Weekend Topic Suggestions
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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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Any conjectures on for how much longer CA home prices can continue their parabolic move before they level off or crash again?
It is pretty clear they are leveling now and have been since the 4th Qtr 2013. Do you think they are still on a parabolic rise? HA is not going to be happy with you!
Do you know what parabolic means?
‘As China’s growth inexorably slows, manufacturers such as Linan Meite Cable are discovering that being an efficient low-cost producer is no longer enough to prosper. ‘I want to buy more machines to do high end cable,’ said Dong.’
“But my father said no, because he has done business so many years in China. He knows China won’t keep going like this” — she angled her hand upwards — “but come down like this,” she said, pointing her hand to the floor.’
Math is fun
http://www.mathsisfun.com/geometry/images/parabola-soccer.gif
Here’s another possible example, side by side:
‘According to data from Hawai`i Information Systems, real estate sales surged in the Puna district during the first quarter of 2014, while the Hilo housing market showed signs of slowing down. The number of residential home sales in Puna increased an impressive 27.5% in the first three months of 2014 when compared with sales a year earlier, and the number of vacant land purchases in the district rose 46.1% during that same time period.’
‘The increase in activity pushed Puna home prices up 21.2%. The South Hilo residential housing market, by contrast, saw a 14.8% drop in the number of homes sold in the first quarter of 2014. Market activity on the west side of the island was also mixed. South Kona home sales dropped 31.3% when compared with a year earlier, while prices spiked 73.7%. While the number of vacant parcels sold in the area doubled, the average price of vacant parcels sold dropped 28.4%.’
‘The first quarter of 2014 saw a 33.3% increase in the number of homes sold in Ka’u when compared to a year earlier, while the average price of houses sold in the district fell 13.2%. The number of vacant parcels sold in the first quarter rose 9.5%, while the average price of land sold in the region dropped significantly, falling 42.9% when compared to the first quarter of 2013.’
It also explains how you get these situations in bubbles where people are caught off-guard. It’s the reversal in speculative sentiment that dashes all the false excuses they’ve created to explain away stupid house prices:
‘A new report expects home sales in Regina will bounce back this spring. Re/Max’s latest housing trends report found that sales were down six per cent early this year. But while overall sales volume is down year-over-year, sales prices in March increased nearly five per cent compared to the year before.’
‘Re/Max’s Rob Nesbitt said that the number of people “moving up” in the market has resulted in growth in the number of listings. “We’re over 20 per cent on listings coming on the market, so we have a really large inventory right now.”
‘Even with the average sale price in March reaching nearly $329,000, an increase of almost five per cent, Nesbitt feels Regina is competitive when compared to other major Canadian cities.’
“We’re still catching up to them, but we’re catching up now on a slower level. And that’s a comfortable level,” he explained, noting that growth in Regina has been strong due to national recognition of the relative affordability of homes and the growing average income.’
‘While those prices have increased steadily since the boom of 2007/08, Nesbitt says Regina traditionally sees prices rise and then plateau; he expects that will happen again eventually.’
These realtors are truly babbling idiots.
“Do you think they are still on a parabolic rise?”
Primarily in listing prices, not sale prices, especially on a quality-adjusted basis.
What I am seeing in sales is the usual action in the death throes of the parabolic phase of a bubble: Explosive price acceleration on shrinking volumes, as the supply of greater fools with buckets of money and boxes of stupid is rapidly exhausted.
Does that pretty much sum it up for you?
I realize this information was just posted yesterday, but apparently some forgetful HBB readers need very frequent reminders.
HOME SALES: Spring sales hit a 6-year-low
Tony Dejak/AP
This Friday, March 21, 2014, photo, shows a home for sale in Cleveland Heights, Ohio. Entering the 2014 spring buying season, the U.S. housing market faces an unusual dilemma: Too few people are selling homes. Yet too few buyers can afford the homes that are for sale. A 13.4 percent jump in the average price of a home sold last year, according to the Standard & Poor’s/Case-Shiller 20-city index, hasn’t managed to coax more homeowners to sell. And combined with higher mortgage rates, higher prices have made homes costlier for first-time buyers as well as for all-cash investors.
BY DEBRA GRUSZECKI
STAFF WRITER
April 15, 2014; 01:57 PM
Home sales across Southern California fell to a six-year low as median prices rose to its highest point since 2008, a new report from the real estate aggregator DataQuick said.
