Housing Bubble Hall of Shame®

Ashley Long, Part 3

2011-08-07T16:00:00.000-07:00

Ashley Long, Home Buyer / Knife Catcher
This was from an article featured on Jan 1, 2008, Ashley Long Part I. These mainstream media bubble articles don't provide any closure. Let's see how this one turned out.

This ~~buyer~~ gambler thought...
“I got a pretty good deal. I know this is a low market and the house is worth more than that,”
and
“It’s the only time I’m going to be able to afford to buy in Sonoma County,”
and
“I can’t imagine it going down a lot lower, and eventually it has to come back up. I don’t want to gamble.”

Well, let's see how much lower it is NOW!

Here is the house:
7108 Hastings Pl, Windsor, CA
4 beds, 3.0 baths, 2,032 sq ft
APN: 163-120-052-000
Sale History:
03/13/1998: $222,500
12/07/2007: $470,000

What is interesting is that Zillow shows a Sale listed months after the initial purchase.

02/01/2008 Listed for sale $485,000
03/07/2008 Listed for sale $485,000
07/11/2011 Listed for sale $345,000

$470,000 - $345,000 =
$125,000 (-26%)

Is that a "lot lower"?

Jim Sinclair's Gift

2011-08-02T18:04:00.000-07:00

Jim Sinclair said to write this down back in 2008. What fascinated me is that he not only said it would happen, but that he provided a date. But he was calling for this long before Dec '08. And if his next prediction becomes reality, are you prepared?

Read on...
Jim Sinclair's MineSet

2008-12-28: A Gift From Jim
Dear Friends,
Here is my New Years gift to you, my extended family.

There is no way that the CONSEQUENCES of the largest creation of paper money since it was invented can be avoided or even modified. Odds now favor Alf Field’s price objective (Elliott Wave Gold Update 23, bonus article Crisis Cogitations).

January 14th 2011 to June 21st, 2012:
The best part of this gift is not the one you already know, which is January 14th 2011 (Sinclair: gold will trade at a minimum of $1650 on or before January 14th 2011), but rather the date that a new currency form will replace the form of the US dollar as you know it today which is the third week of June 2012.

Don’t laugh! Write this down and do not forget about it!

Happy (sort of) New Year,
Jim

Cami Noble - Throw More Money at it!!

2011-07-06T04:54:00.001-07:00

Cami Noble, House Renter / Debt Slave / Government Servant
Now the government is giving out interest free loans to people behind on their mortgage. But if you look at the numbers, it just doesn't work.

Here is a perfect example from the video. Her mortgage is $4,000/month. Zillow shows a rent estimate of $2500/month, which is still obscene.

6710 Percethony Ct
Alexandria, VA 22315
3 bd, 2.5 ba CONDO

Sales History:
04/26/2005 $643,000 <<< CONDO
03/10/2000 $300,000

Student Loan Defaults

2011-01-24T18:09:00.000-08:00

$58B in default
7% default rate

And, as he states, "you can't get rid of a student loan debt in a bankruptcy proceeding".

Enslaved youth of america.

Video #2: Ninja Generation & Student Loan Debt
.

David Crisp, Part 5

2011-01-22T21:40:00.000-08:00

David Crisp, Formerly of Crisp & Cole

The noose is getting closer!!

What timing. I posted Part 4 on Jan 16, and here is what Crisp & Cole get on Jan 21.
(thanks, AuAgPb--three of my most favorite metals, by the way)

2011-01-21: Crisp & Cole: Nine of 10 defendants appear in court
Nine of 10 defendants named in the Crisp & Cole mortgage fraud indictment unsealed Friday pleaded not guilty to the charges against them. The one exception was real estate executive David Crisp, whose arraignment before a U.S. magistrate judge was scheduled for Monday.

Eight of the nine who entered pleas Friday were released on their own recognizance on various conditions, including a requirement that they appear before a U.S. district judge for a status conference at 9 a.m. Feb. 11 in Fresno.

2011-01-21: Crisp & Cole: A timeline of events

2011-01-21: 10 Indicted in $20M Real Estate Scam
Ten people have been indicted in a $20-million wide-ranging real estate scam in California, according to the U.S. Attorney.

David Crisp, 31, was arrested Thursday night in San Diego. Carlyle Cole, 63, was arrested Thursday night in Ventura County. Julie Farmer, 42, Sneha Mohammadi, 49, Jayson Costa, 38, Jeriel Salinas, 29, Michael Munoz, 31, and Caleb Cole, 35, were arrested Thursday in Bakersfield. Robinson Nguyen, 30 was arrested Thursday in Monterey and Jennifer Crisp, 29, surrendered to authorities on Friday morning.

The 10 are being charged in a 56-count indictment with conspiracy to commit bank, mail and wire fraud, and with individual counts of mail fraud.

2011-01-21: Crisp & Cole: A who's who in the case

David Crisp, Part 4

2011-01-16T20:08:00.000-08:00

David Crisp, Formerly of Crisp & Cole

The noose continues to tighten!!!

Ok, I'm a bit behind on the stories, but I'm not going to forget. These two (Crisp & Cole) were main characters in the Housing Bubble Drama, and we will watch them face justice.

2010-07-01: Fifth guilty plea entered in Crisp & Cole fraud case
Christopher Lance Stovall, formerly a loan officer with the mortgage lending arm of Crisp, Cole & Associates, entered a guilty plea in federal court Thursday as part of a plea deal in a mortgage fraud investigation.

Stovall is the fifth person to take a deal in the case. None of them have been sentenced, however. Investigators have asked the court to delay sentencing to give the defendants time to cooperate with authorities in the ongoing investigation.

Stovall, 37, looked boyish despite his bald head and goatee as Judge Oliver Wanger asked him if he understood the terms of each point of the agreement, which was read aloud at the hearing in U.S. District Court, Eastern District of California in Fresno.

To each question, Stovall replied simply, "yes."

When the judge asked how he pleaded to four counts of felony mail fraud and aiding and abetting, Stovall said, "guilty," then shifted his weight from one foot to the other and looked down at the courtroom's blue carpet.
...

A New Low in High College Debt

2010-12-05T18:36:00.000-08:00

Kelli Space (-cadet)
This is absolutely beyond belief. The ignorance in believing an education justifies this kind of expense and debt is mind-blowing. But to help defray the cost of this degree in sociology, she has a website where you can contribute to paying off her debt. Her site is called twohundredthou.com -- how sickening. Perhaps I should start a site where people could contribute towards the purchase of gold bullion, for myself, of course.

The USA truly deserves a hyperinflation event to wipe out debt, pensions, savings, etc. It will take a life-changing event to wake people up to reality.

As she states on her site:
I was 18 and the first person in my family (including extended family!) to attend college. Therefore, not only was excitement consuming me, but my parents didn't exactly know how college would or wouldn't affect my salary in the future.

Therefore? Huh? Clearly, the family needed someone with an accounting degree. Hopefully, she's the last to attend college, and perhaps they took the manual from her family on procreating.

2010-12-03: Is the College Debt Bubble Ready to Explode? (YES)
Kelli Space, 23, graduated from Northeastern University in 2009 with a bachelor's in sociology — and a whopping $200,000 in student loan debt. Space, who lives with her parents and works full-time, put up a Web site called TwoHundredThou.com soliciting donations to help meet her debt obligation, which is $891 a month. That number jumps to $1,600 next November.

In creating the site, Space, of course is hoping to ease her financial burden, but it's "mainly to inform others on the dangers of how quickly student loans add up," she said. So far she's raised $6,671.56, according to her site.

Space is just one example — albeit an extreme one — of a student loan bubble that may be about to burst. Over the last decade, private lenders, abetted by college financial aid offices, eagerly handed young people hundreds of thousands of dollars to earn bachelor's degrees. As a result of easy credit, declining grants and soaring tuitions, more than two-thirds of students graduated with debt in 2008 — up from 45 percent in 1993. The average debt load is $24,000, according to the Project on Student Debt.
...

Going, Going, Sweet Equity Gone!

2010-11-20T19:54:00.000-08:00

It's the final chapter for Mr. Marshall Whittey. He was one of the poster children for better living through tapping home equity, telling his story on the pages of the NY Times. But his story is not unique. The sweet home equity of the housing bubble created a thriving economy, enabling an entire nation to live beyond its means. Unfortunately, all ponzi schemes must come to an end. And now, three years after the NY Times story, Mr. Whittey must give up his primary residence, which is deeply under water.

2007-11-10: Marshall Whittey
2009-08-23: Sweet Home Equity Gone Sour

Personal Residence:
404 Alysheba Ct, Reno, NV 89521
4 beds, 2.0 baths, 2,017 sq ft

Pending Sale: $235K

06/08/2005: purchase $283,900 with Universal American
03/01/2006: $30,000 HELOC with Countrywide
11/20/2006: $375,000 REFI with First Magnus
06/08/2005: $355,000 (unsure about the sales history vs HELOC/Refi)

Gonzalo Lira Makes a Call

2010-10-26T20:24:00.000-07:00

Well, these are some bold predictions by Gonzalo Lira. Let's track them and see how it goes. But if it goes this way...

2010-10-26: Economics Isn’t a Dismal Science—It’s an Ersatz Religion
This will bring hyperinflation by December 2011; severe social disruption starting in Q3 of 2011 and accelerating through Q4, before really exploding in Q2 of 2012; the dissolution of the European Union by December of 2012; and very likely—insane as it might now sound—a de facto dictatorship in the United States.

...

Chris Dodd, Racketeer Lawman

2010-10-11T20:30:00.000-07:00

Chris Dodd, Part 3, Part 2, Part 1
Senator D-Connecticut

Let me see if I understand this...

Chris Dodd, saviour of the US ~~Citizen~~ Consumer, is responsible for hearings on the foreclosure racketeering.

Chris Dodd, friend of Angelo Mozilo, is responsible for hearings on the flawed mortgage paperwork.

Chris Dodd, friend of Fannie and Freddie, is responsible for bringing the criminal banks to justice.

Just checking.

2010-10-09: Up to 40 states plan inquiry into foreclosure data
WASHINGTON – The attorneys general of up to 40 states plan to announce soon a joint investigation into banks' use of flawed foreclosure paperwork.
...
And Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., the chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, said he would hold a hearing on the issue next month.

Sonoma Canary, Part 3

2010-09-30T20:00:00.000-07:00

Sonoma Canary, Part 1, Part 2

Where is the recovery?

Notices of Default and Foreclosures in Sonoma are showing no signs of slowing. And we have an impressive increase in foreclosures, with 52 more in September than August. The NODs also score a high for 2010.

NODs:
. . '08 . '09 . '10 . '11 . '12
Jan 451 . 394 . 255 . 339
Feb 513 . 468 . 380 . 293
Mar 498 . 553 . 407 . 379
Apr 509 . 497 . 354 . 275
May 505 . 491 . 389 . 285
Jun 492 . 562 . 303 . 300
Jul 460 . 615*. 275 . 228
Aug 482 . 425 . 383 . 422
Sep 191 . 399 . 419 . 355
Oct 178 . 379 . 328 . 372
Nov 241 . 320 . 346 . 353
Dec 500 . 319 . 320 . 212

* New Monthly Record
* Sep '08: CA Law SB 1137 takes effect
* Dec '08: CA Law SB 1137 FAILS

Trustees Deeds:
. . '08 . '09 . '10 . '11 . '12
Jan 164 . 166 . 181 . 190
Feb 238 . 151 . 155 . 180
Mar 221 . 121 . 209 . 207
Apr 236 . 123 . 215 . 182
May 280 . 149 . 184 . 175
Jun 324 . 271 . 169 . 179
Jul 341 . 202 . 179 . 228
Aug 372 . 231 . 188 . 204
Sep 303 . 183 . 240 . 175
Oct 195 . 210 . 192 . 161
Nov 184 . 218 . 120 . 143
Dec 229 . 195 . 162 . 145

Two (2) Owners, Whole Lot of HELOC

2010-09-17T17:37:00.000-07:00

Foreclosed Home Sold to Two Separate Buyers
* Partying bachelors... I don't think so.

What is more bizarre and comical about this is that the reporter states that the house was initially $712,000 (video link at bottom). The current owners paid $365,000. But there is no record of a $712,000 sale for this house. THAT IS THE REAL STORY!!! MSM, WAKE UP!!!!

Here is the house:
42 Vista Encanta #42
San Clemente, CA 92672
03/11/2010 Sold $365,000
05/30/1997 Sold $168,000

There are no records of a $700K+ sale of this house. And you know what that means... livin' High on the HELOC. I would love to see the details on this because it's hard to believe they hit the home ATM for $544K!!!

2010-09-17: Foreclosed OC Townhome Mistakenly Sold Twice
SAN CLEMENTE -- A paperwork mix-up is being blamed for a real estate snafu that resulted in one townhome being legally sold to 2 separate parties.

It all started in March when Douglas Garhartt and Brandon Lively closed escrow on a foreclosed townhome in San Clemente.

It was a great deal: three-bedrooms for $365,000, well below the $712,552 owed on the loan.

Just days later an investment group, Saint John Trust, bought the home at auction.

Video: FORECLOSED HOME SOLD TO TWO SEPERATE BUYERS

A Gift From Jim Sinclair - Part 2

2010-09-07T20:33:00.000-07:00

In December of 2008, Jim Sinclair offered a Gift to all CIGAs. I posted that here: Part 1. What fascinated me at the time was that he was willing to make such a bold prediction about the price of gold, well in advance. Since that time, Gold has risen about $370/oz (price chart at bottom), and I am very pleased with my accumulation. Faced with skepticism and scorn, I'm sure, Jim responded today with his absolute belief in what lies ahead for Gold.

I am not a gold bug. What I am is someone that is averse to risk. The risk I detected several years ago was in the very thing that was supposed to be our store of "wealth"... the US Dollar. The only question I'm asking myself right now is, "How much more?"

2010-09-07: Strapping In For The Big Move
Dear CIGAs,

Now that expectations for Gold at very significant prices are being offered by various rational sources, there is one thing you can be sure of. That one thing is $1650.

I am getting many emails asking how it is possible for the gold price to reach $1650 by early January.

I suspect these are far out in time, out of the money call option buyers that have done exactly what I have warned against. That is the using of options with an investment outlook.

Options are speculations that you never hold past the half way to expiry point, but instead switch to further out months if you believe in what you are doing.

Those that pre-offer gold cannot trade it at $1650 in January because of the short time versus the big moves. They clearly have never experienced the gold run in late 1979 and early 1980.

I will stand with what I have said for nearly 10 years. Gold will trade at $1650 on or before January 14th, 2011. That never made me want to buy expensive in time call options.

It has given me the courage to invest in gold without margin both in shares and bullion.

There is no doubt in my mind that $1650 will occur in early 2011. I have told you that Martin Armstrong, a master timer, feels that gold will trade higher and face a reaction in middle to late June of 2011.

The gold banks are throwing blocks to the price as we approach $1262. This is a major waste of time and money as gold is going to and through that price. The only argument is whether gold will hit $1650 in January 2011 or $3000-$5000 in June 2011.

Do you have any idea how much money has been made by those that bought gold modestly and in cash only on every reaction and sold into the rhino horns? It sounded stupid when I suggested this tactic for the wannabe traders.

I ran 22,000 long gold contracts in the New York and London markets in 1978 to 1980. Back then that was a big number. Today if I have a conviction, I simply play with everything I have and screw credit. The only credit I would use as a pro trader is options.

Those of you who follow me closely know that I am NOT kidding. This is the time when PRICE and TIME meet each other.

This is the time now as it was in 1979 that I went throttle to floor.

This is the time now as it was in 1979 that I am committing 100% of all the cash I can accumulate to what I believe in.

This is the time when all I have planned for is falling into place for the final and enormous pay day. However, I will not and you should not violate discipline, as I have always tried to teach you.

Option are never held past 50% of time left when you purchased them.

If I am wrong about gold at $1650 on or before 14/01/11 it only means gold will trade much higher than $1650 five months later.

As far as being long and wrong, that is something I definitely am not.

Respectfully,
Jim

Gen-X/Y, Clueless again - Kerrie Tidwell

2010-09-05T21:27:00.000-07:00

Allison Brooke Eastman & Kerrie Tidwell

What is really interesting about these stories is that these women are willing to air their dirty and stupid laundry for the whole world to see. Yes, Ms. Tidwell, more cleavage and your boyfriend will pay off your debt. Someone needs to teach her about Return on Investment.

2010-09-03: How Debt Can Destroy a Budding Relationship
Nobody likes unpleasant surprises, but when Allison Brooke Eastman’s fiancé found out four months ago just how high her student loan debt was, he had a particularly strong reaction: he broke off the engagement within three days.
...
But as the couple got closer to their wedding day, she took out all the paperwork and it became clear that her total debt was actually about $170,000. “He accused me of lying,” said Ms. Eastman, 31, a San Francisco X-ray technician and part-time photographer who had run up much of the balance studying for a bachelor’s degree in photography. “But if I was lying, I was lying to myself, not to him. I didn’t really want to know the full amount.”
...
These were the questions that weighed on Kerrie Tidwell. A third-year student at the Medical College of Georgia and an aspiring emergency room doctor, she doesn’t worry so much about her ability to pay back her loans.

