The Housing Bubble

Good point Poet!

San Diego, CA Sale Prices Plummet 16%; Sellers Flood Market And Slash Prices

http://www.zillow.com/san-diego-ca-92130/home-values/

“Its all about the fundamentals.”

+1 Eventually gravity wins.

Oh my….

Pittsfield, MA Rental Rates Sink 22% YoY As Vacancies Skyrocket

http://www.zillow.com/pittsfield-ma/home-values/

Another day in mom’s basement playing World of Warcraft?

Oh dear…

Massachusetts Sale Prices Crater 6% YoY Statewide

http://www.zillow.com/ma/home-values/

Thats not inflation Poet. *Learn* the difference.

Not sure what you’re referring to, but central bankers counterfeiting printing money is the textbook definition of inflation. At least currency inflation which, via supply and demand, inevitably leads to general inflation.

For more information/proof see: Zimbabwe, Argentina.

Cue “The More You Know™” banner.

Not really. Not at all. Inflation requires rapidly rising wages.

Not sure what you’re referring to, but central bankers counterfeiting printing money is the textbook definition of inflation.

Which textbook is that? I can’t imagine that Samuelson would have used that definition.

” Comment by Housing Analyst
2014-12-17 16:37:40

Not really. Not at all. Inflation requires rapidly rising wages.

Lol know how I know you’ve never taken an economics class?

Hint: The Federal Reserve conterfeiters Bank’s perverted definition of inflation isn’t the real one. Rising wages are only a symptom, and by the time they hit, usually what you have is HYPER-inflation.

Using currency inflation to cushion the effects of debt is a common centralbanking tactic - just as azdude originally stated.

To elaborate a bit, Zimbabwe’s central bank printing so much money that soon a gallon of mile was going for around $25,000,000 $Zim is textbook (hyper) inflation.

The Fed’s perverted idea is that it’s only inflation when it affects the supply side, i.e. big corporate interests, say via extreme wage increases. God forbid, when that happens and the common/middle class person might get an economic boost…well by God NOW WE HAVE INFLATION!!!!! (according to the counterfeiters Fed).

When the prices of the things we need for daily life double and triple in a few years, well gosh that doesn’t count cause it’s ummm…..uhhh…..V-O-L-A-T-I-L-E and thus shouldn’t be counted at all. Yeah, that’s the ticket: Volatile.

So food, fuel, and housing, magically don’t ever inflate(even though they clearly do), but any hint of wages going up must be dealt with severely.

Jeebus, I don’t think even John Lovitz could pass off BS like that.

If you really believe that wages have to inflate for there to be actual inflation then you’re the bankster’s model puppet.

Dance for your masters!

Inflation doesn’t occur without rising wages. Here’s a hint. Wages aren’t rising.

Lol it’s like talking to Rain Man. “Yeah, yeah definitely not inflation. Definitely not inflation. Of course I’m an excellent economist. Just ask my Dad. Fifteen minutes to Wopner….”

Again, just because your government and the Fed refuse to acknowledge inflation in food, fuel, and housing doesn’t mean it’s not happening.

Dance for you masters!

They’re your masters. You invoke their definitions.

There is inflation and there is price fixing. *Learn* the difference.

FWIW, both Investopedia and wikipedia basically define it thusly: “Inflation is defined as a sustained increase in the general level of prices for goods and services.” Google dictionary defines it economically as “A general increase in prices and fall in the purchasing value of money.”

Same thing.

Are you seriously going to argue that things like Bacon, Milk, and auto repair service haven’t increased by 300%+ in the last 10-30 years?

That’s inflation. Textbook definition. It’s the time value and/or present discount value of money. I believe Samuelson devoted at least an entire chapter to it.

I don’t mean to bust your chops, but the perverted perception that action should be taken by the Fed when wages rise but not when the price of pretty much anything else does is, in my humble opinion, one of the largest if not THE largest cause of the loss of purchasing power and economic station of the middle class.

