Applying the same logic to the boom would mean we should have been removing any overly optimistic prices, or sales involving bidding wars, because their high pricing was not illustrative or indicative of the overall market. Why was nobody suggesting this at the time?
From the Philly Inquirer:
Housing price drop is far less if distressed properties aren’t counted
In the five-plus years since the housing bubble burst nationwide, home values have dropped precipitously, dragged down by record numbers of foreclosures.
In the hardest-hit areas of the country, prices have dropped 50 percent or more, and continue to decline, sales data show. Even in this region, with relatively fewer foreclosures, prices are down 15 percent since August 2007.
Remove sales of distressed properties from the mix, however, and the drop in home prices is much less precipitous, the data show.
In the city of Philadelphia, for example, median prices for single-family houses fell 3.2 percent in May from the same month of 2010, according to CoreLogic, which provides real estate data to businesses and government.
Subtract lower-price bank repossessions and short sales, and the year-over-year city decline was just 1.2 percent, the data show.
Short sales are those in which the lender accepts a sale price that is lower than the balance of the seller’s mortgage, usually as an alternative to foreclosure.
In some parts of the country, eliminating distressed sales turns price losses into gains. In the Washington, D.C., area, for example, CoreLogic says, a 1.5 percent decline became a 3.9 percent year-over-year increase.
Why factor in distressed sales at all? some in the housing industry have asked.
In a recent discussion of his company’s quarterly results, Robert I. Toll, executive chairman of the Horsham-based luxury-home builder Toll Bros., said: “We believe that averaging distressed and non-distressed sales data provides a misleading picture to the public regarding home-price direction.”
By contrast, Toll said in his statement, “we are experiencing flat to slightly increasing pricing in most markets.”
CoreLogic’s data bear out Toll’s contention. Nationally, May median home prices were down 7.4 percent from the same month in 2010. When distressed sales are removed, the decline is 0.4 percent, just about flat.
…
Excluding distressed transactions, which account for about one-third of all sales, would shut out a very large part of the current housing market, said Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics in West Chester.Such properties compete with other houses on the market, Zandi said, “and as long as they account for such a large share of home sales, they will weigh on all house prices.”
…
Zandi said it was “an encouraging sign” that non-distressed house prices were holding up so well.“This suggests that once the distressed share begins to decline, house prices will rise, even if the share remains high.”
From USA Today:
Foreign buyers lifting U.S. home sales
Foreign buyers are helping to stoke home sales in U.S. vacation hot spots decimated by the real estate crash, especially in southern Florida.
…
For the 12 months ending in March, 31% of Florida’s home sales were to foreign buyers, up from 10% in 2007, according to a survey by the National Association of Realtors.
In Arizona, 6% of sales in the same period were to foreigners. That was down from 11% last year but still up from 5% in 2007, the data show.
Foreign buyers are being enticed by low U.S. home prices, down 30% nationwide since peaking in 2006, and the weakened dollar, which makes their money go further. Since the start of 2006, the Canadian dollar has soared 18% against the U.S. dollar, while the euro has gained 22%, says data tracker Oanda.
U.S. home prices, meanwhile, have fallen far more than the national average in some places — down 55% from their peaks in Miami-Fort Lauderdale and Phoenix and 36% in Los Angeles, says Zillow.com. Those are three of the most popular areas for foreigners searching for real estate on Trulia’s website, that company says.
The number of U.S. homes sold to foreigners dropped to 288,000 in the 12 months ending in March, from 224,000 a year earlier, the Realtors survey shows. But certain cities are seeing increases.
Sales are so brisk in the Miami region now that more houses and condominiums could sell this year than in 2005, the peak year, says Ronald Shuffield, president of Esslinger-Wooten-Maxwell Realtors in Coral Gables, Fla.
“International buyers have been the fuel for the Miami recovery,” Shuffield says.
From Seeking Alpha:
Shadow Inventory Stats Show the Bottom May Be In for Housing
The speculative housing bubble of the mid-2000s has widely been considered the scapegoat for the ensuing financial crisis. I am not going to debate the relative importance of housing versus unbridled securitization, suffice it to say the key word is “unbridled”.
Because housing is “the” culprit, a number of news outfits have been created to chronicle its demise and forecast its premature death. Zillow is now a new tool in the appraiser / loan officer toolbox. RealtyTrac is the “source”. And CNBC’s Diana Olick is the megaphone. In the process, they are perpetuating the spiral. This is human since it is the spiral that put them in business in the first place, God forbid the situation should improve!
From CNBC:
Excluding Distressed Sales, Are Home Prices Just Fine?
Home prices in May were down 7.4 percent year-over-year, according to a new report from CoreLogic. This is the first of the May numbers, as S&P Case Shiller, which was released earlier this week, looks back two months.
CoreLogic’s report is unique, though, in that it gives the big bad number (which was a bigger dip than the 6.7-percent annual drop in April) and then it strips out the distressed sales and comes up with a new number. Distressed sales include foreclosed properties (bank-owned/REO) and short sales, where the home is sold for less than the value of the mortgage to avoid foreclosure.
…
Without the distressed sales, home prices fell just 0.4 percent in May, essentially flat. Overall, according to the report, “including distressed transactions, the peak-to-current change in the national HPI (Home Price Index, from April 2006 to May 2011) was -32.7 percent. Excluding distressed transactions, the peak-to-current change in the HPI for the same period was -21.2 percent.”
So should we consider that home prices are really just fine? After all, they might not be moving up, but they’re not falling, and they’re down far less than the headlines scream.
You would have to ignore an awful lot of factors to believe that—number one being that distressed sales make up more than one-third of the current real estate market, and far higher percentages in some of the busiest, albeit most distressed, sales markets.
Secondly, distressed sales might become an even larger share of the market during the next year, as banks are now ramping up the foreclosure process, taking big losses, making deals and cleaning up potential legal obstacles. That in the face of the fact that the pipeline of foreclosures is huge. Read this from Lender Processing Services on Wednesday. Read it a few times, so it really sinks in:
“With foreclosure sales at 78,676 at month end, the volume of serious delinquencies and foreclosures over-shadowed the number of foreclosure sales by 50:1. In fact, there are still significantly fewer foreclosure sales than there were before foreclosure moratoria were put into place, and foreclosure sales are declining.”
Now tell me if it makes any sense whatsoever to strip the distress out of the numbers and come to the conclusion that home prices are done falling. CoreLogic doesn’t do that, but I’m guessing some folks reading its report might.
From Bloomberg:
Housing Recovery Hindered in U.S. as Government Works at Cross-Purposes
Sue Stamper, a business owner in Sacramento, California, wants to buy a home. After mortgage- financiers Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac imposed the strictest loan standards in more than a decade, she doesn’t qualify.
