From Forbes:
Forget Affordability — Housing’s Trends Signal A Bright Future
It seems that whenever something happens in the housing market, a flock of articles pop up explaining why the signs are ominous and housing is destined to flounder. To me, the oddest one has to do with existing home sales this year. Prices have risen, and the inventory of homes for sale has fallen. This happy concurrence has been met with tsk-tsking that both changes will harm the recovery.
The rationale is that the shrinking inventory is causing the house price rise, making homes less affordable and undercutting the buying needed to sustain the recovery. However, these shifts are actually welcome signs – proof that housing is finally shaking off both the Great Recession and the excesses of the preceding housing bubble.
…
1. The 2001 recession following the Internet bubble-burst had little effect on house sales and inventory. Note that the ratio of sales to inventory held steady around 2.5.2. Then the housing bubble took hold, driving sales up. Inventory also rose but at a slower pace, pushing the ratio up to a peak of over 3.
3. In late-2005, early-2006 the reversal in the housing market took hold. Inventory jumped both because of the natural buildup of unsold homes amid falling sales and because of speculators deciding to sell properties. These contrary moves (sales down, inventory up) produced a sharp drop in the ratio to a low of only 1.2.
4. In 2008 and 2009 the Great Recession and housing bubble-burst kept the ratio low as sales remained down and financial strains kept the listing coming.
5. Then, beginning in 2010, sales began their steady rise eating into the inventory, producing a fast rise in the sales-to-inventory ratio.
6. This year the moves have taken us back to what Realtor.com calls “equilibrium.” Note that sales, inventory and the ratio have all completed their recovery to pre-bubble levels
…
That last observation deserves emphasis: The existing house sales, the for-sale listings and the ratio between the two are back to the healthy levels that existed prior to the housing bubble and the subsequent Great Recession and bubble-burst. In addition, Realtor.com’s recent press release states the quality of listings is up, as shown by the “median days on the market” declining 10% since last year to 93. Moreover, the sales/inventory/price improvements are occurring virtually everywhere, even those markets previously hardest hit.
…
The decrease in existing for-sale housing inventory and the increase in sales and prices are neither abnormal nor ominous. Rather, the housing market is emerging fully from its bubble-and-bust period with regained health. Inventory levels, sales and prices also set the stage for continued improvement. Therefore, we can expect to see more good news coming – most likely when the 2014 spring/summer selling season emerges. It looks as though 2013 could be the pivotal year needed to produce a bright future in housing.
From MarketWatch:
Buyers today want a house for the long haul
When Amy Lewis sits in her Lafayette, Calif., home, she can envision her three young daughters growing up there. She sees them forming lasting friendships with the neighborhood kids, graduating from the local schools, coming home for visits during college breaks.
It doesn’t stop there: The 43-year-old can also imagine grandchildren running around the halls.
It’s a different mentality than in years past, when people would buy a home, stay for several years and move up to something bigger or better. First and foremost, Lewis said she and her husband wanted an experience similar to one that they had growing up, one where the neighborhood kids went from preschool to high school together. Her parents still live in the same house they moved to when she was 2 years old (and they’re also flush with home equity in their 80s).
When Amy Lewis sits in her Lafayette, Calif., home, she can envision her three young daughters growing up there. She sees them forming lasting friendships with the neighborhood kids, graduating from the local schools, coming home for visits during college breaks.
It doesn’t stop there: The 43-year-old can also imagine grandchildren running around the halls.
It’s a different mentality than in years past, when people would buy a home, stay for several years and move up to something bigger or better. First and foremost, Lewis said she and her husband wanted an experience similar to one that they had growing up, one where the neighborhood kids went from preschool to high school together. Her parents still live in the same house they moved to when she was 2 years old (and they’re also flush with home equity in their 80s).
“Definitely, for the next 30 years, we feel confident we want to be there,” Lewis said.
More home buyers today are planting deep roots in their communities, according to research from the National Association of Realtors. That’s especially true for buyers younger than 45 years old—those most likely to be move-up buyers, said Paul Bishop, NAR’s vice president of research.