Ms. Tidwell, 26, is involved in a serious relationship with Stefan Kogler, an architect who is a native of Austria and living in Vienna. To Europeans, who often pay little or nothing toward their university studies, the idea of going deeply into debt to get educated is, well, foreign.

Ms. Tidwell feels no guilt about the $250,000 in debt she will probably run up, including some from a master’s degree program she completed in London, where she and Mr. Kogler met. “I didn’t acquire it because I go out and shop a lot,” she said. “It’s because I’m doing something that I’ll love for the rest of my life.”

Sonoma Canary, Part 2

2010-08-31T20:00:00.000-07:00

Sonoma Canary, Part 1

In light of the recent articles about banks dragging their feet on foreclosures to avoid flooding the market, the NODs for August '10 are not forecasting a rosy picture for Sonoma. These are not healthy numbers.

And with 250,000 active Option ARM mortgages in California, this debacle has a long time to run its course. Here are 13 Charts from Dr. Housing Bubble on the weak housing market--use it wisely.

I thought this was interesting. Checking NODs and Foreclosures for September, the following name came up, repeatedly: CARINALLI. Doing a little search on the name gave me this article:

2009-09-30: Carinalli creditors respond to bankruptcy filing
One day after real estate financier Clem Carinalli declared bankruptcy, the longtime Sonoma County families whose investments helped him build a real estate empire for the most part remained either publicly supportive or silent.
- All totalled, there were about 5 foreclosures and approximately 20 NODs over the past several months for this family of investors.

43 Foreclosures to start September (through Sep 3) is a fast pace. That would yield about 301 for the month if it remains steady at that pace.

NODs:
. . '08 . '09 . '10
Jan 451 . 394 . 255
Feb 513 . 468 . 380
Mar 498 . 553 . 407
Apr 509 . 497 . 354
May 505 . 491 . 389
Jun 492 . 562 . 303
Jul 460 . 615*. 275
Aug 482 . 425 . 383
Sep 191 . 399 . 400 through Sep 29
Oct 178 . 379
Nov 241 . 320
Dec 500 . 319

* New Monthly Record
* Sep '08: CA Law SB 1137 takes effect
* Dec '08: CA Law SB 1137 FAILS

Trustees Deeds:
. . '08 . '09 . '10
Jan 164 . 166 . 181
Feb 238 . 151 . 155
Mar 221 . 121 . 209
Apr 236 . 123 . 215
May 280 . 149 . 184
Jun 324 . 271 . 169
Jul 341 . 202 . 179
Aug 372 . 231 . 188
Sep 303 . 183 . 224 through Sep 29
Oct 195 . 210
Nov 184 . 218
Dec 229 . 195

"Maybe it will go away"

2010-08-17T19:57:00.000-07:00

Shawn Schlegel, uber-Realtor / Tiny-Trump
"Maybe it will go away"... say it three times, and it will be so.

This realtard is quite a piece of work. And he's doing himself quite a disservice by airing his dirty laundry. If you're the lender and you see this story, you go out of your way to nail his ass, right?

2010-08-11: I won't pay it back
“I am not going to be a slave to the bank,” said Shawn Schlegel, a real estate agent who is in default on a $94,873 home equity loan. His lender obtained a court order garnishing his wages, but that was 18 months ago. Mr. Schlegel, 38, has not heard from the lender since. “The case is sitting stagnant,” he said. “Maybe it will just go away.”

Mr. Schlegel’s tale is similar to many others who got caught up in the boom: He came to Arizona in 2003 and quickly accumulated three houses and some land. Each deal financed the next. “I was taught in real estate that you use your leverage to grow. I never dreamed the properties would go from $265,000 to $65,000.”

Holycow on Holyoke

2010-08-08T18:08:00.000-07:00

I'm sure this is a story repeated thousands of times... people buying houses, thinking they're getting a great deal, really proud of their decision. One of our favorite Housing Bubble ~~Realtors~~ Agents wrote about such a purchase, and how smart they were for it. It's easy to write with praise about these decisions when they happen, but how do they turn out in the long run? Let's take a look.

Here it is, courtesy of Sacramento Real Estate Gal:

2007-07-16: One Sacramento Neighborhood has Newcomers!
These are my new clients that just bought a home in Sacramento. They moved here from Florida and have the cutest accent.

It was such a pleasure working with them because they weren't the least bit jaded about the real estate market. They realized they were getting a good deal and jumped on it with no hesitation. The market analysis confirmed their happiness. Of course, it helped that they had done their own research online and knew the style and neighborhood of the home they were looking in.

They actually made an excellent purchase because of the following:
- they bought in a slow market
- they had done a lot (I mean A LOT) of research beforehand
- this one is the most important: the market analysis showed that homes in their neighborhood in a half-mile radius sold for anywhere between $30,000 more than they paid for their home to $200,000 more than they paid. Which means that every dollar they invest into the home will have more potential returns than say a neighborhood with a ceiling of say, $20,000 under all comps.

This is an excerpt from one of their emails:
"Thank you for all of your help and patience with this property and me! Thanks again. You are a wonderful agent."

Here is the house...

5001 HOLYOKE WAY, Sacramento, CA
4 beds, 2.0 baths, 2,155 sq ft
Year built: 1970
Sale History
11/09/2006: $326,000
Zestimate: $224,500 (Aug 8, 2010)

And here is the great big problem...

5009 Holyoke Way, Sacramento, CA
4 beds, 2.0 baths, 1757 sq ft
07/15/2010: $189,000

5101 Hemlock St, Sacramento, CA
4 beds, 2.0 baths, 2,126 sq ft
02/23/2010: $160,000

4910 Holyoke, Sacramento, CA

03/19/2010: $185,000

4906 Holyoke, Sacramento, CA
05/27/2010: $179,500

And I count no fewer than 7 foreclosures in the neighborhood, two of which are on Holyoke.
Put simply, this purchase was one of those life-impacting, bad decisions.

Addendum:
Calculated Risk just posted on a story about real estate Northeast of Silicon Valley. While it didn't touch on Sacramento, it does illustrate the continued problems in housing and unemployment in California. We've got a long way to go.
2010-08-09:

East of San Francisco: 20% Unemployment, House Prices off Sharply
In Stockton, which had one of the highest foreclosure rates in the nation, the median home price of $100,500 is down from $397,000 at the height of the boom — a stunning 74% drop.
-

Gen-Y: Stupid is and stupid does, I guess.

2010-08-04T08:11:00.000-07:00

$100,000 in student loans and it's not even from a "coveted" Ivy League skool (sp).

Three words...

RETURN ON INVESTMENT.

2010-07-29: Gen Y: No jobs, lots of loans, grim future

Jordan Hueseman, 25, accrued roughly $100,000 in student loans at the University of Denver earning a bachelor's degree in international business and a master's in business administration. On the job hunt, he found his graduate degree sometimes hindered more than it helped.

“At one point, I applied to Whole Foods, hoping they might see some potential for me to move to some type of management position,” Hueseman said. “The e-mail I received from them said I was far too overqualified for any of their hourly positions and as such would not be considered for a position.”

Hueseman said that after one job application, he was told he should leave his degrees off his resume. Hueseman said he was tempted to follow the advice but couldn’t bring himself to do it.

College Bubble Hitting Mainstream

2010-06-10T22:44:00.000-07:00

Carmen Gardiner, College Graduate

Psychology degree from Louisiana state and all I got was $80,000 in debt.

The MSM seems to picking up on the college bubble. It's nothing really new, though: College Bubble.

2010-06-10: My future is gone
...
Carmen Gardiner, 25, a 2007 graduate of Louisiana State University, is weighed down by her private student loans. Her debt is now about $80,000, and her monthly payments are more than $600. Gardiner's undergraduate degree is in psychology. She lives with her husband, who is still in college, and earns $13 an hour at a call center in Atlanta. They have a 6-month-old daughter.

She hasn't defaulted on her student loan. But she doesn't see much hope. Bankruptcy would not discharge her debt.

"I'm completely sour about the whole idea of going to college," she says. "My future is gone before I have a chance to make one. But if I could discharge this using bankruptcy, it would be better than winning the lottery."

Mo' Munna!

2010-06-02T20:43:00.000-07:00

Ms. Cortney Munna,
College Debtor

Hey, at least she acknowledges the poor return on investment.

2010-06-01: More on Cortney Munna’s Student Loan Tale

First and foremost, I openly acknowledge my responsibility for my current situation, as well as the naïveté in my estimation of the return on investment of a “high quality” education and a liberal arts degree. My only explanation is that once I was in school, I didn’t think much about tuition beyond filling out the paperwork, and I did what I always had done: focused on my education.
...
In retrospect, it’s absolutely clear to me that I should have thought more about the cost of the education versus career prospects. I didn’t think of it as a purchase. It was always just the next step to take: Get into good school. Get decent scholarship. Work hard.

And have it all pay off in the end.

College Shame Edition: Ms. Cortney Munna

2010-06-01T19:29:00.000-07:00

Ms. Cortney Munna, College Debtor

This gal could possibly be the College Bubble Poster Child.

A college degree, alone, is not a key to success. Obtaining a useful, practical degree that justifies the cost is imperative. And a "higher education" for the purely intrinsic value is reserved for the truly wealthy.

What does $97,000 in college loan debt buy you?
How about an interdisciplinary degree in religious and women's studies. WTF!!!

2010-06-01: Buried in Debt
Today, however, Ms. Munna, a 26-year-old graduate of New York University, has nearly $100,000 in student loan debt from her four years in college, and affording the full monthly payments would be a struggle. For much of the time since her 2005 graduation, she's been enrolled in night school, which allows her to defer loan payments.
...
How many people are like her? According to the College Board's Trends in Student Aid study, 10 percent of people who graduated in 2007-8 with student loans had borrowed $40,000 or more. The median debt for bachelor's degree recipients who borrowed while attending private, nonprofit colleges was $22,380.
...
Cortney could move someplace cheaper than her current home city of San Francisco, but she worries about her job prospects, even with her N.Y.U. diploma.

She recently received a raise and now makes $22 an hour working for a photographer. It's the highest salary she's earned since graduating with an interdisciplinary degree in religious and women's studies. After taxes, she takes home about $2,300 a month. Rent runs $750, and the full monthly payments on her student loans would be about $700 if they weren't being deferred, which would not leave a lot left over.

Janet Speer

2010-01-31T18:37:00.000-08:00

Janet Speer, Home-ATM

Why are people still willing to come forward with their B.S. stories for all the world to see???

A comment left at the story says it all:

---- start -----
Let's look at the facts here with the key one being #2:
1) She bought the house at $100,000
2) It went up to $154,000 and she refinanced it at $154,000 which means SHE TOOK OUT $54,000 in cash.
3) Its now down to $120,000 and she cant afford mortgage so she is walking away.

So basically she bought the house with a loan, took out $54,000 in cash to do as pleases, now walking away. And we wonder why banks have struggled. This person took all of the upside ($54,000 cash out) and then walked away when it went down.

There are many sad stories of people losing their house. This is not one of them. This person got somewhere to live and $54,000 cash out over a period of years. They are the example of why the people are to blame for this problem just as the banks have a lot of blame to take. This is an example of a case where you should be just as mad at this person as you are at the banks as they both caused problems by their behavior.
---- end ----

Commentary at Calculated Risk: Is this really "Walking Away"?

2010-01-31:I'm walking from my underwater mortgage
-or- How I tapped my Sweet Home Equity and Now I'm Bailing
I stopped paying my $1,450-a-month mortgage on my 200-year-old, four-bedroom home in September 2008 -- after making the hard decision to walk away from my mortgage because it is hopelessly underwater.
...
This house originally cost $100,000. In 2005, as the housing market heated up and I needed cash, I refinanced it. An appraiser said it was worth $154,000 -- which I thought was too high but nonetheless accepted. I cashed out the house at that value.
-----

And here is the house...
327 church st, Royersford, PA
4 beds, 1.0 baths, 1,577 sq ft

Sonoma Canary

2010-01-29T19:00:00.000-08:00

Below are the Notices of Default and Trustees Deeds for the county of Sonoma, as taken from the Sonoma County Assessor. I thought I would regularly post these as indicators of the real estate situation and "recovery" in California.

Note the drop in NODs and Trustees Deeds as the new California law (SB 1137) went into effect. It effectively delayed the foreclosure process, offering no real benefit or solution for house debtors. The numbers below appear to support its lack of effectiveness.

NODs are down in Jan 10', but Trustees Deeds are up. Lets watch that Alt-A bomb explode.

Sonoma Story: Calculated Risk article on the Alt-A bomb exploding in Sonoma.

July '09 sets new record for NODs!!

NODs:
. . '08 . '09 . '10
Jan 451 . 394 . 255
Feb 513 . 468 . 380
Mar 498 . 553 . 407
Apr 509 . 497 . 354
May 505 . 491 . 389
Jun 492 . 562 . 303
Jul 460 . 615*. 275
Aug 482 . 425 . 252 through Aug 20
Sep 191 . 399
Oct 178 . 379
Nov 241 . 320
Dec 500 . 319

* New Monthly Record
* Sep '08: CA Law SB 1137 takes effect
* Dec '08: CA Law SB 1137 FAILS

Trustees Deeds:
. . '08 . '09 . '10
Jan 164 . 166 . 181
Feb 238 . 151 . 155
Mar 221 . 121 . 209
Apr 236 . 123 . 215
May 280 . 149 . 184
Jun 324 . 271 . 169
Jul 341 . 202 . 179
Aug 372 . 231 . 123 through Aug 20
Sep 303 . 183
Oct 195 . 210
Nov 184 . 218
Dec 229 . 195

David Crisp, Part 3

2010-01-28T21:49:00.000-08:00

David Crisp,
Formerly of Crisp & Cole

The noose tightens!!!

(thanks, fraudyouwant)

2010-01-25: Fourth guilty plea in Crisp & Cole case entered
FRESNO -- An almost imperceptible pause was the only apparent emotion displayed as 31-year-old Megan Balod pleaded guilty to felony wire fraud and other charges in a Fresno federal courtroom late Monday afternoon.
...
"The investigation is continuing," Assistant U.S. Attorney Sheila Oberto said after the proceeding, referring to the overall federal mortgage fraud case related to Crisp & Cole operations. Oberto said she could not comment on specifics of the open investigation.
...
Balod's sister, Jennifer Crisp, is married to David Crisp, the former co-owner of Crisp & Cole along with Carl Cole. Both men have had their real estate licenses revoked by state regulators and numerous civil lawsuits are in play against Crisp, Cole and their failed company.

No criminal charges have been filed against the Crisps or Cole. (YET!)

David Crisp, Part 2

2009-12-28T08:09:00.000-08:00

David Crisp
Formerly of Crisp & Cole
(Part 1)

Crisp's actions "epitomized the rampant greed that contributed to the market collapse," Real Estate Commissioner Jeff Davi said in a statement released Monday. "He should not be allowed to work in any capacity related to finance or real estate."

Amen!

2009-11-23: David Crisp banned from real estate for three years
The California Department of Real Estate has barred former real estate agent David Crisp from working in any real estate-related field for three years.

The ban applies to all real estate firms, including lenders, banks, escrow companies and title companies. It became effective at noon Monday, the same day the state announced its order.

Crisp had initially intended to fight the order and two hearings were set, but he failed to show up to either one and lost by default, according to Department of Real Estate spokesman Tom Pool.
...
In September, Jerald Allen Teixeira, a loan officer who worked for Crisp and Cole for more than a year, pleaded guilty to being a part of mortgage fraud. He was offered leniency in exchange for promising to assist federal prosecutors. (Part 3 is coming for Crisp, I'm sure)

Strategic Defaults

2009-12-27T11:48:00.000-08:00

Strategic Default: Heather Baker

I don't fault Ms. Baker for walking away. It's the right financial decision, she had no skin in the game, and the banks got exactly what they deserve. However, can she really afford it? Using traditional guidelines for affordability, Ms. Baker should have yearly earnings of...
$465K * 0.36 = $167K
It's possible she earns this, but I seriously doubt it. Can she truly afford a $465K mortgage? She was nothing more than a house debtor that got caught in the middle of a massive housing bubble.

2009-12-25: Walking Away From The House She Can Afford
Many homeowners who are tens thousands of dollars underwater on their mortgages — meaning they owe more than the value of their homes — have decided it's just not worth it. Some, like Heather Baker, can even afford their payments, but they're walking away anyway.

Baker is done with being a homeowner. Last month, she stopped paying her mortgage.
...
She figures the house she bought for $465,000 won't sell for more than $225,000 now. That lower figure is what a house down the street went for earlier this year in a foreclosure auction. Like a lot of people, Baker bought her house with no money down. The mortgage broker she worked with told her she qualified for the loan based on her credit score alone.

9100 Granite Ct, Waldorf, MD
5 beds, 3.5 baths, 2,302 sq ft

Sale History
07/28/2006: $465,000
11/12/2003: $289,000
11/24/1998: $199,948

Wendy Zhang

2009-11-27T08:37:00.000-08:00

Wendy Zhang, Mortgage Loan Officer / Seller
She's a mortgage loan officer and the seller of a property to Daverena White (story below). It's amazing how she can take someone earning $15K/year and put them into a loan for $698,000. At what point does "helping" become criminal? The house and story are below.