It’s one of the great lies of our time, and I take any opportunity I can get to dispel it.

Who’s fixing the price of Milk and bacon or car repairs? “Price fixing” is a case of monopolistic or collusion practices. That’s the case with Comcast and a few other cases, but in the broader economy, supply and demand still rule the day.

Increase the money supply (what the Fed does via counterfeiting OMOs, QA, etc - electronic money printing) and supply and demand dictates that price inflation follows. See Zimbabwe for an extreme example.

Thanks to an influx of cheap labor and outsourcing (both threatened and real) wages have stayed nominally stable, thus driving the purchasing power of the American worker steadily downward for decades. That doesn’t mean there’s no such thing as inflation.

It just means that whatever propagandist(s) have manged to convince you that inflation doesn’t exist just because wages haven’t inflated with everything else has done an awesome job.

Just because they don’t want to call it inflation unless wages go up doesn’t mean you have to go along with it.

Now you know better. If you choose otherwise you’re willfully ignorant.

QED

Up above you wrote that central bankers printing money is the textbook definition of inflation. Now you’ve looked up the definition and you see that it’s something else.

Minor correction: “OMOs QA, etc” should be “OMOs QE etc.”

As in Quantitative Easing, i.e. “we’ll just go ahead and counterfeit create a pile of new money and ease it out into the economy but loaning it for (near) free to ourselves (i.e. the shareholders of the Fed ™ who are the only ones with access to the discount window).

They basically counterfeit money and loan it to themselves at near-zero interest. Quite a racket they got going on there.

“Who’s fixing the price of Milk and bacon or car repairs? “Price fixing” is a case of monopolistic or collusion practices. That’s the case with Comcast and a few other cases, but in the broader economy, supply and demand still rule the day.”

The fed. Call it whatever you want but price fixing is not inflation.

“Increase the money supply (what the Fed does via counterfeiting OMOs, QA, etc - electronic money printing) and supply and demand dictates that price inflation follows. See Zimbabwe for an extreme example.”

They can print $4trillion and warehouse it. ZERO effect.

“Thanks to an influx of cheap labor and outsourcing (both threatened and real) wages have stayed nominally stable, thus driving the purchasing power of the American worker steadily downward for decades. That doesn’t mean there’s no such thing as inflation.”

That’s not inflation.

Was the tripling of housing prices from 1996-2007 inflation? Of course not. It was price fixing by the fed via credit expansion. The price of all these items have nothing to do with inflation and everything to do with backstopping the price fixing with credit. You can call it inflation by proxy but it doesn’t meet the definition of inflation.

If wages were spiraling as they were in the 70’s and gold tracking wages as it was in the 70’s, we’d have an inflationary spiral. That’s not the case.

Falling prices is positively bullish and good for the economy.

Part and parcel.

Central bankers print money, and prices inflate.

I guess if you want to get semantic then one could say that central banks’ currency inflation(counterfeiting) is the primary textbook cause of general price inflation.

Then again, one could also unclench their buttcheeks and realize that it’s all the same process.

“Central bankers print money, and prices inflate.”

And how does this currency expanding price fixing make a difference in the absence of credit?

Here’s a thought experiment that might settle the sbove argument: Suppose the Fed kept its “money printing” activity intact, but all of the federally guaranteed lending programs at Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, USDA, FHA, etc were suddenly terminated.

Q. Wither housing in the above scenario?

A. CR8R!

It’s due to solar flares.

George Bush did it.

W or HW (or both)?

Both and the rest of them going back to their great great great great grandfathers of course.

…Git ‘er dun!

love it!

“they attacked us on 9/11 because they hate our freedoms”

And we have Playboy.