In 2012, 27% of home buyers between the ages of 25 and 44 and 18% of buyers between the ages of 18 and 24 said that they planned to be in their homes for 16 years or longer, according to a NAR survey of 8,501 home buyers. In a comparable survey in 2006, 18% of buyers between the ages of 25 and 44 and 8% of buyers between the ages of 18 and 24 said the same.
Expectations have adjusted, and trading up is no longer the goal for many, Bishop said. People became accustomed to the move-up mentality when they’d see their neighbors move for extra square footage or a more desirable area. Now, your neighbors probably aren’t going anywhere.
Listed a townhouse in Northern Bergen County built in 1979. No updates since it was built. End unit with fireplace, 3 bedrooms 2.5 baths, unfinished basement and attached garage. Initial list price 379,000. The interior unit next door without a fireplace or master bath, in somewhat superior condition had recently sold for $380,000.
First 10 days the best offer was $335,000. Reduced the price on Saturday to $369,000. Sunday received an offer for $365,000. The unit didn’t improve but someone saw greater value at the lower price. The difference the $10,000 reduction in price made was to cause a buyer to fear someone else would see the value too.
Pending home sales for September due out at 10am, one of the first chances to really take a look at the impact of higher mortgage rates.
Housing market, headed for bridge abutment at 140 mph. Hurry, bring your checkbook!
The head article is a disgrace…….
Not a whole lot of news flow this morning, I actually went back and added Forbes to the title after I put it up (lest there be any confusion…)
There is a piece in the WSJ this morning about Sandy’s impact on local home prices at the short (read: up), but I haven’t yet been able to find an open link, it’s behind the paywall. Usually I can find an unblocked link in the India version of the WSJ, but no such luck this morning.
I often find people greatly overestimate cost to fix up a condo. The 1,200 square foot condo I bought I did a renovation on. Had a budget of $3,500.
Hired my cheap painters, who do a great job. We scrubbed whole thing for days as was filthy then still hired a maid team and paid them $200. Bought a new dishwasher on sale for $350 and was able to fix the clogged vent on dryer which was only reason that did not work. Fixed two faucets myself. Wife painted vanity in bathroom. We re-grouted two bathrooms and kitchen. I painted storm door and we put in all brand new outlets. Final Cost $3,300
Now onto to furnishing unit. Budget was $1,500. Sleepys gave me three free beds. Ordered a dresser on-line that came badly damaged. Back cracked open, two drawers, cracked and chips. Called manufacturer who asked for pictures and said omg, throw it out we will send a new one. Well we got new one, spent four hours fixing old one and put both in apartment. Then two end tables from a guy in Long Beach throwing them out. Then a dining room set missing two chairs for $35. Bought two chairs online for $99. Then off to Bed Bath and Beyond, 20% off with a fema letter and bought all the kitchen stuff and stuff for wall. Neighbor gaves us some paintings that were under six feet of water, we threw out moldy pictures, put in new prints, and cardboard for back, picked some nic nacs at salvation army and an estate sale gave us some stuff left over for free. Then do gas grill at home depot on sale. And some rugs on line for a good price. Finally some brand new accent pieces at Home Goods. Prior owner left us living room set which helped. I think we were at $1,200 for turn key unit. With a few weeks left in summer I was able to squeeze in three weeks of tenants at 6k total. Which paid for renovation.
I did not have to deal with heat, roof, exterior, garden, windows, AC people forget in a house so much money and time is sucked into expensive stuff. People focus on a condo maintenance. But in a rental property it is amazing how much time if frees up. It is well worth it.
I am suprised more folks dont live in those large condos that are house sized. After sandy the folks in condos faired so much better than us folks in single family houses.
30 year realtor says:
October 28, 2013 at 6:38 am
Listed a townhouse in Northern Bergen County built in 1979. No updates since it was built. End unit with fireplace, 3 bedrooms 2.5 baths, unfinished basement and attached garage. Initial list price 379,000. The interior unit next door without a fireplace or master bath, in somewhat superior condition had recently sold for $380,000.
