforts to find common ground with Republicans. Instead, the president will focus on pumping new cash into job training, early-childhood education and other programs aimed at bolstering the middle class, providing Democrats with a policy blueprint heading into the midterm elections.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/with-2015-budget-request-obama-will-call-for-an-end-to-era-of-austerity/2014/02/20/332808c2-9a6e-11e3-b931-0204122c514b_story.html
Obama’s America, man.
Obama will call for an end to the “era of austerity” ???
BWAAAAAAAAHHAAAAA!
Adding as much to the debt as all the other presidents combined is Obama’s “era of austerity”, he needs to stop taking economic lessons from Mugabe.
A great story from reddit about a neckbeard who blew his entire inheritance on Bitcoin.
————-
http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/1r88vl/need_advice_on_inheritance_arbitrage_family_etc/
(excerpt)
“As of today, over the past 7 months I have lost a total of $410,000. The inheritance was supposed to be split between my younger sister and I, giving us each $375,00 + half of the house (not worth much, rural area, etc).
However, I don’t have a legal obligation to provide her with half of the money, that was a verbal contract between my father and I, the in-writing legal stuff allocates it all to me. I made the mistake of telling her that I invested the money in Bitcoin; she has read the news etc on it, so she is under the assumption that there is a lot more money than there actually is. Regardless, I have already paid her first year of college tuition in cash anyway, this was around $30,000. I also bought her a used car to take to college ($5,000). We later found out they don’t want freshman to have cars?? So we might sell it and I can give her that money. Ultimately, in addition to other living expenses, bills, car, etc I have around $280,000 left which is currently all liquid.
Now, if you took the time to read all of that, thank you, sorry it was so long. What I am looking for is advice on how to trade. How can I guarantee that I earn high returns? What are good resources on how to trade Bitcoin? Are there any good books to read on trading? General information I may be missing?
I know I can earn this money back, I just need to figure out how. If there is an experienced trader out there that is in need for funding I am willing to work out a deal where we can work together on this. I need to see a proven track record of success though.”
“I know I can earn this money back, I just need to figure out how.”
I love this blog.
Flipping houses with Rich Dad Poor Dad?
The concept of an un-copyable, unique digital token is very interesting.
However, watching Bitcoin (and a myriad other cryptocurrencies) go through real-world burn-in tests leads me to believe that it will wind up only in less sensitive applications.
It’s a useful concept but too hackable, it seems to me, to be used as a currency.
So you’re NOT bullish on the WinkDex?
———
http://valleywag.gawker.com/the-winklevii-launched-a-bitcoin-index-to-make-things-m-1526290836
According to the press release:
(Excerpt)
Winkdex will also be used to price the value of the assets held by the Winklevoss Bitcoin Trust which, once approved, will be the first exchange-traded fund for bitcoins reviewed by the Securities and Exchange Commission. Winkdex was also disclosed in today’s amended registration statement that was filed with the SEC.
The SEC filing was sponsored by their company Math-Based Asset Services and they’re being represented by Katten Muchin Rosenman, a law firm that Dealbook says has “helped shepherd some of the most popular E.T.F.’s through the regulatory process.”
The Winklevii understand people desiring logical constructs they can trade for gain. Combination barter/gambling. Hard for people to resist. Very similar to an online game.
IF they can tie constructs in a video game to real currency, that would be one highly played game. It would have to be quite secure though. The Bitcoin and other crypto currency tokens… They’re stealable/breakable. Will they ever not be? I dunno. It’s an arms race between the black hats and the white hats.
I feel sorry for that idiot’s sister. He seems mad that his dad asked him to give her half of the inheritance. He also seems like he’s going to pull an “I don’t have to give you yours”. She will sue him and win, but he will have gambled it all away by then. sux.
She will sue him and win, but he will have gambled it all away by then. sux.
If she breeds she will pass on many of his genes sux even more.
And if he breeds, then he will pass on more of his genes. Remember, sperms are worse than eggs.
My sperm can still swim the English channel.
However, I don’t have a legal obligation to provide her with half of the money, that was a verbal contract between my father and I, the in-writing legal stuff allocates it all to me.’
