The Housing Bubble

wouldn’t it have been better just to helicopter the money to me?

http://cnsnews.com/news/article/terence-p-jeffrey/tax-revenues-set-record-october-feds-still-run-monthly-deficit-1050

If at first you don’t succeed, lie, lie again.

Sean Sullivan ✔ @WaPoSean

Pelosi on Gruber: “I don’t know who he is. He didn’t help write our bill.”
11:01 AM - 13 Nov 2014

By Aaron Blake November 13

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said Thursday that, not only did Jonathan Gruber not play a significant role in drafting Obamacare, but that she doesn’t even “know who he is.”

But then there’s this: Pelosi herself has also mentioned Gruber and his work — back in November 2009, at the height of the Obamacare debate.

Here’s the transcript, via Nexis:

And secondly, the Republican plan ensures about 3 million more people than now, and ours does 36 million people. So that’s a very big difference in that.

We’re not finished getting all of our reports back from CBO, but we’ll have a side by side to compare. But our bill brings down rates. I don’t know if you have seen Jonathan Gruber of MIT’s analysis of what the comparison is to the status quo versus what will happen in our bill for those who seek insurance within the exchange. And our bill takes down those costs, even some now, and much less preventing the upward spiral.

So again, we’re confident about what we set out to do in the bill: middle class affordability, security for our seniors, and accountability to our children.

Nancy Pelosi 2009: Americans Should Read Jonathan Gruber’s …
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4we0lyK1vb8 - 159k - Cached - Similar pages
1 day ago …

Sacramento foothills rental market report: Resident gave 30-days notice to vacate (after 4 years). Last say of occupancy day is November 20th. Signing a new 3-year lease tomorrow starting on December 1!

Conclusions:
1) solid demand (even in winter)
2) rental rates are flat (and have been for about 2 years)
3) many renters are seeking multi-year lease terms (want stabilty after eviction due to sale or foreclosure.)

It is interesting times. I am happy to provide as long a lease term as the client desires. My occupancy rate the last 5 years exceeds 99.5%. It’s hard to improve on that rate.

Despite Dem claims, trash-talking Gruber was well-paid adviser for ObamaCare and more

By Kelley Beaucar Vlahos
Published November 14, 2014
FoxNews.com

During the heyday of the ObamaCare push, Jonathan Gruber was whiz-kid-in-chief. His number-crunching on the benefits of the plan was frequently cited by Democrats trying to sell the proposal to the public.

Now, Washington Democrats have a new message: He’s not with us.

But while Jonathan Gruber might not have been a familiar name until this week for many, Pelosi and the rest of the lawmakers who pushed the law certainly knew who he was in 2009 and 2010.

A look at the record shows he was in fact paid to advise the Department of Health and Human Services. And he continues to play a role in health policy elsewhere, even as his unearthed videos cause headaches for the administration, just ahead of this weekend’s Round 2 enrollment launch.

Gruber, an MIT professor and economist, has lived amid the health care debate in Washington for at least 20 years.

Gruber was retained by the Department of Health and Human Services in 2009 on a $297,600 contract to provide “technical assistance in evaluating options for national healthcare reform.” Gruber also confirmed to The Washington Post that he was paid another $95,000 before that, for a total of nearly $400,000.

Around this time, his analysis was not only featured on Pelosi’s House speaker website in 2009, but cited by the White House several times. Though he often was billed as an analyst in media interviews where he touted the merits of the plan, critics complained his financial ties to the administration weren’t disclosed.

Gruber also spent a good deal of time testifying on the Hill and in meetings at the White House – 19 visits from 2009 to June of this year, according to publicly available logs

Aside from his work in Washington, he went on to bag similar contracts for health care work at the state level after that, working six-figure deals with multiple states.

Gruber is still in demand to help other states overhaul their health care systems. According to reports in July, he was hired by Vermont Gov. Peter Shumlin for $400,000 to study how to create a revenue stream for a single-payer health care system. Records show Minnesota paid him nearly $330,000 for health care work in 2011 and 2012. And around the same time, a 2012 contract from Michigan offered $481 million for health care analysis to a team of three firms, including Gruber and his “Gruber Microsimulation Model.”

Article on Foreclosures in California;

Foreclosures Across California Reach Eight Year Low
Posted by RE-Insider on 11/14/14 • Categorized as Feature Stories,Industry News

While California’s real estate market has remained flat throughout the year, recent changes have revealed that things may be making a turn for the best. In addition to September’s jump in sales, a new study has found that foreclosures across California have hit their lowest mark in over eight years – the latest sign that our economy is finally catching up with the housing market.
Foreclosure home
According to San Diego-based research firm DataQuick, fewer foreclosures were initiated across California in the third quarter of 2014 than any in the past eight years. This is largely an outcome of a recovering market and a declining number of toxic loans made between 2006 and 2007.