There were a total of 17,638 new and resale houses and condos sold in Los Angeles, Riverside, San Diego, Ventura, San Bernardino and Orange counties in March. The six-county sales count was up 25.7 percent from last month’s 14,027 sales, but fell14.3 percent from the 20,581 sales logged in Southern California in March 2013.
“Southland home buying got off to a very slow start this year, with last month’s sales coming in at the second-lowest level for a March in nearly two decades,” DataQuick analyst Andrew LePage said in a Tuesday, April 15 statement.
The median sale price for all of Southern California rose 4.4 percent, from $383,000 in February to $400,000 — the highest since February 2008 — and nearly 16 percent from March 2013. One year earlier, Southern California’s median sale price was $345,500
In March Riverside County’s 3,066 sales were 13.2 percent fewer than the year earlier and San Bernardino County’s sale of 2,048 homes were down 14.9 percent from the 2,406 sales recorded in March 2013.
The median home price rose 17.8 percent in Riverside County to $288,500 in March from $245,000 a year earlier. In San Bernardino County prices were up 21.1 percent, jumping to $230,000 from $190,000 in March 2013.
…
In Southern California – a region where most residents can’t afford to buy a house – rents are the least affordable they’ve ever been, and the trend is likely to worsen.
There are an estimated 5.7 million places to live in Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino and Ventura counties, according to data estimates available from the U.S. Census Bureau. About 48 percent of those housing units are occupied by renters.
“L.A. actually does stand out as having the highest share of people renting which in part is a reflection of the high housing costs in the area and a younger population as well,” said Chris Herbert, Research Director at the Joint Center for Housing Studies at Harvard.
Walk past a metal gate, through a small yard with a lemon tree, and up a flight of stairs, and you reach Chris Payne’s rather cramped two-bedroom apartment in Hollywood. As much as he’d like to at age 28, Payne couldn’t even think about living here by himself so he splits the $1450 rent with a roommate, and even then, Payne has almost nothing left after he writes his rent check.
“I just calculated it, and it’s about 93 percent of my paycheck that goes to rent,” said Payne.
In Silver Lake, Joe Rezendes shares a 400 square-foot apartment with his boyfriend.
Rezendes feels fortunate to be paying just over $1100 a month in rent – a bargain in trendy Silver Lake – but it still eats up about half what he takes home every month working as a fulfillment manager.
“I don’t feel like I’m struggling, but I know that I’m living paycheck to paycheck,” said Rezendes, who at 40 would love to be living in a house by now, or at least a bigger apartment. He spends so much on rent, he knows it’s impossible.
After a month of searching for something more affordable, Amy Ripley recently settled on an $1100 one-bedroom apartment in Echo Park, an improvement from the $1290 studio in Atwater Village where she lived before. Still, half her paycheck disappears every month.
“Saying goodbye to over half your pay every month is really hard, but that’s just the reality of it I guess,” said Ripley. “I have virtually no savings, which is hard to admit, but it’s true. All my money goes to bills and rent.”
Ripley, who works an office job, says saving for a down payment isn’t something she even thinks about right now; She’s tried to pare down her expenses as much as possible just to make rent.
I RARELY GO OUT WITH FRIENDS. WE USUALLY DO GIRLS NIGHT IN. EATING OUT AT RESTAURANTS ISN’T VERY COMMON. I RARELY GO SHOPPING. THERE’S DEFINITELY CUTBACKS, BUT TO ME IT’S WORTH IT BECAUSE THE PLACE YOU LIVE, SO MUCH OF YOUR TIME IS SPENT THERE.
For our last stop meeting renters in Los Angeles, we took the elevator up to Amika Sodhi’s modern seventh floor, 1400 square foot apartment downtown.
Sodhi loved living in the bustling financial district for the past year and a half.
It was also expensive. Sodhi was spending close to half the monthly paycheck she earns working for a manufacturing technology company on rent, and that was before her landlord told her the rent was going up by several hundred dollars.
So, the 28-year-old made the difficult decision to move back in with her parents in Covina.
http://projects.scpr.org/static/longreads/high-rent-few-options/
Collapsing demand, Skyrocketing inventory and falling rents.
I’d be worried too if I were you.
