Everybody Got The Same Idea
A report from Bloomberg. “Canadians who collected Sunbelt bargains during the housing crash have shifted from buying to selling. They’re locking in gains from years of soaring values that are even sweeter because the American dollar, in the past five years, has jumped about a third against their home currency. In Naples, a wealthy southwest Florida town that’s bolstered by Canadian snowbirds escaping cold winters, sales plunged 19 per cent in the first quarter and inventory is piling up. The inventory of homes on the market rose 33 per cent in the first quarter from a year earlier, data from the Naples Area Board of Realtors show. Transactions are also down in once-booming getaway areas such as Palm Springs, California.”
“In the Palm Springs area, a popular getaway for western Canadians, single-family home sales in March were down 2.8 per cent from a year earlier, and inventory rose 45 per cent, according to the California Desert Association of Realtors. Inventory began rising at the end of last year because vacationers saw an opportunity for a currency play, said Joshua Devane, a real estate agent with Bennion Deville who works in the Palm Springs area. ‘Everybody got the same idea, and inventory in the market became a little bit flooded, which makes it difficult to move properties,’ Devane said.”
“In the Phoenix area — which includes Scottsdale, popular with vacationers — Canadians purchased only 110 homes in the first quarter, down from a peak of 1,454 in the second quarter of 2011, according to Michael Orr, founder and publisher of the Cromford Report, a website providing insights on the region’s housing market. Sellers from Canada now outnumber buyers five to one, he said.”
National Real Estate Investor. “For the last few years, the multifamily asset class has been the top performer of all property types. But there is much concern that developers have been adding too much inventory, flooding some markets with new supply. This will inevitably raise vacancy rates and exert downward pressure on rent growth. In fact, new supply has exceeded demand for eight of the last nine quarters. This trend was most pronounced in the last quarter of 2015, when excess supply measured 13,559 units total for the 82 markets Reis tracks. This marked an increase of nearly 10,000 units above the excess supply for the seven prior quarters.”
“In the first quarter of 2016, this trend continued. The vacancy rate climbed to 4.5 percent as 12,000 more units were produced than were absorbed. The oversupply of units has pushed the vacancy rate of CBD sub-markets from a low of 4.4 percent to a high of 6.3 percent in the fourth quarter of 2015.”
SFist in California. “Many of us not in the tech industry saw Twitter’s small round of layoffs last fall. And it turns out, many within the industry look to Twitter as a high-profile barometer as well, and the Chronicle reported this past weekend that that ‘Twitter effect’ has trickled down to the office rental market as a whole, and now more recently to the apartment rental market. Says Chandler Duvall, a big-time property manager in the city, ‘Commercial office brokers get worried, smaller tech companies get worried, venture capitalists get worried — whether it’s legitimate or not. If they are not hiring, should we be hiring? That’s when it starts to affect apartments.’”
“As of last month, also, given the bevy of empty, brand new units that all hit the market at around the same time, properties like this SFist sponsor have been offering one month free if people sign one-year leases — a long-used tactic of landlords when the market becomes more competitive that allows them to keep the base rent up while still giving a discount.”
WBRE in Pennsylvania. “Hundreds of ‘Halliburton’ employees near Montgomery received pink slips Friday, and now the ripple effect of those layoffs is hitting the local economy. Eyewitness News Reporter Cody Butler has the story. Rick Sanguedolce, is the owner of ‘Riverside Campground’, a place where many of Halliburton’s employees from out of state set up temporary homes. Nearly a quarter of the 138 campsites were occupied by those workers now only a few still are are. ‘Its hurt us financially, when you have a large company like Halliburton pull out of an area and let a lot of people go it’s a lot of lost revenue.’”
“If there is a silver lining to all this, it may come in the form of rents. When the boom was on, landlords could set rents as high as the market would bear. But now they have a glut of empty apartments. ‘When you have a large influx of outside workers coming into an area, they bringing a lot of money. But now, that a lot of them have left and are leaving, rent prices have really stabilized,’ said Sanguedolce.”
Nevada Public Radio. “How much do you really know about your neighbors? According to local law enforcement and those in the housing industry, there’s a lot of people living in valley homes who shouldn’t be there. They’re called squatters, and when the economy took a hit in 2008, it created the perfect storm of bank foreclosures and empty houses for squatters to move in. It pushed Las Vegas at the top of the list of metropolitan cities struggling with this issue.”
“Many abandoned homes are foreclosures, which means the banks own them. ‘The banks are absentee. They’re overloaded,’ said Scott Beaudry, the president of the Greater Las Vegas Association of Realtors. Sgt. Kirk Moore of the Henderson Police Department and Vandana Bhalla, a realtor at Signature Real Estate agree there is not one area of the valley with a bigger problem than another. ‘It is really everywhere,’ Moore said. ‘It happens in Summerlin, it happens in Green Valley, some of the nicest neighborhoods in gated communities,’ Bhalla said.”
Scarsdale 10583 on New York. “Though some realtors and residents are laying the blame for a stagnant market for premium homes on Scarsdale’s tax revaluation, it’s clear there are more factors in play than tax rates. A closer look at the market shows that developers have been aggressively buying up and tearing down smaller or older homes and replacing them with premium priced homes that buyers may not be able to afford. There are currently 71 homes on the market in Scarsdale priced at $2,900,000 and above, and among these, 33 of the listings are for new homes.”
“Lewis Arlt of Houlihan Lawrence reported that inventory of homes priced from $3mm to $5mm is up 65%, with 53 active listings this year compared to 32 in that price range at the same time last year. Commenting on the market, Arlt said, ‘Softening in the luxury home market is not due only to village taxes, but a widespread phenomenon. High end product is sitting everywhere. It may have many contributing factors: the stock market, the economy in general, uncertainty in the world, etc., but for whatever reasons, $3M+ buyers around here are scarce, and in some cases they’re simply not perceiving value. There’s an oversupply at the high end, and too many entry-level buyers for the scarce supply we have.’”
“There’s an oversupply at the high end, and too many entry-level buyers for the scarce supply we have.’”
There is only one solution albeit painful. Lower the price. Looks like some “entry level buyers”(not sure what that means) are going to be living it up.
‘A closer look at the market shows that developers have been aggressively buying up and tearing down smaller or older homes and replacing them with premium priced homes that buyers may not be able to afford. There are currently 71 homes on the market in Scarsdale priced at $2,900,000 and above, and among these, 33 of the listings are for new homes’
So it’s been all across the country. Eliminating perfectly affordable housing one way or another and replacing it with over-priced housing. “Oh, but there’s a shortage!” Look around, there’s no shortage. The densest urban are in the country (Manhattan) has a glut of housing! If Tokyo can be overbuilt, any place can.
So far as S.F. weather goes it varies greatly on the west (foggy) and east (sunny) sides of town, I’m a native and lived on both sides. The auto break in problem has evidently gotten worse but was already a major problem when I moved away 20 years ago…even then it was far more sensible to drive a mechanically sound beater if you lived in town. That being said I was paying $700/month for a decent apartment then, paying $4K/month to deal with street crime, sidewalks being used as a toilet, etc. would indeed be madness unless you were making a LOT of money or were on track to do so.