Here is the house:
13222 Catawba Manor Way
Clarksburg, MD 20871-4335

Sale History
05/28/2009: $400,800
12/20/2006: $698,000
01/12/2005: $494,508

Calculated Risk Discussion: WaPo: A Liar Loan Example

2009-11-27: The $698,000 mistake
There was also Wendy Zhang.

Zhang, then 39, was the seller, and she worked as a mortgage loan officer in Rockville. She and her husband had bought and sold a handful of other properties in recent years.

What exactly was it that Zhang understood? "She wanted to buy the house," Zhang would say later. And so she helped find White a lender -- a finance company owned by General Electric called WMC Mortgage that specialized in sub-prime lending and would soon go out of business -- that would allow 100 percent financing.

Even better, as White recalled: Zhang told her that she could get cash back at the closing and that in a beautiful place like Clarksburg her day-care business would thrive.

"You buy this house," White remembers Zhang saying, "and you will be rich."

Across the country, thousands and thousands of such loans were made. White's papers cited income of $163,320 a year, even though she says her 2005 income-tax earnings were less than $15,000 and she relied at times on food stamps.

After owning the house for 22 1/2 months, Zhang and her husband sold it for $203,000 more than they had paid. "In that market, the profit is very, very reasonable," Zhang would say later. Her only mistake, she said, was helping White. "I tried as much as I could to help her. Believe me, I did."

Karenn and Steve Oropeza, Part II

2009-11-15T08:00:00.000-08:00

Karenn and Steve Oropeza, Home-ATM Users, Flakes

The Oropeza's are on the move again.

Recall their case of robbery through home refinancing: Oropeza, Part I

Dr. Housing Bubble even discussed this sickening case study in sweet home equity extraction:
Schadenfreude: The Psychology of Housing Retribution and Justice

They fled their home-ATM escapade in California to move into a McMansion in Katy, TX. But the Texas dream is fading, as their McMansion is up for sale. And according to the listing site, the house is also available for rent. Something tells me that the Oropeza's aren't too concerned about losing their down payment, considering, of course, that the down payment was taxpayer dollars.

Enjoy the pictures of the Oropeza furnishings that OUR TAX DOLLARS ARE PAYING FOR.

Karenn Oropeza
1414 Baldridge Ln
Katy, TX 77494-4713
4 br, 3½ ba, 3,372 sqft

Price Paid: $283K with $28K down
List Price: $329K (Listing Website)
Days listed: 80
(Recently de-listed)

This nearby house might give them some trouble:
2103 Monona Dr
List Price: $280K
Days listed: 163

Fort Bend Assessor

Lori Polin, Part II

2009-10-28T21:05:00.000-07:00

Lori Polin, Realtor
From Realtor Hall of Fame to Housing Bubble Hall of Shame.
Part I

Our realtor sweetheart is up to some bizarre trix. (Thanks, Mav)

2009-10-28: Agent accused of real estate fraud at center of bizarre condo foreclosure
Foreclosure proceedings on Alejandro Salazar's Tampa condo had dragged on so long he finally called the bank this summer to ask why.

Because, the bank told him, your attorney has been fighting us for a year.
...
In a bizarre case, Harlan confirms that he listed himself as Salazar's lawyer even though Salazar hadn't retained him. The person who did, Harlan acknowledges, was a real estate agent who had acquired the deed to Salazar's vacant condo, moved in and wanted to stall foreclosure because she hoped to buy the unit in a short sale.

The agent? Lori Polin, named by Florida's attorney general last year as a key player in an alleged $37 million mortgage fraud scheme.

FHA + 21 =

2009-10-22T20:31:00.000-07:00

More foreclosures.

With a loan amount of $183,000, Miss Tejada should have gross earning of...

$183,000 x 36% = $65,000

for a responsible loan that can be properly serviced.

According to Scott Jagow:
She makes $2470 a month. 54% of her income goes to service the mortgage. Here’s what she says about that:

… I’m left with $1,142 per/month, which is plenty for me.

2009-10-22: Of 21 Year Old With The Underwater FHA Loan
Denise got an FHA loan to buy her home for $155,000. She took out a second loan (called a 203-K loan) to refurbish the place. The total loan amount is about $183,000. She says, “In total, I gave the bank $5,087 + $1,500 which were all deposit and closing costs.”

So her “down payment” was no more than 4% of the value of the home when she bought it. She will get all of that back and then some with the first-time home buyer tax credit.

In other words, thanks to the various government tax breaks, Denise put absolutely no money down on her home. If she has to default on her mortgage, she'll lose nothing except her credit rating. Of course, since she's only 21 years old, there's plenty of time to recover from that.
...
Don't you feel awesome for helping Tejada achieve the American dream?

Barney Frank, Part III

2009-10-11T17:36:00.000-07:00

Barney "I tawt I taw a putie tat" Frank, United States Rep, Mass (D)

Part I
Part II

Barney Frank, the Massachusetts Democrat who is chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, said in an interview that the defaults were, in essence, worth it.

“I don’t think it’s a bad thing that the bad loans occurred,” he said. “It was an effort to keep prices from falling too fast. That’s a policy.”

Raping America... it's a policy.

Everyone wants a piece of this SOB.

Denninger:
To The States: Should We Talk About Secession?
Government Violates The Citizens (Again)

Calculated Risk:
A Policy: Supporting House Prices

How is that "Policy" working?
U.S. Homeowners Cut Asking Prices $27.8 Billion
Aug. 14 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. homeowners cut their asking prices by $27.8 billion with some of the biggest reductions in Nevada and Florida, states hardest hit by the property slump, Trulia Inc. said.

FHA may be setting up repeat of housing bubble
The percentage of FHA loans that are delinquent or in foreclosure climbed to nearly 8% at the end of June, from about 5.5% in early 2006, according to the Mortgage Bankers Assn. And in the weeks ahead, its reserves for loan losses are projected to slip below federally mandated limits.

FHA Shortfall Seen at $54 Billion May Lead to Bailout
Oct. 8 (Bloomberg) -- The Federal Housing Administration, which insures mortgages with low down payments, may require a U.S. bailout because it has $54 billion more in losses than it can withstand, a former Fannie Mae executive said.

“It appears destined for a taxpayer bailout in the next 24 to 36 months,” consultant Edward Pinto said in testimony prepared for a House committee hearing in Washington today. Pinto was the chief credit officer from 1987 to 1989 for Fannie Mae, the mortgage-finance company that is now government-run.

First Failed State?

2009-10-04T11:45:00.000-07:00

It's been very quiet on the California economic condition. Are we getting closer?

How about a 50% vacancy rate in Sunnyvale for office space?

2009-09-01: Empty office buildings dot Silicon Valley

Green Shoots, anyone?

On a side-note, but related, I'm noticing California municipal bond funds rising in price. This makes no sense to me. The risk of holding these bonds seems way to high.

Hat tip to 'Coming Economic Depression', for the link to the story.

2009-10-04: Will California become America's first failed state?
But the state that was once held up as the epitome of the boundless opportunities of America has collapsed. From its politics to its economy to its environment and way of life, California is like a patient on life support. At the start of summer the state government was so deeply in debt that it began to issue IOUs instead of wages. Its unemployment rate has soared to more than 12%, the highest figure in 70 years. Desperate to pay off a crippling budget deficit, California is slashing spending in education and healthcare, laying off vast numbers of workers and forcing others to take unpaid leave. In a state made up of sprawling suburbs the collapse of the housing bubble has impoverished millions and kicked tens of thousands of families out of their homes. Its political system is locked in paralysis and the two-term rule of former movie star Arnold Schwarzenegger is seen as a disaster – his approval ratings having sunk to levels that would make George W Bush blush. The crisis is so deep that Professor Kenneth Starr, who has written an acclaimed history of the state, recently declared: "California is on the verge of becoming the first failed state in America."

Time ARM Bomb - Silicon Valley Style

2009-09-20T08:28:00.000-07:00

~~Time~~ ARM Bomb - Silicon Valley Style
Calculated Risk picked up on this article.

What I don't understand about Mr. Amacker's story is why he would add 2 bedrooms and 1 bathroom to his home when he was only living with his two sons. I wonder if the loan exceeded the cost of the addition? Inquiring minds want to know. (house details at bottom)

2009-09-20: $30 billion home loan time bomb set for 2010
Thousands of Bay Area homes have a ticking time bomb embedded in their mortgage. The homes were purchased with loans known as option ARMs, short for adjustable rate mortgages.
...
Joey Amacker of Newark, who works as an account manager for a catering company, refinanced his home with an option ARM for $624,000 so he could pull out money to build an addition. The friend who sold him the loan assured him that an option ARM was a safe and affordable product, he said.

Amacker said he initially made only the minimum monthly payment of $1,800, which covered part of his interest and none of the principal. The amount he owed grew to $660,000 by November 2008, according to loan documents.

Meanwhile, payments that would cover both interest and principal also escalated above his reach, said Amacker, a single father of twin teenage boys. Although he wanted to pay more than the minimum, "it was a struggle, borrowing from Peter to pay Paul," he said. His 21-year-old daughter moved in to help out, and he rented out the addition he'd built. But he couldn't keep up with the payments. He's been trying to get his bank to modify the loan, but says it doesn't get back to him. The bank did not respond to a request for comment.

Between the negative amortization and his missed payment and penalties, Amacker's total debt has ballooned to $725,000, while the house is probably worth about $500,000, he said.

"I feel so ashamed of how I could have gotten myself in such a bad situation," he said.

Like Amacker, most option ARM borrowers owe much more than their homes are worth, so they cannot refinance their way out of trouble.

------------------------
6589 Fountaine Ave, Newark, CA
5 beds, 3.0 baths, 2,070 sq ft
Zestimate®: $548,500

Sale History
02/16/2001: $425,000

What in the hell did he create? (click image to enlarge)

Interest-Only Insanity Part II

2009-09-09T22:34:00.000-07:00

Moller Interest-Only Insanity

Right on queue, the interest only idiots are coming forward and admitting the world how foolish they were. Didn't they learn from the subprime crew? You don't have your foolish antics published in the mainstream press. You just don't do it!

San Diego, you have a world of hurt coming your way.

2009-09-09: As an Exotic Mortgage Resets, Payments Skyrocket
Edward and Maria Moller are worried about losing their house — not now, but in 2013.

Like millions of buyers during the boom, the Mollers leveraged their way into a house they could not otherwise afford by taking out a loan that required them to make only interest payments at first, putting off payments on the principal for several years.

It was a “buy now, pay later” strategy on a grand scale, meant for a market where home prices went only up, and now the bill is starting to come due.

“I’m praying for another boom,” said Mr. Moller, 34. “Otherwise, we’ll have to walk.”

The Mollers bought in 2005, paying $460,000 for their three-bedroom, thousand-square-foot house. A quick refinance a few months later supplied cash to pay debts. Now the house is worth perhaps $310,000. After their interest-only period is up, they expect their monthly payments to increase 20 percent if not more.
-----------------
Where do you think this house will be at bottom?

My estimate... $200K, barring total economic chaos.

8429 Dallas St, La Mesa, CA
3 beds, 1.5 baths, 1,054 sq ft
Zestimate®: $334,000

Sale History
04/29/2005: $460,000
04/11/2001: $203,000

Interest-Only Insanity

2009-09-08T21:40:00.000-07:00

Interest-Only Insanity
Courtesy New York Times and Calculated Risk.

2009-09-08: The House Trap
“I understand I took a risk,” said [Dean Janis, a Southern California lawyer who bought a $950,000 home in 2004] “But I did not anticipate that the real estate market would go down 30 percent.” He talked with Wells Fargo about his options, and the lender said he had none.

Ok, let's check out this McMansion...

4371 Piedmont Dr San Diego CA 92107
2 beds, 1.0 baths, 1,073 sq ft
Zestimate®: $782,500

Sale History
06/14/2004: $956,500
12/27/2001: $515,000

2bed/1bath and he PAID $950K!!!
What is wrong with people?!!!

This place should go right back down to $400K at the bottom. Until then, just rent and save yourself a sh*tload of money, assuming our money retains any value by then (see A Gift from Jim Sinclair). However, it is about 1.7 miles from Point Loma Seafood, but it's getting way too crowded and expensive--that damn fish sandwich is now $8.32. I can remeber paying around $3.50 for one. More inflation we can attribute to foolish house buyers, perhaps?

Juergen and Lois Kempff

2009-09-07T16:31:00.001-07:00

Juergen and Lois Kempff, Home ATM

It seems as though the OC Register and Calculated Risk are getting into the business of hall of shamers, and this family wrote the book on shameful housing acts. Perhaps you can take comfort in knowing that your tax dollars are going towards a college education for the Kempff kids. Without our help, how could they overcome the College Bubble?

Even in the face of hardships, a house is NOT an ATM.

25231 Del Rio, Laguna Niguel, CA 92677-1517
04/09/2002: $433,000

Current amount owed: $786,000!!

2009-09-07: One Family: Option ARM, failed Modification, Health Issues, Bankruptcy, and more

2009-09-06: Family faces loss of home amid health crisis
LAGUNA NIGUEL – When Juergen and Lois Kempff received a notice of default in the mail saying their home was now in the foreclosure process due to missed payments, they figured it was junk mail.

The notice came from a company they didn't recognize, and to be honest, they had some heavier thoughts on their minds.

...the Kempffs' option adjustable-rate mortgage payment skyrocketed to $4,300 a month from $2,500 last December. Seeing no way to afford the new payments, the Kempffs opted for a loan modification from their bank, IndyMac which was later purchased by OneWest from the FDIC in March.
...
The unpaid amount on the Kempffs' loan is $786,802.59, short of qualifying for a modification by about $60,000.

Since the Kempffs purchased their home in 2002, they took out loans and refinanced their mortgage. The equity from those transactions enabled the Kempff family to fix their cracked pool, remedy a slipping backyard slope by putting in three retaining walls, help three children pay for college and pay for the medical bills of their youngest son who had malignant melanoma.

College Bubble?

2009-09-03T19:37:00.000-07:00

I briefly mentioned a college bubble in the Welcome to 2009 post, and on another occasion, College/University Bubble, linking to a video on the subject that was removed by YouTube. Mainstream media (and Denninger) has decided to weigh in. Welcome to debt hell, students.

2009-09-03: Denninger - Is The Light Flickering On?

2009-09-03: Students Borrow More Than Ever for College
Students are borrowing dramatically more to pay for college, accelerating a trend that has wide-ranging implications for a generation of young people.

New numbers from the U.S. Education Department show that federal student-loan disbursements—the total amount borrowed by students and received by schools—in the 2008-09 academic year grew about 25% over the previous year, to $75.1 billion. The amount of money students borrow has long been on the rise. But last year far surpassed past increases, which ranged from as low as 1.7% in the 1998-99 school year to almost 17% in 1994-95, according to figures used in President Barack Obama's proposed 2010 budget.
...
The new numbers highlight how debt has become commonplace in paying for higher education. Today, two-thirds of college students borrow to pay for college, and their average debt load is $23,186 by the time they graduate, according to an analysis of the government's National Postsecondary Student Aid Study, conducted by financial-aid expert Mark Kantrowitz. Only a dozen years earlier, according to the study, 58% of students borrowed to pay for college, and the average amount borrowed was $13,172.

Sweet Home Equity Gone Sour

2009-08-23T10:35:00.000-07:00

In the aftermath of better living through tapping home equity, what are things like for the Home ATM users? We may not have the detailed answer to that question, but we can certainly see how they're doing on the home-front. Let's go back and look at an example from '07.

In 2007, Mr. Marshall Whittey openly admitted to better living through sweet home equity in the pages of the NY Times. Lavish wedding, trip to Tahiti, flat screen TVs (the ubiquitous home ATM purchase, I might add), shopping sprees, new cars, ... nothing was beyond financial reach if you "owned" a house during the peak bubble years.

How have the houses of Mr. Whittey fared since the article appeared in the NY Times? Let's take a look at the "investment" property and the personal residence.

Investment Property:
915 Demos Ct, Reno, NV 89512
-- 2006-01-03: $444,000 ARM with CTX mortgage
-- 2006-01-03: $111,000 2nd with CTX mortgage

Sold: $215,500 on Mar 31, 2009
4 br 3 ½ ba 2,960 sqft $73/sqft

From $555K to 215K. Wow!!!

Personal Residence:
404 Alysheba Ct, Reno, NV 89521-6274
4 beds, 2.0 baths, 2,017 sq ft
06/08/2005: purchase $283,900 with Universal American Mortgage
03/01/2006: $30,000 HELOC with Countrywide
11/20/2006: $375,000 REFI with First Magnus
06/08/2005: $355,000 (unsure about the sales history vs HELOC/Refi)

Zestimate®: $259,000

Here is a similar property in the neighborhood, currently listed for $249K, and it has been on the market for 114 days: 470 Miesque Ct

Investment Property Loss: $340K
Residence Property Loss: $100K (conservative estimate)

We're looking at total losses of approximately $440K. When/if he walks away from his current under-water situation with this residence, the number should grow. You might ask, who carries the burden of these losses. The answer is simple, it's right HERE.