“So, the 28-year-old made the difficult decision to move back in with her parents in Covina.”
Though a lone data point, it nonetheless helps document the collapse in demand for U.S. housing units which will drive the market over the next couple of decades.
By the way, what point were you trying to make?
There’s a bustling financial district in Los Angeles?
Any conjectures on for how much longer CA home prices can continue their parabolic move before they level off or crash again?”
Watching some homes for sale down the street. A year ago they would be sold in weeks. Now I see open house signs again.
Do the Republicans plan to field any presidential candidates for 2016 who are “big on facts”? Or should we expect the usual lineup* of “not big on facts” type dolts?
* Romney was not one of these, but remember the Republican Party didn’t back him until all the “not big on facts” candidates were dead in the water.
Facts don’t matter, facts are racist.
This just in: It’s cheaper to rent than to own in Coastal Cali.
April 18, 2014, 9:05 a.m. EDT
Rent or buy? This map has the answer
Like all real estate dilemmas, rent or buy question comes down to location
By Daniel Goldstein
Should you rent or buy a home? Depends on where you live.
To help make the decision simpler, RealtyTrac crunched the numbers and created an interactive map of the rent/buy fault lines across America.
…
A tentative conclusion reached by looking at your map:
If incomes are high then RE prices are high as are rents, but nevertheless the ratio of the cost of renting to the cost of buying favors renters.
If incomes are low then RE prices are low and also rents are low, but nevertheless the ratio of the cost of renting to the cost off buying favors buyers.
So, why is that? A possible answer:
If incomes are high then it may be assumed that incomes will always be high and if this assumption is correct then the thinking is one should borrow and buy and allow high incomes and time to pay off his loan and hence RE will be priced accordingly.
And the opposite is true: If incomes are low and are expected to remain low forever then RE prices will remain low because buyers will buy for other reasons than the expectation of price increases and prices will reflect this.
The closer you get to the coast the higher goes the price of buying AND the higher goes the price of renting, HOWEVER the gap between the cost of buying and the cost of renting expands and reaches a peak AT the coast, AT the beach itself. And that’s because they are not making any more beach.
People with lots of money and who are in need of some valuable bragging rights can buy these bragging rights by buying a place that is located right on the beach. Other people who are in search of some sort of capital gains will notice that the price rise at the beach is out of sight (partially due to buyers who are in need of bragging rights) so they want to get in on a sure thing and hence begin bidding up beachfront property prices, and this bidding up of prices attracts still others and - presto! - you have before you a boom in prices.
But you, the investor in beach front property, cannot gain enough income via rents to cover your costs because renters in general do not share the enthusiasm for living at the beach to the extent that you do and they will not pay up to rent the place from you to the extent that you want them to.
There’s a link to another story on that page that I got a kick out of:
America’s least favorite neighbors: renters
I was talking to the old lady next door about her car being stolen right out of her garage (she had forgotten to close it), w/purse on the front seat.
She said that she and her daughter had already gone up and down the block to inform the neighbors, but not the renters.
I think she doesn’t think of us as renters anymore because we’ve been here so long. I’ve had to go to her door to tell her she’d left her garage door open plenty of times in the past few years.
A few years back, I came up with a theoretical explanation for why homes are relatively more expensive near the coast relative to incomes:
1) Since “everyone wants to live near the coast,” housing demand out there is relatively higher than for inland areas where not “everyone wants to live.” This relatively higher demand pushes up relative housing prices.
2) The same “everyone wants to live near the coast” mentality increases the equilibrium level of labor supply relative to places where not “everyone wants to live.” Other things equal, North Dakota will face chronic labor shortages, pushing up wages, while San Diego will experience relative labor surpluses, pushing down wages.
3) Relatively higher housing demand coupled with higher labor supply means home prices will be relatively higher and wages will be relatively lower in San Diego than in North Dakota, where the situation is reverse. Thus the equilibrium home price to income ratio will be higher in San Diego than in North Dakota.
4) “Affordable housing policies” which provide for a higher federally-insured conforming loan limit in San Diego than in North Dakota drive a wider wedge between equilibrium home price to income ratios in those two places, making San Diego home prices even less affordable relative to North Dakota.
5) None of the above speaks to why renting is cheaper than owning in Coastal Cali, but I suspect the story here has something to do with people who have manipulated their own beliefs to convince themselves that “real estate always goes up” and “this time is different.”