Pam Crawford of Lyon Real Estate is trying to sell a three- bedroom bungalow on Sacramento’s east side for $179,000, a third less than what it went for in 2004. She hasn’t found a buyer even after cutting the asking price by $10,000 two weeks ago.
The two women, who haven’t met, illustrate the deadlock crippling the U.S. housing market five years into the crash: While a record share of Americans want to buy homes, U.S. policies, often working at cross-purposes, are making it more difficult. Government-controlled Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have boosted standards so high that some people previously considered prime borrowers no longer qualify. That’s limiting a real estate rebound that also has been damped by a state attorneys general probe into foreclosure practices and an Obama administration loan-modification program that has fallen short of expectations.
“It’s very important for a robust recovery that we get the right credit standards,” said Joseph Stiglitz, a Nobel-prize winning economist and professor at Columbia University in New York. “Giving out unsupportable mortgages was a disaster, and now the danger is overreacting and making the standards excessively high.”
From the Record:
N.J. to begin buy-out talks with homeowners in flood areas
The state will soon begin negotiating with homeowners to buy and demolish as many as 162 houses in flood prone areas of Wayne, Pompton Lakes, Little Falls and Lincoln Park, officials said Tuesday.
The $37 million earmarked last year for the Passaic River Basin comes from $48.3 million in Federal Emergency Management Agency grants to New Jersey anti-flooding projects. The basin has continually been the hardest hit area in the state, experiencing 13 floods in the last 42 years that were so bad they prompted federal disaster declarations.
The bulk of the money will be used to buy out homes, demolish them and keep the land as open space to soak up floodwaters. They include:
* 106 in Wayne’s southern neighborhoods including Hoffman Grove,
* 35 in Little Falls,
* 15 in Lincoln Park
* six in Pompton Lakes.
The number of homes is an estimate based on regional real estate prices and interest from homeowners, said Mary Goepfert, a spokeswoman for the state Office of Emergency Management.
“We’re hopeful we can get this many, but you never know what somebody is going to do until the contracts are signed,” she said. “There is a lot of interest in this and our goal is to move people out of the areas that repeatedly flood.”
From Forbes:
Borrowers sue over apparent loan mod mishaps
It seemed Maria Campusano’s financial problems were behind her when the mortgage on her Victorian home in a Massachusetts mill town was chopped by hundreds of dollars a month.
She soon learned that her troubles had just begun.
Weeks after making her first payment under the new rate, the school district staffer began receiving past-due notices, documents showing wildly inaccurate loan balances and letters threatening foreclosure. She now fears she’ll lose her home.
“How can they take away what I have worked so hard for?” Campusano said.
Campusano is one of two named plaintiffs in a proposed class-action lawsuit alleging breach of contract by Bank of America NA and subsidiary BAC Home Loans Servicing LP.
The suit, which was filed in Los Angeles federal court because BAC is located in nearby Calabasas, is among a growing number of legal complaints accusing banks of disregarding what should be binding agreements to reduce the monthly mortgage payments of troubled borrowers.
The suits involve permanent modifications through the U.S. Treasury-administered Home Affordable Modification Program, which offers incentives to loan servicers who extend modifications, as well as so-called proprietary modifications, which banks offer independently of the government guidelines.
They represent a new wave of complaints against banks that have already weathered years of criticism for their reluctance to modify loans and for foreclosing on borrowers after offering them trial modifications.
From SmartMoney:
Renters See Prices Skyrocket
Sorry renters, but the days of low rents and lenient landlords are over — at least for now.
Nationwide, the average rate for apartment and home rentals is up 6.7% from June 2010, according to a new report from housing search engine HotPads.com. Prices for studio apartments are up 14.3%, and a five-bedroom home is 12.1% more. One- and two-bedrooms got off relatively easy, with average increases of 2.3% and 2%, respectively. Tenants will see the bulk of rent increases this year, predicts listing site Rent.com, but can expect another 3% jump when it’s time to renew in 2012.
At the heart of the increases: vacancy rates have dropped from about 8% to 6.2% nationwide over the past year. “That’s a really steep decline in a 12-month period,” says Christina Aragon, a spokeswoman for Rent.com. The drop indicates pent-up demand from people who made-do with roommates or stayed with family during the recession. Nearly half of property managers say they have also seen an increase in applicants moving from a foreclosed property, according to a recent survey from credit bureau TransUnion. “Landlords have the power right now,” Aragon says.
In past years, renters could negotiate a lower rent or other concessions, like a waived pet fee or free parking. That’s largely disappeared, leaving consumers little recourse but hunting around.
From the WSJ:
Bill Calls for Fannie, Freddie Merger
A California Republican is set to introduce a bill as soon as Wednesday to merge Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and restructure the company into a government-held corporation.
It’s the latest idea in what figures to be a long, high-stakes drama over what to do with the mortgage giants whose government takeover has put taxpayers on the hook for $138 billion to keep them afloat and stabilize mortgage markets.
The legislation, sponsored by Rep. Gary Miller, will propose that the merged company purchase mortgages and sell them to investors as securities that are government backed. It wouldn’t be operated for profit-making purposes and wouldn’t have shareholders, effectively returning it back to its New Deal-era roots, before Fannie Mae was privatized and sold off to shareholders in 1968. It’s expected to win backing from bond investors and the real-estate industry.
The debate on what to do with the companies has inched along since February, when the White House called for winding them down and offered three options that would take their place: One would leave the private sector to fill their void, and two would create some new type of government backstop.
Wednesday, July 6, 7:01 AM MBA Mortgage Applications: -5.2% vs. -2.7% last week. Thirty-year fixed mortgage rate increased to 4.69% from 4.46%.
http://seekingalpha.com/currents/post/81139
Grim, This reminds me of when that fat finger crashed the s&p 500 minis and tanked the market all afternoon and then nyse called a do-over.
CHICAGO, July 6, 2011 – The number of planned job cuts
announced by U.S.-based employers increased by 4,297 or 11.6 percent to
41,432 in June. Despite the increase, the overall pace of downsizing through
the first half of 2011 is at the lowest level since 2000, according the latest
report on downsizing activity released Wednesday by global outplacement
consultancy Challenger, Gray & Christmas, Inc.
The June increase is the second in as many months. Announced
layoffs in May were up 2.0 percent to 37,135, after falling to a four-month
low of 36,490 in April.
http://www.challengergray.com/press/PressRelease.aspx?PressUid=180
grim (8)-
Fannie + Freddie = Beavis + Butthead
It’s for the children….