The study found that during the July-through-September period, there were a total of 16,833 Notices of Default (NoDs) recorded – 691 fewer than the second quarter of 2014 and a 17.1% drop from the same time last year.

One should also note that the recent drop in foreclosure starts is actually part of a larger trend. Prior Q3, DataQuick found that Notices of Default were declining during the second quarter of 2014 – the lowest since the fourth quarter of 2005 when only 15,337 NoDs were reported. Similarly, NoDs have dropped significantly since their peak in 2009, when a total of 135,431 NoDs were recorded.

“This home repo pipeline isn’t exactly drying up, but it sure is diminishing. Its negative effect on the overall market is only a fraction of what it was several years ago, and is really only still noticeable in some pockets of the hardest-hit markets of the Inland Empire and Central Valley,” said John Karevoll, a CoreLogic DataQuick analyst.

Mukilteo, WA(Coastal WA) Sale Prices Plummet 14% YoY

http://www.zillow.com/mukilteo-wa/home-values/

Walla Walla, WA County Sale Prices Crater 7% YoY

http://www.zillow.com/walla-walla-county-wa/home-values/

Oil Prices Expected to Keep Falling in 2015
By John Kapetaneas
@JohnKapetaneas
Nov 14, 2014 9:19am

Morning Money Memo….

Oil prices are expected to drop into 2015, the International Energy Agency said in its Oil Market Report this morning. Downward price pressure is expected to continue into the first half of next year, with oil demand falling to five-year lows while oil production shows no sign of decreasing. Crude oil prices have dropped about 30 percent since June to a four-year low, with a strong U.S. dollar and rising U.S. light oil output outweighing any disruptions in the global oil distribution. Brent and WTI crude were both below $80 per barrel this morning. All of this has meant good news for U.S. drivers, who have seen prices plummeting at the gas pumps nationwide. The average gas price in the U.S. is currently $2.91 per gallon.
…

Seattle, WA Sale Prices Plunge 6% YoY

http://www.zillow.com/lake-forest-park-wa-98155/home-values/

Beaverton, OR Sale Prices Turn Negative YoY; Down 12% QoQ, 2% MoM

http://www.zillow.com/west-slope-or-97005/home-values/

It’s all gonna crash when interest rates go back into significantly positive territory.

The reason home sales are running slow is because many people are scared to buy. These people are making a mistake. The FED, ECB, and BOJ have printed so much money, I expect SoCal beach close homes to double to triple over the next 15 years. It is a matter of time.

SHORT SALE OPPORTUNITY - FIRST MORTGAGE WILL BE PAID IN FULL; SECOND MORTGAGE IS THE ONLY MORTGAGE BEING SHORTED.

Just seen in my area. Yuck, yuck.

Denver, CO Sale Prices Fall Flat YoY; Down 6% QoQ, 2% MoM

http://www.zillow.com/denver-co/home-values/

Here is were the Halfamillionmore model stands. We’re guessing he bought for $300,000. He says he still owes $200K. Here’s what he’ll pay over 30 years. Anybody else hear of a 30 yr mortgage at 3.2%? That’s what ibbots says he’s got.

Price $300,000
interest $113,000
tax $270,000
insurance $90,000
maintenance $180,000

total $953,000

Wow, that’s a lot more than I’ll pay over 30 years for shelter!

Real estate hucksters and their lies. LOL.

People always talk about millennials and how they are dragging down the housing market for various reasons:Student loan debt, family formation, mobility…..

One thing that is rarely discussed is how the millennials are the generation who saw their parents buy, overextend and now have severe financial problems due to a large housing purchase and the subsequent fallout.These “kids”, who are in their mid-20s now were teenagers living with their parents and going to high school during the bubble days. People will say that millennial are dumb and self centered, but I think a great portion saw what their parents went through (or are currently going through) and have zero desire to take part in the housing process. I think we should give some credit to millennials for not repeating the mistakes of the past.

Because it’s good to be the king

“The wealthy now have a wealth gap of their own, as economic gains become more highly concentrated at the very top. As the top one-hundredth of the 1 percent pulls away from the rest of that group, the superrich are leaving the merely very rich behind. That has created two markets in the upper reaches of the economy: one for the haves and one for the have-mores.

According to a recent paper by the economists Emmanuel Saez of the University of California, Berkeley, and Gabriel Zucman of the London School of Economics, almost all of the increase in American inequality over the last 30 years is attributable to the “rise of the share of wealth owned by the 0.1 percent richest families.” And much of that rise is driven by the top 0.01 percent.