First 10 days the best offer was $335,000. Reduced the price on Saturday to $369,000. Sunday received an offer for $365,000. The unit didn’t improve but someone saw greater value at the lower price. The difference the $10,000 reduction in price made was to cause a buyer to fear someone else would see the value too.
Until you have sustained job growth with real jobs and real salaries instead of 30 hours in the retail and the food handling industry, then take all of these speculative opinion pieces and place them on the same page with the Kardashian gossip. The inventory is still a bucket of sh1t and the prices still make one snicker.
Anything that is forwarded by the so-called RE “industry” touted as expert analysis is nothing more than a sales and marketing technique. Use your f.ucking head; the economy sucks hard, real jobs still don’t exist and property taxes doubled and continue to rise unabated. And there’s no inventory because people can’t sell. They’re f.ucked. Geezus!
Need I remind you…..”The company today released a 2012 study of those it has moved throughout the nation. It shows 62 percent of New Jersey migrators are heading out rather than moving into the state. New Jersey replaces Illinois as the state more people are leaving; Illinois is now second.”
http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702304682504579156320881293950?mod=WSJ_hps_MIDDLENexttoWhatsNewsThird
#7..that the link?
Hat tip – From the link above (posting for posterity’s sake):
John Anello had visited the Jersey Shore since he was a small child and always wanted a beach home there.
Superstorm Sandy has granted his wish—and made him part of a national demographic shift that has driven up real-estate prices, while sowing social discord, in some coastal communities.
After Sandy, Mr. Anello says he paid $296,000 for a lot in Ortley Beach, where a small home was destroyed by the storm. He plans to build a 2,500-square-foot house on 8-foot pilings for about $350,000.
“It’s a time to buy,” says the 52-year-old Mr. Anello, an automotive technician in West Orange, N.J., with his own business. “I guarantee that you’ll see a lot of people moving in and rebuilding the whole area. My house will be worth double what it is worth now in five years.”
…
After a storm’s damage, many less-wealthy longtime owners find the only financially viable option is to sell. That moves many such properties further up the economic ladder, as buyers like Mr. Anello build bigger, more luxurious homes where bungalows once stood.
The result has been a surprise in these coastal communities: Many have found that storms were ultimately followed by real-estate prices that rose, rather than fell as feared.
After Hurricane Andrew hit Florida in 1992, a Federal Housing Finance Agency study showed values dramatically increased for the hardest-hit areas before eventually settling back to pre-storm rates of increase.
In 1988, a year before Hurricane Hugo battered South Carolina, typical oceanfront lots went for $200,000 on Isle of Palms, a vacation destination, says Michael Scarafile, president of Carolina One Real Estate in Charleston. After the storm, much of the rebuilding was of bigger, more luxurious houses, he says. By 2006, he says, his average listing on the island was $2 million, partially accelerated by the storm.
“Overall, it was very healthy for the market,” he says. “A lot of the bungalows that were built 50 years ago went away.”
…
As larger homes go up, real-estate officials say, some towns could benefit from the added tax revenue and the spending of more-affluent beachgoers. “Financially, 10 years from now, our town will be in far better shape than it was today,” says Stephen Acropolis, the mayor of nearby Brick Township. “You’re going to have these McMansions coming up everywhere.”
But some fear that because there will be fewer homes with fewer residents, small businesses will suffer. “If you don’t have these secondary residents back,” says Paul Jeffrey, president of the nonprofit Ortley Beach Voters and Taxpayers Association, “the pizza shops and the hardware stores that depend on them don’t make it.”
Even before the storm, prices on beachfront properties were on the rise in New Jersey. Prices held up better on beaches during the financial crisis than elsewhere in the state, says Peter Reinhart, director of the Kislak Real Estate Institute at Monmouth University.
That has put shore homes out of reach for many would-be newcomers, in extreme cases, dramatically: The average listing in Mantoloking is about $2.2 million, according to Trulia, an online real-estate service, and about $1.2 million in Bay Head, as of mid-October.
Vacant office space continues to rise as job market is slow to recover
http://www.nj.com/business/index.ssf/2013/10/vacant_office_space_continues.html#incart_river_default
With unemployment in New Jersey continuing to hover above the national average and corporations restructuring, the percentage of vacant office space rose slightly, according to a report from Jones Lang LaSalle.