“they attacked us on 9/11 because they hate our freedoms”

Certainly, they hate us because our societies do not legally condone such behavior as the link below identifies. I do not understand liberal feminists defending Islam, they do not know the history. While some Muslims may claim that Islam does not condone such behavior they are probably lying since Islam allows for and encourages lying to infidels to promote the “faith” or they just do not understand their own religion.

http://www.albawaba.com/editorchoice/signs-world-ending-isil-published-guideline-taking-female-sex-slaves-632490

Certainly, they hate us because our societies do not legally condone such behavior as the link below identifies

There’s no evidence to support such a reason for the hatred. If you want to understand it, you should consider US policies in the Middle East since 1945.

Islam’s hatred of the West (Christianity) goes back to its creation not to 1945, you should study Islam and maybe you will see that the fundamentalists reflect true Islam as taught by the prophet.

I am sure the Muslim Turks committed genocide against the Christian Armenians during and just after WWI due to US policies after 1945. Yea that makes sense. (not).

I was referring to the quote “they attacked us on 9/11 because they hate our freedoms”. It was the World Trade Center and the Pentagon that were attacked on that day. Presumably, if the reason for their hatred of “us” was Christianity, they would have chosen different targets, such as the Vatican and the Canterbury Cathedral.

After a thousand plus years, they have added secular values to the hatred of non-Islamic countries. They attacked the trade center since they correctly calculated that target would do the most economic damage to the US. I remember many Muslims commenting after the attack that liberty was just an excuse for libertine and was un-Islamic.

Nothing of importance happened before 1945.

Are you asserting $8 trillion of new free sh!t programs? That would be incorrect.

New or existing is a distinction without a difference, he made sure they were funded and expanded.

That would have to include the two wars started by Bush, along with his Medicare prescription drug benefit.

Bush has his own deficit and it is about half of Obama’s and it includes those items.

and the Bush tax cuts left us with less revenue.

I see Obama as a tight wad: http://money.cnn.com/2014/01/27/news/economy/spending-obama/
NEW YORK (CNNMoney)
It’s unlikely that President Obama will ever shake his reputation among Republicans as a big spender. But a key fact counters that rap.

Bush has his own deficit and it is about half of Obama’s and it includes those items.

Then the recession occurred, which further increased the deficit.

Nancy falls further into the minority, thanks Obama:

You can say that about the midterm elections for every two-term president in recent memory, except Clinton who got lucky. 1986 was great year for the Democrats, as was 2006.

Did you miss the part about the Republicans having their greatest majority in over 80 years and remember the Democrats started out with their greatest majority in decades, no this was not a normal shift during Obama’s presidency.

It says the largest House majority in 83 years. If you go back to 2006, the last election year before Obama was either president or running for president, the Democrats had 233 in the House to the Republicans’ 202. In 2008, with Obama at the head of the ticket, the Democrats increased their total to 257. That was not a historically high count. The Democrats had more seats at various points a few decades ago. They had a very good year in 1974, when they won 291 seats.

So the 247 seats currently held by the Republicans is a historic accomplishment for them, but it’s not such a big deal in the grand scheme of things. This last election also had a historically low turnout. The Republicans won a House majority in 2012 when there was a larger turnout, but they actually lost the popular vote House seats, so state-level gerrymandering is a factor.

One thing both Ben and I agreed on was that the Democrats were going to either repeal Obamacare or they would pay the price at the polls, and they did big time.

In 2008, with Obama at the head of the ticket, the Democrats increased their total to 257. That was not a historically high count.

Are you really that clueless? The Democrats went from having a large majority to a point where the Republicans have the most seats in 80 plus years, this is not a normal change as you tried to portray it in your first post. It is something that might happen every century.

You ignored everything that I wrote, didn’t you? The low turnout, the gerrymandering, you’re just not interested.

Albuquerquedan: One thing both Ben and I agreed on was that the Democrats were going to either repeal Obamacare or they would pay the price at the polls, and they did big time.

I’m not sure this has anything to do with Obamacare. I look at the Maryland governor’s race. It was truly uninteresting. A nominally black Democrat with an outstanding resume (2 Harvard degrees and 30 years as an officer in the Army). As the evening wore on, it seemed the absolutely incomprehensible would happen - the Republican, who’d never led in any polls - was winning. Incomprehensible. And then - the concession and acceptance speeches. Truly stunning.