Are the incomes of people who own a beach house as a second house part of the data that determines local income?
Did the Treasurys you neglected to sell just get hammered on rate-hike jitters?
Unless you happen to own TIPS, it might be high time to clear the deck for the T-bond portion of your portfolio.
April 17, 2014, 2:26 p.m. EDT
Treasurys sink on rate-hike jitters
Yield curve is flattest since 2009; Strong TIPS auction fails to bolster market
By Ben Eisen, MarketWatch
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — Treasury prices accelerated losses Thursday, pushing benchmark yields up more than 8 basis points after a round of strong data stoked market doubts about the Federal Reserve’s promise to keep its key lending rates low.
The 10-year note (10_YEAR +3.45%) yield, which rises as prices fall, was up 8.5 basis points on the day at 2.721%, according to Tradeweb. The jump, aided by dwindling volume ahead of an early close and a three-day weekend, marks the biggest move higher in nearly a month.
The 7-year note 7_YEAR +4.58% yield rose the most, adding 9 basis points to close at 2.299%.
“There are a lot of different things going on,” said David Robin, co-head of financial futures and options at Newedge. “I think some are position driven, some liquidity driven, but the largest question the market is still trying to figure out is if the Yellen regime can manage the policy path in a very complicated environment.”
In a speech Wednesday, Chairwoman Janet Yellen said that despite indications the U.S. economy is within reach of a healthy recovery, inflation is likely to lag behind. The market has seen below-target inflation as one reason that the central bank may hold its key lending rate near zero for a considerable time period. Nonetheless, the market has been on edge about whether qualitative guidance about when rates will rise will hold up as economic data improve, Robin said.
The 5-year note (5_YEAR +5.20%) yield rose 7.5 basis points to 1.731%, while the 30-year bond (30_YEAR +2.29%) yield rose 6.5 basis points to 3.517%. The spread between those two securities dropped to 1.79 percentage points, the least on a closing basis since the fall of 2009, as investors dump intermediate-term securities amid jitters about the Fed’s guidance on when it will raise its funds rate.
The drop in Treasury prices accelerated after the Philadelphia Fed index, an indicator of business conditions in the Philadelphia area, rose to 16.6 in April, compared with 9.0 in March. That was a blowout number compared with economist expectations of 10.0, and the highest reading since last September.
Data on Thursday also showed that the number of people who applied for unemployment benefits last week was close to its lowest level since 2007. Jobless claims, which are often seen as a proxy for layoffs, rose to 304,000 from an upwardly revised 302,000 in the prior week. That number was better than economist forecasts of a 315,000 reading.
TIPS inflation view
The Treasury Department sold $18 billion in 5-year inflation-protected securities at a yield of negative 0.213%. Bidders offered to buy 2.70 times the amount of debt sold, compared with an average of 2.55 times during the past six sales.
Indirect bidders, which can include foreign central banks, came in strong, taking down 58.4% of the sale, compared with a recent average of 41.4%. Direct bidders, which often include domestic money managers, took down 5.9% of the sale, compared with a recent average of 10.9%. Nonetheless, the solid statistics didn’t help out the broader market.
“Indirects took down their largest ever share in a 5-year TIPS auction while dealers came away with their smallest allotment since August 2011,” said Gabriel Mann, market strategist at RBS. “However, the solid statistics did little to help the belly of the Treasury curve find a bid into the close.”
Treasury inflation-protected securities, which increase in principal size along with increases in consumer prices, have been signaling higher expectations for the pace of price increases, despite concerns about inflation expressed by the Federal Reserve.
…
From the inter-tubes:
‘Facebook’s Existential Crisis’
Uh, do you mean that a site full of drunken photos and pets isn’t worth billions and billions? Darn, maybe some of the other tech stuff isn’t what it’s cracked up to be? Could it be that Airbnb ISN’T worth more than Safeway? Those guys in Silicon Valley wouldn’t pawn a bunch of worthless tech stocks off on the public, would they?
so no Recession ?
Investors did a happy dance on Wednesday as earnings, economic data and Janet Yellen brought good news.
Federal Reserve Chief Yellen sent a clear message to Wall Street today to stop panicking about interest rates.
“Interest rates will likely stay at current levels for a considerable time after asset purchase program ends,” she said.