Barack Hussein Obama, Part 2

2009-08-16T08:15:00.000-07:00

Barack Hussein Obama, Commander in ~~Chief~~ Thief

First we had George W. Bush with his "homeownership plan". Now we have Obama with his "home rentership plan".

Having your government as the landlord is a great thing, isn't it.

Ahhh, yes, change!

2009-08-16: Rentership Society
WASHINGTON - The Obama administration, in a major shift on housing policy, is abandoning George W. Bush’s vision of creating an “ownership society’’ and instead plans to pump $4.25 billion of economic stimulus money into creating tens of thousands of federally subsidized rental units in American cities.

The idea is to pay for the construction of low-rise rental apartment buildings and town houses, as well as the purchase of foreclosed homes that can be refurbished and rented to low- and moderate-income families at affordable rates.

Alt-A Bomb II

2009-08-10T19:54:00.000-07:00

2009-08-06: Deutsche Sees 48% of All US Mortgages Underwater in 2011
By AUSTIN KILGORE
August 6, 2009 4:18 PM CST

Deutsche Bank (DB: 66.83 +0.97%) believes continued declines in home values will increase the number of US mortgagors with negative equity from 14m in Q109 to 25m in Q111.

According to a report Deutsche released this week, the 25m represents a projected 48% of all US mortgages. While subprime and option adjustable-rate mortgages (ARM) are the biggest source of underwater borrowers in the current market, Deutsche said a larger percentage of prime conforming and prime jumbo borrowers will join the fray.
...
By 2011, Deutsche predicts 89% of option ARM borrowers will be underwater, up from 77% in 2009. The rate of underwater subprime borrowers will increase from 50% to 69%, and underwater Alt-A borrowers will increase from 49% to 66%.

Carlos Justo

2009-08-02T15:35:00.000-07:00

Carlos Justo, Superstar Real Estate Agent
Can this guy strike a similar pose or what??

snkjorge recommended this guy for the Housing Bubble Hall of Shame. I couldn't agree more.
Cheers!

2009-08-01: A superstar real estate agent plots his comeback
Justo is $20 million in debt. He is five months into a massive bankruptcy filing. The IRS is after him for $6 million.

And yet, he dreams.
...
In 2005, Justo was worth $20 million. He and the agents who worked for him sold $200 million in real estate in a single year. He was also the owner of 12 multimillion dollar estates in the county's most exclusive enclaves; he intended to eventually flip them and make a profit. Justo and his business partner, Irving Padron, were awarded a prestigious Sotheby's franchise and opened its offices in one of the few historic mansions in downtown Miami.
...
"I knew the market was going to crash," he said. "It was irresponsible what we did, what all of us did in the United States. We took out huge loans, we bought things that people had no business buying."

For three years, Justo had tried to avoid filing Chapter 7, even borrowing $15,000 from his 85-year-old mother and $75,000 from his 83-year-old aunt to pay his monthly debts.

2009-02-06: Connected, Fabulous ... and Broke
.

Sacramento Sorrow

2009-07-12T17:49:00.000-07:00

Ok, here comes the Prime and Alt-A whiners. The bubble was obvious; if you participated you put yourself, your family, and your savings (assuming you used any for a purchase) at risk. Now we get a whole new breed of Shamers!

Ya' know, I remember a time when $500K was a LOT of money. But here's a guy that drank the kool-aid deeply. Go out and buy that $600K house on the golf course; live large; prices only go up; don't worry about the future. Well... it's time to give it all back.

Food for thought:
At the ripe old age of 55+, why would anyone want to take on crippling debt? As you approach your "golden" years you should be seeking security and zero debt.

2009-07-11: Mortgage defaults spread as even 'safe' borrowers falter
No longer is the real estate bust simply the result of exotic, subprime loans that doubled payments and blew up in homeowners' faces. As the Sacramento economy buckles, even the safest mortgages have become part of a new wave of loan defaults, experts say.

With capital-area job losses reaching 45,000 in the past year and unemployment at 11.1 percent, lenders, bankruptcy attorneys and debt counselors all say they're seeing rising delinquencies among prime borrowers with fixed-rate loans and good credit. Many of those slipping into trouble are state workers, the mainstay of Sacramento's economy.

There are 3.3 million of them in California – 56 percent of all mortgages. But nearly 4 percent were delinquent in the first quarter,

Already in the foreclosure process is Ron McClure of Roseville. He bought a $600,000 house at Sun City Roseville in 2003, using a prime, fixed-rate loan that cost him $3,200 a month.

That worked until the housing market collapsed. McClure, partner in a small home-building business, saw his income collapse with it. Six months ago, he stopped making payments on the house.
--------------

Here is the house:
7681 Rosestone Ln, Roseville, CA 95747
3 beds, 2.5 baths, 2,538 sq ft
Zestimate®: $455,000

Sold 08/15/2003: $600,000
2008 Property Tax: $6,757

Kern County - Record Foreclosures

2009-07-09T22:53:00.000-07:00

Lets continue the Kern County NOD and Foreclosure record tracking for Bakersfield Bubble.
Record NODs HERE.

California Insolvency is Here (?)

2009-07-01T20:15:00.000-07:00

We're insolvent, I guess. Let's see what happens.

2009-07-01: California Prepares to Issue IOU's
Sacramento (myFOXla.com) - California's controller will start paying many of the state's bills with IOUs as soon as Thursday after lawmakers failed to close the state's worsening budget deficit, adding a new measure of indignity to a state sinking deeper into dysfunction.

2009-07-01: BofA to accept California IOUs
Bank of America said Wednesday that it will accept IOUs from the State of California from its customers through July 10.

“To support our customers, while giving the government additional time to pass a budget, we will accept California state-registered warrants - or IOUs -from existing customers and clients,” the bank said. “Based on state disbursement estimates, we will accept the registered warrants through July 10.”

California Insolvency!

2009-06-28T07:56:00.000-07:00

2009-06-30: Federal Judge Blocks Bankrupt California from Reducing Wages of State Workers
U.S. District Judge Claudia Wilken halted the wage cuts on June 25 in response to a lawsuit by the Service Employee International Union (SEIU) on behalf of 250,000--out of a total of 440,000--home care workers that it represents in California.

The judge ordered the state to keep paying the workers, referred to as In-Home Supportive Services Workers (IHSS), up to $12.10 in wages and benefits. [IHSS? WTF?]
...
The union argued that the IHSS program actually saves the state money because it keeps its users from going into nursing facilities that tend to be more expensive.

However, according to a California Senate Office of Oversight and Outcomes report this year, the IHHS program “lacks sufficient oversight and suffers from fraud and abuse.” [How shocking!!]
----
Ok, let's do the math... (assume 1000 work hours/year; half-time)

440,000 workers x $12.10/hour x 1000 hours/year = $5.3BILLION

2009-06-30: California poised to issue IOUs to vendors
So far, no banks have committed to honoring the IOUs, said Hallye Jordan, spokeswoman for state Controller John Chiang.

She said banks are probably waiting to see how much interest the state will pay on the IOUs – a figure that won't be decided until Thursday, the same day Chiang is scheduled to issue IOUs. The notes will total $3.36 billion, with about $500 million targeted for the private sector.

2009-06-24: California set to issue IOUs
"Next Wednesday we start a fiscal year with a massively unbalanced spending plan and a cash shortfall not seen since the Great Depression," Controller John Chiang said in a statement announcing that he would be forced to use IOUs to pay the state's bills beginning on July 2.

Kendra Todd - The Lawsuit

2009-06-23T20:32:00.000-07:00

Kendra Todd, Uber Real Estate Pumper
(see also, Part 1, Kendra Todd Meets God)

If guilty, perhaps behind bars she will convert to Islam.

* Hat tip Johnnie

2009-06-21: Kendra Todd accused of fraud in lawsuit over homesale
...
But homebuyer Diane Harris probably wished Todd had a different show - perhaps one entitled, "My Closing Costs Are Worth What?"

Harris said Todd used her Apprentice success "to lull unsuspecting victims into her scheme to defraud," according to a Palm Beach County Circuit Court lawsuit filed against Todd by Harris earlier this month.

More specifically, Harris claims Todd defrauded her by inducing her to buy a Texas home in a deal stuffed with financial extras for Todd, "including overcharges and illegal charges, none of which were disclosed." As a result of the added closing costs, plus a high interest rate mortgage Harris couldn't afford, the property is in foreclosure and Harris' credit is ruined, the lawsuit claims.

Harris is suing Todd, mortgage broker Michelle Caldwell, and Todd's company, Kendra Todd Group, a dissolved Florida corporation formerly based in Hypoluxo. The suit, which includes allegations of fraud and breach of fiduciary duty, seeks unspecified money damages.
...
In her lawsuit, Harris claims Todd called the Obra purchase "a fantastic investment opportunity" and that only a few lots still were available for sale. Swayed, Harris said she gave Todd a $7,500 deposit for the purchase of a $88,820 home, the lawsuit says.

Things went south soon after that. Harris's suit said she was told the home would be equipped with appliances. But when Harris went to see the home, she learned the appliances weren't included - but could be purchased through the mortgage loan. So another $1,000 was added to the mortgage, the lawsuit says. (Before it went bust, Obra gained a reputation for luring home buyers in with low-cost home prices and the promise of free appliances.)

In addition to the appliance snafu, other nasty surprises awaited Harris, including an extra $2,000 in deposits owed, the suit claims.

Harris claims she later learned Todd received "kickbacks" from Obra for bringing buyers to the homebuilder, the lawsuit alleges. But Harris' suit said Todd wasn't licensed as a broker in Texas, and therefore couldn't receive kickbacks - or brokerage fees, as Todd described them in closing documents, the lawsuit says.

Harris's suit said she also paid mortgage broker fees to Caldwell, even though she wasn't a licensed mortgage broker in Texas. Caldwell could not be reached for comment, and the company she worked for, Benchmark Mortgage Corp., is listed as a dissolved Florida corporation, according to state records.

Todd, who still owns a Boynton Beach home appraised at $219,276, also could not be reached for comment by presstime. Her publicist said she was in Seattle.
----
34 Baytree Cir, Boynton Beach, FL
3 beds, 2.0 baths, 1,577 sq ft
Zestimate®: $180,000

Sale History
04/23/2004: $207,000

Property Appraisal

Barack Hussein Obama

2009-06-19T19:37:00.000-07:00

Barack Hussein Obama, President, USA
As if the housing debacle couldn't get any worse, along comes the Commander in ~~Chief~~ Thief to bring "financial rape" to the American Public (The Dumbest Thing I've Seen Yet, Denninger).

2009-06-19: Obama’s Mortgage Program
June 19 (Bloomberg) -- President Barack Obama’s program to help more homeowners refinance may be expanded to include borrowers who owe more than 105 percent of their homes’ values, Federal Housing Finance Agency Director James Lockhart said.

The Obama administration is considering allowing Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to refinance loans with current loan-to-value ratios of 125 percent or higher, Lockhart said at a National Association of Real Estate Editors Association conference in Washington yesterday.

Roxie Chilcott, Part 2

2009-06-10T20:58:00.000-07:00

Roxie Chilcott, Mortgage Broker??
(Part 1)

Well, well, well, what do we have here? I was perusing some old HBHS® posts and after seeing Roxie I thought I would do a little internet search to see if there was any new, publicly-available information on our mortgage broker sweetheart. And what do I find...

Link: Foreclosure Listing

And, San Diego Source: PUBLIC NOTICES (then select "Trustee's Sales")
Notice is hereby given that RECONTRUST COMPANY, N.A., as duly appointed trustee pursuant to the Deed of Trust executed by ROXIE ANN CHILCOTT, AND KEVIN RICHARD KELLY, WIFE AND HUSBAND AS JOINT TENANTS, dated 11/10/2006 and recorded 11/17/06, as Instrument No. 2006-0820873, in Book, Page 11705), of Official Records in the office of the County Recorder of San Diego County, State of California, will sell on 01/22/2008 at 10:00AM, AT THE SOUTH ENTRANCE TO THE COUNTY COURTHOUSE, 220 WEST BROADWAY, SAN DIEGO, CA at public auction, to the highest bidder for cash or check as described below, payable in full at time of sale, all right, title, and interest conveyed to and now held by it under said Deed of Trust, in the property situated in said County and State and as more fully described in the above referenced Deed of Trust. The street address and other common designation, if any, of the real property described above is purported to be: 4046 CAMINITO ESPEJO, SAN DIEGO, CA, 921071521.

Reviewing the house details, it was purchased in '95 for $160K and it sold for $415K after the foreclosure. But the loan amount shown in the foreclosure listing is $468K. Livin' high on the HELOC? Out of curiosity, would this loan have legal recourse?

What is even more fascinating about this foreclosure is that it occurred near the same period of time that Roxie was serving as Pres. CA Assoc of Mortgage Brokers (San Diego Chapter) and was being quoted in the San Diego Union-Tribune (Dec. 07).

4046 Caminito Espejo, San Diego CA 92107
3 beds, 2.5 baths, 1,434 sq ft
Recently Sold: $415,000

Sale History:
06/13/2008: $415,000
02/28/1995: $160,000

Kendra Todd Meets God

2009-06-08T19:03:00.000-07:00

Ever notice that when people reach bottom and they can't pimp their BS anymore, they turn to god. Go check out some of Kendra's more memorable past remarks, HERE.

Kendra Todd: "Money is God" (see below)
WTF!!!

Kendra Todd: "the Lord will guide us through this financial crisis"

Wait a second, didn't she help guide people INTO the crisis??

700-Club Video

Kendra Todd: Turn Passion Into Prosperity
“I’m a real estate investor, but that’s just one facet of one part of a bigger picture – teaching people how to develop a healthy attitude and mindset towards money,” she said.

Her best selling book, Risk & Grow Rich targets the challenges and importance of taking risks to create wealth, and directly confronts how our relationship to risk affects our lives.

Her team's main mission is to match buyers with properties that fit their goals, and to help people grow one step closer to financial freedom. And, although Kendra has an in-depth background in real estate, her main goal is equipping people with the knowledge that success and wealth comes from God.

“I’m a strong Christian, and I’m getting ready to launch a Christian biblical based approach to making and saving money, tithing and giving,” she said. “I am getting ready to do what I am passionate about. I want to empower people to create a real positive relationship with and perspective on money, and realize it’s all God.”

Kendra also specializes in financial literacy and believes that it’s important to learn how to save and not be indebted to anyone; learning the biblical foundation on how to approach money and setting yourself up for retirement is key, especially during this current economic crisis. (Hey, what happened to tapping sweet home equity? See: My House is Worth What? )

“It isn’t about you. It’s all God,” she said. “That’s something that I really put out there as one of the fundamental approaches to developing a successful mindset. Turn off the television; the Lord will guide us through this financial crisis. Don’t get overly excited about what the news is saying. Don’t let that dictate how you feel about your current situation.”

Santa Clara Fishing

2009-06-06T19:35:00.001-07:00

Is it really a good time to buy?
Is SillyCon Valley really immune?
Answers: No and No

Fasten your seatbelts, SillyCon Valley, the day of reckoning is appoaching.

Here's a random example of the insane bubble.
$630K at the peak.
He $HOOT$, he $CORE$!!!
(but they better convert some of that fiat profit to tangible assets; one way or another, it all has to be given back)

3173 Cabrillo Ave (or Movoto)
Santa Clara CA 95051
3 beds, 2.0 baths, 1,078 sq ft

Sale History
06/25/2008: $500,605 *
05/19/2006: $630,000 (Buy now or be priced out forever! Really?)
06/29/1995: $210,000

For Sale: $430,000

Got Gold?

2009-06-02T21:17:00.000-07:00

Is this going to be a growing trend???

Things are getting very, very interesting.

And did you see silver bust through $16?

2009-06-01: Northwestern Mutual Makes First Gold Buy in 152 Years
June 1 (Bloomberg) -- Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance Co., the third-largest U.S. life insurer by 2008 sales, has bought gold for the first time the company’s 152-year history to hedge against further asset declines.

“Gold just seems to make sense; it’s a store of value,” Chief Executive Officer Edward Zore said in an interview following his comments at a conference hosted by Standard & Poor’s in Brooklyn. “In the Depression, gold did very, very well.”

Northwestern Mutual has accumulated about $400 million in gold, and Zore said the price could double or even rise fivefold if the economy continues to weaken. Gold gained 10 percent last month, the most since November. The commodity has more than tripled since 2000, rising for eight straight years. Gold futures for August delivery slipped $4.80 to $975.50 at 4:03 p.m. in New York.

“The downside risk is limited, but the upside is large,” Zore said. “We have stocks in our portfolio that lost 95 percent.” Gold “is not going down to $90.”

Alt-A Bomb

2009-05-31T15:33:00.001-07:00

I haven't done this in a while, so lets do some detective work and poke at house debtors.

Here was the story:
2009-05-30: Alt-A Loans, Second wave of foreclosures ahead
Refinancing three years ago into a pay-option loan allowed Kristi and Marvin Laron to avert a jump in the monthly cost on the original loan the couple used to purchase their Cloverdale home. The loan’s minimum payment was $400 lower than their previous mortgage payment.

“Our whole goal was to pay less,” Kristi Laron said. “We figured we were going to refinance again. Who knew what was going to happen.”