But - voter turnout was only 44%. I think the Democrat constituencies stayed home not because of Obamacare, but because there was no candidate they wanted to support. The cause? I suspect economic malaise. The kicker here was the low turnout.

There are a few (powerful) groups who hate Obamacare but for the typical consumer, it has no impact which I can see.

Its regulations caused a good part of the economic malaise and motivated Republicans. Besides contrary to the Democrats it did not become widely popular, Democrats ran from it and Obama being on the defense is never good in politics.

is it so cal dave? lower gas prices are good for walmart shoppers arent they?

Oil just hit $59 a barrel so they better fuel up fast.

Only another $25 to fall eh ABQ_D?

No only another $25 to rise in the next year, two years out, we hit $100.

is it so cal dave ??

Nor-Cal…

In the meantime, crude continues to crater. Why wouldn’t it considering demand is collapsing?

“In the meantime, crude continues to crater.”

Don’t let facts like oil is up over $2 a barrel today get in your way, or the fact we are up 10% from the bottom made Monday.

Or down 50% in the matter of 60 days. Just another bounce on the way down the stairs.

Kind of like housing.

Cambridge, MA Sale Prices Sink 4% YoY; Housing Demand Plummets

http://www.zillow.com/cambridge-ma/home-values/

I would not consider a few days a trend Adan…

I would not consider a few days a trend Adan…

or even six months. But the fact remains the basic rule of economics have not been repealed, people only invest in areas where they expect to make a reasonable return and with today’s geology that is about $100 a barrel.

This is how I see it.

1. The world was ready, willing, and able to pay $100 per barrel for oil; However
2. Fracking has allowed lots of oil to be produced profitably at somewhere between $50 and $70 per barrel, depending on who you talk to.
3. Oil production from a fracked well declines starting immediately–therefore, to continue to increase production from these areas, drilling needs to continue at a high level.
4. Recently, new permits for drilling in fracking areas has declined approximately 30%, but hasn’t stopped.
5. At anything like stable prices at $50-$70 per barrel, Iran, Russia, Venezuela, and lots of other oil-producing countries are screwed–they need higher prices to balance their budgets.

My conclusion?

Any oil price below $50 is likely to be an unstable level (prices will tend to rise from here, since production will inevitably decline).

Any oil price above $80 is likely to be an unstable level (prices at this level will make marginal locations profitable, thus increasing supply).

Oil producing countries that need high oil prices are screwed.

How the damage to those oil producing countries affects the world is an open question.

and with today’s geology that is about $100 a barrel ??

I am no expert so I don’t know but if true thats for a new well…Anything existing is “sunk cost” so anticipated return is replaced with current return…Anticipated return is a go/no-go decision…After the well is in, take what the market allows no matter what the Anticipated return was…

“or even six months. But the fact remains the basic rule of economics have not been repealed, people only invest in areas where they expect to make a reasonable return and with today’s geology that is about $100 a barrel.”

There it is folks. ABQ_D’s production cost analysis. In other words, he doesn’t know chit.

Anything existing is “sunk cost” so anticipated return is replaced with current return

I am not talking about wells that have already been drilled, I am talking about the cost of new wells and new sources of oil. Not oil that was discovered 70 years ago, oil such as pre-salt oil which is “today’s geology.” If fracking wells declined at the rate of the old wells say 2 to 3% per year, you would be right, but know that we are talking about 30% and more decline rates, it is the cost of the new well that is important, the wells that we have already drilled cannot stop the decline in production that is coming.

Why wouldn’t production decline given the fact that demand has cratered?

And what is the cost of “new wells”?

Show me any data that shows that oil consumption has actually fallen instead of just not increased as rapidly!!

Overflowing tank farms across the globe is your evidence. That’s why oil prices are cratering.

Now back up you field development cost expertise.