Driven by increased empty office space in Northern New Jersey, the real estate investment management firm found the state’s overall vacancy rate increased from 24.2 percent at mid-year to 24.6 percent in the third quarter.
Northern New Jersey posted a vacancy rate of 24.8 percent, compared with 24.1 percent in the previous quarter; while Central New Jersey’s vacancy rate remained unchanged at 24.5 percent.
Newark and the Hudson Waterfront, however, reported some of the lowest high-end vacancy rates in the state — 10.3 percent and 17.8 percent, respectively, along with the highest average rents.
The state reported job growth during the first half of the year, but has seen about 12,000 job losses during July and August, including loses in the professional and health service sectors.
“The professional and financial services sectors have historically been drivers of demand for space In New Jersey,” Robert Kossar, executive managing director and market director for JLL’s New Jersey and Long Island operations, said in the report.
“The lack of significant employment gains by these vital sectors has cast a shadow over the office market, where limited demand is being countered by corporate restructurings and rightsizings. These forces have caused the overall vacancy rate to range near the 25.0 percent level for the past three years,” he said.
Hasn’t Mantoloking always been out of reach for the average person? There were always massive gated mansions on the waterfront there. That’s not new. Yeah many of them were completely flattened but now that part of the island has been completely re-engineered into a fortress. Driving by it this summer they have the largest engineered dunes I’ve seen down the shore. I don’t think they’re going to let a Sandy type storm do that to them again.
“That has put shore homes out of reach for many would-be newcomers, in extreme cases, dramatically: The average listing in Mantoloking is about $2.2 million, according to Trulia, an online real-estate service, and about $1.2 million in Bay Head, as of mid-October.”
IMHO – Shore has been out of reach for many since the mid 90s, hell probably mid 80s really.
Any time I hear a story about a working class stiff down on LBI, I’m pretty sure I know how they got there, his/her parents bought the place in the 50 or 60s and they inherited it. Maybe if they were lucky, they got a plot big enough to subdivide a few times, which they usually did, and it usually funded the lifestyle.
Otherwise, a shore house is an impossibility for the middle class.
C’mon, decent place on LBI, and by decent I mean basic but clean, is going to run you close to three quarters of a million. For a second house? Who can afford that? Even a $500k second house is technically out of reach for all but the top 2-5% or so.
Who really wants to sink money into a beach house to use 3 months out of 12?
13. He’s from West Orange home of the saavy real estate investor. Just hoping to escape this gulag by breaking even one day.
Not considering places like Brick, Toms River, Stafford, Egg Harbor, Howell, etc as “shore”, as they are not.
He seems very sure:
“It’s a time to buy,” says the 52-year-old Mr. Anello, an automotive technician in West Orange, N.J., with his own business. “I guarantee that you’ll see a lot of people moving in and rebuilding the whole area. My house will be worth double what it is worth now in five years.”
Love how they describe the guy – Automotive Technician.
Paints the picture of him being a wrench monkey at the local oil change shop.
and then they add the …. with his own business… at the end like that.
Why not describe him as a successful business owner?
“My house will be worth double what it is worth now in five years.”
Another speculative investment genius. There is no such thing as a get reach quick scheme, my friend. And besides, I thought you wanted to build the house to enjoy?
So, Michelle Oblama’s good friend from college gets the no bid contract to build a rinky dinky website at a cost of over a half BILLION dollars. Hmmm… is this a shovel ready project? No collusion or misappropriation of tax dollars here. Can you imagine if a Republican President ever attempted something like this?
[21]grim – I chuckled over the same thing. I instantly thought of a guy I went to HS with who owns a super successful repair and body shop in Dover. He lives somewhere up in Boonton in a 6,000 sf house on a couple acres on a very tony street.
Love how they describe the guy – Automotive Technician.
Paints the picture of him being a wrench monkey at the local oil change shop.
and then they add the …. with his own business… at the end like that.
Why not describe him as a successful business owner?
15,
Re: mantoloking
Yea mantoloking is safe but the massive dunes will end in Normandy beach. That means the water is going either through Bay Head or Ortley Beach. Cranberry inlet, closed in the 1850’s by a storm will return.