Now the Larons are stuck with the loan and face a $1,000 hike in their monthly mortgage payment, boosting it to about $3,200. The couple can’t refinance because they owe more than the house is worth. Their lender has denied requests to change the loan and avert the payment jump, primarily because the couple has not fallen behind on payments and doesn’t have a financial hardship.

“We’re trying to avoid foreclosing on our house. We’re trying to do the right thing and nobody wants to help,” Kristi Laron said. “We both have jobs and we can’t really complain except for wondering what the future holds.”

Here is the house:
433 Reisling, Cloverdale, CA
Z-Estimate: $340,000
Sold: 1/20/2005
Sale Price: $400,000
2008 Property Tax: $5,361

There is a house for sale in the neighborhood for $300K. As the bomb starts going off, how many houses in this neighborhood will succumb to foreclosure? And check out the property taxes; the price of "ownership".

Was their long-term plan to continue refinancing to keep their house ponzi going?

Final Question: Who will help the Larons?
(click HERE for answer)

Pink-Slip Capitals

2009-05-27T22:25:00.000-07:00

2009-05-19: America's Pink-Slip Capitals

#4: Los Angeles, Calif

Mass Layoffs: 100
Workers Affected: 10,594
A state budget crisis is hurting government budgets. In April, the Los Angeles Unified School District voted to lay off 5,000 teachers, school administrators, counselors and other employees.

#6: San Francisco, Calif
Mass Layoffs: 50
Workers Affected: 7736
The City by the Bay is being hit by market turmoil as financial heavyweights headquartered there, like Wells Fargo, Barclays Global Investors, Charles Schwab and Visa thin their ranks to survive hard times.

#10: Riverside, Calif
Mass Layoffs: 19
Workers Affected: 4,107
Collapsing home prices have caused mayhem in the inland empire economy leading to sweeping reductions in payrolls. State budget cuts have hit construction projects and government workers, too.

Silicon Valley: Cracks in the Foundation

2009-05-24T18:53:00.000-07:00

Silicon Valley... it's different here.

No, not really, but that is the kind of ridiculous thinking that permeates the mentality of people living here.

Silicon Valley, AKA 'Self-Entitlement Valley', 'Silly Valley', etc...

I know someone in Santa Clara that paid $850K for a house in '05--one of those new, packed-in, little communities. They owe $750K and the Z-est is $600K; maybe it would sell for $550K today. I then searched 18 houses immediately surrounding this one; all purchased in '05 for $750K-850K. Unless they put massive dollars down, every house debtor is seriously underwater and ALL should walk away. But this is ~~Silicon~~ Silly Valley, it's different here. Wrong. At bottom, these boxes should be priced around $350K. Things are just starting to get interesting, but most of the debtors are in serious denial.

After the dot-com garbage and now the exploding real estate debacle, where will the next phony injection of wealth come from for Silicon Valley?

2009-05-24: Recession suddenly humbles high-tech sector
Five miles away, former indoor plant specialist Michael A. Jones is having what he calls "a humbling experience" at a nonprofit food pantry, choosing dented cans of corn and tuna, a crunched box of Rice Krispies and some soon-to-expire milk to supplement his food stamps.

Jones used to gross $12,000 a month as an indoor horticulturist for high tech companies, restaurants and car dealerships (SAY WHAT?? $12K/month for a glorified gardener?!), although not Silicon Valley Auto Group. Then "everyone cut back all at once and we had to shut down," he said. "It happened fast."

The Associated Press Economic Stress Index, a month-by-month analysis of foreclosure, bankruptcy and unemployment rates in more than 3,000 U.S. counties, shows that last year, as the national economy tanked, high tech economic centers from California's Silicon Valley to North Carolina's Research Triangle were apparently "recession-proof" with increasing jobs and stable housing prices.

Last fall, everything changed. When previously invested funds petered out, there was no new capital. Bankruptcies, foreclosures and unemployment in high tech regions spiked, and are now at some of the highest levels in the country.

For example:
-- Santa Clara County, home to Silicon Valley, saw bankruptcies soar 59 percent in the past 12 months, and projections are that they're still climbing;

"We had hoped we might stay insulated from the global economic crisis, and for a long time we were," said Silicon Valley Network president Russell Hancock. "But then it caught up with us and now everyone is laying off."
Everyone?
"There isn't anybody who isn't laying off," he said, then draws a long breath before reciting this list: "Microsoft, Intel, Hewlett Packard, Sun, Yahoo, Apple, Google." He pauses a moment to consider that. "Google. When Google is laying off you know something is going very wrong." (What's wrong is Google, itself.)

"Folks believe that because we're in the Silicon Valley with million-dollar homes and billion-dollar businesses, hunger and homelessness don't exist. But in fact it's getting much worse, and it's just really frightening," he said.

Timothy Geithner

2009-05-20T19:25:00.000-07:00

Timothy Geithner
And the taxpayer continues to pick up the tab for the mistakes, recklessness, and stupidity of others.

2009-05-20: Geithner Says Toxic-Asset Plan to Start in Six Weeks
May 20 (Bloomberg) -- Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said policy makers plan by early July to begin helping banks dispose of illiquid assets, in the U.S. government’s next step to end the worst credit crisis in decades.

“Working with the Federal Reserve and the FDIC, we expect these programs to begin operating over the next six weeks,” Geithner said in testimony to the Senate Banking Committee today in Washington.

The Treasury’s Public-Private Investment Program will use $75 billion to $100 billion of government funds to finance sales of as much as $1 trillion in distressed mortgage-backed securities and other assets. The effort has two components, which the Treasury will manage in conjunction with the Fed and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.

UCLA Anderson Forecast

2009-05-17T08:42:00.000-07:00

Why does this group continue to be published? But if it's predicitions you want, here are 10 that are probably much more accurate than Anderson Forecast
America By 2012: 10 Dire Predictions

And follow the link for Mark Shniepp. Is this the kind of "expert" you want to follow?

2009-05-15: Home price fall nears bottom
Although 2009 will be a “throwaway year” for San Diego County, with double-digit unemployment, growing office vacancies and declining retail sales, local housing prices will hit bottom this fall, heralding an eventual recovery, UCLA's Anderson Forecast predicted in a report to be released today.

The Anderson Forecast, one of the state's most followed teams of economic analysts, predicted that housing prices will start rising steadily by the second quarter of the year, starting with a rebound in the price of existing single-family homes.

“When it is generally perceived that selling values have reached a bottom, sideline buyers will enter the market and conventional home sales will dominate the real estate recovery,” UCLA economist Mark Schniepp said. “Reported selling values for homes will reverse, slowly at first, and then rise more convincingly.”

Oh, yeah, Anderson Forecast?

2008-03-11: Experts' forecast sees no recession
UCLA's Anderson Forecast, which previously has been ahead of the curve in forecasting the downturn of the California housing market and the resulting decline in the economy, predicted yesterday that the state and nation would not fall into a recession.

“The data don't yet add up to a recession, and there is nothing to challenge the basic story of sluggishness that we have had for two years. Don't worry, be happy,” said Edward Leamer, director of the forecast, the state's best-known economic report.

Tell us more, WHORES!

2006-05-04: County home prices to flatten
With home sales sharply declining and values hitting a plateau, economists from the UCLA Anderson Forecast predicted yesterday that residential real estate prices in San Diego County will remain flat through 2011.

Ratcliff said no crash in prices is likely since the economy is so healthy. Generally, home prices fall only when large numbers of workers lose their jobs. [LIKE RIGHT NOW?]

“Home prices will plateau but not depreciate,” Ratcliff said. “Home prices only fall during recessions.”

Trampled Green Shoots

2009-05-16T21:07:00.000-07:00

I like lists of things. Here is one from Jim Willie...

2009-05-15: Trampled Green Shoots
What follows is a laundry list that puts the USEconomy halfway between the Intensive Care Ward and the National Morgue:

Endless War spending could subsidize every household in America with $1000 per year
Income is trending down in the United States, England, and Japan
US banks loan loss reserves are at a 20-year low while profound losses continue
Of the nearly 9000 US banks, 1575 of them posted a Q1 loss
Bernanke claims $2 trillion is needed by the big US banks, but they pass the Stress Test
Municipal bonds and state finances are disasters, as they each appeal for USGovt aid
A shocking 20% of US homeowners have loan balances greater than their home values
Half of modified loans result in foreclosure within several months
Jobs report for April revealed jobless level at 8.9% (massaged) and 15.8% (actual)
Jobs Report for April included 66k worse revised job losses for March and February
Continuing jobless claims at 6.56 million, grew 220k just last week
CALPERS pension fund is insolvent, USGovt pension PBGC guarantee fund in deep deficit
FDIC requested $500 billion in additional funds to cover bank failures (giant failure coming)
Car sales still down 40% annually, with steep Japanese car sales declines also
Detroit carmakers are closing down plants, with huge ripples through entire supply chain
GM & Chrysler restructures are extremely likely to result in Chapter 7 liquidation in time
GM burned $1.3B in Q1, burns $113 million per day, unable to transition to green cars
Business investment down 38% in Q1, a RELIABLE LEADING INDICATOR
Durable goods up 9% in Q1, but only after Q4 was pushed down from bank shock
Inventory reduction not key, but rather inventory/sales ratio, since sales way down
Economic contraction despite lower energy costs from crude oil, natural gas, gasoline
Housing was false foundation since 2002, now in stubborn decline, the Giant Albatross
Distress sales make up 40% of all housing sales, led by underwater sales and foreclosures
Cramdown Law rejection means open season on foreclosures, more huge bank losses
Banks admit that home loan are not modified after all, a revolving door to foreclosure
Option ARMs, Jumbos, and Commercial mortgage defaults are ramping up fast
Commercial mortgage bonds have $70-100 billion that cannot be refinanced, sure to default
Staggering decline in consumer credit, -80% in Q3, minus $31.7B in Q4/Q1

Kern County: New 'Highest Ever'

2009-05-13T19:49:00.000-07:00

Lets continue the Kern County NOD record tracking for Bakersfield Bubble.

(Old Highest Ever)

2009: Credit Cards and California

2009-05-11T19:45:00.000-07:00

From Welcome to 2009, here is more supporting information for the downtown.

* Credit Card Debt and Credit Contraction
* Reduced State/Government Tax Revenue

2009-05-10: Credit card losses
Mr. Ward lost his job at a retail warehouse in April and so far has managed to make minimum payments on his credit card debt, which he estimates at $15,000 to $20,000. Asked if he thinks he will be able to pay off his balance, he said, “Not unless I win the lottery.”

In the meantime, he said, “I’m just doing what I can.”

Even if Mr. Ward can pay off his debts, experts predict that tens of thousands of Americans will not be able to, leaving a gaping hole at ailing banks still trying to recover from the housing bust.
The bank stress test, released last Thursday, found that the nation’s 19 biggest banks could expect nearly $82.4 billion in credit card losses by the end of 2010 under what federal regulators called a “worst-case” economic situation.

But if unemployment breaches 10 percent, as many economists predict, the rate of uncollectible balances at some banks could far exceed that level. At American Express, Citigroup, and J.P. Morgan Chase, one-fifth of the credit card balances are expected to go bad over the next 20 months, according to stress test results. At Bank of America and Wells Fargo, about a quarter of card loans are expected to sour.

(hat tip to Exurban Nation)
2009-May: CA State Revenue in April 2009
* The State’s revenues continued to deteriorate in April. Total General Fund revenues were down $1.89 billion (-16%) from the latest estimates found in the 2009-10 Budget Act.
* Personal income taxes were $1.06 billion below the estimate (-12.6%), corporate taxes were below the estimate by $831 million (-35.6%) and sales taxes lagged the estimate by $108 million (-19.9%).
* Compared to April 2008, General Fund revenue in April 2009 was down $6.3 billion (-39%). The total for the three largest taxes was below 2008 levels by $6.3 billion (-40.3%). Sales taxes were $452 million lower (-50.9%) than last April, and personal income taxes were down $5.7 billion (-43.6%). Corporate taxes were $142 million below (-8.6%) April of 2008.
* Sales tax collections year to date are short $327 million (-1.8%) from the 2009-10 Budget Act. Income taxes were $653 million lower (-1.7%) than expected, and corporate taxes were $788 million lower than expected (-9.5%). The State’s other revenue streams were $299 million below (-6.7%) the estimates.

ACORN

2009-05-01T20:36:00.001-07:00

ACORN, housing.ACORN.org, ACORN Housing Services
And as the Housing Bubble enters the later stages of its destruction, a group has to insert its stupidity in hopes of saving house debtors. Fools, morons, monkeys, and jackasses... welcome, ACORN.
(hat tip to Sacramento Land(ing) )

2009-05-01: Protesters disrupt foreclosure auctions in Sacramento
Protesters disrupted several foreclosure auctions Tuesday on the Sacramento County Courthouse steps, winning a temporary cancellation of one and sending an unidentified auctioneer to the hospital with chest pains.

An ACORN official said the activist group simply wants more time for struggling borrowers it claims were often targeted for dangerous loans.

"Many of the sales that are happening now are around houses that could be saved by the (loan modification and refinance) plans starting to be implemented," said Amy Schur, California director of ACORN.

Goldman Suchs

2009-04-15T20:26:00.000-07:00

Goldman Sachs
'Most Evil Entity in the Universe'

So now this piece-of-sh*t "bank" is trying to shut down a blog because they don't like it. But I guess that 'sticks and stones' don't apply when you have billions of taxpayer dollars and total control of the US Federal government (my opinion).

Here is the blog they're attempting to shut down:
Goldman Sachs - Evil Empire ('Evil Empire' is my edit & opinion)

Not to sound harsh, but I hope all employees of this company rot in hell. Is that too much?

Why do I feel that these "profits" (see below) belong to you and me?

2009-04-14: Goldman Sachs posts forecast-busting earnings
WASHINGTON (AFP) – US banking giant Goldman Sachs took markets by surprise, announcing forecast-busting quarterly earnings and a massive five-billion-dollar share issue to help repay government aid.

Goldman Sachs reported first-quarter net profit of 1.81 billion dollars with earnings per share of 3.39 dollars, sharply higher than 1.33 dollars per share forecast by most analysts.

The profit came on the back of revenues of 9.43 billion dollars in the first quarter, which ended on March 27.

2009-04-14: Jesse's Cafe Commentary:
Goldman Sachs Buries Losses to Beat the Estimates
The only thing getting blown away around here are the shareholders, taxpayers, and anyone else who buys what Wall Street in general is selling these days.
Goldman Sachs Releases Earnings After Hours

And Hanky-boy has been around here since Dec '07.

The Spin (Smith) Doctors, Part 2

2009-04-14T19:54:00.000-07:00

Dr. Margaret Smith and Dr. Gary Smith
The Spin (Smith) Doctors, Part 1

Patrick.net had a little blog about this crazy couple, so I thought I'd link to it here. And recall that I gave them 'props' in October '07 (link above). Enjoy!
2009-04-14: Housing and Bad Assumptions

Fannie/Freddie Bonuses

2009-04-05T08:06:00.000-07:00

They have got to be kidding!!

"give workers the incentive to stay in their jobs"

Here is some incentive. Lose your job and you won't be able to find another one. And you save $210M in a bankrupt company.

2009-04-03: Fannie, Freddie worker bonuses total $210M

WASHINGTON – Mortgage finance giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac plan to pay more than $210 million in bonuses through next year to give workers the incentive to stay in their jobs at the government-controlled companies.

The retention awards for more than 7,600 employees were disclosed in a letter from the companies' regulator released Friday by Sen. Charles Grassley of Iowa, the senior Republican on the Senate Finance Committee. The companies paid out nearly $51 million last year, are scheduled to make $146 million in payments this year and $13 million in 2010.

Is it working?

2009-03-22T19:37:00.000-07:00

“Owners of capital will stimulate the working class to buy more and more expensive goods, houses and technology, pushing them to take more and more expensive credits, until debt becomes unbearable. The unpaid debt will lead to the bankruptcy of banks, which will have to be nationalized, and the State will have to take the road which will eventually lead to Communism. ”

Karl Marx, 1867

Welcome to 2009... again

2009-02-17T22:45:00.000-08:00

Wow, we're only a month and a half into the year and most of the concerns I have are happening; perhaps you share some of them. I was going to post to all the economic news that supports the growing downturn, but there is so much it that it would be too big a task. But after seeing the article shown below, I chuckled at the title and the last statement the author made, considering my 2009 preview, Welcome to 2009.

Welcome to 2009, indeed!!!