Oh not good
that was a verbal contract between my father
Nice of the idiot to provide a party admission to prove the existence of that verbal contract.
Wells Fargo is once again setting sail on subprime mortgage waters, despite how choppy they were several years ago. The bank will consider mortgage applicants with credit scores as low as 600, announced Franklin Codel, a Wells Fargo mortgage executive. Previously, the minimum was 640, and this change applies to purchase mortgages to be guaranteed by the Federal Housing Administration.
The waters fine jump on in.
I think the recovery bubble is on the verge of popping.
I’m sure WF already has an agreement with the FED for getting bailed out.
Lowering credit standards will allow more buyers to enter the market and this will add to the demand.
Adding to the demand give a lift to prices and giving a lift to prices gives a lift to the value of underwater mortgages whose values are connected to these lifted prices. Price equals value and all that.
So … it’s all good for Wells Fargo.
Yup, as long as the bailouts keep a’comin.
Hope and Change
“Retiring Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) Says in a new interview that President Obama was elected in part because of “guilt” that Americans felt — and that that same guilt won’t benefit a female candidate for president.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-politics/wp/2014/02/20/bachmann-americans-not-anxious-for-a-woman-president/?tid=hpModule_ba0d4c2a-86a2-11e2-9d71-f0feafdd1394
Hope and Change
“In 2012, there were more black babies killed by abortion (31,328) in New York City than were born there (24,758), and that black children killed comprised 42.4% of the total number of abortions in the Big Apple, according to a report by the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene.”
http://cnsnews.com/news/article/michael-w-chapman/nyc-more-black-babies-killed-abortion-born#
Rush Limbaugh discussing this article now on the radio.
Genocide by any other name….
And blacks will still vote 95% for liberal “abortion at anytime and for any reason with uncle sam paying the bill” democrats…
Are you talking about feti or children?
Anyone else catch the pro-US-manufacturing Walmart ad?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7OQcoDQq3-o
Wallyworld faces an insurmountable climb. Their competition is Dollar Store…. think about it.
From the company’s website:
“By making producton more affordable and feasable in the United States, we can bring our customers more U.S.- made products and manufacturers can create more jobs in America.”
“… making production more afforadable and feasable” means … what? Means cutting costs, perhaps? And, if so, just what costs will be cut? Wages and benifits, perhaps?
What else?
In order to save American jobs Walmart will have to pressure American manufacturers to cut costs so their costs will be in line with the costs of foreign manufacturers. This, at root, is their $250 billion commitment over the next then years.
If American manufacturers cut costs then Walmart will spend $250 billion over the next ten years in buying their products - this is essentially what Walmart is saying. But Walmart says it is such a way so as to come across as being a hero.
Production in America will be more affordable when imported manufactured goods from Chindexico are taxed through a tariff. That would make our wages go up, enabling us to purchase the stuff we make. Remember the good old days, back when we used to have tariffs and people lived better?
This would actually be bad for certain regions like yours and mine. Baltimore and Norfolk are the main deepwater ports for the east coast. (I think NY/NJ Port Authority is aggressively dredging and reconfiguring some bridges in the Bayonne/Staten Island area, but they’re years from completion. NYNJPA also seems incompetent, given the recent Chris Christie/bridge situation.)
Posted last night
The Millionaire Next Door Lives in a Micro Apartment
https://www.mint.com/blog/saving/the-millionaire-next-door-lives-in-a-micro-apartment-0114/
This appeals to the Bill in LA type. I don’t like spending money on my personal environment. I like spending money to invest or to buy insurance (precious metals) or to buy wine - and I can rent wine storage elsewhere.
Micro Apartments where you would maybe share a kitchen but have 120 square feet, your own bathroom/shower and bedroom. In very upscale areas they are expensive per square foot but still cheap. These are a great idea and would be something for a white collar urban 20-something who is more interested in becoming financially independent than to become married with children. Combine that with living in Manhattan or San Francisco and you don’t need to own a car or worry about car maintenance or where to park it.
You would really get the 50 year old home moaners p.o.ed at you when you are 35 and financially independent while they have no savings.