Adan-

A friend of mine invested early in the Bakken (yes, he has done well). The most interesting factoid from talking with him is that the early wells took about 4 months to drill and frack. The new wells take 21 days now. Much lower cost of labor.

In any event, any comparison to prior gluts/busts is faulty for the reason you note…very rapid decline in production after the initial burst of activity for a fracked well. In the past, the marginal cost of pumping oil after the cost of drilling was very low, and so a glut could be sustained for years after the initial creation of the glut. However in this case, while it’s relatively cheap to continue to pump oil (as before), the amount of oil pumped goes down very quickly, making the fact that it’s cheap to continue to pump completely moot.

“No only another $25 to rise in the next year, two years out, we hit $100.”

Why would you be cheering for that scenario? You must have skin in the game. Do your self a favor and liquidate your positions as fast as possible, the end of the ponzi is drawing near.

#SellSellSell

And jobs and housing both landed hard ??

Hard would be understated….It crushed millions….Lost everything they had…

That’s what happens when you pay too much and borrow to do it.

Lesson: If you pay too much, you’re going to lose big.

“Hard would be understated….It crushed millions….Lost everything they had…”

+1 Some authors call that period America’s first great recession since the 30’s depression. Unemployment was really high, and construction was absolutely dead in the water.

You mean like right now.

Banks could also potentially return to solid profit-based business models, rather than casino gambling operations.

Banks could also potentially return to solid profit-based business models ??

Raise rates in the face of deflation trends ?? We are already the go to safe haven for capital….Raising rates would just accelerate a run toward our T-Bills….FED is stuck between a rock and a hard place….They need the other world economies to get out of the deflationary trend…

On the other hand, it’s nice to rest assured that you can run up your electronic balance sheet to the tune of several trillion, yet foreign investors still flock to the dollar and dollar-denominated assets.

yet foreign investors still flock to the dollar and dollar-denominated assets ??

Half a pie is better than no pie…There are many places in the world that you risk losing it all if you leave it there…

I’ve got a pile of cash and emergency savings salivating for higher interest rates. Bring it!!

Bring it !!

At this point in time, the only thing that higher rates will hurt is us…If the FED raises rates in the face of zero rate and in the case of Germany & Sweden a negative rate policy money will just flock to the T-Bill and drive effective rates back down…Given the state of affairs in the world economies right now I think the FED is stuck in the mud…

when will they announce QE4? The economy is addicted to the printing presses now.

No one wants austerity under their watch. The only way out is to keep creating more dollars than you pay on interest to service the debt.

The economy is addicted to the printing presses ??

The world is addicted….We stalled the meltdown in 2008…Finding the way back to normalcy for the entire economic world is no easy task…And still a task that there is no clear answer so, its stay the course for now…

Staying the course on collapsing demand and cratering prices is indeed the right thing to do.

Now imagine cascading defaults in the so-called emerging nations on dollar denominated debts. Imagine oil patch and mining debt defaults and the pyramid of debt induced inflation shrinking instead of growing.

Imagine you still owe 5 years of your (past) salary on your house (and the HELOCs you rode in on).

u have a strange imagination.

Poet… Do you really thing inflation(Wages) are going to rise?

Post never appeared so I will repeat. Yes, I expect wages to rise 2% in the U.S. and 10% in China over the next year.

So wages aren’t going to double or triple to meet grossly inflated prices?

Thanks for that tip.

It may explain a good portion of the Bush’s deficit but not Obama’s deficit. Unless you consider the states as job creators and their wish to avoid laying off union workers by using federal money as “tax cuts”.

Tax revenue always increases after a tax cut. It did in the 60s, the 80s and the 00s. Proble. Is spending in erased even more. Yet progressives think tax cut = deficit.

It depends on the tax rate at the time of the tax cut, even Arthur Laffer would admit that some tax cuts do not pay for themselves. I do not think the Bush tax cuts cost the revenue some claim but I do not think they paid for themselves. Lowering the corporate rate would have been far more effective than cutting high income individuals, IMHO.