23. This is right on target man. This has been a helluva week or two for Obama. Methinks he has jumped the shark for good. Now if only his constituency read.
Grim [1];
Someone is trying to define down expectations. People used to dream about moving up in houses. Now they are lucky to hope for owning a shack where they don’t have to move every three years at the whim of a landlord.
The current administration is all about managing America’s decline to where they think it should be. Its what happens when we elect a class of people who hate America at its core.
The truth lies in between 30 years assessment of housing market and Fast Eddies opinion of job market. Make no mistake, this is all about Bernanke policies. Investors with cheap money pushed into Real estate as Ben instructed. With floor in, people with money bought in last year bc Bernanke blew stock bryubble. The question is middle class and under 30 who rely on stable jobs to buy homes. They have been left for dead by Ben. There is no history or guidance here. Forbes article is bunk. Keep printing and pass buck until it collapses again.
#28..my opinion…..Fed is doing what they can to keep economy afloat while our elected representatives either do nothing or act incompetently to solve the problems of the economy and offer real solutions
moose (27)-
It’s way too late. The empire is in full decline, and it won’t be reversed.
Lie back, and enjoy the feeling of oblivion washing over you.
“As larger homes go up, real-estate officials say, some towns could benefit from the added tax revenue… ”
You’re telling me they won’t lower the tax rate as assessments increase?
I’m shocked, shocked.
If you look at Bojangles in the way you would a comic or TV actor, he’s actually quite amusing.
Bernanke is keeping the banks afloat. In terms of fixing the economy, there are no options for Congress to choose that don’t involve immense pain via an enormous restructuring… no one will ever choose that route, willingly.
1987 Condo says:
October 28, 2013 at 11:03 am
#28..my opinion…..Fed is doing what they can to keep economy afloat while our elected representatives either do nothing or act incompetently to solve the problems of the economy and offer real solutions
Actually grim this is what you get when you have tammany hall type corruption mixed with Nixonian paranoia. Sprinkle in large doses of incompetence and whamo it spits Obama out. President not my Fault and the buck stops somewhere else.
Meat [33],
He’s a f.ucking cartoon; an absolute train wreck. How the f.uck does anyone watch this guy and not say, “Oh My G0d, what have we done!”
One more example of job market, a recruiter called me on Friday. We had talked 3 mos. ago. He had job at my former company and pay was very good rate. One of few that was same as I am making now. Told him that not going back to old company. He said when current contract is up, lets talk. My contract was extended. Our conversation? Are you available now at a cheaper rate? He was fishing to see how desperate I was. He had no jobs in 130k range for people with 12 years experience/ accounting/ masters. This is low salary folks.
Scientists at Shanghai’s Fudan University have created a one-watt light bulb that provides access to wireless internet.
Using a technology called Li-Fi, or light fidelity, the prototype created by the scientists is claimed to be an affordable and efficient alternative to existing means.
According to Chi Nan, an information technology professor with the university, four computers were found to be able to connect easily to the internet when kept near the Li-Fi bulb.
The use of light frequency enables all computers to connect simultaneously. The Li-Fi bulb, featuring a microchip, generates around 150 mbps that is 20 times faster than the average connection in China. Nan also states that the current wireless signal transmission equipment is expensive and inefficient.
http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/articles/515887/20131022/chinese-lightbulb-wireless-internet-shanghai-fudan-university.htm
’87,
I think Congress is doing what is has always done- look to the Fed to solve their problems while harping on hot button but non-pertinent issues to provide illusion of governance. The Fed is the leader and you are seeing it exposed to the world.
#23 Fast Eddie
Halliburton?
What is really funny about this website issue is that it was apart there were issues day one. But with the GOP shutting down the government and grandstanding with the Debt Ceiling, it went relatively unnoticed. So the O administration has had two week head start to get out in front of this.
Now give yourself a big “Bengazi” yell to make yourself feel better.
Fab [40];
Unless I’m mistaken, Halliburton actually successfully accomplished what they were paid to do, didn’t they?
