Lemonjello's intermittent skullduggery

[lemonjello]

Rumor Mill

Rumor the other day was that 30%+ of the home loans in the San Diego area are nothing down ARM type loans. They are resetting now - interest rates increasing. Even upper middle class types are having a hard time paying for their million dollar McMansions.

Approx. 1/3 of the GDP increase for the last few years has been from the housing sector. Does flipping houses back and forth for nothing down really do anything to help the economy? Anybody remember the Resolution Trust Corporation?

Can Uncle Bennie bring the economy in for a soft landing? It's going to be more like landing a fighter jet on the deck of carrier during a hurricane IMO.

[IIC]

Rumor the other day was that 30%+ of the home loans in the San Diego area are nothing down ARM type loans. They are resetting now - interest rates increasing. Even upper middle class types are having a hard time paying for their million dollar McMansions.

Approx. 1/3 of the GDP increase for the last few years has been from the housing sector. Does flipping houses back and forth for nothing down really do anything to help the economy? Anybody remember the Resolution Trust Corporation?

Can Uncle Bennie bring the economy in for a soft landing? It's going to be more like landing a fighter jet on the deck of carrier during a hurricane IMO.

The RTS...oh yes...even had dealings w/ them in an old job.

RE is going to fall apart...I'm patiently waiting to swoop in and get some deals...Most should occur next year tho IMO...IIC


Edit: No...I do not believe he can do it...IMO we need a recession to get back on track

[lemonjello]

Cheneys betting on bad news?

Vice President Dick Cheney's financial advisers are apparently betting on a rise in inflation and interest rates and on a decline in the value of the dollar against foreign currencies. That's the conclusion we draw after scouring the financial disclosure form released by Cheney recently.

http://articles.moneycentral.msn.com/Investing/Extra/CheneysBettingonBadNews.aspx?page=all

[lemonjello]

Say What?!

Housing Expert: 'Soft Landing' Off Mark
By David Streitfeld, Times Staff Writer
July 21, 2006

Leslie Appleton-Young is at a loss for words.

The chief economist of the California Assn. of Realtors has stopped using the term "soft landing" to describe the state's real estate market, saying she no longer feels comfortable with that mild label.

"Maybe we need something new. That's all I'm prepared to say," Appleton-Young said Thursday.

The shift in language comes as debate over the real estate market is intensifying. The long-awaited drop-off is happening, but there's little agreement about how brutal the landing will be.

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke said in congressional testimony Thursday that the national housing downturn so far appears orderly.

At about the same time, however, D.R. Horton Inc. Chief Executive Donald Tomnitz was telling analysts that the home builder's sales in June "absolutely fell off the Richter scale." Horton, the nation's largest builder of residential housing, has numerous projects in California.

For real estate optimists, the phrase "soft landing" conveyed the soothing notion that the run-up in values over the last few years would be permanent. It wasn't a bubble, it was a new plateau.

The Realtors association last month lowered its 2006 sales prediction from a 2% slip to a 16.8% drop. That was when Appleton-Young first told the San Diego Union-Tribune that she didn't feel comfortable any longer using "soft landing."

"I'm sorry I ever made that comment," she said Thursday. "When I get my new term, I'll let you know."

If there's one group in California still unreservedly bullish on real estate, it might be the throngs lining up to take the licensing exams.

The state Department of Real Estate recently reported that the total number of agents in the state passed 500,000 in May for the first time. That's one agent for every 55 adults in the state.

Appleton-Young had no qualms about predicting a hard landing here: "We're expecting a fairly significant shakeout."

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-soft21jul21,0,1398201,print.story?coll=la-headlines-politic

[IIC]

One in 55 are RE agents...One in 300 are lawyers...One in 500,000 are good stockpickers...IIC

[Rob]

"I'm sorry I ever made that comment," she said Thursday. "When I get my new term, I'll let you know."

How about "wild fluctuation"?

...One in 500,000 are good stockpickers.

... and one of those is named Sherri Haskell. I wish someone could persuade her to post on this forum!

[lemonjello]

What happens in Vegas stays on the market

Barrons.com

The latest housing numbers certainly suggest that the end is getting nearer in Las Vegas. Sales of local homes fell nearly 24% in June from the same period in 2005, while the number of listed homes rose nearly 32% from a year earlier, to a record 20,026, according to the Greater Las Vegas Association of Realtors. The statistics on condominiums and townhouses are even more telling, with listings up in June nearly 83% from a year ago and sales down 22%. "We've got a dramatic increase in inventory," says Jack Woodcock, founder of the Las Vegas realty brokerage Prudential Americana Group.

"We've got 400 to 500 houses in the $500,000 to $600,000 price range that have never been lived in and are sitting on the market for over a year." In fact, a full 40% of all the area's homes for resale aren't even occupied, according to First American Title Co. That's usually a sign of a market that has been inflated by speculative fever.

[Rob]

That's good stuff, lemon ... I mean, not that real estate is looking like the bottom's fixing to fall out, but good articles you're bringing to our attention.

Hey, if real estate tanks so badly that people have to walk away from their mortgages and let the banks foreclose, there's always that van down by the river.

[IIC]

That's good stuff, lemon ... I mean, not that real estate is looking like the bottom's fixing to fall out, but good articles you're bringing to our attention.