The amount of Tesla’s driving around that city…prime targets. The amount of people I met working 2-3 bartending jobs to be able to afford the dream and live in a studio in the Tenderloin -_- Sheesh
I was puzzled by your sentence, so forgive me for rewriting it for anyone else who was likewise puzzled.
“That being said I was paying $700/month for a decent apartment then.
[Anyone] paying $4K/month [today] to deal with street crime, sidewalks being used as a toilet, etc. would indeed be madness”
My first thought was of George Segal’s brother in “Where’s Poppa?” who got mugged by the same guys every time he passed through Central Park.
I forget the exact line - “You know the routine - go like Cornel Wilde!” (The Naked Prey.)
Classic.
With rental rates and prices falling in the Bay area, not too many are paying $4000/month.
‘Real estate consultant and appraiser Jonathan J. Miller, in his quarterly Westchester report prepared for Douglas Elliman Real Estate, said prices of Westchester luxury homes ̶ the upper 10 percent of single-family home sales ̶ “continue to remain soft.” The average price of a luxury home was $2,365,910 in the first quarter, down more than 3 percent from the first quarter of 2015. The price threshold in Westchester for inclusion in that luxury category dropped to $1.4 million in the first quarter, down from $1.6 million a year ago, according to Miller.’
‘The decline in luxury-home prices could be due in part to a surge in listings of high-end properties. There were 915 houses listed in the luxury category at the end of the first quarter, up from 586 listings in the first quarter of 2015 and 623 listings at the end of last year, Douglas Elliman Real Estate reported.’
At Hudson Gateway Association of Realtors, Haggerty said the four-county market “is running smoothly and at high speed. The supply of housing seems adequate to support the high volume of sales. Price increases are not outpacing inflation and are falling back in some areas and among some property types. That easing of prices probably is one of the major factors driving prospective purchasers to enter a local real estate market where buyers’ and sellers’ expectations are in accord.”
‘The average first-quarter sale price of a single-family home in Westchester was $768,767, down nearly 7 percent from a year ago. The median price of a single-family home dropped 5 percent in the first quarter to $569,950, down from $600,000 in the first quarter of both 2014 and 2015.’
‘The recent Panama Papers leak has triggered controversy around the world as various offshore transactions and tax haven of the most powerful people were revealed. Along with this, different anomalies in various sectors were uncovered, and a recent report claims that Miami’s luxury real estate boom was brought about by money laundering through condos in the state.’
‘The Panama Papers leak follows the US government’s crackdown in money laundering through real estate properties in Miami. However, for analyst Jack McCabe, it’s impossible to uncover all the properties purchased through “dirty money.”
“But I think many people believe it could be a sizable portion of the new condominium market in Miami,” McCabe said. “Even though developers and real-estate professionals suspect many of these units are bought with illegal funds, they realize their projects may not be successful without that support.”
I did a podcast in September (IIRC) 2014 with Mr McCabe in which we discussed money laundering in south Florida. He said at the time it would be about 2 years before the market turned.
‘Lax U.S. rules and real estate industry’s no-questions-asked approach make it easy for dodgy characters to funnel wealth through high-end Manhattan apartments.’
‘One day during Chen Shui-bian’s second term as Taiwan’s president, several people lugged what a witness described as “five or six” fruit boxes into the presidential residence in Taipei. Inside the crates, the witness later said, was 200 million in New Taiwan Dollars, equal to about $6 million in U.S. currency.’
‘The cash was a bribe intended for first lady Wu Shu-jen, a sweetener encouraging her to prod her husband to provide regulatory relief to a securities firm involved in a contested merger, according to court claims by U.S. and Taiwanese authorities. Pulling strings in such situations, the witness said, required getting “consent from Madam.”
‘Documents in U.S. District Court in Manhattan describe the circuitous path that authorities believe the cash followed after it was unpacked from the fruit boxes: First it was stored in a bank vault in Taipei along with other piles of loose cash that the first lady described as political donations . Later much of the cash in the vault was stuffed into seven suitcases and stored in a basement at the home of an executive involved in the corporate merger. After a time it was moved, in a roundabout way, through banks in Hong Kong and the U.S. and into a Swiss account controlled by the first couple’s son.’
‘In the spring of 2008, a chunk of that money was wired into an account in Miami. U.S. authorities claim that on May 29, 2008 — nine days after Chen had completed his second and final term as Taiwan’s president — money from the Miami account was used to buy a prime piece of a real estate in yet another destination in the money’s global odyssey.’
‘The property: a $1.575 million apartment in Manhattan’s Onyx Chelsea, a glass and metal tower “steps away,” as real estate promoters say, from Chelsea Park and Madison Square Garden.’
‘The movement of dirty money from fruit boxes in Taipei into America’s real estate capital illustrates, in vivid detail, one of New York’s dirty secrets: High-end New York real estate is an alluring destination for corrupt politicians, tax dodgers and money launderers around the globe.’
‘New York is among an elite group of destinations — along with Miami, London, Dubai and a few other cities around the world — that attract large numbers of international property buyers. Manhattan condos are popular with wealthy Chinese, Russians and South Americans. Since 2008, roughly 30 percent of condo sales in pricey Manhattan developments have been to buyers who listed an international address or bought in the name of a limited liability company or some other corporate entity, a maneuver often employed by foreign purchasers.’
Westchester County, NY Homes for Sale & Real Estate-5,585 Homes
http://www.realtor.com/realestateandhomes-search/Westchester-County_NY
Westchester County, NY Homes, Price Reduced-1,798 Homes
http://www.realtor.com/realestateandhomes-search/Westchester-County_NY/shw-pr
32% of all sellers in Westchester County reduced their price at least once.
Too little supply relative to demand of any product in any market drives prices higher.
There will be no incentive for builders to lower their prices until they need to, and there is no need if they can still find buyers at their asking prices.
New York is overbuilt, but primarily for very high end condos.
Supply is severely lacking for homes that are considered “starter” homes–and that is keeping prices too high at the low-end.
With housing demand at 20 year lows and tens of millions of excess empty and defaulted houses out there, there is plenty of supply Rental_Fraud.
San Fran bubble pop on the news
Portland ,Seattle r next
we need more Colombian cash buying drug dealers…..how can we entice them to buy in san fransillyisco?
SF is the most insane market I’ve ever worked/visited in. People pay $4,000/mo to walk out the front door and be accosted by violent methed out hobos and deal with MUNI trains that seem to show up when they please.
Here’s a recent NYT article that talks about street crime in San Francisco …
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/25/us/san-francisco-torn-as-some-see-street-behavior-worsen.html?_r=0
“Visitors come to bask in the Mediterranean climate, stroll through the charming streets and marvel at the sweeping views of the bay and the Pacific.”
_________________________/
Uh, “bask” in San Francisco’s climate? How much time has the writer spent there? I’ve visited three times, all in the summer, and learned to appreciate the line “the coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco.”