The wealth of the top 1 percent grew an average of 3.9 percent a year from 1986 to 2012, though the top one-hundredth of that 1 percent saw its wealth grow about twice as fast. The 16,000 families in that tiptop category — those with fortunes of at least $111 million — have seen their share of national wealth nearly double since 2002, to 11.2 percent.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/16/business/another-widening-gap-the-haves-vs-the-have-mores.html?_r=0

More Lucky Ducky news

Cash-Strapped Americans Are Abandoning Restaurants

“The average American goes out to dinner 74 times a year, The Washington Post’s Wonkblog reports, citing the consumer research firm NPD Group. That’s the lowest reading in three decades.

The popularity of takeout and prepared foods, like frozen pizzas, has partially contributed to the decline, reports Roberto Ferdman at Wonkblog.

But Americans are also worried about cash and are looking to cut back.

“Consumers spent roughly 7 percent less on eating out in 2010, compared to the year before, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics,” Ferdman writes. “Meanwhile, people are buying more groceries, because it’s cheaper.”

The trend is hurting business at casual dining establishments like Olive Garden, Applebee’s, and Red Lobster.”

http://www.businessinsider.com/americans-are-eating-out-less-2014-11

Everyone Must Check In

At a…

FEMA Capstone National Level Exercise

No “pent-up demand” for $500,000 starter homes here

CounterPunch - Inequality, Student Debt and the Millennials

“Millennials are the most highly-educated generation of young adults in our nation’s history, attaining college degrees at record-high rates. Yet despite their greater educational attainment, they appear to have less wealth at this point in the lives than prior generations.

If not for a sharp increase in student debt since 1989, young working- and middle-class Americans would have actually slightly higher net worths than their counterparts had a quarter century ago. This is a surprising finding in an analysis of the Survey of Consumer Finances by my colleagues at the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR).

Let’s be clear: most young working Americans have never had much wealth. In 1989, the net worth of the bottom three-fifths of 18- to 34-year-olds averaged only $3,300. But by 2013, their net worth dropped by $11,000, to an average of $7,700 in net debt. A chief factor in this flip in fortunes is that the average educational debt among this group shot up more than eightfold, from $1,900 in 1989 to $16,300 in 2013.

Much of this debt seems to be burdening those who have the fewest resources to pay it off. For the middle quintile of 18- to 34-year-olds, student debt averaged $3,300 in 2013, while their net worth averaged $11,000 (a drop from $14,400 in 1989). Meanwhile, the student debt of the bottom fifth was almost 13 times larger, averaging $42,700, while their average net worth was a negative $35,400.”

http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/11/14/inequality-student-debt-and-the-millennials/

Do you want me to read the card?

“It’s easier to fool people than to convince them that they have been fooled.”

― Mark Twain

A Permanent Infrastructure for Permanent War

“In the Persian Gulf alone, the U.S. has major bases in every country save Iran. There is an increasingly important, increasingly large base in Djibouti, just miles across the Red Sea from the Arabian Peninsula. There are bases in Pakistan on one end of the region and in the Balkans on the other, as well as on the strategically located Indian Ocean islands of Diego Garcia and the Seychelles. In Afghanistan and Iraq, there were once as many as 800 and 505 bases, respectively. Recently, the Obama administration inked an agreement with new Afghan President Ashraf Ghani to maintain around 10,000 troops and at least nine major bases in his country beyond the official end of combat operations later this year. U.S. forces, which never fully departed Iraq after 2011, are now returning to a growing number of bases there in ever larger numbers.

In short, there is almost no way to overemphasize how thoroughly the U.S. military now covers the region with bases and troops. This infrastructure of war has been in place for so long and is so taken for granted that Americans rarely think about it and journalists almost never report on the subject. Members of Congress spend billions of dollars on base construction and maintenance every year in the region, but ask few questions about where the money is going, why there are so many bases, and what role they really serve. By one estimate, the United States has spent $10 trillion protecting Persian Gulf oil supplies over the past four decades.

Approaching its 35th anniversary, the strategy of maintaining such a structure of garrisons, troops, planes, and ships in the Middle East has been one of the great disasters in the history of American foreign policy.

http://www.tomdispatch.com/blog/175922/

Real journalists will construct your narrative

“During her Friday program on the Fox Business Network, Melissa Francis made a truly scandalous revelation: “When I was at CNBC, I pointed out to my viewers that the math of Obamacare simply didn’t work. Not the politics by the way; just the basic math. And when I did that, I was silenced.”