—————————————–
Many people who have houses look down on us renters. They publicly consider us low lifes and criminals while many of us have higher net worth than house buyers. At work I can tell one of the youngest guys is a snob toward me - he knows I am not flashy and I couldn’t care less about spending money or getting married. I think his snobbishness conceals his fear. He called single people “selfish” for not getting married and having families. I overheard him saying that in the next cube. I think his real fear is that he does not know himself and has to be around others to have them tell him who he is. That is how it usually is with extroverts.
I don’t live in a micro apartment, but it’s small enough that my electric bill is less than $30/month eight months of the year (not watching TeeVee helps too). Heat is included in the rent, when you were here visiting Boulder and Longmont and it was minus 10F outside it never got below 70F in my place.
And regarding your co-worker, Bob Dylan summarized it nicely in the song Maggie’s Farm:
“I try my best to be just like I am, but everybody wants you to be just like them”
My local IKEA has a micro-apartment set-up.
Pretty comfortable for 1/2 people.
2 most NYC apartments are small, but today with so much being digital….from flat screens on the wall…to furniture with drawers underneath…it becomes much easier to live in a smaller space and save on the rent utilities…
This is the desk i am sitting at saved it from the dumpster and a massive deluge of rain by 30 minutes 15 years ago….i love the side pullouts hard to find on a desk today….but I dont think it will be taken to the next place when we move again.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=300988664652
Pretty comfortable for 1/2 people.
Lots of things are comfortable for half a person :-P.
There’s a problem?. Just keep your right leg out in the hallway.
He called single people “selfish” for not getting married and having families.
I’ll never understand people who think that way. No one has a “duty” to get married or have kids. Do it because you want to do so. It can be rewarding but it’s not for everyone.
Yeah, that’s a great idea for a person who never wants to enjoy their limited life span.
The very same people who ridicule financially free people for being cheap are the people who vote for socialists to rob those people - a reward for saving and working hard.
Evil winter strikes again.
Winter is almost as bad as Bush…
—————————–
Existing Home Sales Hit Lowest Rate Since July 2012
FoxBusiness.com | 2/21/2014 | FOXBusiness
U.S. home resales fell more than expected in January and hit an 18 month-low as the combination of cold weather and a lack of housing stock sidelined potential buyers.
The National Association of Realtors said on Friday home sales dropped 5.1 percent to an annual rate of 4.62 million units, the lowest level since July 2012. December’s sales pace was unrevised at 4.87 million.
People should just move to the south to get rid of the worst parts of winter, right?
Oh wait, seems like the south sucks, even southerners think so:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2564383/North-Dakota-tops-list-happiest-U-S-states-West-Virginia-bottom.html
Isn’t ND overpopulated with scandinavians? May be it’s the happy genes afteall.
Racist.
Is Government Work A Full-Time Job
news.investors.com | 2/20/2014
Work: A new study of government data says that since Oct. 1, federal workers, including bureaucrats and members of Congress, have worked less than three-fourths of the time. To which we respond, how can they tell?
Federal workers have long been seen as slack, but they seem to have gotten more so recently.
Analyzing Office of Personnel Management data, the Washington Times found the government was closed a total of 21 days since the start of October due to the shutdown, snow days and regular holidays. And “delayed openings or unscheduled leave and telework policies were in effect for six more days,” the Times observed. So, all told, federal workers took 27 days off.
Sure, you’d hear wailing about how America’s “public servants” — politicians and bureaucrats — are unappreciated and underpaid. But a Cato Institute study last year found that the average total yearly compensation for federal workers in 2012 was $114,976, 74% higher than the private sector’s $65,917.
Better take Grover Norquist’s advice to “shrink the size of government to where you can drown it in the bathtub” by pushing fed employees into early retirement and backfilling every one of those positions with a contractor, who costs the taxpayers twice as much.
Nice try, 2brony
“Costs taxpayers twice as much” and then, on top of it, aggressively lobbies for increased future spending and new projects, especially if they violate privacy and undermine the whole principle of “limited government”.
BTW, Boeing (does a lot of gov cont work) paid exactly ZERO in corporate income tax last year. Lollies!11
Around 15 years ago my father met an economist who works for Boeing. He said that the return on investment on the civilian part of Boeing was not any better than interest rate on municipal bonds. So those government contracts are very important.