Investors took this as more assurance that rates aren’t going up any time soon, and the market held steady and then ticked up slightly after she finished her remarks.
http://money.cnn.com/2014/04/16/investing/stocks-markets/index.html
‘“Interest rates will likely stay at current levels for a considerable time after asset purchase program ends,” she said.’
Treasurys sold off yesterday, revealing bond traders’ skepticism regarding this view.
Gradually build up Series I bonds. The variable yield is going up. It has been going up the last couple of 6-month periods. And expected to go up again. The fixed rate is at 0.2 now. It was 0 for several 6 month periods. I would not be surprised if it is at 0.2 or 0.3 in May.
And yes I am slowly picking up the pace of buying series I bonds. Maybe $3,000 worth this year. Maybe $5,000 next year. As long as the fixed rate goes up.
ft.com > Companies > Financials >
Banks
April 18, 2014 7:59 pm
US banks post worst start to year for bond trading since 2008
By Tom Braithwaite and Camilla Hall in New York
US banks reported their worst start to the year in fixed-income trading since the financial crisis, raising new questions about whether Wall Street’s profit engine can ever roar back to life.
Citigroup, JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley reported $15.1bn in fixed-income trading between them in this week’s earnings season. That is the weakest first quarter since 2008 when most banks racked up huge losses on their bond portfolios.
It is barely more than half the level that the five banks made in the Federal Reserve-fuelled bumper first quarter of 2009, when the central bank’s efforts to rescue the financial system drove up asset prices and allowed the five banks to record $25bn of profits.
It is also worse than 2007, at a time when the five banks faced more competition before the demise of Lehman Brothers and the acquisitions of Bear Stearns and Merrill Lynch. In the first quarter of that year they made $15.7bn.
Since then new regulations, including the Basel III capital rules that make trading riskier products less profitable and the Volcker rule that bans banks from trading for their own accounts, have curbed risk-taking.
At the same time, the banks’ clients have shown muted appetite to trade in uncertain markets.
Fixed income, where banks trade derivatives, interest rates, bonds, commodities and currencies, is still a hugely significant part of the banks, representing more than 17 per cent of their revenues – even though three of the five banks also have large consumer operations. But it has been steadily declining after surpassing 28 per cent in 2009.
The weak results in the US come as Barclays and Deutsche Bank – two heavyweights in the business – prepare to report their first-quarter results, with some analysts predicting an even worse result there.
The top four US banks are hoping to pick up share from European rivals. “I am a believer that the European firms are going to continue to have to hunger march,” said Guy Moszkowski, analyst at Autonomous Research. “Either they are undercapitalised, which is certainly the case for Deutsche, or they are facing regulatory pressure, whether from the UK or Swiss banking authorities, to minimise their risk participation.”
Brad Hintz, analyst at AllianceBernstein, said: “I think Goldman makes a good case that at some point in the distant future we will reach the nirvana of repriced markets [because competitors shrink their businesses]. I’m not sure that we’re there yet.”
…
Let’s see if we can add 2 + 2.
2 = “US banks post worst start to year for bond trading since 2008.”
2 = The stock market had an epic crash in Fall 2008.
2 + 2 = ???????????????????????????????????????
My suggestion is: How will the (already started) decline play out this time? Jingle believes in some ungraphable pattern like a parabolic plateau, but things aren’t quite the same as last time. This crash seems more like squeezing out the investors and flippers and starting back with the decline on the regular owners that should have proceeded further 2 yrs ago. Not as many foreclosures, not the increasing unemployment?
I’d be happy to see 2011 prices in my area again, but this time with houses you could actually buy rather than ones being held in reserve for some real estate investor group. Oxide thinks if this happens then the investors will come back. I think Ben answered that pretty well yesterday using the phrase ass-pounding. We’ll see.
Think of it this way;
Have you ever tried to suspend any one or more of the Thermodynamic Laws? It can be done but the energy required to do so cannot be sustained indefinitely.
Actually no you’re never suspending the laws of thermodynamics. The law says you need extra energy, you put in the energy, law is followed.
Now, if you are equating “energy” with “Yellenbux,” yeah, I agree. It can’t be sustained indefinitely. But for me it doesn’t have to be sustained indefinitely. It only has to be sustained long enough where buying beats renting for the same duration. And ultimately, we’re definitely dead.