This appears to be the largest of dozens of major cheating scandals, unearthed across the country. The allegations point an ongoing problem for US education, which has developed an ever-increasing dependence on standardized tests.
http://news.yahoo.com/americas-biggest-teacher-principal-cheating-scandal-unfolds-atlanta-213734183.html
13. Actually it’s pretty much what you expect when jobs and compensation are tied to a test. Go figure.
From post 3.
“Read it a few times, so it really sinks in:
“With foreclosure sales at 78,676 at month end, the volume of serious delinquencies and foreclosures over-shadowed the number of foreclosure sales by 50:1. In fact, there are still significantly fewer foreclosure sales than there were before foreclosure moratoria were put into place, and foreclosure sales are declining.”
Now tell me if it makes any sense whatsoever to strip the distress out of the numbers and come to the conclusion that home prices are done falling. CoreLogic doesn’t do that, but I’m guessing some folks reading its report might.”
Per Gary “any questions”.
Or maybe BC’s “got demand?” will save the day. Yes we do but no mortgages to go with them, post 4.
Hey, if one discounts the people killed, injured, or displaced as a result of the war, WWII was not as big a human tragedy as the statistics would have us believe.
If one discounts the home, businesses, and infrastructure damaged or destroyed by the war, WWII was not that bad for human-built structures.
Pigs the gift that keeps on giving.
http://seekingalpha.com/currents/post/81145
“EU peripheral bond yields are melting higher in the wake of the Portugal downgrade, as traders now wait for the ball to drop on Ireland. The Portuguese 10 year is up 118 bps at 12.21%, Ireland +66 bps to 12.21%. Italian yields are modestly higher, but their CDS are blowing out, +12.3%. “
Mortality rate is fantastic if you exclude deaths due to cancer and heart disease.
removing distressed sales is like saying: if you just take away all his strikeouts, fly outs and ground outs the guy is really hitting .1000 for the season!
This one might be better:
Inflation is well controlled if you exclude food and energy.
Ha!
Oh, wait…
why don’t you just not count how much cars sell for in wholesale/auction market when you trade in your car, just tell dealer you want retail price. Of course all prices should count.
Grim (7),
gee, who could have seen this coming. If no one is buying homes and everyone prefers to rent until this mess is over then doesn’t it make sense that landlords kniw thi sand increase their rents everytime they get a chance to.
Most of my tennants are month to month and on June 1st everyone’s rent went up $50.00. July 1st came around and everyone paid it. On January 1st, rinse repeat.
Owning a multiunit building is looking good. However, if you have to selll it good luck getting a 8 multiple.
removing distressed assets is like saying if you take away all the blow jobs, thresomes, and inters, models, porstars, school teachers, stewardesess, college and long island girls, JJ is actually a virgin and a good boy.
http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2011/07/seaside_heights_boardwalk_figh.html
vacation wonderland
9 – Mike – big jump in purchase apps last week, refis hit the wall due to the tick up from the magic 4.50 mark.
Re: [3];
“Excluding Distressed Sales, Are Home Prices Just Fine?”
Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how did you enjoy the play?
Grim 26 got sidetracked here usually look at that as the number can be misleading for just the reason you posted.
4.5 aint such a magic number when the best one year CD in country is paying 1%. It is 450% greater interest rate. Not long ago one year cds were almost 5% when mortgages were 7%. Unless some is playing kick the can by paying off higher interest debt by taking out lower interest debt and leaving themselves actually more indebted when you count refinancing costs it does not make much sense at all to refinance event at 4.5% considering fees and fact bottom line 4.5% is still 450% more interest than the bank. Unless one gets rid of mortgage all together does not accomplish much. The day I paid off my mortgage in late 2008 and took that almost 2k a month and invested it each month instead of paying the bank is when my savings actually jumpstarted. Why be content with getting 30% of mortgage payment back on taxes when you can keep 100%.
grim says:
July 6, 2011 at 8:27 am
9 – Mike – big jump in purchase apps last week, refis hit the wall due to the tick up from the magic 4.50 mark.
it we dont count the pedophile priests the priesthood is in wondeful shape. Honey if you back out my one or two gang bangs, five spring breaks, college and my eight trips to hedonism and club med I have only slept with three men besides you.
If you don’t count the 600K in debt we have our net worth is 100K.
JJ [30];
If you don’t count the 600K in debt we have our net worth is 100K.
I had an idiot cousin (with a lefty mindset – though the latter is just a subset of the former) tell me something almost exactly like that in a discussion over buying a house. “You net worth goes up by the value of the house the day you buy it,” she said. As if the money for the purchase came from thin air, didn’t count on the balance sheet before the purchase, or the mortgage debt didn’t reduce new worth.
Sadly, this is just how the sheeple think, and its reflected in the mythical “wealth effect”.
Fannie + Freddie = Cow cakes + horse manure
Hobo With a Shotgun says:
July 6, 2011 at 7:42 am
grim (8)-
Fannie + Freddie = Beavis + Butthead
#4While a record share of Americans want to buy homes
Is this a statement, or a fact?So we are to believe there are a record share of Americans, ready and willing to buy homes, if only they could get financing?
NEW YORK (CNNMoney) — As the economic recovery continues to lose momentum, more job losses are on the horizon for thousands of Americans, according to a report released Wednesday.
The number of planned job cuts rose 11.6% in June to 41,432 from May’s 37,135, according to outplacement consulting firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas.
Government workers will take the biggest hit, the report said, accounting for 10,176 of the announced reductions.
Print
While the overall pace of job cuts has slowed since the recession, hiring has been spotty. Employers have now announced a total of 245,806 planned job cuts this year — down 17.4% from 297,677 cuts announced in the first six months of 2010.
But year over year, job cuts have increased 5.3% from June 2010.
“The employment picture remains a bit cloudy. Continued slowness in the pace of job cuts is certainly promising. However, hiring is coming in spurts and is not quite robust enough to make a significant dent in unemployment,” John A. Challenger, chief executive officer of Challenger, Gray & Christmas said in a statement.
The Challenger report along with the ADP report due out Thursday, typically set the tone for the government’s highly anticipated monthly jobs report due Friday. Economists are expecting 120,000 jobs were added to payrolls in the month. Typically, the economy needs to add about 150,000 just to keep pace with population growth.
http://money.cnn.com/2011/07/06/news/economy/jobs_challenger/
“Economists are expecting 120,000 jobs were added to payrolls in the month. Typically, the economy needs to add about 150,000 just to keep pace with population growth.”
Yes with these kind of numbers a bottom in housing is just around the corner.