Did the study control for type of job? Government workers have fewer burger flippers.
So someone took a look at a period of time that included a government shutdown and the end-of-year holiday season and determined that federal employees didn’t go to work for many days during that period. Wow, that’s really helpful information. It’s just fascinating. Then these findings will probably get published on 200 dopey right wing websites whose purpose is to get their readers angry. I wonder if it actually works. I wonder if any of the readers who get angry feel angry about the Republicans who engineered the shutdown, thus giving all of those federal workers a little vacation.
I also remember that during the shutdown that we kept hearing that it was only a partial shutdown, that much of the government, maybe even 85% of it, was still functioning. So a large portion of the federal workforce was still at work during the shutdown. From 2banana’s exceprt above it doesn’t appear that the august Washington Times mentions that fact.
“You’d have to have rocks in your head to buy a house at these prices.”
You better believe it.
Come out and play
OakSkidMarks.Hope and change…
———————
Study: Uninsured Patients Get Better Care Than Insured
CBS DC | February 20, 2014 | Dr. M. Kit Delgado
Researchers from the Stanford University of Medicine found that patients with insurance are less likely to get the best care than those who do not have insurance. They found that insured patients taken to non-trauma hospitals were 13 to 15 percent less likely to be transferred to trauma centers than uninsured ones.
“Insured patients may, ironically, get worse outcomes because they are taken care of at a center where there’s a lower volume of resource for critically injured patients,” Dr. M. Kit Delgado, a former Stanford emergency medicine instructor, and the study’s lead author said in a press release obtained by HealthDay News.
Researchers analyzed data of more than 4,500 patients who were critically injured at 636 hospital emergency rooms across the country.
Shootings and traffic accidents are the most common causes of death in this county among people under 44-years-old. Previous research has shown that severely injured patients are 2 percent less likely to die if treated at a top-ranked trauma center than at a non-trauma center.
“Finding disparities in quality of trauma care based on insurance is very disturbing,” Dr. Nancy Wang, an associate professor of emergency medicine at Stanford, said in the press release. “It is important for researchers to identify and call attention to these disparities in access to care and outcomes so that all people can receive the appropriate, high-quality care, regardless of their insurance status,” Wang added.
Wall Street Landlords Buy Bad Loans for Cheaper Homes
Wall Street-backed landlords areshowing a greater appetite for bad mortgages as a source forcheap property as the supply of foreclosed homes declines whilehousing prices continue to climb.
The companies have dominated U.S. foreclosure auctions inthe last two years by buying as many as 200,000 single-familyhomes. Now American Homes 4 Rent, the second-biggest single-family landlord, Barry Sternlicht’s Starwood WaypointResidential Trust and Altisource Residential Corp. (RESI) are leadingacquisitions of non-performing loans, or NPLs, to expand theirholdings of rental properties.
The shift to loans comes after foreclosure starts droppedto the lowest level since 2006 and house prices jumped inAtlanta, Phoenix and other markets where investors have made themost purchases. The development is raising concern among housingadvocates that private equity firms and hedge funds will be morelikely to take possession of the properties rather than offerloan modifications. Residents may be displaced or transformedinto renters of their former houses.
Doug Brien, co-chief executive officer of StarwoodWaypoint, said his firm plans to give delinquent residents achance to stay put as owners or renters.
“Our intent is to approach some of these folks where itjust doesn’t look like they’re going to get caught up on theirloans,” Brien said. The firm can “offer them the opportunitiesto stay in their homes and keep their kids in the same school.”
50% Rentals
Starwood Waypoint (SWAY) invested $219.7 million for 1,736 non-performing loans compared with $707.5 million to own 5,049rental houses, according to a January presentation to investors.That averages about $127,000 per distressed loan compared with$140,000 per home.
Brien said an estimated 30 percent to 50 percent of theNPLs will end up as rentals for the company. In other cases, theborrowers will resume paying the loans after a modification orthe homes will be sold because the location or quality doesn’tmatch Starwood Waypoint’s criteria
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/wall-street-landlords-buy-bad-050001620.html
This is not a shift. All the boyz were buying bad loans in 2010. They lost all their money, and then they did the shuffle and started buying houses. Now they’re shuffling back. There is not much intelligence in them thar hills. Yes Wall Street, I’m looking at you.