LOL!

u guys r funny people.

But watching you tirelessly work is priceless Poet.

Oh my word.

Salem, OR Sale Prices Crater 7% YoY

http://www.zillow.com/or-97303/home-values/

Living in a rental will never feel like a real home.

Uh oh….

Las Vegas, NV Sale Prices Crater 5% YoY; Plunge 12% MoM

http://www.zillow.com/las-vegas-nv-89113/home-values/

Falling prices isn’t doomsday Dave.

Falling prices is positively bullish and good for the economy.

“anything a value they…may just swim out and take it”

OK. I am thinking of someone swimming out to take my generator, or maybe my corelle dishes and my cribbage board. Holding up a boat bum has slim prospects. Ok, the silverware is silver, but no one under 50 would recognize that.

They could take your boat after tossing your corpse into the lake/ocean.

They? Who is they?

Of course they could, the ones left. Are all the land whales already dead at that point?

LOL, after a mile swim in cold water I rather think they would be a clumsy bunch. Would they swim out with grappling hooks and climb ropes to board?

after a mile swim in cold water ??

You got to come to shore for food & gas sooner or later…..

Colorado
There are Medical and Dental Tourism firms that escort you to and from US tourism firms approved clinics. Although I wholeheartedly agree with you, there are cases where traveling into Mexico is safe. The govt LOVES the Dental & Medical Tourism $. I’m doing my due diligence starting with the MDA (Mexico Dental Association) credential certification. Many MDA members are also ADA members.

Mexico’s peasants are our criminal invaders.

I am in favor of the Cuban decision. Hey, we trade with China, and it’s not exactly a mirror govt model of the USA.
Rubio (R) seems like a whining hack.

What about Menendez? Oh wait he’s a Democrat, he’s cool, even though he said the exact same thing Rubio said.

Are they going to swim out to my boat also? I think I’ll need more flares.

Falling prices isn’t “crash and burn”. Falling prices is positively bullish and your wallets best friend.

And yet Mexico is a functioning nation.

Really? I think the illegals pouring across our borders, the drug trade/wars, and the rampant corruption suggests otherwise.

It’s not Somalia. And they come because they are next door. If it was in South American there would be no Mexodus.

Seems like the lefties like ever increasing prices and debt, goes hand in hand with the chaos model.

#ClowardAndPiven

I worked with Jack and I spent time at his home in MB. Even in his last yrs, his arms were solid as bricks. Great man!

Avo
Jack - I admire his early adopter mentality, and he built an honest empire, not like the Kardashians (being famous for being famous). He honored is body and practiced what he preached. As I kid, I watched his show, and couldn’t keep up. That dude was in shape, and was so until the end. IIRC he was a former Chiropractor.

I saw pictures of him in his 70s and 80s and you are right. Solid triceps and biceps. His motto was to stay in motion and his diet was just the Mediterranean diet. His only dessert was a couple glasses of red wine (he was French descent).

He has a museum at his house with all the weight machines he invented. He just never patented them before they got popular.

“…and his diet was just the Mediterranean diet.”

Jack also said to avoid anything made with white flour.

Got a little bit of smarm going there eh Dave?

Yep….Every day…..

Not too hard. When I was in Raleigh I was struck by the number of Bojangle’s Fried Chicken places. They must have outnumbered all the burger joints combined.

I was struck by the number of Bojangle’s ??

Yep….And go into any restaurant that is now a national chain….Grits….Gravy….Mashed potatoes with all the fixens…Biscuits…and the main course….Deep Fried Chicken…

Great for mountain bikers and snow skiers. Great for MJ tokers ?

No snow but you get the Ocean in return….

any deals in the bay area on homes? what do you think of the petaluma, santa rosa area?