Interesting that much of the crime is of the smash-and-grab variety. Is it that hard not to leave items in plain sight in your car? Where I grew up it was accepted that anything left in view was likely to be gone by the time you returned.
There are those on the street who watch the actions of drivers who park their cars on the street. Drivers who show a lot of activity and effort spent in hiding what the have in their car are advertising to anyone who cares to pay attention that there the car probably contains some valuable items.
I don’t doubt that, but smash-and-grab is a more difficult proposition when something is in the trunk.
In California, you can wager whatever is in the trunk is illegal or a crime like drugs, a dead body, slaves of various types, stolen items, burglary tools, etc.
“slaves of various types” in the trunk
Reminds me of the Cheech and Chong skit where they go the drive-in movie.
He said he felt sorry for whoever broke a window of his limited-edition BWM twice, stealing his gym bag both times.
What an idiot!
1.) Don’t leave your gym bag inside the car, within view of everyone! Put valuables in the trunk! Out of sight, out of mind!
2.) Fool me once, shame on me. Fool me twice, I’m an overpaid fool that shouldn’t be able to purchase a limited-edition BMW and my high paying job would be better spent on someone with more sense!
Don’t leave your gym bag inside the car, within view of everyone! Put valuables in the trunk!
It sounds as if people need to keep everything in the trunk. Not many people keep valuable stuff in gym bags.
The problem is (as I have unsuccessfully tried to convince my wife) that the thief doesn’t KNOW that your gym bag only has sweaty workout clothes in it - they are hoping for an expensive iphone, wallet, house keys, tablet, or whatever else could also be in there. Even if they only score one out of five times on a smash-n-grab, they are still going to take the chance.
This is a huge problem in the Seattle area as well - actually two problems: 1) idiots who leave their purse right on the front seat in plain view, and 2) the police just don’t have the resources to do much about these crimes.
The sheeple of SF voted for liberal Democrat “leadership.” They are getting exactly the maladministration they voted for. I have no sympathy.
The only way they can afford the $4,000 per month rent in San Francisco is that multiple roommates are teaming up and each paying their share of the high cost rent. Which is fine when you’re young and have party on the mind. Eventually you get older and party is no longer on the mind and it will be time to move on. Most likely out of the city, since a single person wouldn’t be able to afford the $4,000 per month rent. At least not for too long.
They were all coders, yes it was 3 of them in a loft style apartment. However once they completed their respective builds for a project, they were handed pink slips. The party ended very quickly.
Here’s 2500+ SF rentals less than $2000 a month.
http://sfbay.craigslist.org/search/apa?max_price=2000
Rental rates are falling in SF.
LOL
Since when is Antioch=SF?
There are about 10% of those in SF proper, and some of those are studios with shared bathrooms.
Like this beauty:
http://sfbay.craigslist.org/sfc/apa/5529759356.html
BYOP
Bring your own pot (to p*ss in)
Plenty of rental housing all over the bay area.
And heres some for sale. 5,000 of them.
http://www.realtor.com/realestateandhomes-search/San-Francisco_CA/radius-10
No shortage of housing in SF either.
Yes but there is money in that area.
Not every company is a big payoff, but over the years enough of them have paid off to enable the market.
Portland ,Seattle r next
God, I hope so…
I keep telling my friend to sell his home in Portland now! He lives in a small part called St Johns (heavy gentrification). He keeps hoping for more, they would be way ahead if they sold at today’s market and moved out to the sticks, which is what they want.
“the coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco.”
However it does get really nice in Sept./Oct., spectacular even.
That said the SF Bay Area is primed for an epic housing crash. All the schmucks that bought in the last few years will be utterly submerged.
The new far left governor of PA (Wolf -D) promised to shut down fracking in the state with massive new taxes.
Like most democrats - he/she never considers cause and effect.
WBRE in Pennsylvania. “Hundreds of ‘Halliburton’ employees near Montgomery received pink slips Friday, and now the ripple effect of those layoffs is hitting the local economy. Eyewitness News Reporter Cody Butler has the story. Rick Sanguedolce, is the owner of ‘Riverside Campground’, a place where many of Halliburton’s employees from out of state set up temporary homes. Nearly a quarter of the 138 campsites were occupied by those workers now only a few still are are. ‘Its hurt us financially, when you have a large company like Halliburton pull out of an area and let a lot of people go it’s a lot of lost revenue.’”
This imbecile should visit my grandparents region, coal country, Northumberland County. The area has been ravished by the decline in coal and factories. Houses cost $30,000, drugs are a growing problem with bored kids who cant get a job at the local supermarket. Its amazing that my grandfather just 30 yrs ago was still making a good honest living off the coal economy.
Choke off coal, choke off fracking, send manufacturing overseas, whats left? Bartending to depressed unemployed folks buying beer and whiskey with disability or unemployment?
$30k is about what a used house is worth generally.
It is the democrat economy.
Get rid of the icky things.
You can always raise taxes to pay off the FSA.
Give unions whatever they want.
No tort reform.
What could go wrong?
Choke off coal, choke off fracking, send manufacturing overseas, whats left?
Import millions of Third World wage slaves and Democrat-on-Arrival entitlement voters and take the corporatocracy to the next level, while the serfs continue to sanction their own demise with their votes for the Republicrat duopoly.
They don’t need those wage slaves even at illegal immigrant prices. Kiosks and robots and drones.
Some day soon someone is going to realize that all those on the dole are no longer “necessary.”
This….related to the economy in coal country and other areas…..
http://www.investors.com/politics/on-the-right/betsy-mccaughey-obamas-killer-economy/
Hey its a win win, the banks can gain more foreclosed assets, the gun agenda can be pushed (increased gun suicides), and no more dirty industrial jobs. Bartenders and waitresses is all we need in this economy.
Choke off coal, choke off fracking, send manufacturing overseas, whats left? Bartending to depressed unemployed folks buying beer and whiskey with disability or unemployment?”
Global security. Thats what the embry riddle college kid I talked to majored in.
Need to keep the supply chain open. Like Sparta in the old days..
That’s were its headed anyway
There’s nothing in that article about taxes causing the layoffs.
Irrelevant.
visit howmoneywalks.com
taxed out
When our permanent Democrat Supermajority imposes a collectivist dictatorship of the takers, we too will be Venezuela. Meet your future, ‘Muricans.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-04-27/venezuela-economy-literally-grinds-halt-maduro-orders-five-day-weekend-public-worker
Looking forward to fighting over a bad of onions…
yes - we - can.
————
In Venezuela, Former Chavistas Risk Lives Fighting over a Bag of Onions
Breitbart | 26 Apr 2016 | Frances Martel
A disturbing video of a crowd physically beating each other to get at a select few bags of onions outside a supermarket in Venezuela highlights the struggle the average Venezuelan must endure to keep his or her family fed in the increasingly impoverished socialist nation.
military coup up next
“How much do you really know about your neighbors? According to local law enforcement and those in the housing industry, there’s a lot of people living in valley homes who shouldn’t be there. They’re called squatters, and when the economy took a hit in 2008, it created the perfect storm of bank foreclosures and empty houses for squatters to move in. It pushed Las Vegas at the top of the list of metropolitan cities struggling with this issue.”