Let me be clear: Yes…. We…. Can!
3b 33 Americans WANT a lot of things unfortunately due do the financial situation our government can no longer give them their candy. But but they are entitled to be home owners, wah wah wah.
#31 – sounds like your idiot cousin is john boehner or eric cantor
Yes…. We…. Can! I sleep so much better knowing that, wait Yes…. We…. Can! what?
Aw hell it doesn’t matter because Yes…. We…. Can! Just keep repeating it tap your ruby slippers together 3 times & all will be well.
Challenger Gray numbers look pretty good, no?
Planned layoffs at 11 year low, bulk of the job cuts are in government.
How is this not good news?
From CNBC:
Pace of US Layoffs Lowest Since 2000: Challenger
Planned job cuts rose 11.6 percent to 41,432 in June, but the overall pace of downsizing fell to its lowest level in 11 years, according to a monthly survey by Challenger, Gray & Christmas.
The mid-year total of 245,806 layoffs is the lowest since the turn of the century, according to the report, which noted that since a lull in April, companies have been looking to increase the pace of job cuts in May and June.
“The employment picture remains a bit cloudy. Continued slowness in the pace of job cuts is certainly promising. However, hiring is coming in spurts and is not quite robust enough to make a significant dent in unemployment,” John A. Challenger, CEO of Challenger, Gray & Christmas, said in a statement accompanying the release that.
Strong payroll gains in between February, March and April were offset by slow growth in May, he added.
“The next three or four months of employment and hiring data will be important indicators of whether the expansion has prematurely hit the brakes or if the dips in job creation are simply bumps on the road to recovery,” he said.
The government sector is the most active in trimming staff, the Challenger report noted. The public sectors accounted for 77,591 of the total cuts, although the year-on-year figures show a slowing of the pace of layoffs. Almost 100,000 government jobs were lost in the first half of 2010.
#35 True. But again IMO I do not believe there is a record share of Americans waiting to buy homes. A record share compared to when?
And on a side note if I were the writer of that article I would have used number instead of share;it sounds better.
Just drove by a “distressed sale” this morning, eviction occurred late last week, all the stuff is out on the lawn, beds, clothing, furniture including the now ancient projection TV. Must be a real hoot to get evicted right before the 4th of July and then have all of your stuff rained on.The neighbors are going to have to pitch in and get a 20 yrd dumpster over there ASAP to keep this “distressed sale” from affecting the prices of the other dozen homes for sale on that street.
The only way to prevent distressed sales which consume about 25% of all sales these days is to pull them off the market bulldoze them take a debit and a credit on the books and forget they even existed.
#40 grim: The mid-year total of 245,806 layoffs is the lowest since the turn of the century, according to the report, which noted that since a lull in April, companies have been looking to increase the pace of job cuts in May and June.
Well if I am reading the article correctly we had a lull in job cuts in April, but now companies have been increasing the pace of cuts in May and June. So for the beginning of the year from Jan to April, we got a break, now in May and June the number is rising again. so that is more current then what occurred between Jan through April. If May and June cuts continue into July and August and beyond than it really IMO is not good news.
All statistics released through the media are lies. UE is about 20-22%. Nothing is getting better, and it won’t until we start putting the white collar criminals masquerading as our “leaders” on notice that they might catch a high velocity round on the way to lunch one day…unless they start doing things to stop the r@pe of the individual and restore power back to the voter.
TPTB are using each successive crisis to further consolidate control over everything. It will probably require massive bloodshed to restore balance.
ChiFi [32];
I really don’t care about the species of sphincter — it’s all $h!t.
Reminds me of the joke of the kid shovelling the pile with gusto… ‘There’s got to a pony in there somewhere!’
re: “we get the right credit standards”
Stiglitz in his book Freefall said higher deposits and no exotic mortgages would have prevented the bubble and it’s fallout. I doubt he is changing his tune, seems Bloomberg and the MSM will misquote him to fit their agenda which would be that the Government continue to restart the bubble at all costs.
The government could buy up all distressed homes and bulldoze them, or better yet bulldoze the inner city high rise and low rise projects that have been a failure for several generations now years relocate the residents to the distressed homes. How is that for change you can believe in?
Listen, don’t you know that unfunded mandates and higher taxes paves the way for recovery and growth?
3b (43)-
McD0nalds, coffee bars, WalMart and the zillions of other businesses that employ minimum wage labor in dead-end jobs aren’t laying off lately.
Big fcuking whoop. No real economy can be based on people selling each other crap destined for landfill and hamburgers. Millions of actual jobs are gone and never coming back. Tell my 52 y/o neighbor who was knocking down 190K plus bennies in pharma 8 years ago how he is part of a serious recovery by donning an orange smock for 27 hours a week at $11 per.
And when do I get my f*cking shovel ready job?
Man, this Lagarde lady is one rough-looking broad.
Who is she gonna bend over first?
gary (49)-
Nothing for you, but a shovel to the head.
When will it become as easy to evade taxes here as it is in Greece?
I might be able to make ends meet if I can go to all-cash compensation and get myself on the dole.
Hobo [51],
Does Obamacare cover my injuries?
Juice 46
The government could buy up all distressed homes and bulldoze them, or better yet bulldoze the inner city high rise and low rise projects that have been a failure for several generations now years relocate the residents to the distressed homes. How is that for change you can believe in?
Memphis tried that and it was a net washout at best as it destroyed existing social support networks and dumped the people involved into towns/neighborhoods that didn’t really want or accept them.
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2008/07/american-murder-mystery/6872/
When does Government Motors (GM) start sending vehicles directly from the production line to the scrap yard for recycling? Would it really be that different from bulldozing some neighborhoods?
…”General Motors Co. stocked Jim Ellis Chevrolet in Atlanta with plenty of Silverado full-size pickups in early 2011, part of a wager on a strong economic recovery. The strategy is backfiring. “We thought that this year would bring back the kind of economic activity that would translate into us selling more trucks,” Mark Frost, the dealership’s general manager, said in a phone interview. “It’s not happening.” Supply of Silverado has ballooned to 6 1/2 months worth at the dealership, a figure Frost, 52, calls “a little scary.” The Detroit-based automaker, 33 percent owned by the U.S. after its 2009 bankruptcy, has 280,000 Silverado and GMC Sierra pickups on dealers’ lots around the country. If sales continue at June’s rate, that would be enough to last until November.” T
It’s all over but the singing.