They lost all their money, and then they did the shuffle and started buying houses.
No, Obama made sure the big boys did not lose all their money, they were given cheap loans to carry the other loans until they were back into the black or the Fed bought them from them at inflated prices so they had money to make new loans. Had they lost all their money, houses would have been sold cheaply in a bankruptcy sale and we would have had many new people in the .01% ranks but the .01% would have a much reduced share of the overall wealth.
I’m talking about “institutions” like Kondaur Capital (spelling? CON-door). They came in after the crash and started buying bad mortgages and doing deeds in lieu of foreclosure, but they lost it all.
O.K. but they were not one of the big boys referenced above.
That’s true. I guess the initials were medium boyz.
“No More Hesitation“
Georgia teen holding Wii remote shot by cops at his front door: family lawyer
By Irving Dejohn / NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Wednesday, February 19, 2014, 1:35 PM
A Georgia teen who dreamed of being a Marine was killed by police at his front door while wielding only a Wii remote, the family lawyer claims.
Christopher Roupe, 17, of Euharlee was felled by a single police bullet when an unidentified officer arrived at the family mobile home to execute a probation violation warrant against his father, authorities said.
RELATED: ARIZ. COP REPORTS DON’T SAY SUSPECT KILLED WITH HANDS UP
Meanwhile, police assert that the teen pointed a gun directly at the female officer, prompting her to blast the boy in the chest.
The circumstances of the tragic shooting last Friday night are under reviewed by the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, according to reports.
“It just doesn’t add up,” family attorney Cole Law told WSBTV. “He heard a knock at the door. He asked who it was, there was no response so he opened the door and upon opening the door he was immediately shot in the chest.”
Roupe, 17, was a member of the ROTC at Woodland High School and was planning to sign up for the Marines, his friends said.
“He was a good kid,” his pal William Corson told WSBT.
Euharlee police said two officers arrived at roughly 7:35 p.m. and Roupe answered the door with a gun drawn — contradicting the lawyer and witness claims that he was unarmed, expect for the video game device.
The officer, who has been placed on administrative leave, broke down after she realized that she had shot the teen at point-blank range, witnesses said.
“She put her head in her hands and she was sobbing,” Ken Yates told WSBT. “Supposedly, he opened the door with a BB gun and in my opinion I think he was playing a game with his neighborhood buddies.”
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/georgia-teen-holding-wii-remote-shot-cops-front-door-family-lawyer-article-1.1619842 - -
Sad but if Daddy wasn’t a felon none of this would have happened.
In many states - having a shotgun shell or a thirty round magazine now makes you a felon.
I don’t think the punishment for “daddy is a felon” should be death by firing squad.
I don’t think the punishment for “daddy is a felon” should be death by firing squad.
It wasn’t, but when police are responding to a call involving a felony or a felon they are prepared to meet deadly force with deadly force, if you have anything resembling a gun in your hand you stand a high chance of being shot. Officers are trained to be able to go home at night. Spit second decisions are often wrong but they need to be made.
Glad to know that officers will go home at night after possibly murdering me for answering my door. Remind me never to answer my door without shooting through it first. Gotta make that split-second decision, ya know.
Better to be judged by twelve than carried by six but shooting through the door will seldom be justified unless they are smashing through the door. You might be able to justify that if they do not identify themselves as police. What do you think police should do if they believe someone is pointing a gun at them, wait to get shot and then return fire if they still can?
If she had time to draw her weapon, then she had time to see that the kid was holding a toy. The other option (if you think there’s danger) is to arrive at the house with backup, and call to the person with a bullhorn from the street.
Article for Downlow Joe, the metrosexual millenials making Denver fabulous:
http://www.cnn.com/2014/02/20/living/denver-menswear-fashion/
Liberace’s Internet Housing Crew would be in Shangri-La.
You gotta look good when you’re snapping a selfie on the summit of Brokeback Mountain
looks like a chill store with some handmade products, but I don’t wear any leathergoods or other animal products except shoes and a belt. I use a flash drive and have remote access, hence no briefcase.