(snip)
“‘It is really everywhere,’ Moore said. ‘It happens in Summerlin, it happens in Green Valley, some of the nicest neighborhoods in gated communities,’ Bhalla said.”
Gated communities, squatters have moved into gated communities.
What is the selling point of gated communities? Is it not the idea that the gates will keep out people who do not belong in the community?
Am I missing something here?
Am I missing something here?
Accountability.
Back in the bad old days of smaller government - banks would take ownership of the house and resell it very quickly as they would eat the monthly losses. On the rare chance a squatter would show up - they would be quickly arrested.
In our progressive new liberal big government of the FSA. The US government backs all these loans. No reason for a bank or wall street firm to ever take ownership. And squatters have rights too (as part of the FSA).
It is funny how when people vote for socialists they are surprised when they get socialism.
And any complaints are racist.
There was a gated apartment complex in Mobile Al next to my hotel while ona project. I was jogging and I guess they close the gate at 4 pm, I had to hop it, and someone was crazily honking their horn at me for hopping their lovely gate to their ghetto apt complex. Idk why, but I thought it was amusing someone got so worked up when it was the shortcut to my hotel.
“I guess they close the gate at 4 pm.”
Sign me up!
I know a couple that live in Summerlin in a gated community. The guy who was heading their HOA was a real POS.
They along with some of their fellow neighbors decided to unseat the HOA guy in the upcoming election. One of the group, on my urging, looked up his property records.
They found a NOD on his property. He hadn’t made a mortgage payment in over two years.
Needless to say my friends were able to get a new individual into the position.
That was a year ago and ex HOA guy is still in the house.
The sheeple on both sides of the Atlantic are starting to get suspicious that trade deals crafted by oligarchs for oligarchs are going to end up shafting the middle and working classes.
http://wolfstreet.com/2016/04/26/transatlantic-corporatocracy-trade-agreement-ttip-begins-to-unravel/
Enjoy your Soros-sponsored “fundamental transformation,” Europe.
http://www.breitbart.com/national-security/2016/04/26/report-islamic-state-sleeper-cells-operational-italy/
Sweden’s “center-left” Quislings have thrown open the door to radical Islamists. Now the Swedes who voted these globalists into power are going to have to live with the consequences of “fundamental transformation.”
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-04-26/sweden-high-alert-after-reports-isis-militants-enter-country-target-civilians
Santana - Winning - YouTube
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HNeXJg0Sh1Q - 375k -
Noon eastern time today will be the announcement of the end of neocon.
And the beginning of the end of crooked?
Which one? The race is lousy with them.
You can win with Bill in LA by stacking gold and silver and platinum, as well as buying Bitcoin, ether coin, and Litecoin.
Palm Springs, CA Housing Affordability Surges As Prices Plunge 8% YoY; Economy Accelerates On Falling Oil Prices
http://www.movoto.com/palm-springs-ca/market-trends/
Precious metals surging as Yellen the Felon is set to announce more dollar-debasing “dovishness” to try to keep the markets juiced and forestall the financial reckoning day until the Oligopoly’s annointed one, Hillary, is installed in office.
http://www.kitco.com/market/
When the Fed and its Wall Street accomplices lose control of our rigged, broken, manipulated “markets” the carnage is going to be epic.
http://davidstockmanscontracorner.com/on-the-impossibility-of-a-soft-landing/
And they know that. Which is why every possible device will be employed to maintain control. There will be no rules anymore, only improvisation and the propaganda needed to sell it. If we had broken up the big banks in 2008, we could have been well on our way to building something better by this time. Now it’s too late.
We’re going to have tragedy that people in ancient Greece would understand. Too bad we don’t study those plays anymore.
Will the Petrodollar (and neocon delusions for bringing “regime change” to the Middle East) be the final casualty of 9/11?
http://www.alt-market.com/articles/2876-one-more-casualty-of-the-911-farce-the-petrodollar
Surprised solar customers find themselves with liens
By Tori Richards / April 15, 2015 / News / 84 Comments
A SORRY PURCHASE: SolarCity panels cover the roof of Jeff Leeds’ home. The panels have been nothing but trouble, he says.
By Tori Richards | Watchdog.org
Jeff Leeds says installing SolarCity’s panels on the roof of his home in the Northern California city of El Granada was the sorriest day of his life.
Agreeing to the company’s 20-year lease was like partnering with the devil, he claims. He says he has endured skyrocketing electric bills, installation of an inferior system and contract violations because SolarCity refuses to clean the panels or to provide a payment for his system’s poor performance.
The latest surprise: a notice from his bank telling him that SolarCity had placed a lien on his home, and that his equity line of credit application could not proceed until the lien was removed.
“I was totally surprised by this and very pissed off,” Leeds said. “When I talked to the bank they told me it was a lien. I had to pay the bank a $48 fee for removal. They held me up from closing my loan to buy a vacation home so I had to borrow from another account. It cost me time in calls to both Wells Fargo and to SolarCity.”
SolarCity say it’s not a lien, but a “fixture filing” that stakes the company’s claim to the panels, which it owns if consumers have taken part in its popular lease program. Owning the solar electricity-generating system allows SolarCity to claim lucrative state and federal subsidies available only to system owners. SolarCity has received approximately $500 million in tax subsidies and grants over the years.
During a Feb. 12 Capitol Hill hearing of the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, U.S. Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., grilled Department of Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz about solar company liens. Flake singled out SolarCity’s rival Stealth Solar as the offender.
“After entering into these long-term agreements, a lot are in for a surprise when they realize they have to pay off a lien put on their house,” said Flake. “What role, if any, can or does DOE plan to play in ensuring these companies who access federal tax incentives in particular … aren’t misrepresenting what they are doing to their customers?”
Moniz was apparently caught off guard by the question and stammered that he didn’t know anything about liens but would look into it.
SolarCity’s website, in a consumer Q&A format, says: “Is there a lien on the solar home? No … the UCC-1 protects our interest in the solar energy system and prohibits the lender from taking ownership of it.”
When Jeff Leeds talked to SolarCity recently about his home title woes, “they referred me to a paragraph sunk deep inside their contract,” he said. “That UCC-1 is what they kept telling me on the SolarCity side, but Wells Fargo Bank considered it a lien and charged me $48 for the fact that it was there.
“SolarCity acted like everyone knew what this UCC thing was, but the bank considered it a lien, period. And nobody explains that to you when you buy it. They give you a huge contract to read and nothing is explained,” Leeds said.
A California banker, who requested anonymity because she is not authorized to speak on this topic, says she encounters enraged homeowners with Leeds’ same scenario five to 10 times a day.
“This is my nightmare for 2015,” the banker said. “(Homeowners) have no idea what they’ve gotten themselves into. (Fixture filings) are definitely liens.”
The banker said she frequently sees contracts with “a provision that allows solar companies to block the sale of your home so they can notify the buyer to enter into an agreement with themselves. Green energy is so popular with lawmakers that it allows these companies to say, ‘This is ours, our property.’