“Greeks withdrew €4.8B in deposits from domestic banks in May, the highest outflow since April 2010. Last year, the money appeared to go to Switzerland, suggesting it was the rich moving the dough. Now Cyrpus – which has smaller minimum deposits – is the recipient, suggesting middle class money is fleeing.”
http://blogs.wsj.com/source/2011/07/06/greek-jitters-hit-bank-deposits-–-again/?mod=WSJBlog&utm_source=
#48 So true. I know a couple of people myself just in the last week who were let go, alloolder years of experience etc.
Thank goodness we’re insulated and it’s contained to subprime! Whew!!
I wonder if the greeks will string up any of their politicians when this is said and done? i would be little surprised if there wasnt at least a small body count.
Ket 55 Anybody want a pickup I hear deals can be had.
Ket 54 My thoughts also , yes take all the inner city people & move them out here to Vernon. Yes that will work out well. No mass transit , no work , need a car to get a Qt of milk & I will not get into how that acceptance thing would work out.
My mom, who still lives in Memphis, reports that busting up the public housing and spreading the residents all over town only ended up creating a situation in which crime rates are almost identical in every precinct. Also, lots of DWB (driving while black) incidents in the predominantly white burbs.
http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2011/07/five-alarm_fire_at_scotch_plai.html?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter
Hey look at that, Hekla is on deck!!!
MIW
But Morgan Stanley is making GM a top pick, thatlittle inventory problem must be just a technical blip.
……
July 6, 2011
General MotorsCompany
Moving to Top US Auto Pickand MS Best Idea
We are making GM our new top overall pick ahead of Ford as well as a Morgan Stanley Best Idea.
This move is in conjunction with the upgrade of our N.American Auto industry view to Attractive from In-Line.We believe GM offers a powerful combination of positive near-term earnings revisions and negative investor sentiment held up by open-ended questions surrounding the US Treasury hangover, UAW negotiations and the deployment of GM’s fortress balance sheet. Key drivers for outperformance for 2H11 and into 2012 include
Out here in the real world the recession was never over anyway, despite what the blabbers on t.v. were saying. It’s very unstable in the workforce.. while the firm I work for recently hired some workers they are now “furloughing” others. Little of it makes any sense. There is either a lack of planning going on here, or they are just plain myopic in their planning. But the situation leaves us anxious and certainly unwilling to spend money on wants.
re # 54 – F Morgan Stanley and GM
GM lost control of its growth market and can’t get it back. GM sold the golden 1% to SAIC in 2009 and they now own 51% and book the profits over there in China not here.
It would not be the Jersey Shore without some boardwalk beatdowns.
62 arrested after fights lead police to shut down Seaside Heights boardwalk.
Sporadic fights broke out along the boardwalk beginning around 10:30 p.m. and as the number of fights increased, Police Chief Thomas Boyd arrived on scene to assess the situation, Korman said.
The fights heated up between 11:30 p.m. and midnight, and by 1 a.m. Boyd determined the boardwalk should be closed for the safety of the people there, Korman added.
http://www.app.com/article/20110705/NJNEWS/307050079/62-arrested-after-fights-Seaside-Heights-boardwalk?odyssey=nav|head
It’s for the Children! Taxes are for Other People!
“An investigation into New Jersey’s largest teachers union finds that the Internal Revenue Service has an outstanding lien against the New Jersey Education Association for $56,730.31 in back taxes.
The lien involves unpaid taxes from as far back as 2005, though most of the teacher union’s unpaid taxes are from 2009 and 2010.
The federal tax lien was issued against the NJEA on December 7, 2010, and has been on file with the Passaic County Clerk’s office since December 21, 2010.
The investigation was conducted by Education Action Group with the assistance of Mark Kalinowski, founder of North New Jersey Tea Party Group which is based in Passaic County.
The NJEA recently settled two other IRS tax liens totaling $16,581. One of those tax liens involved $13,885.76 in unpaid taxes, going back to 2005 and 2006. That lien was released by the Passaic County Clerk’s office on January 6, 2011.
The other lien, totaling $2,696, was filed on October 13, 2010 and was released by the Union County Clerk’s office on May 3, 2011.
All told, the NJEA has been dragged its feet in paying $73,311 in federal taxes, even as union leaders never misses an opportunity to call for higher taxes on their fellow citizens.
The NJEA recently aired a TV ad excoriating Gov. Chris Christie for giving “a tax break to millionaires” while cutting school funding.
The teachers union also opposed efforts to limit annual property tax increases to 2.9 percent. But this investigation has revealed the NJEA’s hypocrisy on taxation.
For years, the NJEA has championed higher taxes for most New Jersey residents. And for years, the NJEA hasn’t paid some of its obligations.
The NJEA has a ‘do as I say, not as I do’ approach to paying taxes. That’s something for New Jersey taxpayers to keep in mind the next time they hear the NJEA call for a tax hike. ”
http://townhall.com/columnists/kyleolson/2011/07/06/chris_christie_-_loathing_new_jersey_education_associations_tax_lien_troubles
#49…
And when do I get my f*cking shovel ready job?
Jobs will be trickling down anytime now, as soon as we “take our country back”.
Rolls Royce is the Cadillac of Cars.
Name the movie that was said in.
JJ: separated at birth…
http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/galleries/sports_lookalikes_in_hollywood_entertainment_and_politics/sports_lookalikes_in_hollywood_entertainment_and_politics.html
My cousin Vinny?
From the sequel to Titanic….
TITANIC 2011 …the band played on…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C-yhRJSMcD0&feature=related
Pretty Women.
You go GM!!
JJ – AKA Two Hands says:
July 6, 2011 at 11:50 am
Rolls Royce is the Cadillac of Cars.
Name the movie that was said in.
[54] kettle
“The city gave former residents federal “Section8” rent-subsidy vouchers and encouraged them to move out to new neighborhoods. Two more waves of demolition followed over the next nine years, dispersing tens of thousands of poor people into the wider metro community.”
I noticed this trend over a decade ago, and also noticed the concominant increase in sketchiness and crime. But don’t expect anything to change. In fact, I am surprised that the research confirming these observations was even allowed to come to light.
[75] redux
I should have noted that I noticed this in Mass. (not Memphis). Back then, I theorized that cities and suburbs next to Boston would become sketchy, with outer suburbs becoming desirable. With urban renewal and the popularity of downtown living increased, this further pushes the poor and troublemakers to the peripheral ring. That “horseshoe” described in the Memphis piece can be seen around Boston, Philly, DC, etc.
This headline says all one needs to know about the current state of this nation:
http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/43655349/ns/us_news-crime_and_courts/
Shore [77];
Sad state of affairs for FL and the US, when that is what passes for a hot piece of tail that is either a hot property for mainstream soft core mags and/or has too active a love life to be dedicated to raising her kid (depending on who you believe, of course).