“Now, if you are equating “energy” with “Yellenbux,” yeah, I agree.”
Did you think we were discussing the perpetual motion machine?
My suggestion is: How will the (already started) decline play out this time? ‘
More interest rate cuts ? Oh wait they can’t go any lower..
KEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEYRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAASH!!!!!!!!
That was the sound of housing demand and housing prices collapsing in your neighborhood.
House? Crater? Same thing.
http://www.noupe.com/wp-content/uploads/trans/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/bizarrebuilding21.jpg
Oxide got married!
http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2008/10/08/article-1073629-02F076B300000578-985_468×333.jpg
(btw, JFWY Oxy)
I’m under contract. Scheduled to close as soon as the little gal heads to college.
http://blogthebeach.best-of-st-pete-beach.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/IMG_1904.jpg
“I DON’T CARE IF I BOUGHT IN 2006! I REFUSE TO THROW MONEY AWAY ON RENT!”
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_7eYAst4pmo4/TKa_8sIBA0I/AAAAAAAAA60/1wKg_Ses3ZI/s400/upside_down_house+4.jpg
Housing always goes up!
http://www.columbusco.org/DotNetNuke_2/Portals/17/arson.jpg
Whoops. Sorry, Ben. Done thought I was posting in bits. Uh, yeah, these are weekend topic suggestions.
Did you perchance mean to say “up in smoke?”
Detroit Fights Devil’s Night
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The Fed has a “dual mandate”:
“In 1977, Congress amended The Federal Reserve Act, stating the monetary policy objectives of the Federal Reserve as:
“The Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System and the Federal Open Market Committee shall maintain long run growth of the monetary and credit aggregates commensurate with the economy’s long run potential to increase production, so as to promote effectively the goals of maximum employment, stable prices and moderate long-term interest rates.”"
http://www.chicagofed.org/webpages/publications/speeches/our_dual_mandate.cfm
I see three items there, but perhaps that’s more inscrutable Fedspeak (“Your number system has no power here!”).
So - wouldn’t promoting inflation be a violation of their mandate? Isn’t suppressing long interest rates a violation of their mandate?
“Isn’t suppressing long interest rates a violation of their mandate?”
You’d think lower rates would reduce returns to lending, thereby discouraging banks from loaning money to fund profitable projects, wouldn’t you? From my jaundiced perspective, the Fed is myopically focused on the demand side of the lending equation, but ignores the supply side. Hence they are pushing on a string and loanable funds remain under the proverbial mattress instead of loaned out to fund economically valuable projects.
So, we were told that recovering from the financial crisis of 2008 would take a long time since it was caused by too much debt. Debt that would simply have to be paid off in order to free up spending.
So… when do we get to say whether the policies of the Fed and government (whatever those have been, if anything) have or have not worked? It’s been six years. Too soon?
Just remember, no matter how bad things are or how long they stay that way, things would have been much worse if Ben Bernanke’s policy prescriptions had not been followed.
Well, one thing is for sure: At 8.1% unemployment, before even considering the unprecedented decline in the size of the labor force since the onset of the Great Recession in December 2007, California’s labor market remains mired in recession.
California adds 11,800 jobs, unemployment rate holds at 8.1%
By Shan Li
April 18, 2014, 7:45 a.m.
This post has been corrected. See the note below for details.
California’s economy added 11,800 net new jobs in March, a meager showing after robust gains the month before, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Friday.
Although the Golden State gained some jobs, the unemployment rate held steady at 8.1% from a month earlier, according to the data. February’s unemployment rate was revised up to 8.1% from the previously reported 8%.
…
Fifth column regulators and agency heads.
Good thing or bad thing? Fair or unfair description?
Does anyone have an estimate of exactly how many FIRE sector workers are paid to tell whoppers intended to lure greater fools into making regrettable financial decisions to throw away their life savings on bad investments (e.g. overpriced used home purchases)?
I’m guessing the answer is ALOT!
I’m also wondering what the official job title is for these highly corrupt professional fraud artists? Over the years I’ve jokingly referred to them here as porcine beauticians, but there must be an actual job title for those whose work involves a chronic pattern of fraud and financial deception.
Wait, I think I’ve got it: Is it REALTOR®?
Why….. why…… I think you’re right!