“That lease will follow you until you die,” the banker deadpanned.
Excellent post.
I had a couple of squares of sidewalk replaced and the concrete company put a lien on my house in case they didn’t get paid. “Routine”, they said.
Wow. So the main takeaway is to pay upfront with MasterCard, for almost everything. It’s worth the interest payments to get that debt into unsecured space.
Don’t pay without a signed release of lien from the contractor AND the material supplier.
At $3/sq ft for flatwork, it’s not much money anyways.
Oh…. and lol@donk.
LOL
Where have I seen this before?
“Homeowners are far more likely to pay their electricity bill than their car payment.”
Wall Street’s New Cash Cow: Your Roof
Home solar panels aren’t just generating clean electricity; they’re now asset-backed securities.
Todd Woody Nov 22, 2013
SolarCity raised $54.4 million this week. It didn’t do it, though, by selling a lot of solar panels or stock. Instead, the Silicon Valley company bundled up a bunch of residential leases for the photovoltaic arrays it installed on suburban rooftops—and then sold them to pension funds, hedge funds, and other high-rolling investors.
Packaging leases for cars, ships, trains, and other big-ticket items into so-called asset-backed securities has been common for decades. But this marks the first time that solar has been securitized. SolarCity’s move opens the door to a potentially large new pool of capital that could finance the expansion of renewable energy just as crucial federal tax incentives for green power are set to sunset in the coming years.
“You look at the market and it’s huge,” SolarCity chief financial officer Bob Kelly told me.
How huge? Kelly is already planning to sell $200 million more worth of solar securities in the first half of next year.
“The solar business is asset-intensive,” Kelly says. “Every three minutes we make a sale. For a typical household, the cost is $21,000 to put a solar system on the roof. You need to increase your sources of capital and drive down the cost.”
These days, most homeowners sign 20-year leases for solar panels to avoid such ownership costs, paying a monthly fee in exchange for the electricity the photovoltaic array generates. (Those payments are usually 10 percent to 15 percent lower than what the homeowners would pay their local utility.) Those lease deals generate a dependable source of cash that can be used, in turn, to pay off the notes sold to investors.
To date, companies like SolarCity, Sungevity, and SunRun have raised so-called tax equity funds to finance those leases. Banks and green-minded corporate investors like Google invest hundreds of millions into those funds so they can take advantage of a 30-percent federal tax credit for renewable energy projects. (Last May, for instance, Goldman Sachs put $500 million into a fund to finance SolarCity leases.)
But tax equity funds come with a cost. Kelly says the interest payments on those funds run in the 8-percent to 9-percent range. But SolarCity is paying investors a 4.8-percent rate on the securities it sold this week.
Kelly says it took some effort to get bankers and rating agencies not only to come onboard, but also to understand that what SolarCity is really selling is energy, not solar panels. Homeowners, he notes, are far more likely to pay their electricity bill than their car payment.
Standard & Poor’s gave the bonds a mid-range BBB+ rating. Kelly expects to score a higher rating on future security offerings as the ratings agencies become more familiar and comfortable with the solar business.
The solar industry has been closely watching SolarCity’s foray into securitization, and Kelly expects competitors to follow suit. “They really are going to have to do this to compete,” Kelly says, “as the cost of capital is so important in a capital-intensive business.”
Lemmie see if I understand this.
obama gives billions of US taxpayer dollars to solar CEOs who give heavily to his campaign.
obama has put not one banker in jail and lets rampant fraud go unchecked on wall street.
obama puts out tax breaks for homeowners to install solar panels as they make no economic sense otherwise.
Homeowners, following the script, “lease” the solar panels and are now forever a debt slave.
CEOS, bankers and installers laugh all the way to the 1% bank.
You forgot about the solar companies keeping the federal, state and local “incentives” and subsidies instead of the homeowner.
How Solar Leases Scam the Homeowner and Solar Contractors Keep the Subsidies
Government creating niche market of scams
December 19, 2014
by Katy Grimes
While the consumer is looking for ways to save on energy bills, solar companies found that instead of trying to hard-sell the pricey rooftop solar systems outright, leases were a much more appealing option for the homeowner, with less out-of-pocket investment. However, this has allowed the solar companies to claim the federal and state tax credits instead of the consumer. Many solar companies are able to claim federal, state and local “incentives” and subsidies.
Consumers are being lead to believe they are getting a great deal on solar energy. But what many don’t know is they are actually leasing their roof for 15 to 20 years to a company that collects all of the government subsidies.
The Solar Scam
Non-utility, third-party solar contractor and installers (with no skin in the game) contact small businesses and homeowners, offering little or no upfront costs for installation of a rooftop solar system. They promise big energy savings with the complete installation of a rooftop solar system, using a 20-year lease.
“These savings estimates are based on inflated assumptions about future utility rates that are unsupported by any real or reliable analysis,” according to Bradley A. Blakeman, professor of politics and public policy at Georgetown University. “The consumers do not own the system that is affixed to their homes and are merely purchasing the ‘electricity’ that is generated from an entity other than their public utility.”
Homeowners have reported they are not told that the solar lease is secured by placing a lien on the homeowner’s property.
The initially low lease payments escalate year after year, and the homeowner ends up paying more for electricity in just a few years if their utility company doesn’t raise rates as assumed. And if the homeowner refuses to pay on the lease, now upside-down, they find out that the solar installer placed a lien on their home, which forces them to continue to pay on the bad contract. Good luck selling your home with a lien on it.
sub dub dubbidized, yo
That’s a nice loophole in the regulations that needs to be stopped up, and quickly. So The Little People get their green feelies while Goldman Sachs takes a nice little skim off the government (that they hate so much).
No wonder Home Depot has a near-permanent Solar City desk staffed with young college kiddies on commission.
“That’s a nice loophole in the regulations that needs to be stopped up, and quickly.”
That ship has sailed.
Elon Musk’s growing empire is fueled by $4.9 billion in government subsidies
Jerry Hirsch
May 30, 2015
Tesla and SolarCity continue to report net losses after a decade in business, but the stocks of both companies have soared on their potential; Musk’s stake in the firms alone is worth about $10 billion.
Musk and his companies’ investors enjoy most of the financial upside of the government support, while taxpayers shoulder the cost.
The federal government also provides grants or tax credits to cover 30% of the cost of solar installations. SolarCity reported receiving $497.5 million in direct grants from the Treasury Department.
That figure, however, doesn’t capture the full value of the government’s support.
Since 2006, SolarCity has installed systems for 217,595 customers, according to a corporate filing. If each paid the current average price for a residential system — about $23,000, according to the Union of Concerned Scientists — the cost to the government would total about $1.5 billion, which would include the Treasury grants paid to SolarCity.
The most profound thing Tesla built is a mountain of debt.
It is interesting to read Yelp and other reviews on some of the solar hucksters, in many cases once the contract is signed actually getting the installation done and approved by an inspector can take a VERY long time after many broken promises.
Down here a Notice to Owner is “Routine” a lien is not.
What is a Notice to Owner?