Pain
Get yours while supplies last!!!
http://www.aimsurplus.com/product.aspx?item=F3YugoSKS&name=Yugoslavian+SKS+7.62×39+Rifle&groupid=12
Nom,
To grossly simplify it seems that “we” keep hanging onto the idea that poverty can be fixed with a bunch of cash and some social engineering. It would seem to come down we consistently choose to give out fishes as opposed to teaching people to fish.
If you want controversy, suggest a government funded program that puts socioeconomically disadvantaged kids (of all races) into boarding schools located away from the blighted areas they may have come from (hey, have the Citadel run the program).
It is an interesting idea (on the surface anyway) that i have seen pop up a few times, but the heated condemnation and criticism that gets hurled upon anyone who suggests such ideas is really very impressive.
re # 78 – Sad indeed
“There are 80,000 bartenders in the United States with bachelor’s degrees,”and 17 percent of baggage porters and bellhops have a college degree as well as 15 percent of taxi and limo drivers.
now that is a cool stat!
re # 78 – Sad indeed especially when you cannot pull harmless pranks anymore.
When 18-year-old Tyell Morton put a blow-up sex doll in a bathroom stall on the last day of school, he didn’t expect school officials to call a bomb squad or that he’d be facing up to eight years in prison and a possible felony record.
The senior prank gone awry has raised questions of race, prosecutorial zeal and the post-Columbine mindset in a small Indiana town and around the country, The Indianapolis Star reported in its Tuesday editions.
Legal experts question the appropriateness of the charges against Morton, and law professor Jonathan Turley at George Washington University posed a wider question about Morton’s case on his legal blog.
“The question is what type of society we are creating when our children have to fear that a prank (could) lead them to jail for almost a decade. What type of citizens are we creating who fear the arbitrary use of criminal charges by their government?”
http://news.yahoo.com/teen-faces-prison-sex-doll-prank-goes-awry-205000563.html
Kettle,
Now the government doesn’t even hand out fishes. The government borrows and prints money, hands it out to whomever didn’t earn it, and then encourages the purchase of cheap grain and sugar based products that deaden the mind and inflate blood sugar. That keeps them stuck to their couches.
I’d go along with your boarding school idea if we could hire non-unionized private sector Singaporean institutions to run the schools, rather than the usual suspects. But look at the trouble the Australian government got into for taking the little natives from their mommas in their “natural habitat”. Troubled NJ kids need their crack mommas, dominos pizza, and cable TV like the Australian aborigines needed their Kangaroo rodeos and roast grubs.
funny how times have changed, last day of school at stonybrook for seniors everyone used to throw their fridges out the window. People used to drag gigantic keleventors and kenmore puket green old non energy efficient fridges to school with them. By the time they graduated they were rusty and covered with stickers, school charged a $75 removal fee if they were in your room. So rather than drag the monster three flight down just remove windows and push it out. It was fun. I recall the school driving around with a pickup truck picking them up. Funny if you stuck you head out window or were walking by, good luck charlie.
Me and my buddy threw one down the internal staircase in the library five flights down, the split second after we pushed I was like yikes I hope no one takes the steps. That fridge hit the ground like an earthquake from five stories up in stairwell it was super loud, library was open and all the kids came running laughing their butts off.
Nowdays harmless practical jokes like that are frowned upon for no apparant reason.
speaking of times changing, I read the other day that Ed Koch mayor of New York city in August 1984 made the first cell phone call in New York City. Seems like they have been around longer than that.
Sastry,
If you are interested in attending, our investment club meeting is tomorrow up in Pequannock . Please let me know and I’ll share with you the deets.
This could never happen in NJ, where teachers are highly paid experts who serve only the children.
http://news.yahoo.com/americas-biggest-teacher-principal-cheating-scandal-unfolds-atlanta-213734183.html
re# 86 – JJ – Motorola DynaTAC first cell phone the price was $3,995 in 1983. There were car phones know as Radiophones before that. 300,000 subscribers in 1984 to more than a billion today.
Remember this commercial?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0WUF3yjgGf4
The end is nigh, Phoenix dust-storm edition:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8W4Cx44XKZ4&feature=player_embedded
I recall the very first time I saw a cell phone call. It was summer of 1986. Girl in my hampton’s house started dating a rich wall street guy. Had a fully restored red mercedes 1961 convertible with a white top. Anyhow he goes I have to make a call and he whips out a cell phone that costs more than all the money I owned and my car put together. Of course it says no signal, so he goes he is taking a drive to find a tower. I go hey can I go with you. Heck I wanted a ride in the car, we drive down the road till we find a hill, he drives to top of it parks the signal comes in and he makes a super quick call that cost one dollar a minute. I go to him you know there is a pay phone walking distance from the house that is one a dime. This cell phone thing is never going to catch on what is the point. Of course stupid girl in house dumps guy a few weeks later and the ten guys in house almost cried, guy brought a case of heinkens with him, played ball with us, had a cool car and a cell phone, I was his entourage. Girls are stupid. But to this day that was the nicest mercedes I have ever seen.
Juice Box says:
July 6, 2011 at 2:27 pm
re# 86 – JJ – Motorola DynaTAC first cell phone the price was $3,995 in 1983. There were car phones know as Radiophones before that. 300,000 subscribers in 1984 to more than a billion today.
“It would not be the Jersey Shore without some boardwalk beatdowns.”
As a kid, I spent a ot of time in seaside and knew a good number of cops in the Park and the Heights. They were often very aggressive; sometimes they applied forc to those who needed it and other times, it appeared to be less appropriate. One thing they always did, though, was bring overwhelming numbers to any disturbance.
force, too
snip
Patel Associates was paid a $126,000 retainer by the school board under a professional services contract for the 2010-2011 school year that expired June 30. Under the terms of the contract, the firm was also given free office space and supplies in the district’s administration building at 1144 Hooper Ave.
The retainer covered 160 days of engineering and architectural work on “medium-sized projects,” which were not specified in the contract. Large construction projects, though, did pay the firm millions more.
The Board of Education voted late last month to approve a list of seven “on-call” engineers to replace the Patel firm, which was first hired by the district 18 years ago.
In addition to its work for the school district, Patel Associates also did work for MJ Rit, the private construction business of former school Superintendent Michael J. Ritacco. Ritacco, who had served as superintendent of the state’s fourth-largest school district for nearly 20 years, was indicted last October on federal charges of taking up to $2 million in bribes from the district’s former insurance broker, Francis X. Gartland. Ritacco retired the day he was arrested.
snip
http://www.app.com/article/20110706/NJNEWS/307060021/Toms-River-schools-engineer-leaves-district?odyssey=mod_sectionstories
MARGATE — Who says lightning never strikes twice in the same place? Certainly not Lucy the Elephant.