I’d rather see people dress up a little and have some respect for themselves, rather than walking around looking like a slob. I’d probably sign up for some monthly delivery service (Frank & Oak is a good example) before actually going to a boutique.
“walking around looking like a slob”
The Alpine Squad Task Force models the Spring 2014 Snowshoe Collection on the runways of the Lost Creek Wilderness at elevation circa 10,000 feet:
http://www.picpaste.com/IMG_20140216_105326_710-mim0HdaD.jpg
That lady is flashing the “two” sign!
First of all, I want to say that I have nothing against gay people. Secondly, I hope everyone realizes that only a gay guy would shop at any of those places.
February 20, 2014“Georgia Real Estate Investor Pleads Guilty to Bid Rigging and Fraud”
http://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/2014/February/14-at-182.html
Hmmm… Amy James in Atlanta?
http://www.remax.com/realestateagentoffice/decatur-ga-30033-amyjames-id25043121.html
Now we know not to deal with these corrupt basturds in GA.
Just a few days ago I recall reading a headlines in Yahoo Finance about how people should invest in Mining stocks. HA
Newmont Mining Corp. swung to a fourth-quarter loss as the gold and copper producer recorded a steep impairment charge, while results were also hurt by weaker average prices.
Though Newmont NEM -6.42% posted an adjusted profit for the period excluding charges, results missed Wall Street’s expectations. Shares fell Friday after the results, which were released late Thursday.
Earlier this year, Newmont projected stable gold production for the year, as well as higher production of copper and more cuts to capital and overhead expenses. Like other mining companies, Newmont has moved to trim costs as the sector was hurt by falling gold prices last year.
Read more on mining stocks: Gold-miner stock rally has just begun
Gold prices slumped 28% in 2013, the largest annual decline since 1981. Gold’s decline was accelerated by a record-breaking bull run in U.S. stocks. But gold prices have received a boost early in 2014, as worries about the health of some developing economies and a swoon in equities markets renewed demand for alternative assets.
Facebook or mining stocks or 0.0001% bonds?
What is an investor supposed to do?
Walnut Creek, CA Housing Prices Dive 39% Y-o-Y on Rising Inventory
http://www.movoto.com/walnut-creek-ca/market-trends/
Median yoy house size change of those sold from the same source: -42%.
Conclusion: median price per square foot is flat.
If the fact that only the smaller, less expensive homes are selling portends dark things, then let’s talk about that. But house prices in walnut creek are not currently crashing 40%. It may well happen, but not at present.
Location Location Location
High sales? Genius Girl Scout sells hundreds of cookies outside cannabis clinic
Mark Molloy
Friday 21 Feb 2014 12:17 pm
An enterprising Girl Scout has demonstrated her brilliant business acumen by selling boxes of cookies outside a cannabis clinic.
Danielle Lei, 13, pitched up outside The Green Cross medical centre in San Francisco with her mother, enticing patients with the munchies to try their baked treats.
And the teenager had no shortage of customers, selling a total of 117 boxes.
‘It’s no secret that cannabis is a powerful appetite stimulant, so we knew this would be a very beneficial endeavour for the girls,’ Holli Bert, a Green Cross staff member, told Mashable.
‘It’s all about location, and what better place to sell Girl Scout cookies than outside a medical cannabis collective?’
http://metro.co.uk/2014/02/21/high-sales-genius-girl-scout-sells-hundreds-of-cookies-outside-cannabis-clinic-4312822/ - 70k -
Why Kerry Is Flat Wrong on Climate Change
The warming numbers most commonly advanced are created by climate computer models built almost entirely by scientists who believe in catastrophic global warming. The rate of warming forecast by these models depends on many “assumptions and engineering” to replicate a complex world in tractable terms, such as how water vapor and clouds will react to the direct heat added by carbon dioxide or the rate of heat uptake, or absorption, by the oceans.
http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303945704579391611041331266
This is a good article because they don’t say that the climate isn’t changing, but they do identify the overstatements of the past and the reluctance of climate changed scientists to allow for real disagreement when the facts present themselves.