A Notice to Owner (NTO) is a written notice prescribed by Florida Statute (713.06) that officially advises the owner of an improvement that the sender, usually a subcontractor or supplier not dealing directly with the owner, is looking to the owner to be sure the sender is paid before payment is made to the contractor on the job.
Florida Statute (713.06), requires that a Notice to Owner be served on the improvement owner not later than 45 days from the date of first labor, services, or materials delivered to the job site as a prerequisite to secure the sender’s right to lien the property in the event the sender is not properly paid for work done at the property.
This notice gives the owner the opportunity to verify that the sender is paid, usually by obtaining a “release of lien” by the sender of the notice when payments are made to the contractor, so that the owner monitors downstream payments and is not later surprised with a lien against the property from someone with whom the owner does not have a contract.
Actual/verbal notice to the owner by the non-privity party working on the job is NO substitute for the written notice to owner.
Serving a Notice to Owner on every job is just good business. Viewed as a basic “cost of doing business”, a Notice to Owner will: improve cash flow by helping to be sure you get paid, establish good communication between your business and those making/securing the payments, and protect your right to payment by securing your right to lien a property should the need arise.
http://www.buildersnotice.net/Our_Services-Notice_to_Owner.asp - 36k - Cached - Similar pages
SolarCity had placed a lien on his home, and that his equity line of credit application could not proceed until the lien was removed.
You mean you to pay them? No fair! I want my equity line of credit!
Yup
Obama and Goldman Sachs got him by the short hairs.
“(Last May, for instance, Goldman Sachs put $500 million into a fund to finance SolarCity leases.)”
If I owned a house I’d put a solar system on it. They’re so cool.
These green energy vultures - the companies, the backers like Goldman Sucks, and the govt cronies that take the contributions to look the other way are pure evil. Hell isn’t hot enough for all these shylocks.
Mark my words, all this lawlessness results in trust being broken down at all levels of society. This will not end well.
Reform is not in sight yet. Wonder what the next Big Lie will be to herd and fleece the gullible.
all this lawlessness results in trust being broken down at all levels of society…
Wonder what the next Big Lie will be to herd and fleece the gullible.
Isn’t that how the free market works? People run scams, then everybody learns they’re scammers, and they quit doing business with them.
Stopping them before they run the scam sounds like regulation, and we all know that’s antithetical to the free market.
Don’t be a lola.
When will Yellen the Felon announce “helicopter money” to prop up Wall Street and shove us further down the road to Weimar 2.0?
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/gundlach-says-buy-bonds-and-get-ready-for-fed-helicopter-money-2016-04-27
Housing Bubble II leading indicator of trouble ahead.
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/mortgage-reits-are-enjoying-a-renaissance-2016-04-26
We must embrace the blessings of globalism and multiculturalism. Our oligarch betters insist.
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/7106420/Europe-to-very-soon-have-more-Muslims-than-Christians-Belgian-minister-warns-against-making-an-enemy-of-Islam-at-Brussels-attacks-hearing.html
Solar Subsidies Scam Taxpayers And Homeowners
Stephen Moore And Joel Griffith
1/13/2015
Solar panels are being installed on the roofs of homes and businesses all across America at a record pace. The fad is the latest way for families to “go green” — the energy equivalent of blue recycling bins.
The Solar Energy Industries Association likes to tout the industry’s “amazing success” — but it’s holding a “Shout Out For Solar” social media event Friday as it sees an “uncertain future.”
That’s because its continued success depends on a cascade of government subsidies, including a 30% federal investment credit that expires at the end of 2016.
Guess what? Taxpayers are paying for it — and through the metaphorical roof.
Thanks to the slew of solar industry subsidies, homeowners can effectively contract with solar leasing firms that will install those panels for free. But they often get gouged later, as do taxpayers in one of the great corporate welfare scams of modern times.
Shady Solar Leasing Firms?
Congress is investigating if the industry is ensnaring homeowners in green energy “teaser” loans.
Rep. Paul Gosar, R-Ariz., and a member of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, plus 11 House colleagues fired off a letter last month to the Federal Trade Commission asking if the booming solar leasing market — a “new industry with a limited track record and little regulatory oversight — poses a “considerable risk” to homeowners.
Some leasing companies “sold large numbers of subprime mortgages to unsuspecting homeowners in the runup to the subprime mortgage crisis,” the investigators have found.
California and Louisiana homeowners have filed class-action lawsuits vs. solar leasing companies alleging fraudulent marketing campaigns that don’t warn customers of true costs and risks.
Meanwhile, utilities such as Edison International (EIX) complain that regulators require them to buy solar power at inflated, money-losing rates. Ultimately they must pass the costs on to other ratepayers.
A few years ago, the Institute for Energy Research found solar energy receives more than $700 in total subsidies per megawatt-hour produced. The per-megawatt subsidies to oil and gas — which President Obama rails against — were less than one-one hundredth as large.
It’s highly doubtful the solar industry could survive without these corporate welfare handouts. SolarCity admitted as much in its annual report:
“Our business currently depends on the availability of rebates, tax credits and other financial incentives. The expiration, elimination or reduction of these rebates, credits and incentives would adversely impact our business.”
Rep. Gosar isn’t worried just about the taxpayers, but the families that have been lured by “deceptive marketing strategies” into sucker deals. His investigation has found that “homeowners who signed these zero-money-down leases are struggling to sell their homes” and may not have been “fully aware of the terms of their 20- (to)30-year leases.”
Meanwhile, the handouts keep coming as the Obama administration continues to tout renewable energy as the power source of the future. The solar industry boasts it plans on issuing one million new long-term leases by 2018. All of this at a time when solar’s economics have been crushed by the 50% fall in oil and gas prices since last summer.
Don’t be surprised if all of this means massive taxpayer losses that could make Solyndra look like a picnic by comparison.
Government making electricity affordable.
Millennials showed a truly lemming-like enthusiasm for “hope ‘n change Goldman Sachs can believe it.” Now they are getting exactly the reaming they deserve. Sorry, Millennials, but stupidity has consequences.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-04-27/americas-millennial-dream-making-20-less-drowning-debt
And Ray K. This on Otraumacare -
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/obamacare-disaster-will-be-obamas-enduring-domestic-legacy/2016/04/25/a8c09b38-0ae4-11e6-8ab8-9ad050f76d7d_story.html
Several questions and an observation for any who care to chime in…..
a) With this massive failed policy - who if not the taxpayers are gonna pick up the tab as the insurers leave the market place? Interesting that few pressers on the left comment on say United Health leaving - only the right leaning pressers seem to do so…..I would like to see left leaning pressers report on this more…..without the typical liberal all is just great aphorisms….and the right crying gloom and doom all the time. Just so tired of all that divided camp stuff while the house burns.
b) I suspect this is all going according to plan. Obummer had to skewer the sheeple into thinking that FSA stuff will come to them for a simple vote in 2008 and again in 2012 while not addressing attending results. He and his minions only held out the crystal mesmerizing orb, repeating that it is all good with no bad to be born here. We may be at the ruh roh moment as the real truth behind this is rolled out. (Remember what that twit who designed this fiasco said as people were being Grubered - voters are too STOOOOPID to know what is best for them) . I suspect the back story all along has been single payer. There must be a better way - the question is what?
c) Colorado (AGAIN as if pot wasn’t enough - sorry there apt 401/goon) is spearheading an effort toward single payer with this ColoradoCARE ammendment vote. Reports have it that if passed businesses and folks be moving out of the state as CO would have the highest personal tax rate in the nation. A bellweather of things to come?