The national historic landmark on the Jersey shore was damaged over the weekend by a lightning strike that knocked out electrical, computer, alarm and air conditioning systems.
Richard Helfant, executive director of the group that maintains and operates Lucy, says Sunday’s lightning strike could cost anywhere from $10,000 to $100,000 to fix.
Lucy was hit by lightning in 2007 as well. That hit caused $162,000 worth of damage to her riding carriage, called a howdah. After that incident, lightning rods were installed. They may have helped limit the damage from Sunday’s strike.
snip
http://www.app.com/article/20110706/NJNEWS10/307060060/Lightning-strikes-twice-NJ-s-Lucy-Elephant?odyssey=mod_sectionstories
TRENTON — Gov. Chris Christie often tells audiences the story of his dying mother and says that, like his relationship with her, in New Jersey, even if there are disagreements, there should be “nothing left unsaid between us.”
After the past few days, little has been left unsaid — except in a direct conversation — by Christie, a Republican, and Senate President Stephen M. Sweeney, a Democrat, who has launched multiple tirades against the governor and in one interview called Christie “a rotten prick.”
snip
http://www.app.com/article/20110706/NJNEWS/307050090/Sweeney-says-relationship-Christie-has-changed?odyssey=mod_sectionstories
re # 94- Shore – you can make a quick dime with a camera phone in Seaside.
http://njcivilsettlements.blogspot.com/2011/02/seaside-heights-pays-30000-to-settle.html
“In his suit, Justin Racelis said that on July 29, 2007, he was leaving the Bamboo Bar when Police Officer Robert Rezzonico yelled to him “Hey, f*****’ retard, get over here!” After he and his friends emptied their pockets in accordance with Rezzonico’s instructions, Rezzonico allegedly threatened Racelis with arrest if he said “another word.” After Racelis asked Rezzonico if he was serious, Rezzonico reportedly arrested and handcuffed him.
Racelis’ girlfriend then allegedly put her attorney’s business card and a PBA card into Racelis’ mouth, and Rezzonico reportedly took them out. After the girlfriend asked for the cards back, Rezzonico allegedly threatened to “kick her ass.”
Yup. This sounds par for the course.
“
WSJ
NY CULTURE
JULY 6, 2011
Showing His Enthusiasm
Bill Buckner Chats About Returning to New York and Getting Back Into Baseball.
By KIMBERLY CHOU
Among the many guest stars on the eighth and purportedly final season of HBO’s “Curb Your Enthusiasm,” which begins Sunday and was filmed in creator Larry David’s native New York, former Red Sox first baseman Bill Buckner is perhaps the most cosmically appropriate.
“Curb” is a show built on faux pas and awkward situations as they befall the fictionalized version of Mr. David; he’s successful and otherwise competent, save for these endless social screw-ups, or “Larry David moments.” And Mr. Buckner’s best-known moment—a game-ending fielding error in Game 6 of the 1986 World Series, after which his Red Sox lost to the Mets in Game 7—can be seen as sort of the ur-“Larry David moment.” It just happened in real life.
Mr. Buckner, 61, is over it. He and Mookie Wilson, who hit the grounder that trickled between his legs, regularly sign autographs together at events. And his appearance on “Curb” addresses the infamous incident. Over the phone from Brockton, Mass., where he is in his first season managing the Brockton Rox of the Canadian American Association of Professional Baseball, Mr. Buckner stayed relatively mum about the episode in which he appears. He did say his scene takes place at a baseball-card show at a hotel, where Mr. David meets him and Mr. Wilson. “Curb” co-star Susie Essman, who plays the combative wife of Mr. David’s best friend, also has a Buckner run-in. “She drops a few f-bombs,” Mr. Buckner said.
Neither Mr. Buckner nor Mr. Wilson was a regular “Curb” viewer before this year, but both say they’ve watched a few episodes since filming. “I think my kids are more fans of it than I am,” said Mr. Wilson, now the Mets’ first-base coach. “I didn’t realize how big the show was—and when I told them I was going to be on it, they went crazy.”
Mr. Buckner spoke with the Journal recently about “Curb,” baseball and going back to Boston.
How did you wind up on “Curb Your Enthusiasm”?
[Larry David] just contacted me early last summer and asked me if I’d be interested in it. He told me what direction they were going in and what they were trying to do. I thought about it and I thought it’d be fun. It worked out well.
Do you get a lot of film and television requests?
Well, I don’t get a lot. I’ve done a few and most of those I did for my daughter [29-year-old Brittany Buckner], who is in the business. Part of the deal was that she gets a chance to be in an episode. All the stuff that I’ve done she’s been in, which has been good for her.
What was the filming like?
Well, actually, I was a little worried about it because I’m not an actor obviously. I’ve done a couple other parts in movies where I had to memorize lines; I wasn’t too good at that. But this was all improv. It kind of fit me pretty well, so I felt pretty comfortable doing it. I think a lot of it had to do with Larry. He’s easy to work with, so funny and everything. [It’s easier] when you just play yourself. I don’t have the acting skills my daughter has.
Are there any transferable skills from baseball you were able to apply on the set?
I think just being in front of the camera a lot. We’re entertainers. A lot of it is non-verbal. It’s basically the same thing.
What led you to take the managing offer from the Brockton Rox, which brings you back not only to baseball but to the Boston area?
I’ve always wanted to manage. [With the Can Am league] it’s a short season and with independent league baseball, you’re managing to win every game, not like the minor leagues.
Any aspirations to get back to the major leagues?
It’s a possibility. Baseball’s what I do. If I’m going to get involved in another job, it will probably be in baseball.
What is it like being back in the Boston area?
It’s been fun, I’ve enjoyed it. It’s nice being in this part of the country for the summer.
And the Red Sox fan reaction?
It’s all positive … It’s just life, you know. There are ups and downs. As they say, s— happens. You deal with it.
Are you and Mookie Wilson friends?
He’s coaching for the Mets, so he’s pretty busy. So we usually see each other two or three times a year. I like him a lot. He’s a good person. We’ve been around each other enough that I can say we’re good friends. We have a lot of respect for each other and it’s always good to catch up and talk about each other’s families, just how things are going in life and our baseball stuff.