1970s - global cooling
2000s - glabal warming
2010 - climate change
2020 - just give all your money to government and freeze in the dark
2020 - just give all your money to government and freeze in the dark
Corrected:
Just give all your money to a world government and freeze in the dark.
They will not even care that you are putting carbon into the atmosphere just that they are getting taxes on the carbon.
By its very nature, science allows for disagreement, but only when backed by data. It doesn’t allow religious arguments or upset children to suddenly change the picture.
No, the AGW claims that the science is settled no more argument is allowed. Which just demonstrates that on this issue they are acting like a religion and not as scientists.
There are some things that are settled, and some that aren’t. For instance, the Earth is round, and it orbits th sun. Nobody is going to waste their time rehashing the already thoroughly tested, reviewed, retested, re-reviewed, and retested-by-multiple-methods data.
Sorry as graph supplied by someone else today shows AGW does not meet this test, the models and the actual results are too far apart. Also look at the graph and you will see that for the most part the satellite data and the ground data have matched for decades. Since the graph covers decades you cannot see the last four to five months, the ground based data is now widely divergent from the satellite data, with the ground based data being much higher, January 2014 is only a warm global month based on the ground based data, it was actually fairly cool based on the satellite data. I think some bad data is being fed to NASA or NASA is fabricating bad data. It needs to be investigated.
Exactly and pluto is a planet.
Yes, those young punks downsizing it make me mad.
Ukraine Is Responsible For Its Demise…But We All May Suffer
Daniel McAdams
Lew Rockwell Blog
February 21, 2014
Ukraine is an utter disaster. A few thousand violent rebels in a country of more than 40 million have turned Kiev into a post-apocalyptic hell, where the government is incapable of restoring order, incapable of protecting its own police force from snipers whose well-armed presence in buildings is reminiscent of the Syrian rebels (also backed by the US government).
US Ambassador Geoffrey Pyatt, who was caught on tape plotting the overthrow of the democratically-elected government of Ukraine — presumably in the name of democracy? — openly demands that a new government be formed and that the Ukrainian constitution be rewritten to limit presidential power.
This while his own boss, President Obama, has declared that he intends to disregard Congress and instead rule by Executive Order.
Secretary of State John Kerry demands that security forces be removed from the city center immediately and that they cease using force against rebels who are seeking to overthrow the government. He announced sanctions against those in Ukraine who have used force — on the government side, not among the rebels who shoot and burn alive law enforcement officials.
Witnessing the hypocrisy of US officials who have militarized the police in the United States at every opportunity telling foreign governments they dare not use force against those who seek a violent overthrow of constitutional order, one must ask who is really at fault here.
Is it the US, run by “deep government” interventionist forces who retain power regardless of who the citizens elect? Is it the intolerable EU, whose leadership endlessly lectures the rest of the world about democracy despite being unelected themselves?
Or is it the Ukrainian government itself?
As Paul Craig Roberts writes in a hard-hitting column today:
The Ukrainian and Russian governments allowed this dangerous situation to develop, because they naively permitted for many years billions of US dollars to flow into their countries where the money was used to create fifth columns under the guise of educational and human rights organizations, the real purpose of which is to destabilize both countries. The consequence of the trust Ukrainians and Russians placed in the West is the prospect of civil and wider war.
It is hard to argue with PCR about this. Failing to defend sovereignty, the Ukrainian regime has opened the door to the chaos and destruction it now faces. No country — from the most liberal democracy to the most authoritarian — would willingly allow foreign powers to subvert the rule of law in attempt to change the regime.
Dr. Roberts comes to this dire conclusion, with which it is also difficult to disagree:
Unless the Russian government and people are willing to accept Washington’s hegemony over Russia, Russia cannot tolerate the coup that the West is preparing in Ukraine. As it is unlikely that Western forces would be a match for the Russian army in its own backyard, or that self-righteous, hubristic Washington could accept defeat, the conflict toward which the corrupt Western governments are driving is likely to turn nuclear.
At the centenary of the start of the Great War, the insane neocons who control US foreign policy and their vain EU hypocrite allies are jack-booting us toward a repeat. The brakes are seemingly off the train…
Who controls US foreign policy?
Hope and change for the Ukraine
Who controls US foreign policy?
The Bilderberg group.