And the FSA marches on - never to be denied at the expense of productive folk who are just trying to do what is responsible.
Man this ain’t KS anymore Toto.
Housing my friend housing!
Morris Township, NJ Housing Prices Plummet 18% YoY
http://www.zillow.com/morris-township-nj/home-values/
Irving, TX Housing Affordability Improves As Housing Prices Fall 9% YoY; Economy Surges On Falling Oil Prices
http://www.zillow.com/irving-tx/home-values/
The shambolic SEC continues to turn a blind eye to Wall Street fraud and criminality.
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/sec-to-reverse-order-allowing-steven-rattner-to-rejoin-wall-street-2016-04-26
Those employed there either have no idea that most of the country regards the agency as hapless and a joke, or are just marking time before they can work for Wall Street themselves, directly or indirectly. If the SEC ceased to exist, would anyone even notice?
With all those Canadians locking in gains on Florida properties we will soon be gains locked. Buy now or get gains locked out!
Windermere, FL Housing Affordability Grows; Housing Prices Plunge 9% YoY As Falling Oil Prices Accelerate The Economy
http://www.zillow.com/windermere-fl/home-values/
‘Nearly a quarter of the 138 campsites were occupied by those workers now only a few still are are…’a lot of them have left and are leaving, rent prices have really stabilized,’ said Sanguedolce.’
Yeah, stabilized to zero.
‘When the boom was on, landlords could set rents as high as the market would bear. But now they have a glut of empty apartments.’
I let that beaut sit without commenting but seeing as you did.
“Stabilized”….. that old but familiar tapdance word.
So rents can go to zero. But housing can and does go negative.
oooooph
And I’ll mention that all these trades working out of town where their jobs are evaporating are being replaced by far more trades working out of town building gas fired combined cycle plants that are replacing all the coal plants. Much bigger biz and extremely lucrative.
‘“Hundreds of ‘Halliburton’ employees near Montgomery received pink slips Friday, and now the ripple effect of those layoffs is hitting the local economy.’
It’s amazing how fast it turns. This article was published on Monday. It’s like a bomb being dropped.
‘new supply has exceeded demand for eight of the last nine quarters. This trend was most pronounced in the last quarter of 2015, when excess supply measured 13,559 units total for the 82 markets Reis tracks. This marked an increase of nearly 10,000 units above the excess supply for the seven prior quarters.’
‘In the first quarter of 2016, this trend continued. The vacancy rate climbed to 4.5 percent as 12,000 more units were produced than were absorbed.’
‘new supply has exceeded demand for eight of the last nine quarters’
Yet if you read most multi-family “experts”, they’ll tell you this thing is going up for years. If you read the HBB, you’d have known this bust was coming long ago.
‘Twitter effect’ has trickled down to the office rental market as a whole, and now more recently to the apartment rental market. Says Chandler Duvall, a big-time property manager in the city, ‘Commercial office brokers get worried, smaller tech companies get worried, venture capitalists get worried — whether it’s legitimate or not. If they are not hiring, should we be hiring? That’s when it starts to affect apartments.’
Twitter, Inc. (TWTR) -NYSE
15.05 Down 2.70(15.21%) 11:26AM EDT
http://finance.yahoo.com/q?s=twtr
I’ve mentioned before that making money is important. Silicon Valley has ruined a lot of people before ignoring that and they’re doing it again. 63,000 San Francisco condos in the pipeline.
I am sad that Bits Buckets is not up and running right now.
Ben - is it a question of funding or time or both?
RageCages are more efficient I think.
http://goo.gl/4Yd0KF
Donkey abuse! Donkey abuse!
I don’t think it was either.
As I recall, it was time, to some degree. Not to mention it was getting kinda nasty on the political front and Ben had to deal with all that stuff, some of which could have put the blog at risk. I miss it a little myself, but I don’t blame him.
This will leave a mark……. it’s a good thing these people are all good boot-strapping, exceptional, suburban Johnson County Republicans, and will be able to find another six figure job right away, thanks to the low/zero tax environment provided by the Republicans in the capital building.
http://tinyurl.com/j2aat5z
The company strategy going forward?
“…..moving from a paper-based, labor intensive environment” to “a state of the art paperless (and employee-less) platform”.
These people have three choices. Find a local McJob paying (at best) half of what they are making now, or move to the East Coast financial centers (assuming they can find a job). Or, they can become the latest members of the 47%, and live off of the overly generous unemployment benefits that Kansas provides.
Any way you look at it, it isn’t going to help the local new/used house market in south Johnson County.
“Pending Home Sales Tumble In The West As Demand Is Starting To Weaken”
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-04-27/pending-home-sales-tumble-west-demand-starting-weaken
Housing demand has been cratering all along but worth noting anyways.
My local flower shop sent me an e-mail, advising me that today is “Administrative Professional Day”.
Govern yourselves accordingly.
Annandale, VA Housing Affordability And Economy Surges On Falling Housing And Oil Prices; Sale Prices Plunge 9% YoY
http://www.zillow.com/annandale-va/home-values/
Is anyone else getting a sense of late-2005 deja vu?
Transactions down… Inventory way up… Hmm, what was it that happened to pricing shortly thereafter?
There are more houses for auction in my part of the OC. Just found another starting at $255,000.
A colleague of mine told me she and her husband bought their place in Lake Forest that way. They bought for under $300k. There were six other bidders for their place. The $255k one is surrounded by houses zillowed in the high $500s. The colleague told me you gotta be able to write a check right there at the auction.
Gulp.
This was one of the hottest markets in the country recently:
‘In Naples, a wealthy southwest Florida town that’s bolstered by Canadian snowbirds escaping cold winters, sales plunged 19 per cent in the first quarter and inventory is piling up. The inventory of homes on the market rose 33 per cent in the first quarter from a year earlier, data from the Naples Area Board of Realtors show’
So why aren’t the investors jumping all over this inventory? Why is Palm Springs “flooded”? It’s California, there’s gold laying on the ground all over the place.
And it was one of the hottest markets just before the bust of real estate bubble 1.0, back in 2006.
I was down there in 2006 and the “Welcome to Naples and Collier County” guide in my hotel room was replete with real estate advertising. If I remember correctly, the words “paradise,” “Shangri-La,” and “Xanadu” all were used as bait. In the meantime, a lot of the hourly labor in town commutes from Immokalee or shamelessly is brought in from foreign countries, as hotel staff nametags attest.
Ben:
I suspect the same in PHX, Scottsdale, Gilberts etc. AZ.
Was down there in early March - several (un) realtors at a lunch I attended with a friend there and they all said the Canadians were vacating due to FX trade and consequence of Canadian economy.