They used to hire a lot of “seasonal” cops, and put them through a minimal program that left one wondering if they ever discussed 1) the constitution, 2) reasonable force, 3) probable cause and that, 4) not every citizen is a dirtbag.
re # 98 – Shore this exact senario happened to a drunk friend of mine for passing out on the Seaside Park Beach at night back in 1980s. We had cases of beer and a group of a dozen or so and were drinking in “safety” in Island Beach State Park dunes. Our friend wandered over to the Seaside Park to sleep it off and was jumped and arrested by quite a few cops. We ran into the Park Rangers later who only made us leave and pick up our empties.
6 cops for one drunk?
On September 16, 2009, Alexander Casey, who receives mail at a post office box in New Vernon, New Jersey, accepted $225,000 as full settlement of his excessive force claim against the Borough of Seaside Park (Ocean County) and several members of its police department.
Casey’s civil lawsuit, filed in June 2007, arose out his encounter with Seaside Police Officers Christopher Bonner, Jillian Dworzanski, Michael Garvey, Matthew Brady, Christopher R. Graham, Joseph M. Luna, Ryan Jenkins and Rafiq Abdul-Ghafur during the early morning hours of June 10, 2005.
Casey alleges that walked from the Terrace Motel to the beach across the street via the sand dunes and was approached by officers while lying on the beach. He claims that Officer Abdul-Ghafur told him that he was under arrest and that he offered no resistance to the arrest.
During his arrest, Casey claimed that the six officers verbally and physically abused him by punching and kicking him in the face and head, spraying him with OC spray, hitting him in the head with police batons, kicking sand in his eyes and rubbing his injured face in the sand and handcuffing him so tightly as to cause injury.
Casey further alleged that after he arrived at the Seaside Park Police Headquarters, the six officers continued to spray him in face with OC spray while he was handcuffed in his cell and denied him medical treatment for his injuries. He claims that his injuries were so severe that the Ocean County Jail refused to admit him and required him to be transported to Community Medical Center for medical treatment.
http://njcivilsettlements.blogspot.com/2009/10/seaside-park-pays-225000-to-police.html
This whole thing sounds like NJ’s plan to make housing affordable.
Take a beating by the ‘holiday help’ cops at ‘da Shore; cash a check worth about 50% down on a dumpy NJ house. See you at D’Jais in Belmar?
Shore,
Three biggest areas for graft in NJ – school boards, city councils and local housing authorities. Get as many relatives and friends as you can on the taxpayer gravy train and steer all the no bid contracts you can to your campaign donors.
From the Atlanta Journal Constitution:
“Investigation into APS cheating finds unethical behavior across every level
Across Atlanta Public Schools, staff worked feverishly in secret to transform testing failures into successes.”
http://www.ajc.com/news/investigation-into-aps-cheating-1001375.html
Undoubtedly an incident limited solely to Atlanta; not a chance something like this would occur anyplace else; especially New Jersey.
Shore, Juice
One of my housemates in college was a seasonal boardwalk cop and is now a state trooper. During his boardwalk days he loved to come home and regale us with the stories of the evenings adventures! According to him they were encouraged to behave in such a manner, not that he seemed to mind doing so.
http://www.northjersey.com/news/125107139_Carlstadt_electronics_distributor_may_lay_off_172.html
Very Interesting Information! Thank You For Thi Blog!
You certainly deserve a round of applause for your post and more specifically, your blog in general. Very high quality material
“they were encouraged to behave in such a manner”
The sense I always got was that it was policy to rough up a fair number of folks in front of as many others as possible as a from of social control — if you step out of line the slightest bit, Comrade Stalin, um, the Chief, will have us crush you like a piece of cotton candy under our ridiculous standard-issue boots.
98 shore I have a few seaside heights stories that actually beat that by a mile. For perspective, consider these two antecdotes: (1) its a seasonal town flooded with the most ignorant, obnoxious, uneducated criminals pouring directly from the bowels of nnj & staten island’s poorest inner cities; and (2) during the offseason the housing units are completely ovetaken by ocean county’s most distressed, unstable, toothless welfare cases. Think appalacia mixed with jersey shore.
Then mix those factors together with youngest, most steroid enraged, under trained alpha cops and you get a potent mix of absolute sh!t.
Grim and Barbara, this one is for you…
Homes from Notable Periods in US History
http://www.zillow.com/blog/2011-06-28/see-homes-from-notable-periods-in-u-s-history/?scid=emm-070511_JulyBuzzAmericanHomes-blog
Right right… but the snakes never bothered you before the 50% price crash and a 22% unemployment rate?
Hundreds of Snakes Force Family Out of Home, Into Foreclosure
http://iamtheeye.com/2011/07/06/hundreds-of-snakes-force-family-out-of-home-into-foreclosure/
Question for the pros, what does it mean when seller wants buyer to be responsible for c/o? Does it automatically mean something is wrong with house?
Typical for REO and some short sales, so it doesn’t necessarily mean something is wrong, it’s just that the bank/owner doesn’t want to be responsible for making any repairs (or doesn’t have the money to).
However, it is riskier than as-is, since you can move into an as-is house (seller is still responsible for CO), you can’t move into a house without a CO (and you’ll be responsible for the repairs). Can it mean big issues? Absolutely. Should you run away from a good deal? Nah.
Have your attorney include additional provisions that allow you to break the contract if repairs exceed some comfortable amount ($500), and that the CO be granted prior to closing (it may required for your mortgage anyhow).
As far as the CO process goes. First, call the town and inquire about the requirements for a CO, most times they just check for smoke/co2 and fire extinguishers, so no big deal. Often the township checks open building permits, if so, call the records department and request any recent/open permits to see what the trouble areas might be. Open permits will need to be closed before the CO is granted, and that means passing inspections.
Armed with that info, go ahead and pay the couple of bucks and kick the CO process off. If the inspector has issues, they’ll let you know exactly what needs to be done. Based on that info, you’ll either be in a warm and fuzzy place, or exercising your right to bail.
Cool thank you, we had our deal die in attorney review over this last year and am seeing it advertised more commonly now.
Shore and Sean, it sounds like Seaside, but they need to take a creativity and applicability lesson from my teen years…and run with it against the booze. Get the town out of the limelight for a while. Maybe get some cred.
I was smart and a smart@ss and got picked up hanging in a park (not in Seaside Heights) with a bunch of college peeps and was the designated driver (unfortunately I was 15) so the cops took me in and tossed me in the slammer with a stew of trash. They bring the fingerprint gear and do it in front of this white trash prostitute. After two hours – like midnight,- this guy (the good cop) who looks like the CHIPS guy with the dark hair comes in and whispers, “look honey, if you were legal I’d take you home, but I’m busting you out of here and you tell me where you belong. When I’m home, he hands me the prints and says, “Shhhhhhh.”
I never, ever, ever, ever did anything bad again…in that town.
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