Obama told me the ocean levels would fall, Gitmo would be closed and the world would love america again if we would only vote for him…
Look, the cops in Kiev won’t talk to the press. Reporters have pictures showing the armed rebels flanked by the residents who live in these neighborhoods. No one is even trying to say that the cops didn’t start it. By all available accounts, the cops started it by throwing rocks at the protestors, and the cops just won’t back down, and neither will the protestors. This no longer has anything to do with the EU. It’s about a totalitarian regime. With the way things are going, I don’t think the Ukraine needs the US to intervene. They are about to come to their own conclusion.
Minister: Martial law in Ukraine was a real possibility
Last updated Fri 21 Feb 2014
World Ukraine Poland ITV News Europe Editor James Mates talks to Polish foreign minister Radoslaw Sikorski after the diplomat was overheard telling a Ukrainian opposition leader: “If you don’t support this [deal] you’ll have martial law, you’ll have the army. You will all be dead.”
http://www.itv.com/news/?player=LON_News_15&void=214305 - 50k -
Getting out of debt takes courage and persistence. Take my word for it as a former debtor the freedom is intoxicating.
+1
“Getting out of debt takes courage and persistence. Take my word for it as a former debtor the freedom is intoxicating.”
+1 Spent roughly 25-yrs servicing debt, i.e., paying interest. No missed payments, no bankruptcies, lived within my means. Debt free over 2-yrs now, but I still have family obligations.
Say what you want but in South Africa, they truly know what it means to be a union goon. Goon how about the appropriate Doors tune for this?
From MiningReview.com
Police have reported that a miner has been attacked and killed by group of men at Anglo American Platinum (Amplats. Police spokesman Thulani Ngubane said that the man was attacked and set on fire by four armed men as he was on his way to work yesterday. The man died from his injuries this morning, and his identity and union affiliation have not yet been released.
Since the beginning of the strike five weeks ago, there have been several incidents of violence reported, including an Amplats employee who died following a clash with the South African Police Services (SAPS) and another Amplats employee who was in a critical condition after an assault at the mine.
Amplats took immediate action, calling on the Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union (Amcu) to comply with picketing rules.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-02-21/sales-of-u-s-existing-homes-slump-to-lowest-since-july-2012.html
This was a quote from the Peak Oil site, whether it actually Teddy I cannot verify but it does say it all:
The things that will destroy America are prosperity-at-any-price, peace-at-any-price, safety-first instead of duty-first, the love of soft living, and the get-rich-quick theory of life.
… Theodore Roosevelt
Teddy was the first Republican “progressive.” judge Napolitano has a book on the progressives TR and Woodrow Wilson.
Correction: Whether it actually is Teddy
Foreclosed
Starring: Marlee Matlin, James Denton, Jamie Kennedy, Paul Sorvino, Alex Frnka, Ernest Thomas
When Jake and Allison Turner find the home of their dreams, it’s almost too good to be true: as a foreclosed property, the house is well within their budget. But Forest Hayes, the home’s current occupant, refuses to leave. The police remove Forest from the property. But soon, he begins a campaign of surveillance and harassment; when the neighbor and the realtor suspect him, he kills them. Finally, Forest takes Allison hostage in her own home, threatening to kill her if the family doesn’t relinquish the house.
Upcoming Airdates
Fri Mar 7 at 8 PM
Sat Mar 8 at 12 AM
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Foreclosed - Watch Lifetime Movies Online | myLifetime.com
http://www.mylifetime.com/movies/foreclosed - 110k - Cached - Similar pages
Foreclosed. Watch Online · Lifetime Movies · Schedule · LMN · Foreclosed …
Another late post with a link. Will repost in the A.M.
But two observations 1) either Obama is retarded or a closet anarchist fomenting a revolt against statism and 2) buy gold (read the last paragraph on page 2)
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/obama-plan-cut-tax-breaks-for-rich-retirement-savers-2014-02-21?pagenumber=2
The consequences will be to force people who have very high balances to stop investing in these plans and they will turn to movable, hidable assets.
Hey Where’s Lee Ber arrchieeee
http://lasvegassun.com/news/2014/jan/23/liberaces-former-lover-ordered-spend-8-20-years-pr/