I’m not sure I really feel the public outrage yet…..I think the jury is still out in many people’s minds. The problem is that the vast majority of the “intelligentsia” is unaffected…..and those who NEED it still do not fully know what is being offered to them……..
Essex says:
October 28, 2013 at 10:32 am
23. This is right on target man. This has been a helluva week or two for Obama. Methinks he has jumped the shark for good. Now if only his constituency read.
#35 Fast Eddie
Welcome to the DNC 2000-2008
#41 Anon
There are parts of this website that are working. Overall it’s a volume issue.
Haliburton came with a lot of fraud and a lot of waste. http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2010/jun/09/arianna-huffington/halliburton-kbr-and-iraq-war-contracting-history-s/
44 – Please. Don’t even try to defend it. It’s a national joke.
http://www.cnn.com/video/?/video/showbiz/2013/10/27/newday-snl-obamacare-sebelius.cnn&hpt=hp_c3&from_homepage=yes
Fab [43];
Let me try seeing this from your point of view. You looked at the GWB administration in abject horror — so you and those who think like you decide to elect someone far worse? To what end?
Why were you in horror about GWB. Iraq? You may have disagreed with the Iraq war (and the current ‘whisper campaign’ in support of Hillary 2016 will try to whitewash that she voted FOR the resolution authorizing the use of force) — It may have been too expensive — It may have been misguided in its aims (‘install democracy’, and all that). At the end of the day, the ruling regime in Iraq was deposed, and what we propped up is more favorably disposed to US interests than Saddam was.
Obamacare? Higher costs (no surprise to anyone who didn’t believe Obama himself) — more people losing coverage than gaining it; and a half-billion dollar website that can’t even hold onto people’s data. Abject failure.
OK so Google, yahoo, ebay, amazon, and hundreds of other websites provide services to millions of customers each day without fail and it is a volume issue? I think it is a competence issue Fab but keep eating that spoonful of sh!t they are serving you and telling them it is good.
Fab [44];
Haliburton came with a lot of fraud and a lot of waste.
So Obamacare is all the fraud and waste we’ve come to expect of government, just no actual results. Great campaign slogan.
http://www.hulu.com/watch/550560
Moose,
I guess just forget that hundeds of thousand innocent Iraqis were killed during our bombing campaigns..but who gives a sh*t about them, right?
Any of you guys who think the blue or red team are one iota different are going to be really shocked pretty soon.
They are all working from the SAME script…to the SAME ends…for the SAME overlords. The controversies are all scripted to give us entertainment-@ddicted zombies a few minutes of jollies every day and to occasionally scare us back into a into servile stupor.
Seriously, how many last-minute stick-saves of the entire free world does it take before you realize it’s all a sham?
If you believe any of the crap coming out of DC, please send your kids to get shot up in some foreign jerkwater. And please accept my thanks in advance.
“He’s a f.ucking cartoon; an absolute train wreck. How the f.uck does anyone watch this guy and not say, “Oh My G0d, what have we done!”
Echoes of the populaces view of ‘W’.
As for creating a working website…I can’t access my yahoo webmail about once per month and Chase’s banking site is down more than it’s up lately. And both of those companies have been in existence online for what? Twenty years? Longer?
They are ALL the same. Stop taking sides. It’s like rooting for the pedophile over the date rapist.
Baa Baa.
Anyone at the Red Bulls game yesterday? Kick ass!
This page is working well.
https://www.healthcare.gov/pre-registration.html
Get your bumper stickers….
http://www.zazzle.com/error_404_anti_obamacare_defund_obamacare_bumper_sticker-128753344138771927
55
Before clicking the link, I had pictured the bumper sticker being “Website has timed out” or something to that affect.
I’d urge some caution with the comparisons between healthcare.gov and some of the major eCommerce properties.
Comparisons with companies like Google and Amazon are completely without basis in reality. These are companies with near billions in infrastructure and expertise, built over a decade or more. These are companies worth in the hundreds of billions of dollars folks, whose entire business models hinge on the capability to execute.
Not defending the debacle, but trying to make comparisons on the basis that these are both “websites” is a pretty silly thing to do.