I suspect alot of inventory will be comin on the market there too.
I think it’s the heavy personal debt most people have, but now combined with stock market being topped and interest rates headed up. The idea of buying before the rates go up is probably not debt bait anymore. And people are noticing house prices are peaking. Why buy now when the value will tumble 20%, maybe 40%?
2007. Plus the weight of all the excess inventory and shady paperwork is far greater now than it was in the past.
More vacant structures to add to the 25 million foreclosed assets. At this rate the banks will be waiting a long time for an ROI
No Deja Vu yet for me.
No liar loans
No CDO squared’s
No Option-ARMs as affordability product
No building way above the long-term rates needed for population growth
No credit flowing freely to private homebuilders
Yes, there are pockets and product types with overbuilding (high end condos in NYC, Class A apartments in many markets, etc.). However, it’s not close to the near universal overbuilding that was occurring in 2005-2007.
Will there be softness? Sure, in some product types in some markets.
Will there be another national housing crash?
Nope. Not until there is a lot more supply being added.
You’re gyrating Rental_Fraud.
Housing is already crashing. Why?
25 MILLION excess, empty and defaulted houses CHECK
Housing demand at 20 year lows and falling CHECK
Housing prices inflated by 250% CHECK
Household formation at multi decade lows CHECK
Rampant housing fraud CHECK
A media corrupted by the housing industry CHECK
Population growth the lowest in US history CHECK
Immigration flat to slightly negative CHECK
What were you saying about housing?
RentalWa:, 4/’16: “Will there be another national housing crash? Nope.”
With a built in weasel clause:
“Not until there is a lot more supply being added.”
‘No liar loans’
Have you listened to the radio lately?
Hacienda Heights, CA Housing Market Affordability Surges As Prices Crater 13% YoY
http://www.zillow.com/hacienda-heights-ca/home-values/
BY: Washington Free Beacon Staff
December 1, 2015 2:53 pm
President Obama, Vice President Joe Biden, and Secretary of State John Kerry offer the following words in the video about climate change.
“Today, there is no greater threat to our planet than climate change.”
“No challenge poses a greater threat to future generations than climate change.”
“It is indeed one of the biggest threats facing our planet today.”
“Climate change is the threat multiplier.”
“If another country threatened to wipe out an American town, we’d do everything in our power to protect ourselves. Climate change poses the same threat right now.”
“And years from now, I want to be able to look our children and grandchildren in the eye and tell them we did everything we could to protect them.”
Michael Savage - GREEN GANGSTERS TIED TO OBAMA SCORE …
http://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=10153688567851848&id=123040616847 - 181k - Cached - Similar pages
There is no bigger threat to our way of life than the voter. The tyrants they vote in actually follow the rules by the cronies, but add the worst wishes of the voters in the mix to throw out some crumbs.
The best way to insure against the voters is to vacate fiat money - get into precious metals bullion and crypto currency.
Collectivism is the scourge of the earth.
There is no bigger threat to our way of life than the voter.
This is especially true when 95% of the electorate are stupid.
You need to make a correction. The “electorate” is all eligible voters. Suppose the majority of nonvoters don’t want to vote for any of the rotten choices? They know the worst of all evils is evil.
There is a cartoon at the bottom of the THE GREEN CORRUPTION FILES site.
It has Obama talking to a guy with a Green Firms sign on his back.
It is titled…
How Green energy works
Obama says… You give me your green and I give you the taxpayers green.
Mission Viejo, CA Housing Affordability Balloons As Housing Prices Plummet 9% YoY
http://www.zillow.com/mission-viejo-ca-92692/home-values/
Hmm…I only wish.
The data is the data.
Not the way you cherry-pick it, HA.
Objection overruled.
Sarasota, FL Housing Prices Crater 16% YoY
http://www.movoto.com/sarasota-fl/market-trends/
‘Larry Fink, chairman and chief executive of mutual-fund behemoth BlackRock’
‘With a Federal Reserve decision looming later in the day, and virtually no one expecting an interest-rate increase, Fink made it clear he believes the dependency on monetary policy to spur economic growth has gone on far too long and that it’s time for fiscal policy to take over.’
“We’re harming savers worldwide with low and negative interest rates,” he said. People save for events — buying a house, sending their kids to college, retirement, etc., he said. When rates are near or below zero, they’re forced to save even more to meet those goals, and consumer confidence and spending suffer as a result. “The psychology of people who are near retirement is fear — fear that they’re not earning enough to meet the needs of the lifestyle they desire.”
the Eagles — Already Gone (1974):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sTrEAo0mbgA
the Kinks — This Time Tomorrow:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qwVJ7FWc4rQ
P.S. there’s more to life than wasting it all on housing, think about it…
Leo made me do it.
Turkish conglomerates are racing to add high-end apartment blocks and office towers to Istanbul’s rapidly-changing skyline, turning to one of the world’s most profitable real estate markets for quick returns as other parts of the economy suffer.
Anadolu Holding, which has interests in banking, retail and brewing, plans to venture into real estate with two developments in Istanbul this year, while Aksoy Holding, an energy-to-tourism conglomerate, is building a luxury residential complex on the Aegean coast and plans another project in Istanbul.
Construction lies close to heart of President Tayyip Erdogan, who sees big real estate projects - both public and private sector - as a showcase for Turkey’s rising prosperity, as well as a vehicle for job creation and winning loyalty at the ballot box by increasing the supply of new housing.
But some economists warn that such investments risk fuelling volatile consumption-led growth and undermining government efforts to put Turkey’s economy on a more sustainable path.
They say they fail to address an under-investment in manufacturing technology that could erode the global competitiveness of Turkish industrial products and exports.
“Investments in construction create a doping impact in the economy in the short run but these are not quality investments boosting productivity,” said Haluk Burumcekci, an economist who runs the Istanbul-based Burumcekci Consulting.
“And in the long run such investments do not help a sustainable growth model.”
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-turkey-economy-construction-idUSKCN0XO1QU
This will not end well.
Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras on Wednesday sought help from the European Union to break a deadlock in critical debt talks as his spokeswoman accused the IMF of “undermining” the process.
Mr Tsipras’ office said the leftist premier had asked EU President Donald Tusk to call a summit to help facilitate negotiations with the debt-ridden country’s creditors.
The move came after an expected Eurogroup meeting on Thursday was postponed, scuppering Greek hopes of an agreement by Sunday to launch talks on debt relief.
Mr Tusk said he had urged eurozone finance ministers to meet “within days”, warning that failure to act could bring a repeat of last summer’s drama that nearly saw Greece crash out of the eurozone.
“We have to avoid a situation of renewed uncertainty for Greece,” Mr Tusk said.
Mr Tsipras and Mr Tusk would speak again on Thursday, a Greek government source said.
Eurogroup chief Jeroen Dijsselbloem for his part on Wednesday said the next meeting of eurozone finance ministers could take place “next week or ultimately the week after”.
http://www.businesstimes.com.sg/government-economy/greek-pm-seeks-eu-help-to-break-creditor-deadlock
The never ending story.
Crater
Saw ya
Crater.