SCDave “MJ” = marijuana

AZdude:

My sister lived in Petaluma a few years and is now in San Rafael. I was actually up in those towns over this last weekend. Santa Rosa is more working class up further north. San Rafael is upper end. If you like the Northern California climate of cool temperatures and winter rains, it’s a great area. the air is clean too. Petaluma is not as costly as San Rafael. There are smaller towns in the area. San Anselmo north of San Rafael, then Nicosio / Woodacre even smaller. Lots of biking opportunities. Larkspur is next to San Rafael and also small. You are generally safe there, as if you are in Orange County in the Irvine area.

Deals on homes? I defer that to Dave to answer.

any deals in the bay area on homes ??

Nope…Everything close to the job centers has gone vertical…Got to get over the hill or to south county (Gilroy) to start getting some decent pricing in relationship to what you get relatively speaking…

what do you think of the petaluma, santa rosa area ??

Its not as bad as the bay area near all the tech employers…

When I say not as bad I mean prices….Its a wonderful area to live in…Little wet and a little hot as compared to the bay area but still very nice…

I’ve lived in Santa Rosa for 7 years and like it a lot, as was said an excellent area for bicycling EXCEPT that the roads in Sonoma Co. are no longer maintained well and many are extremely rough…still my main interests in retirement are bicycling, motorcycling, and vintage sports cars and this is a great place to enjoy them.
However Bubble 2.0 is definitely happening here, prices are up about 60% in the last 2.5 years i.e small houses that were $250K in 2012 are now $400K+. I tried to buy for a year in 2011/2012, made about 8 offers and was ignored in every case due to competition from 100% cash flippers and speculators. Definitely would not buy anything now and just turned down an offer to be partners on a property. Waiting for Bubble 2.0 to pop in 2015 and may try again if prices drop back to 2011 levels but am hoping I there won’t be a second wave of flippers and specuvestors to compete with…that was very discouraging and I gave up after a year of wasted time and disappointments.
Petaluma is considerably more expensive than Santa Rosa and for parts of the year the odor from the nearby chicken and livestock operations is STRONG and would gag a maggot…still it is a very nice town overall, worked there for awhile and liked it, but the RE is out of my price range.

I grew up in Petaluma, but haven’t been back for years. I still have friends there.

One note. If you look up the history of growth control ordinances, Petaluma was one of the first to have such a law in place. It restricted the number of building permits per year, thus restricting supply, regardless of demand. That has caused prices to generally be higher in town than they would have been otherwise.

We always thought there was a different between Marin County folks, and those farther north (Petaluma is in Sonoma County). My friends who are still in Petaluma say that the people who are moving into town make it more like Marin County was 20 years ago.

Is that bad? It depends who you are. When I grew up, there was a reasonable mix of the ag community and the rest of town (parades celebrating the agricultural history of the town, lots of multi-generational dairy families active in town, kids had parties out in the middle of fields, etc.). Marin was much different–much more urbanized–agricultural folks were more fringe. To me, it would be kind of sad if Petaluma was similarly urbanized today.

Anyway onto whether there are “deals”. At this point, I doubt it. That said, you would probably do better looking outside of town than in town. Get more land, more open space, which IMHO is part of the allure of Petaluma/Santa Rosa vs. San Rafael.

Yes and he is making sure he has less and less of them to hate every year.

New York Rental Rates Plunge 18% YoY Statewide

http://www.zillow.com/ny/home-values/

“…cryptocurrency is here to stay.”

Yes.

“And it’s worthless because you have to have other people in the chain to make the coins usable.”

And it’s the ongoing risk that your preferred cryptocurrency’s users will get syphoned off to another newer, sexier one, plus the lack of a monetary authority to stabilize its value, that suggests bitcoin will remain forever unstable and subject to periodic crashes and devaluations.

What’s worse, with a sufficient number of new entrants to the unregulated cryptocurrency arena, the value of bitcoin can easily be dissipated to 0. Technically speaking, this is known as rent dissipation due to an open-access externality.

We need webcam verification of Lolacado. Wear a green shirt.

Now you know.