I think I heard someone make the same comment in testimony to Congress the other day (not positive, only caught it in the background), and again, only highlights the lack of knowledge in the space.
There is no way the folks that built healthcare.gov could have built something with the same level of IP and Infrastructure investments as Amazon and Google in this short of a timeframe, without spending tens of billions of dollars, if even possible at all (likely not).
I suspect that a number of major players in this space simply chose the “No Bid” option, when presented with this, due to risks involved. Anyone who thinks they can build an Amazon or Google in a matter of months is naive.
Get your head out of fox news’ ass, half a billion is the amount of money the Canadian company CGI made during its 7 years as a government contractor, starting in the Bush administration. The entire amount spent for all of Obamacare is only about $300 million and actual website estimates are from 70 to 120 million at most.
Interestingly 100 million is also the amount of the no bid contract Christie gave to Ashbritt to clean up the Jersey shore on the recommendation of Mississippi governor Haley Barbour who just happens to be a member of Ashbritt’s lobbying firm.
Fast Eddie says:
October 28, 2013 at 10:06 am
So, Michelle Oblama’s good friend from college gets the no bid contract to build a rinky dinky website at a cost of over a half BILLION dollars. Hmmm… is this a shovel ready project? No collusion or misappropriation of tax dollars here. Can you imagine if a Republican President ever attempted something like this?
BTW, have we paid for the $750 million that Bush’s glitchy, and 6 month delayed, medicare part D website cost taxpayers?
Same problem. Different administration. When will the people learn.
Pending home sales for September due out at 10am, one of the first chances to really take a look at the impact of higher mortgage rates.
From Bloomberg:
Pending Sales of Existing Homes Slump by Most in Three Years
Fewer Americans than forecast signed contracts to buy previously owned homes in September, the fourth straight month of declines, as rising mortgage rates slowed momentum in the housing market.
The index of pending home sales slumped 5.6 percent, exceeding all estimates in a Bloomberg survey of economists and the biggest drop in more than three years, after a 1.6 percent decrease in August, the National Association of Realtors reported today in Washington. The index fell to the lowest level this year.
…
The Realtors’ report showed purchases rose 1.1 percent from September 2012 on an unadjusted basis, the smallest advance in more than two years.
From the NAR:
The PHSI in the Northeast dropped 9.6 percent to 76.7 in September, and is 6.4 percent below a year ago. In the Midwest the index fell 8.3 percent to 102.3 in September, but is 5.7 percent higher than September 2012. Pending home sales in the South slipped 0.4 percent to an index of 116.2 in September, but are 2.0 percent above a year ago. The index in the West dropped 9.0 percent in September to 97.3, and is 9.8 percent lower than September 2012.
Stupid Amerikan dopes still think you have to pay for the house you move into.
Otto have we paid for anything in the last 40 years. It was all bought on credit
Ottoman,
Why cant you be satisfied with just ripping Gary a new one in terms of his comments not being factual? (assuming they are, cause I dont feel like double checking what you and he said). Why do you then have to compare a current bums with the former bums as if that justifies anything?
And yeah Christie is similarly a criminal like all the rest
Ottoman,
BTW, have we paid for the $750 million that Bush’s glitchy, and 6 month delayed, medicare part D website cost taxpayers?
Yes, right after Oblammy declares himself unpatriotic for increasing the debt by $6,000,000,000,000.
Grim,
I think rising interest rates is bunk excuse. I think it is the prices of bubble buyers and old crows who think they can ask whatever they want because media told them so. I can’t tell you the number of 2007 and 2008 bagholders with b@lls to ask 70-100k more for ikea updates. I told you market tanked late summer and believe me that this spring will be a sh*t show bc we are not on upward trajectory that many think. The ones who had to buy, bought. Now you will see that normal folks do not have employment or means. They will need to lower lending
You know the state of things is sad when people who post here can do no better than to praise politicians with faint damnation.
@MMFlint: 500 US kids killed by guns per year. Up by 80% since 1997, two years before Columbine: http://t.co/9dwE0B9XUW
“About 500 American children and teenagers die in hospitals every year after sustaining gunshot wounds — a rate that climbed by nearly 60 percent in a decade, according to the first-ever accounting of such fatalities, released Sunday.