2009-02-04: You Think 2008 Was Bad? Welcome to 2009
Eric Sprott and Sasha Solunac
By all accounts thus far, it's already been a pretty bad year... and we're only three weeks into it! If you will recall, 2008 was a pretty bad year for the banking sector. For example, the shares of Citigroup, Bank of America, and the Royal Bank of Scotland fell 77%, 66%, and 92%, respectively, in 2008. So far this year (remember, this is only three weeks) the same stocks are already down 50%, 55%, and 74%, respectively. Like we said, 2009 has already been a pretty bad year! For as bad as 2008 was, 2009 promises to be a whole lot worse. The problem isn't just the banking system anymore. The problem is the banking system and everything else. This year, the financial crisis of yesteryear is morphing into an altogether different animal. It's morphing into a financial crisis that has an economic crisis layered on top of it. In fact, to call the current environment an economic crisis is likely understating the situation. What we really have is a global economic catastrophe. One where weakness only begets more weakness, causing a vicious circle that is proving nigh impossible to reverse in spite of all the world's financial, economic, and political brain trust throwing everything they have, including the kitchen sink, at the problem.
...
We believe the problems of 2009 will make people yearn for 2008 all over again. In 2008 it was only savings and assets that got pillaged. In 2009 it will be jobs and incomes that get lost. In 2008 we had the Madoff Ponzi scheme, supposedly the largest fraud in history. In 2009 we have the US dollar Ponzi scheme - no contest. But to only pick on the dollar wouldn't be fair. As governments the world over take ever increasing roles in markets and the economy, all paper currencies will be at great risk, pillaging whatever savings people have left after 2008.

Welcome to 2009.
.

Christopher Warren

2009-02-16T19:20:00.000-08:00

Christopher Warren, Loomis Wealth Solutions

Back to our regularly scheduled blog. BWAHAHAHAHA

2009-02-13: Fugitive's Safe Deposit Box Yields $400K in Gold
SACRAMENTO, CA - The mortgage fraud fugitive caught returning to the United States on Tuesday was carrying two safe deposit keys that led to more than $400,000 worth of gold coins.
...
During his week-long globetrotting adventure, federal authorities believe Warren stashed some of the proceeds from his illegal activity-- including as much as $5 million in gold.
...

2009-02-11: Calif. fraud suspect caught with $70,000 in boots
SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — A suspect in a nationwide mortgage fraud scheme who fled the country was caught at the Canadian border with $70,000 stuffed in his cowboy boots and nearly $6,000 worth of platinum, authorities said Wednesday.

Christopher J. Warren, 26, was arrested early Wednesday while entering the United States at Buffalo, N.Y. After he disappeared Feb. 3, Warren was charged with conspiracy, fraud and conducting a continuing financial crime.

$100 Bills = Toilet Paper?

2009-02-15T13:58:00.000-08:00

John Williams of Shadow Government Statistics provides some insights into inflation and a sign to indicate that hyperinflation has arrived. His advice to prepare: physical gold, hold assets outside of the US dollar, and have bartering goods (e.g. scotch).

Video: $100 Bills = Toilet Paper?
(click link or image; use right-mouse click to open in new window or tab)

Revolt Brews in California Counties

2009-02-10T17:56:00.000-08:00

Not your everyday, normal recession, now is it?

2009-02-09: Revolt Brews in California Counties
Counties in California say they've had enough – and they aren't going to take it anymore.
In what amounts to a Boston Tea Party-style revolt against the state Capitol, they're threatening to withhold money.

Los Angeles is considering such an option. And Colusa County supervisors said they authorized payment delays for February.

"We didn't vote on it, because I don't think anybody wants to go to jail," Colusa County Supervisor Kim Vann said.

Closer to home, Sacramento County is planning to file a lawsuit this week against the state and Controller John Chiang for withholding millions of dollars – much of it for social service programs.

"The Legislature authorized those expenditures, and (the controller) has decided to withhold it," said Susan Peters, chairwoman of the Sacramento County Board of Supervisors. "I believe it's possible other counties will be joining in the action."

Riverside County is looking at a similar lawsuit but plans to go one step further. It authorized going to court to relieve it from having to provide state-mandated services without state funding.
...

College/University Bubble...

2009-02-08T21:35:00.000-08:00

...CHECK.

U.S. Housing Slump Has ‘Just Begun'

2009-02-04T23:08:00.000-08:00

2009-02-05: U.S. Housing Slump Has ‘Just Begun,’
Says Forecaster Talbott

Feb. 5 (Bloomberg) -- Let’s say you own a $1 million home in Santa Barbara, California. The house seemed like a steal when you bought it with that adjustable-rate mortgage in 2005. You still love the white beaches and those yachts bobbing up and down in the harbor.

Then you awaken early one morning, troubled that your monthly payments will soon double. You go out to pick up your newspaper and see for-sale signs on five houses on the street. One identical to yours just sold for $500,000.

Are you going to pay the bank $1 million plus interest for your place? John R. Talbott, a former investment banker for Goldman Sachs, poses that hypothetical question in his latest book of financial prophesy, “Contagion.”

His answer: “I don’t think so,” he says. “If I’m right, then this housing decline has only just begun.”
...
Five More Years
Talbott’s latest predictions are sobering. The U.S. is only halfway through the total potential decline in housing prices, he says. Home values will continue to deteriorate for four to five years, he forecasts. Adjustable-rate mortgages issued in 2004 and 2005, for example, are only now resetting for the first time, he notes.

Bankers may “try to blame the crisis on poor Americans with bad credit histories, but that is not the real cause of the housing crisis,” he says. “The greatest home-price appreciations and the homes most subject to price readjustment are in America’s wealthiest cities and its glitziest neighborhoods.”
...
How did we get into this mess? Talbott blames everyone from average Americans who caught “the greed bug” to hedge funds and credit-default swaps. The single biggest error, he says, was for U.S. citizens to allow their national politicians to take large campaign contributions from big business and Wall Street -- a theme Kevin Phillips developed in “Bad Money.”

‘No Accident’
“This crisis was no accident,” he says. It began, in Talbot’s view, because the U.S. government was “co-opted” into deregulating the financial industry. Politicians were “paid to deregulate industry,” taking billions of dollars each year in campaign contributions.

His investment advice for this prolonged recession: Hang on to cash and invest in gold or Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities, or TIPS. If he had to invest in stocks, he would put his money in China.

Crazy Carnes - Final Chapter(?)

2009-01-31T22:50:00.000-08:00

Chandra & Michael Carnes, Loco House ~~Buyers~~ ~~Debtors~~ Renters
(Part 1)

The final chapter of the Carnes' has arrived... for this bubble, that is. They started their real estate adventure by "purchasing" a million dollar abode (5903 Mountain Hawk ) under the guidance of super realtor, Chris Nunez. When the benefits of interest only payments disappeared, they managed to sell at a small loss and "purchase" another house (1086 Elsbree Ln ). This, however, was a price too far, and a little over a year later they were forced to sell using a short sale. But here is an alternative thought: they purchased this house for its peak sales price and then months later put it back on the market. Hmmmmm...

Sale History
07/29/1994: $241,500
09/21/2007: $640,000 - peak sales price
Feb 2008 - back on market - why so soon??
01/23/2009: $525,000

Zillow: 1086 Elsbree Ln Windsor CA 95492
Price Paid: $640,000
Days on Zillow: 292
For Sale: ~~$669,000~~ ~~$659,000~~ ~~$599,000~~ $540,000
Recently Sold: $525,000

On the sale price of $525K, the buyers are foolish. Unless they have money burn (which is what they're doing), they'll watch the value of this house fall to under $400K. My guess is that they sold a few years back and have been renting, waiting for that "bottom", but most people still don't grasp the magnitude of the economic problems this country is facing.

This story is probably repeated hundreds of thousands of times all over the country. What made the Carnes' story unique is that they openly discussed their insane spending spree on PBS--NOW Part 1, Part 2.

3552 Kendell Hill Dr
173-400-037-000
494 Quince St Windsor CA

California Unemployment

2009-01-23T18:19:00.000-08:00

The rate at which things are unwinding is even shocking me. I watched gold and silver climb $50 and $0.50 today, respectively, and I'm wondering if this is a sign of the next leg down in the stock market. I say this because a number of forecasters have been calling for large drop in the market in February; the stars may be aligning for that event. I was even a little disappointed because I've been contemplating another purchase of both metals, but I'll probably do it anyway.

California unemployment rate jumps to 9.3 percent
By SAMANTHA YOUNG, Associated Press Writer
Friday, January 23, 2009

California's unemployment rate jumped to 9.3 percent in December, capping a tumultuous year of massive job losses and a housing slump that has struck most of the country.

The jobless rate announced Friday by the state Employment Development Department represents a jump from the 8.4 percent figure in November 2008.

Excluding farmworkers, California lost 78,200 jobs in December as employers sliced payrolls to deal with the slowing economy.

California's unemployment rate hasn't been at this level since January 1994, when the state was coming out of its recession in the early part of that decade, said Stephen Levy, senior economist for the Center for Continuing Study of the California Economy.

"California, like the nation, is in the midst of a terrible and deepening recession," Levy said. "We all expect the job losses to continue and unemployment rates to go higher."

Tsunami of Foreclosures to Come?

2009-01-11T21:17:00.000-08:00

Ivy Zelman of Zelman and Associates predicts a tsunami of foreclosures yet to come over the next few years, and the only solution she recognizes is nationalization of the mortgage industry. Wouldn't that be a great solution, 'Comrade Blogger'.

Hope for Housing? Not a fu**ing chance.

California Property Tax Shortfalls

2009-01-10T20:06:00.000-08:00

This is not surprising but it's interesting how fast things seem to be unwinding as we enter '09. The MSM is starting to write about the dwindling property taxes. If you look at the NODs posted previously, you can imagine it's only going to get much, much worse. This is gonna be ugly.

2009-01-10: Property tax assessments could plunge across California, worsening fiscal crisis
California's plunging property values have already clobbered homeowners, but now the trend is promising pain for struggling counties, cities and schools that rely upon property taxes — a downward shift unseen in decades.

"It's the first time since the Great Depression that we've had a negative growth in property taxes that are the heart and soul of local government services," said Paul McIntosh, executive director of the California State Association of Counties.
...
Santa Clara County's property tax roll is projected to show low-single-digit growth, down from 7 percent last year. But that could well change as a growing number of properties are evaluated, said longtime county Assessor Larry Stone. Final assessed values will not be sent to property owners until mid-May.

"I've never seen an economic downturn as significant and pervasive as this," Stone said.
...
Shrinking property tax funding "exacerbates the need dramatically," said Santa Clara County Supervisor Liz Kniss. Applications for safety net programs here have increased almost 40 percent in the last year, as county leaders wrestle with a $220 million budget shortfall.

Homeowners whose properties are devalued "may be getting a break on their tax bill," Kniss said. "But they're going to feel it in the health care arena, in schools, and in what we are able to provide in services for the homeless."

Kern County Canary

2009-01-06T23:21:00.001-08:00

(purple line is '08, tan is '07)
Hat tip to Bakersfield Bubble. Yet another county in Kalifornya with increasing NODs, which will eventually lead to many more foreclosures. 2009 has only begun and the news is grim on retail sales, unemployment, taxes, commercial real estate, and housing, in general. Buckle up.

Welcome to 2009

2008-12-31T11:40:00.000-08:00

Here are my concerns/predictions going into 2009. Similar concerns led me to exit the stock market last year, and I'm trying to position myself for '09, but it's difficult to find safety.

What am I missing?

Also, I added many links to '09 predictions.

Enter 2009 in a RECESSION
Credit Card Debt and Credit Contraction
Alt-A, Prime ARM, Option ARM resets coming
Increase in cost of borrowing money (eventually this must happen)
Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae will be given unlimited access to the U.S. Treasury
Continued House Foreclosures (6M-12M by 2012)
House prices falling, and must still fall 50% in some areas
College/University Costs (another bubble?)
Retail Sector Collapse
Commercial Real Estate Collapse
Manufacturing is Falling
Destruction of the United States’ domestic manufacturing capacity
Rising Unemployment
Rising Healthcare costs; medical care for unemployed; healthcare bubble?
Tax Increases (talk has begun)
Civil Unrest / Protests / Tax Revolution
Increase in Crime
Corporate Contraction
Reduced State/Government Tax Revenue
Existing US Debt is massive
Capitalism is dead, they are looting the treasury
State Debt and Municipal Bond Default
Hedge Fund Implosion (unknown dollar amount); CDS Risk
Rising Food Costs (deflation for other goods, but food is up)
Weakening US Dollar leading to Devaluation? Collapse?
Fed 'Quantitative Easing' (money dropped from helicopters)
Rampant Inflation Possible (long-term)
Intentional Devaluation of US Dollar
US Dollar as the worlds reserve currency at risk; Russia and China announcing they no longer consider it the worlds reserve currency; G20 meeting in '09 will be interesting
US Bond Market Collapse
Bank Failure Risks
Loss of Economic & Dollar Confidence
US Markets Likely to Drop 25-50%
Markets Crashing Around the World
Foreign Currencies in Trouble (e.g. Ruble)
Wars/Troops in Iraq and Afghanistan; billions spent every day
Turmoil in Pakistan and India
Iran Nuclear Capability
Gold/Silver to rise (Gold ~$2000, Silver ~$30)
In the not-too-distant future, 500 oz of silver will be able to buy the average house, and 1 oz of gold will be equivalent to 1 share of the DOW

Other Predictions:
Where We Are, Where We're Heading (2009) (Market Ticker)
Our 2009 Predictions (Roger Wiegand)
10 Predictions for 2009 (Jason Hamlin)
Top Trends Of 2009 (Gerald Celente)
10 Worst Real Estate Markets of 2009
8 really, really scary predictions (Fortune)
Outlook '09: Forget Good, Economy Is Bad Or Ugly
What will 2009 bring for Gold?
10 worst real-estate markets for 2009
Golddrivers 2009 - Bullish outlook for gold (Eric Hommelberg)
2009 forecasts in a nutshell (Peter Cooper)
Prospects for 2009 (Jim Klinge)
Time to break out the crystal ball (golfer_X)
Gold and Silver in 2009 (James Turk)
2009 Real Estate Forecast: Troubles Spread
Forecast for 2009 (James Howard Kunstler)
The Year Ahead: 2009, Part 1 (Glen Allport)
2008 Year Review and Outlook For 2009 (Peter Grandich)
Outlook for 2009 (Monty Guild)
Ten Things We Might Expect to See in 2009 (Jesse's Cafe)
Predictions for 2009 (Jim Otis)
25 Predictions for 2009 (One Salient Oversight)
California 2009 Economic and Housing Forecast (Dr. Housing Bubble)
2009: Managing The Shift From Deflation Back To Inflation
Forecast 2009: Deflation and Recession (John Mauldin)

Video/Audio Predictions:
Gerald Celente on GoldRadio - 12/23/2008
Marc Faber predicts economic disaster in 2009 part 1 of 2
60 Minutes: The Mortgage Meltdown - Coming ARM Resets
Analyst: One Third Of Banks Could Collapse In 2009
What is Gold Telling Us? (Oil/Gold Price Ratio is broken)
Marc Faber on CNBC - 12/29/2008
CNBC Healthcare Bubble Next to Collapse
Tech Outlook 2009
John Rubin - Gold 2009

Other Links:
‘Pay option’ mortgages could swell foreclosures (12/10/2008)
Fitch: Alt-A Mortgages Deteriorating More Rapidly than Expected (12/15/2008)
Option ARM: No one saw it Coming According to the Mainstream Media. The Alt-A and Pay Option ARM Tsunami Quickly Approaches. Charting the Option ARM and Alt-A Wave. (12/16/2008)
Quantitative Easing: FAIL (Denninger, 12/24/2008)
Russia Devalues Ruble for Third Time in Week (12/24/2008)
Bleak economic picture emerges from new data (12/24/2008)
Year Stained By Insolvency (12/26/2008)
The deflation that many analysts describe is actually a systemic liquidation that will be difficult to reverse, a necessary step by producing the critically important inflation. ... THE ENTIRE MORTGAGE INDUSTRY, COMPLETE WITH MILLIONS OF HOME MORTGAGES, AND PERHAPS COMMERCIAL MORTGAGES, WILL BE NATIONALIZED WITHIN THE NEXT 12 TO 18 MONTHS.
Dollar Devaluation To Fix The Great Recession (12/09/2008)
Ponzi Nation (12/26/2008)
Retail Sales Plummet (12/26/2008)
Consumers fall deeper into debt (12/23) Consumers, not PEOPLE.
U.S. Home Resales Fall (12/23/2008)
China to begin yuan-settlement trials (12/25/2008)
China to allow freer yuan trades (12/25/2008)
U.S. debt approaches insolvency (12/19/2008)
US urging calm over possible Pakistan troop moves (12/26/2008)
Retailers Brace for Major Change (12/23/2008)
Hospitals Ill from Bad Debt (12/27/2008)
Getting Excited about 2009
The Global Economic Crisis - Bad and Worsening
2008: A Year in Review, Part I (Daily Reckoning)
2008: A Year in Review, Part II
Is recession behind spike in bank robberies?
Economy Down, Theft Up
False Diagnosis of Deflation (Jim Willie)
Manufacturing index drops to 28-year low
Cash-poor states eager for a piece of Obama plan
44 States Face Huge Budget Shortfalls
U.S. governors seek $1 trillion federal assistance
California governor offers new budget fix plan
Is Social Security a Ponzi Scheme?
Late December Economic Rant -Roger Mason
How Deflation Creates Hyperinflation
*****Ten Major Threats Facing The Dollar in 2009*****
Dollar, Treasuries, Gold, Silver, Oil, Banks, Home Inventories/Delinquencies, Vacancies
Legislature to consider college tuition freeze

A Gift from Jim Sinclair

2008-12-29T12:10:00.000-08:00

Ok, Jim Sinclair says write this down, so I'll note it right here. I consider the 'replacement' of the US dollar a low probability event, but it's not zero, and a lot can happen between now and June 2012. What really fascinates me is that he not only says it will happen, but that he provides a date.
Jim Sinclair's MineSet

Next year is going to be very interesting and the economy deserves close attention and scrutiny, particularly if your plan is to survive and possibly thrive as we emerge from the recession. My goal is survival and I emerged from '08 relatively unscathed, but I'd like to come out of the overall recession in better shape than when it started.