Straight from the horse’s mouth, Jonathan Gruber telling you that the architects of Obamacare think that you’re stupid and most importantly, they are absolutely counting on your lack of economic understanding. They aren’t the only villains in this story, though. They are also depending on the liberal media to help them cover up the truth. So far, NBC, ABC, the L.A. Times and the Associated Press and others have been only too happy to comply. Those outlets have not even mentioned the video evidence from Jonathan Gruber. It is shocking. But it actually doesn’t surprise me. Because when I was at CNBC, I pointed out to my viewers that the math of Obamacare simply didn’t work. Not the politics by the way; just the basic math. And when I did that, I was silenced.

I said on the air that you couldn’t add millions of people to the system and force insurance companies to cover their preexisting conditions without raising the price on everyone else. I pointed out that it couldn’t possibly be true that if you like your plan you can keep it. That was a lie. And, in fact, millions of people had their insurance canceled. As a result of what I said at CNBC, I was called into management, where I was told that I was, quote, “disrespecting the office of the president” by telling what turned out to be the absolute truth.

http://www.infowars.com/melissa-francis-when-i-worked-at-cnbc-they-stopped-me-from-telling-the-truth-about-obamacare/

Hope and Change

“In 2014, Obamacare’s first year, individuals are facing a penalty of $95 per person, or 1 percent of their income, depending on which is higher. If an American failed to get coverage this year, that penalty will be taken out of their tax refund in early 2015, Adams noted.

While that might be painful to some uninsured Americans who are counting on their tax refunds in early 2015, the penalty for going uninsured next year is even harsher. The financial penalty for skipping out on health coverage will more than triple to $325 per person in 2015, or 2 percent of income, depending on whichever is higher.

Children will be fined at half the adult rate, or $162.50 for those under 18 years old.

So, that’s your incentive. Either sign up for Obamacare at a rate of roughly $750 a month or more for a middle-class family of four, or pay a $325 penalty or two percent of your income, whichever is higher. Plus, if you have kids, they’ve been incentivized too!

Moreover, if you fail to sign up for Obamacare and subsequently refuse to pay your penalty your house will be raided by armed IRS agents, seized by the government, and you’ll be imprisoned for tax evation.

Welcome to the new America, where the government now has the power to compel you to purchase products from private companies under the threat of imprisonment or death. Yes, death. Because if you run from those armed IRS agents they’re going to use their brand new militarized AR-15′s to ensure your compliance.

http://www.infowars.com/your-children-will-be-fined-if-you-fail-to-sign-up-for-obamacare-people-are-going-to-be-in-for-a-shock/

And so it was that later
As Jon Gruber told his tale
Pelosi’s face just ghostly,
Turned a whiter shade of pale

Grubered again! ‘Stupid’ Americans ‘falling off a building’

Obamacare architect knew U.S. workers would lose job-based insurance

Chelsea Schilling
Published: 18 hours ago

Obamacare architect Jonathan Gruber – who has been making headlines this week after a video surfaced of him admitting the law was meant to take advantage of the “stupidity of the American voter” – acknowledged that the administration knew U.S. workers would lose their job-based health insurance when President Obama’s signature legislation took effect.

“If you like your health-care plan, you can keep it,” Obama said numerous times when pitching the new law.

But by fall 2013, more than 4 million Americans were getting cancellation letters in their mailboxes.

As it turns out, Gruber, also an MIT economics professor, apparently knew it would happen – reportedly comparing U.S. workers losing their insurance to people “falling off a building.”

In a Nov. 13 piece for Time magazine, reporter Kate Pickert wrote, “I’ve talked to Gruber many times over the past six years. He’s a good source because he’s smart, candid and was privy to the Democratic behind-the-scenes thinking and maneuvering that preceded passage of the Affordable Care Act.”

Pickert recalled a particular conversation she had with Gruber: “In 2013, for instance, I asked Gruber if Democrats understood that the ACA would slowly and methodically erode the system under which millions of Americans get health insurance through their jobs. In pitching the ACA, Democrats had been adamant that the law would support and sustain the employer-based system, not erode it. But Gruber knew better and he told me so, likening workers being kicked off job-based health plans to people ‘falling off a building,’ an outcome that architects of the ACA knew was likely and had planned for“ (italics added).

In February this year, the Congressional Budget Office released its annual Budget and Economic Outlook, projecting, as a result of Obamacare,”between 6 million and 7 million fewer people will have employment-based insurance coverage each year from 2016 through 2024 than would be the case in the absence of the ACA.”

Read more at http://www.wnd.com/2014/11/gruber-knew-americans-would-lose-job-based-insurance/#bg1AJtPQKzpDfJPc.99

“The very definition of a ‘housing recovery’ is falling prices to dramatically lower and more affordable levels”.

Precisely.

“Get some risk put back into the market and get these interest rates up to 10-12% where they belong. Then watch the economy accelerate like you’ve never seen.”

Exactly.

phony scandals