Hey, if real estate tanks so badly that people have to walk away from their mortgages and let the banks foreclose, there's always that van down by the river.

I believe there will be a lot of walk-a-ways next year and the year after...IIC

[lemonjello]

Just trying to convey an idea of the bigger economic picture (maybe not so hot). Combine that with the long term charts that are breaking down. Even though Bernanke is signaling a soft landing, to me it still looks up in the air. The Fed uses a lot of different data tho so maybe corp earnings will power thru. Plus you may be able to buy some cheap real estate in the next couple of years - the early 90's in Cali?

Just for grins - the futs are showing gold could make another run up and the dollar another run down in the next few weeks. Maybe around the next FOMC meeting which is Aug 8. Hmmmm. No guarantees tho. Stay tuned to your Bat Channel.

That's good stuff, lemon ... I mean, not that real estate is looking like the bottom's fixing to fall out, but good articles you're bringing to our attention.

Hey, if real estate tanks so badly that people have to walk away from their mortgages and let the banks foreclose, there's always that van down by the river.

[mrmarket]

Vice President Dick Cheney's financial advisers are apparently betting on a rise in inflation and interest rates and on a decline in the value of the dollar against foreign currencies. That's the conclusion we draw after scouring the financial disclosure form released by Cheney recently.

http://articles.moneycentral.msn.com....aspx?page=all

If this is true, Bush's popularity will be at a historical low when he exits the presidency. History will be very unkind to dubbya.

[Lyehopper]

Lemon, I like your thread....

[New-born baby]

If this is true, Bush's popularity will be at a historical low when he exits the presidency. History will be very unkind to dubbya.

note this quote from the article:
The vice president's advisers say the vice president pays no attention to his investments. His lawyer, Terrence O'Donnell, says outside money managers supervise the investments. "He has nothing to do with it," O'Donnell said.

So I would say that MSN Money's title for the article is misleading. The people betting on bad news are the money managers. By the way, all but one of the editors and columnists for MNS Money voted for John Kerry last election. Do you think they might be a little slanted against the Vice President?

[billyjoe]

New-born,
My parents had a friend whose job put him in close proximation to several Presidents ending with Bush #1. Some he became very close to as well as with their families. The press , public relations , and video media can portray a President any way they choose and often the public perception is nothing like the actual person. Too bad it often makes a good man look bad.

---------billyjoe

[lemonjello]

USA: Free Democracy => Feudal Plutocracy

<on soapbox> Does it seem that the US government is trying to turn the country into feudal state by destroying the middle class?

Let's see - abolish the estate tax ("death tax") so the rich can become incredibly more rich and NEVER be taxed on some profits. Open the door to unlimited immigration by poor people willing to work for pennies on the $ off the books to impoverish and destroy the middle class. Then lie to the American people until it's an irreversible done deal. Not to mention debasing the currency, running up incredible debts, etc. The USA is turning into a banana republic.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plutocracy

---------------------------------------------
Washingtonpost.com

Bad Bargain
Senators shouldn't be cowed by the House effort to hold a minimum wage increase hostage to cutting estate taxes.

Tuesday, August 1, 2006; Page A16

UNRELENTING in their zeal to cut taxes for the richest Americans and unabashed about employing the most cynical of maneuvers to achieve this goal, House Republicans left town this past weekend for their five-week August recess -- after shipping over to the Senate a noxious package that combines an increase in the minimum wage with an outrageous near-repeal of the estate tax and an extension of expiring tax breaks. The House GOP win-win political calculation here is obvious: Marrying a tax break for the rich with a wage hike for the poor dares senators in an election year to cast a vote against increasing the minimum wage. That, combined with some extra goodies, might be enough to get the estate tax cut over the 60-vote Senate hurdle that has so far, fortunately, blocked congressional action. If not, Republican leaders wager, they've at least given nervous House members cover to assert (however insincerely) that they backed a minimum wage increase, only to be stymied by Democrats.

But this is a bad bargain -- unaffordable, unnecessary and, as usual, dishonestly presented. Senators shouldn't be snookered, or intimidated, into going along with it.


Whatever the case for increasing the minimum wage -- and there are points pro and con on that subject -- it doesn't justify nearly eliminating the estate tax. The House measure would raise the minimum wage, which hasn't been increased since 1997, from $5.15 an hour to $7.25 by 2009. According to estimates by the Economic Policy Institute, which favors the change, 6.6 million workers would enjoy an average yearly wage increase of about $1,200. But even assuming that's correct -- and that employers facing higher costs wouldn't respond by cutting jobs -- the benefit pales in comparison with the riches the wealthy would reap by the cut in the estate tax. Assuming that the 2009 exemption of $7 million per couple would be otherwise left in place, according to the Brookings-Urban Institute Tax Policy Center, the estate tax cut would give an estimated 8,200 estates an average tax break of more than $1 million.

The estate tax cut is being peddled as a less-expensive version of one already passed by the House and rebuffed by the Senate. Senators: Don't buy the new model. It's just a gimmick-laden version of the old one. Backers of the cut, which would raise the size of estates free from any tax to $10 million per couple and lower the tax rate on estates under $25 million to the capital gains rate, now 15 percent, argue that it would cost a mere -- mere ! -- $268 billion between 2007 and 2016, $15 billion less than the previous incarnation.