2008-12-28: A Gift From Jim
Dear Friends,
Here is my New Years gift to you, my extended family.

There is no way that the CONSEQUENCES of the largest creation of paper money since it was invented can be avoided or even modified. Odds now favor Alf Field’s price objective (Elliott Wave Gold Update 23, bonus article Crisis Cogitations).

January 14th 2011 to June 21st, 2012:
The best part of this gift is not the one you already know, which is January 14th 2011 (Sinclair: gold will trade at a minimum of $1650 on or before January 14th 2011), but rather the date that a new currency form will replace the form of the US dollar as you know it today which is the third week of June 2012.

Don’t laugh! Write this down and do not forget about it!

Happy (sort of) New Year,

Jim

Santa Claus Bailout Hearings

2008-12-25T08:13:00.000-08:00

realrant 50% Watch

2008-12-19T19:00:00.001-08:00

Roy 'realrant' Merlino, Real Estate Guru
(Part I)
Back in November '07 at a Sacramento Land(ing) post, I left the following comment (see below), which drew a response from a local realtard. He believed that a median price drop of 50% for Sacramento zip code 95864 was impossible. Well, the impossible appears to be on its way. Lets start the 'realrant 50% Watch'. We're already at 40%.

And there is a lesson to be learned from this. First, you cannot trust realtors, and second, this housing bubble was far larger than most could imagine and it is not over. House prices will continue to drop in California until 2011. The toxic ARMs are starting to reset and the economy is tanking. When things reach bottom, the words used to describe the devastation will be 'shock' and 'awe'.

Sacramento Landing Post: November 16, 2007

Tyrone said...
If that "best deal" isn't a mark-down of 30-50%, forget it; you're just a sucker, otherwise. Price-to-rent ratio has a long way to come down in Sacramento.

RealRant said...
Hey Tyrone. Re: If that "best deal" isn't a mark-down of 30-50%, forget it...So I want everyone to remember that Tyrone says that the median price in 95864 needs to be $194,000 before anyone but a sucker would buy. Hey... do I get some kind of membership card or T-shirt for the Housing Bubble Hall of Shame? What are the criteria for induction?

This is the 95864 Percent (%) Drop Watch:

Sacramento 95864
Nov '07 $388,000
...
Oct '08 $271,000 -30% (DQNews)
Nov '08 $234,000 -40% (DQNews)
Dec '08 $425,000 xxxx (DQNews) Low Sales?
Jan '09 $218,000 -43% (DQNews)
Feb '09
Mar '09
Apr '09 $325,000
May '09
Jun '09 $317,000

Target $194,000
.

Leslie Appleton-Young, Part II

2008-12-19T10:23:00.000-08:00

Leslie Appleton-Young, Chief "Economist", California Assoc of Realtors
(Part I)

Hat tip to Captain Credit Crunch.

This is classic NAR propaganda. You can't make this stuff up; it's absolutely priceless! Are these the kind of people you want to listen to when you make 'the most important purchase of your life.' Absolutely no accountability for their false statements.

DataQuick: Bay Area median home price sinks to 8-year low

2007-04-10: Economist sees Marin holding its own in housing slump
"It's God's country, what can I say," Leslie Appleton-Young, chief economist for the California Association of Realtors, told an audience of agents Tuesday in Terra Linda. "When is the 30 percent decline in Marin County's market going to happen? Not in my lifetime." (Is she dead?)

"It's important to keep it in perspective. Do you really know anyone who thinks, 'Gee, I'm so sorry I bought in the Marin market?'"

Despite the problems in the housing sector, Appleton-Young noted that the economy is growing at a moderate pace, interest rates are relatively low and job creation has been steady in California. Also, the commercial real estate market has been "on fire," suggesting brisk job growth and investment, she said.

"It doesn't look like there's a recession coming any time soon," she said.

2008-12-18: Another month of plummeting home sales in Marin
Another month of plummeting home sales in Marin included a price drop of nearly 30 percent from November 2007, as discounted foreclosure sales continued to drive the Bay Area market.

The median price of a single-family home in Marin last month was $790,000, down from $975,000 last year, and 104 single-family homes were sold, down from 160 in November 2007, MDA DataQuick of San Diego, a real estate information service, reported Thursday.

Yvonne Herrara, Part II

2008-12-18T19:42:00.000-08:00

Yvonne Herrara, House ATM User
(Part I)
Yvonne was featured in a Whittier Daily News article* back in Feb '08. She tapped $300,000K of her home "equity" for home improvements, a pool, expenses for your kids, and who knows what else. Since then, she was foreclosed upon and had to vacate the house. I received a comment at my original post (Part I) about the recent purchase. In a nutshell, the comment stated:

The house was in shambles
It had no pool
It seemingly had no improvements
It Was in Complete Disarray!

Can somebody point out the $300K pool? BWAHAHAHA

18820 E Laxford Rd, Covina, CA 91722-2004
3 beds, 2.0 baths, 1,122 sq ft

Sale History:
01/29/1998: $132,000
06/17/2008: $225,802 *back to the bank
10/31/2008: $280,000

I hope the Herrara's made the most of their $300,000 party! This country is f'ed.

On a final note, does the bank have recourse on their debt? I believe it does. The bank could sell their debt to a collection agency for pennies on the dollar, and the collection agency could harass them forever. They could have taken a lesson from the Oropeza's; after raiding the bank's 'treasury', the Oropeza's moved to Texas, which has homestead laws that can protect them.

* The original article can no longer be found at the Whittier Daily News, not even in their archives. Very strange.

Ventura County Blues

2008-12-16T18:51:00.000-08:00

Exactly one year ago on December 16, 2007, the Ventura County Star ran a story on a young family, desperate to "own" a house at any cost. And now, what a cost it has been. The latest numbers from DataQuick show a 32% drop if median price for Ventura County, and interestingly enough the numbers are close to the numbers for this particular family's house. The original story is posted below, along with a video and the Zillow numbers. At what cost is home "ownership" worth? It's going to take a lot of coupon clipping to make up for $126,000 lost, so far. ($512K-$386K)

Ventura County: DataQuick
Nov '07: 516 $521,250
Nov '08: 729 $355,000 -31.90%
Dec '08: 876 $338,000
Jan '09: 578 $335,000
Feb '09: 545 $327,000

1793 Wolverton Ave, Camarillo CA 93010
3 beds, 2.0 baths, 1,229 sq ft

Sale History
05/25/2007: $512,000
Zestimate®: $358,000 5/22/09 Time to walk away (see house below).

Nearby houses for sale:
2793 Munson St Camarillo CA 93010
3 beds, 2.0 baths, 1,391 sq ft
For Sale: $379,900 (easy buy at $340K, if you're into falling knives)
Days on Zillow: 142

Temple Ave Camarillo CA 93010 (Foreclosure)
4 beds, 3.0 baths, 1,950 sq ft
Foreclosure: $369,900
Days on Zillow: 8

2007-12-16: Families finding struggle to stay in pricey state
Owning a house was a top priority for ~~Mark and~~ Marianne Moise. (Do you really think it was his top priority?)

Both of them were born and raised in Ventura County. They wanted to stay close to family and friends. Even with the high cost of homes in Ventura County, they wanted a house with enough space for 7-year-old Cody and 18-month-old Maddison.

"We were both worried we weren't going to be able to afford a home," Mark Moise said. "It was real discouraging looking at housing prices. Even fixer-uppers were out of our price range, but we found one."

With the loan, their monthly mortgage on the $512,000 home is $3,500 a month, $200 less than what they would have paid for a $475,000 home they looked at previously at a two-year fixed rate that would adjust upward after that period. The Moises are grateful for their fixed rate, as they watch people they know lose their homes when adjustable loan rates increase. (They would be more grateful had they WAITED for the bubble to pop. The price of ownership per day: $126,000/575 days = $219/day LOST.)

Art Laffer, Part II

2008-12-15T17:36:00.001-08:00

Art Laffer, Economist, B.A. Econ Yale '63, MBA/Ph.D. Econ Stanford '65/'71
This one is for you, seyelda.
(Part I)

Not only does he refuse to pay the penny, he won't be sending that 'nice note' to Peter Schiff. He also says you basically cannot forecast the economy beyond 9 months into the future. Funny that I don't recall him giving this disclaimer in the first video. What a complete and total bum.

At 4:00 in the second video, Peter mentions the ARMs resetting. This is all over the news right now. I guess the mainstream media decided to inform the sheeple, although the MSM and the sheeple can't seem to look forward more than a month ahead, which makes Laffer's forecasting (9 months) look pretty good compared to morons.

YouTube Videos:
Art Laffer Refuses to Pay the Penny
Schiff vs Laffer

Gregory Paquin

2008-12-08T20:11:00.000-08:00

Gregory Paquin, President, Gregory Group
(hat tip to Sacramento Land(ing))

2006 Prediction:
"I would suggest on the new-home side that we haven't reached the bottom point yet, and I'm optimistic we will in 2007. ... I think next year is going to be very similar to this year. I don't necessarily think it's going to go down a whole lot more. I think new-home sales are going to be relatively the same as this year."

"I think sales on the new-home side are going to be pretty consistent with this year. I think we'll see a little bit of a bump in '08 in terms of sales volume. In terms of pricing we may see a consistent level. Maybe a little lower next year, not significantly by any means. And then maybe net pricing is a little bit up."

2007 Prediction:
Paquin believes the average price of a new home – $404,689 this year – will fall to $374,337 next year. His good news: Builders will find a bottom in 2008. "

With the spring sales season of 2009, you will start to see some positive movement in sales rates," he told a gathering of the North State Building Industry Association.

2008 Prediction: Real estate expert predicts '09 bottom
Question: It's been the slowest year yet for home builders. When do you anticipate that the market will hit bottom?

Answer [Gregory Paquin, president, Gregory Group]: It is our expectation that the Central Valley will hit bottom during 2009 and begin to see the signs of recovery in 2010 and 2011, although some areas - Sacramento and some northern Central Valley communities - may experience the recovery sooner than others (some mid- and southern Central Valley communities). Several things will need to happen before the housing recovery can begin: a slowing of foreclosure activity, less fear about job losses, the stabilizing of the overall economy and the easing of credit markets - a swing of the pendulum back to the center.

And then this gem...
2007-04-01: Mortgage defaults on the rise, but what's next?
Gregory Paquin, president of the Gregory Group, a real-estate information and consulting service in Folsom, said he doesn't anticipate a housing-market bubble because regional employment numbers are strong enough. "But clearly there are issues with sub-prime."

Sonny Kim

2008-12-04T22:00:00.000-08:00

Sang-Min 'Sonny' Kim, Super-Flipper

Wow, this guy turned $100 into $300,000 in 3 months! Impressive!

And a 'Fraud Expert' stated that 'it was obvious the banks weren't paying attention'. Ya' think? Too bad they couldn't, or wouldn't, put a stop to this when it was 'obviously' taking place. They could have read some of the housing bubble blogs if they needed help.

Sonny Kim’s investment company bought this house at 4809 N 17th St., Belmont Heights, in April 2006 for a $100 deed and sold it three months later for $300,000.

2008-11-30: A case study in housing collapse
This husk sold for $300,000 in 2006 with the help of a no-money-down mortgage from a subsidiary of Washington Mutual Bank. The owner defaulted; WaMu owns it now. Listed for $52,000, the house could be yours for $35,000 cash.

"What we had here was an obvious case of mortgage fraud," said Josh Parker, a Coldwell Banker Realtor.

Most of the homes Sang-Min Kim sold are empty now. Many have code violations, and are clustered in impoverished neighborhoods such as Belmont Heights and Sulphur Springs.

The trail of foreclosures and blight is lined with the bad mortgages approved or assigned by Wachovia, Washington Mutual, Bank of America, National City Bank, Lehman Bros., Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and Wells Fargo.

The loans — many made by banks now getting billions in a taxpayer bailout — dwarfed the true value of the properties. Some borrowers had no prospects to suggest they could pay off the loans. Multiple loans from the same bank branch sometimes went to a questionable borrower within weeks of each other.

"It's obvious the banks weren't paying attention, or worse," said Richard Hagar, a property fraud expert.

Dawn Aguiar

2008-11-30T14:33:00.000-08:00

Dawn Aguiar, House Debtor/Deadbeat
Ms. Aguiar should not be seeking a write-down in her mortgage principal. Houses might be selling for $450-500K in her neighborhood, but at the bottom, $300K might be the price. And if this economy unfolds into a full-blown meltdown, they won't be able to give these houses away.

Dawn, this video is for you:
THE HOUSING BUBBLE EXPLAINED ** SPECIAL SHEEP VIDEO!

2008-11-25: Homeowners say no help from lenders
Customers of Countrywide, Wachovia and other lenders describe the firms as uncooperative, ineffective and rude. Borrowers say they must navigate a maze of phone banks. They say lenders won't offer good deals."They're supposed to be getting people into fixed-rate loans they can afford, reducing their principal," Aguiar said. "That's not what I'm getting from Countrywide."

"Countrywide says it wants to help people restructure? That's baloney," said Dawn Aguiar, who bought her Fremont home for $587,000 in 2005. "They have not been helpful at all." She financed the purchase with $586,000 in Countrywide loans.

Homes in her neighborhood sell for $450,000 to $500,000. Her house is "under water" — worth less than the loan.

Aguiar said she often hears Countrywide and other lenders are aggressive in finding ways to redo loans.

"They're supposed to be getting people into fixed-rate loans they can afford, reducing their principal," Aguiar said. "That's not what I'm getting from Countrywide."
Her adjustable rate loan balance increases monthly. She's behind in her payments.

"One lady I spoke to was rude, she had a real attitude," Aguiar said. "She talked down to me like I was a deadbeat."
===============
Ok, lets check out her house...

4343 Delaware Dr Fremont CA 94538
3 beds, 2.0 baths, 1,104 sq ft
Sale History
12/16/2005: $587,000
08/26/1998: $234,000

$587K for 1100 sq ft!!!
$533/sqft!!!

These are the idiots we're wasting tax dollars on. Lets do the math:
- assume 20% down
- $470K mortgage loan

Historical affordability guidelines are 3x gross earnings for loan amount. Lets use 3.5x...
$470K/3.5 = $134K

The Aguiar household must earn $134K, right?
(at 10% down, household income of $150K!, 0% down, $168K!)

Bay Area Whine

2008-11-29T18:18:00.000-08:00

Dawn Aguiar, House Debtor/Deadbeat

Roy Risk, House Debtor ('Risk')
Mark Gagliardi, House Debtor
Sue Chai, House Debtor
Rachelle Gonzales, House Debtor
Karen Mims, House Debtor

They should have looked for the good deals before signing up to a crippling mortgage they could not afford. It wasn't too difficult to understand that they were overpaying in the midst of an epic bubble, unless, of course, they actually believed the realtard line that "real estate only goes up", or better yet, "you'll be priced out forever." BWAHAHAHA

What they fail to grasp, which isn't suprising since they overpaid in the first place, is that the "deals" they are seeking will not be deals in 1-3 years. We are still facing a catastrophic economic collapse. These houses will fall another 30-50% from today's prices.

Dawn, this video is for you:
THE HOUSING BUBBLE EXPLAINED ** SPECIAL SHEEP VIDEO!

2008-11-25: Homeowners say no help from lenders

Customers of Countrywide, Wachovia and other lenders describe the firms as uncooperative, ineffective and rude. Borrowers say they must navigate a maze of phone banks. They say lenders won't offer good deals.

"They're supposed to be getting people into fixed-rate loans they can afford, reducing their principal," Aguiar said. "That's not what I'm getting from Countrywide." (Kiss my a**, Dawn)

"One lady I spoke to was rude, she had a real attitude," Aguiar said. "She talked down to me like I was a deadbeat." (You're a deadbeat, Dawn)

Risk and his wife paid $921,000 in 2005 for a home, financing it with a $736,000 World Savings loan. Wachovia later inherited those loans. Their house is now worth $580,000, based on an appraisal in October.

Wachovia's offer? A first mortgage of about $580,000, at a fixed rate of 5.4 percent, with a 30-year loan term. So far, so good. But Wachovia also insisted on a second loan of $175,000 — to cover the difference between the current value of the house and the loan balance of around $755,000.

"What's going on here?" Risk said. "Are they going to help people or are they not?" (Kiss my a**, Roy)

Mark Gagliardi has sought for months to rework his loan with Countrywide on his Oakley home, but to no avail. Gagliardi and his wife bought the house in 2006 for $768,500 and obtained two Countrywide loans totaling $691,000. Homes nearby now sell for $410,000 to $450,000.

"There is no way to refinance because there is no value left in the house," Gagliardi said. "We are hanging on by the skin of our teeth. We admit our part in this. But Congress did its job. The president did his job. Now the banks are dragging their feet."

Gagliardi wants a 30-year fixed-rate loan based on his home's current value. He has gotten nowhere with Countrywide, despite placing many calls to the firm. (Kiss my a**, Mark)

Sue Chai Spaulding wants Bank of America to restructure a $250,000 equity line of credit on her Berkeley home. She got the loan to help buy a San Francisco house.

"They don't want to help you," Spaulding said. "But they shouldn't take this so lightly. These are people's lives. They have been rude to me." She has retained a lawyer. (Kiss my a**, Sue)

Oakley resident Rachelle Gonzales started a loan workout process in May with American Home Mortgage. In September, the lender rejected the deal.

"It's so frustrating," Gonzales said. "They say they'll help. Then they say no. They have called me names. They have called me a slime. This has been awful. Just awful." Her loan is now delinquent. (Rachelle, you're slime; kiss my a**)

Karen Mims sought for more than a year to convince her lender, Aurora Loan Services, to modify the $509,000 loan on her Oakland home. The payments are too high. "I have desperately tried to work things out," Mims said.

Mims was told she would be helped. But Aurora rejected a new loan although Mims was on a payment plan. On Nov. 12, Aurora foreclosed on the loan. She remains in her house of 11 years.

"This is my home," Mims said. (Karen, it's not your house, anymore; kiss my a**)

"I'm ready to let (Wachovia) have the house," Risk said. "See if they can get $580,000 for it."

He says it's frustrating to see those he believes created the crisis receive help while he and his wife are ignored by lenders.

"They better be careful because those of us at the back of the line just might create the new foreclosure crisis," Risk said
======================

Roy, you and everybody else that participated in this bubble have destroyed the country through your lack of responsibility and self-entitlement attitudes. The meltdown is just getting warmed up. I was out of the stock market a year ago, and now I'm bracing for the next few steps in the process... currency devalution and raging inflation. Got gold?

Walmart, Part 2

2008-11-28T11:17:00.000-08:00

Walmart (Part 1)

Shopping, zombie savages, indeed.

2008-11-28: Wal-Mart worker dies in Black Friday stampede
Bargain-hungry shoppers stepped on a fallen Wal-Mart worker, who died Friday morning, after the crowd knocked down the store's front doors -- and the worker -- during the "utter chaos" of a Black Friday shopping melee, Nassau County police said."

A throng of shoppers . . . physically broke down the doors" at around 5 a.m. Friday and knocked the 34-year-old part-time worker to the ground as the crowd pushed its way into the store at the Green Acres Mall, Nassau police said.

"They kept shopping. It's not right. They're savages,"

Richard Gaylord, Part II

2008-11-07T17:20:00.001-08:00

Dick Gaylord, REMAX Realtor / 2008 NAR President
(Part I)
thanks ArtLatin

Here's a little going away speech from Dick Gaylord. It's about fishing.... errrrr... real estate... errrrr... fishing... Well, it's about something.

Exactly why is the NAR going to fight the reduction in the FHA loan limit? People CANNOT afford those prices. The prices MUST, and will, come down.

Dick, real estate is going to be dead for a long, long time.

And he says we need a third economic stimulus bill to help the economy. Here is what I think we need:

- a return to traditional (ie non-fraudulent) lending standards

- improvement in our nationwide production capacity with jobs creation

- reduction in dependency on foreign consumer-goods
- elimination of the self-entitlement attitude
- stop the wallstreet criminals
- return to the gold standard?

- elimination of the fed?
I'm sure this isn't all it'll take, but it's a start.

2008-11-07: Challenging Market Focus Of Speech
You can’t catch any fish if you don’t go fishing. Sometimes you just catch little fish, sometimes you don’t catch any fish, but sometimes you catch a big fish. You can’t do that if you’re not fishing.”

Gaylord talked about the lobbying power of the 1.3 million-member NAR, pointing out that the group was instrumental in getting a housing component into the economic incentive package. One of the largest changes was increasing the limit the FHA would loan to $729,000, up from less than $500,000. That limit is set to go back down to $625,000 next year, and the NAR is fighting to avoid that drop, Gaylord said.

“We have to remember, and remind our leaders, that real estate is what is going to bring this economy back. We need a third economic stimulus bill to get money to lenders. And we have to work to make that happen.”

Credit Card Bond Sale

2008-11-05T20:52:00.000-08:00

Credit Card Bond Sale

What's next?

- Severely restricted card limits

- Credit cut-off

- Less cards

Get used to it, "entitlement generation".

2008-11-05: Credit Card Bond Sales at Zero, First Time Since 1993
Nov. 5 (Bloomberg) -- Credit card companies were shut out of the market for bonds backed by customer payments in October for the first time in more than 15 years, as investors shunned the debt amid the global credit freeze.

A weakening job market and a looming recession are making it harder for consumers to make monthly payments, eroding confidence among investors about the safety of credit-card-backed bonds. It's the first month since April 1993 that there have been no sales, according to Wachovia Corp. data. Issuers sold $17.1 billion of the debt in October 2007, the data show.

U.S. Debt

2008-11-03T18:20:00.000-08:00

I.O.U.S.A.: The 30 Minute Version

Video describing the $53 Trillion U.S. debt. (32:35)

Hmmmm... you mean we can't consume more than we produce, indefinitely??

Desire for higher Corporate profits and desire by workers for higher wages drove our production capacity to other countries. We need to suck it up, take less pay, live simpler lives, and bring jobs and production back the U.S.A.

How are we going to get out of this mess?

How about: (based on '08 budget at 8:45 in video)

10% Reduction in Social Security ($61B)
50% Reduction in Medicaire/Medicaid ($267B)
10% Reduction in Military (bring troops home) ($61B)
10% Reduction in "Everything Else" ($93B)

That's $482 Billion. And, of course, we need to stop consuming so much and start exporting more. I didn't say it would be easy, but it's a start.

Show Your Patriotism

2008-11-02T10:09:00.001-08:00

Vote the Banker Bailout Supporters Out of Office!

Here are a few to get you started:

- Barney Frank, House Rep Mass (D) (Part 1, 2)

- Anna Eshoo, House Rep CA (D), 14th District (blog)

- Laura Richardon, House Rep CA (D), 37th District (Part 1, 2)

Final Vote Tally - Vote #1, Vote #2

Office of Clerk: US House of Representatives
.

Barney Frank, Part II

2008-10-31T10:09:00.000-07:00

Barney "I tawt I taw a putie tat" Frank, United States Rep, Mass (D)

Part 1

Shameless posturing in preparation for the voting on Tuesday.

2008-10-31: Rep. Frank: bailout funds must be used for lending
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Companies receiving public money under a U.S. government financial rescue program must use it for lending or they will be violating the law, the powerful chairman of the U.S. House of Representatives Financial Services Committee said on Friday.

"I am deeply disappointed that a number of financial institutions are distorting the legislation that Congress passed at the president's request to respond to the credit crisis by making funds available for increased lending," Rep. Barney Frank, a Massachusetts Democrat, said in a statement.

"Any use of the these funds for any purpose other than lending -- for bonuses, for severance pay, for dividends, for acquisitions of other institutions, etc. -- is a violation of the terms of the Act," he added.

Rebuttal at Market Ticker: Heh Barney Fife!

2008-09-30: Herald readers put blame on Barney Frank

Vote this stupid son-of-a-bitch out of office.

Video of Barney Frank clearly stating that he sees no evidence of safety of soundness issues in a report on Freddie Mac HAS BEEN REMOVED FROM YOUTUBE!!!

If somebody has access to the video, let me know where it is.
This one is back up:
Democrats Covering up the Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and Economic Crisis

Here is an alternate video showingt the Democrat Coverup:
>>> Democrats Covering up the Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac <<<

FDIC & Treasury

2008-10-29T19:10:00.000-07:00

FDIC & US Treasury

Ok, so lets do some remedial math.
3,000,000 house debtors
Cost: $50 Billion

Cost per household : $50B / 3,000,000 = $16,000

So they are trying to say that bailing out 3 million households will only cost an average of $16K per household. Lets try some other calculations.

Lets assume 1/2 of these houses require principal reduction.

Lets also assume that the average reduction for these houses is $50,000.

Cost for House Debtor Bailout: $50,000 x 1,500,000 = $75,000,000,000

That is $75 Billion for a conservative estimate. In California, you'd need at least $100,000 per household to save house debtors. If all the household required $100K, that would bring the estimate to $150 Billion. And don't forget the additional 'moral hazard' this will introduce, but what the heck, we're not a capitalistic country anymore.

That number seems a bit more realistic than the $50B bullshit they're shoveling, below.

2008-10-29: Treasury, FDIC Crafting Plan to Rework Millions of Mortgages
Officials with the Treasury and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. are crafting a plan under which the government would guarantee the mortgages of as many as 3 million homeowners now struggling to avoid foreclosure, according to three sources familiar with the discussions.

Under the program being discussed, the lender would agree to reduce borrowers’ monthly payments, for example by lowering the interest rate or principal of a mortgage loan, based on the homeowner’s ability to pay. These reconfigured loans could help homeowners avert foreclosure.

It would cost between $40 billion and $50 billion, sources said. The program is being discussed as members of Congress are voicing frustrations that the $700 billion rescue program thusfar has been aimed at helping banks, but not homeowners.

2008-10-28T18:59:00.000-07:00

June Reyno, Protesting House ~~Owner~~ Debtor & Realtor
Hmmmmm... some information has surfaced regarding this individual. It's a shame the reporter didn't do his job.

What she may have omitted from her sob story:

- She possibly refinanced and used $300K for a failed business

- She is a realtor

- “Specialist in Mitigating Foreclosure Losses”

BTW, here is her website: http://junereynosales.com/

Video: Woman Chained To House To Prevent Eviction

2008-10-27: San Diego Woman Chains Herself to Foreclosed Home to Resist Eviction
SAN DIEGO,CA. A Mira Mesa woman and her husband are fighting their eviction from the place they’ve called home for the last twenty years on Priestley Street. Unable to afford the adjustable rate mortgage monthly payments of $5,800, the couple and their five dogs have been evicted, but June Reyno is fighting the eviction - which could be today the 27th or tomorrow - by chaining herself to her house. They expect the San Diego Sheriff’s Department to come out to the Reyno’s home any day. The Sheriffs delivered the eviction notice on October 8th.

From Comments OB Rag Blog:
I have no sympathy. Channel 8 reported a more complete story. She refinanced and used $300k+ in a business venture that failed. According to sources readily available online, the house was offered up for auction one year ago with an estimated default of over $633k, and the original sale price when she and her previous husband bought it was $198k. She styled herself a foreclosure and short sale specialist.

Housing Doom Story Coverage (be sure to watch the video)

Ratings Agencies

2008-10-26T19:33:00.001-07:00

Moody's

IS THIS A SICK JOKE? Code of conduct?

Moody's Investors Service Code of Professional Conduct

Standard & Poor's (Part 1: The Bear Stearns Rating)

Standard & Poor’s is a leading provider of financial market intelligence. The world’s foremost source of credit ratings, indices, investment research, risk evaluation and data, Standard & Poor’s provides financial decision-makers with the intelligence they need to feel confident about their decisions.

Well, it looks like the last few pieces of the Housing Bubble puzzle are coming together. I'm sure you've all read the articles and watched the congressional hearings on the ratings agencies. What is truly fascinating about their actions is that their sole purpose for existing is to ACCURATELY and ETHICALLY assess quality and risk of financial obligations.

2008-10-22: Moody's, S&P Employees Doubted Ratings
"Let's hope we are all wealthy and retired by the time this house of cards falters,'' one e-mail from an S&P employee said.

"It seems to me that we had blinders on and never questioned the information we were given.. Combined, these errors make us look either incompetent at credit analysis, or like we sold our soul to the devil for revenue.''

Mark Schniepp

2008-10-20T21:00:00.000-07:00

Mark Schniepp, Director of the California Economic Forecast
I saved the link to this article because I thought this guy was quite comical. And Trulia says the median Ventura County sales price is $370K.

2008-02-08: Mixed outlook on Ventura economy
Despite a sinking real estate market and job losses at two major employers, Ventura County could still dodge a much feared recession if interest rates continue to fall and Congress passes an emergency stimulus package, a local economist said Thursday.

“Recession is likely to be avoided in Southern California, but we’ll be close,” said Mark Schniepp, director of the California Economic Forecast, which released its county projections for 2008. “It’s a slowdown, not a recession.”

But the county still faces a tough road ahead. Sales of existing homes hit bottom in the fall, Schniepp said. The number of mortgage defaults and foreclosures reached record levels in 2007, and the trend will continue through the new year.

“It’s pretty bleak,” he said during a conference in Thousand Oaks. “We’ve got retail sales going down. We’ve got the apartment market that’s softened. We’ve got the Amgen and Countrywide fallout. We have got a housing market that is absolutely at rock bottom… . I think 2008 will be the transition year; 2009 will be a lot better.”

Schniepp said it’s not all bad news. Bank of America announced last month that it would buy Countrywide for $4 billion. He said there is little duplication between Countrywide and BofA operations and that further job cuts would probably occur gradually.

Sales of existing homes last year were down nearly 30% to less than 4,100 homes, the lowest level in 25 years, Schniepp said. Further pressuring the market were default notices – warnings from mortgage companies about nonpayment – which more than doubled to 5,022 last year.

But the median price for existing homes only slipped about 2%, to $673,786, in Ventura County, according to the California Assn. of Realtors. The median price is the point at which half the homes sold for more and half for less.

“There is a limit to how far a home can go down. It’s time for buyers to realize they are about as low as they’ll go,” Schniepp said.

Schniepp said he expects home prices to remain steady if a provision in President Bush’s stimulus package survives – raising mortgage loan limits from $417,000 to $729,750 to assist high-cost states – and interest rates remain low.

“It you don’t have to sell, then hold on until 2010. If you do have to sell, sell right now, immediately,” Schniepp said. “And if you’re a buyer, buy new – these are the best deals you’re going to get.”

Among the forecast’s bright spots is commercial real estate. Retail vacancies remain at record lows, and construction is set to begin this year on about 1 million square feet of office space.

And then...

2008-10-17: Ventura's investments in trouble
Ventura stands to lose up to $10 million of taxpayer money from soured investments in the banking industry — the only city in Ventura County facing such risks.

Chris 'Save the Consumer' Dodd

2008-10-14T19:48:00.000-07:00

Chris Dodd, Part II (Part I), Senator D-Connecticut

You know, the idea of taking my money (gold and silver, not US junk dollars) and moving to Canada or some other country sounds more and more attractive every day.

What happened to CITIZENS of the UNITED STATES?!!

2008-10-14: Dodd Planning Credit Crisis Aid Package for Consumers
Oct. 14 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd said he will offer legislation to help consumers weather the credit crunch, including a 90-day foreclosure freeze and credit-card lending protections.

``These are areas where I think the American consumer can benefit,'' Dodd, a Connecticut Democrat, told reporters in Washington today after a meeting with Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson.

Dodd wants to include his proposals in economic-stimulus legislation he said may be taken up during a lame-duck session of Congress. He aims to build on the Treasury Department's plan to use $250 billion of taxpayer funds to purchase stakes in financial companies to shore up a banking system roiled by the biggest housing slump since the Great Depression.

The measure would also include provisions to curb predatory lending and allow bankruptcy judges to modify mortgages for struggling borrowers, Dodd said.

``It seems to me appropriate that we take steps to provide some relief for the consumer,'' given how much assistance the government is providing to companies, Dodd said.

Fannie Mae & Family

2008-10-12T14:33:00.000-07:00

Fannie Mae & Family
I'm sorry, but it doesn't matter if you're black or white; if you can't tote the note, you shouldn't have a mortgage. These criminal congressman must be voted out.

Fannie:
Frank Raines, ex-CEO Fannie Mae
Supposedly cooked the books to line his pockets.
"These assets are so riskless..."

Daniel Mudd, ex-CEO Fannie Mae
Fannie and La Famiglia (Democrats, Congressional Black Caucus)
HE SAID IT!

Family:
Rep. Maxine Waters, D-California
"Under the outstanding leadership of Frank Raines, everything in the 1992 act has worked just fine."

Rep Gregory Meeks, D-New York
"The GSEs have done a tremendous job."

Rep. Lacy Clay, D-Missouri
"This hearing is about political lynching of Franklin Raines."
(interesting word choice)

Rep. Barney Frank, D-Massechusetts
"I don't see anything in this report that raises safety and soundness problems."

Sen. Barrack Obama, D-Illinois
Friend of Fannie Mae that received $126K in donations--2nd highest amount.

Rep. Artur Davis, D-Alabama

Late '04:

Linda Minnifield

2008-10-11T18:59:00.000-07:00

Linda Minnifield, Average Alt-A Debtor
I added Linda as an example of the upcoming Alt-A debacle. Watch the video. She is so underwater that the only logical action for her is to walk away. What do you think?

1343 7th St, Rodeo, CA
Zestimate: $306K
Sale History 12/02/2004: $455,000

Here are nearby houses for sale:
507 Sonoma; Price: $250K
438 Vallejo; Price: $214K

Mortgage Meltdown Fears Persist
Her 'good credit' allowed her to buy the house for $455K. I wonder if she had 'good income'.
$455K/3 = $152K (I think Dr. Housing Bubble would love this case.)