In addition, an estimated 7,500 kids are hospitalized annually after being wounded by gunfire, a figure that spiked by more than 80 percent from 1997 to 2009, according two Boston doctors presenting their findings at a conference of the American Academy of Pediatrics, held in Orlando, Fla.”
“Same problem. Different administration. When will the people learn.”
Lib is totally right. People on both sides need to understand that the gubbmint should not be building any sort of public websites for ACA/Medicare Part D. This has been an unmitigated diaster for everyone invloved.
stu (59)-
Actually, it’s one 40 year-long plunger handling by the increasingly stupid, inept and corrupt members of both team red and blue.
“Same problem. Different administration. When will the people learn.”
69. Oops, I meant disaster.
The only thing the gubmint should be doing is hanging from ropes in the public square.
Bystander
you are so naive. if houses go down then bank based looting called economy goes kaput. Democrats are happy by giving “free money” bankers are happy by lending said “free money”. People have nowhere to put their money and nowhere to make money but real estate. Most people here with nothing jobs are destroyed when housing goes down. There is only one way and it is called inflation. Prices are going nowhere but up. See what media say
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/27/business/economy/in-fed-and-out-many-now-think-inflation-helps.html
Note: comments in this times article are disabled. Wonder why hahahaha
Nice Louima reference clot
In theory, the government should be able to do a great job gaining economies of scale when providing social services. Then again, in theory, I should have sent the vending company the extra quarter the soda machine accidentally spit out when I bought a drink for my lunch today.
Lib it was a refund on poor service ; )
The diet Pepsi was delicious.
unb,
Well then wages should rising, right? Hmmm..who is naive. Point me to any legit article with cajones to even make that claim. Even if you attempt then it is BS.Homes will rise on the anticipation of higher wages? Now I will hear that incomes don’t drive housing. You will be waiting a long time for this housing trajectory based on inflation.
Grim – The monstrosity healthcare.gov is hosted at Terremark a tiny subsidiary of Verizon with a few hundred employees. Their managed cloud infrastructure isn’t Amazon that is for sure. Their CMS Cloud isn’t scalable as Amazon or Google and I believe Verizon is building a new Cloud architecture now to better compete with Amazon or any of the other large could providers.
Here is a good one the CGI Federal Execs AKA Michelle’s Friends that got that no bid contract. A pic is worth a thousands words right?
http://dailycaller.com/2013/10/28/cgi-federal-executive-spent-christmas-with-the-obamas/
I think that somebody needs to file a reverse discrimination lawsuit since they bids weren’t even considered.
@pourmecoffee: America created a massive technology infrastructure for acquisition and tracking of pretend football teams. We can do it for healthcare.
79 – Can it get any better?
Glad Christie punted the state health care exchange to the Feds, if the national exchange was this much of a boondoggle, can you imagine the corruption an NJ-based exchange would have seen?
The site would have been hosted out of the back of the Taco Bell on Rt 46 is Saddle Brook, 4 lines of CGI code to redirect visitors to pron sites, and the principals would be closing on their new Mansions in the Domincan Republic, $50 million vaporized. Bergen County Police would have been provided with a 99 year contract to defend said “data center” from terrorist attack (annual cost to the state, $25 million). AFL-CIO Communications Workers would have exclusive right to staff said “data center”, annual cost to the state, $45 million). Ashbritt would manage waste and carting for the facility (ay, oh, ay, fuggedaboudit) – annual cost to NJ $55 million.
The Mafia would’ve done a much better job with healthcare than the gubmint.
And I’d love a signup website with lots of redirects to p0rn sites.
Fab [43] – Con’t;
One last thing about the ‘horror’ among the DNC ’00-’08; I think you may be engaging in a bit of revisionist history. From what I was told, by new year’s eve 2002 the thing most leftists would only say among like-minded company was relief that Gore had not actually won.
Juice Box,
Priceless picture! It should be blasted everywhere. What an arrogant destructive bunch!
Grim i have to agree with clot’s current personality the mafia would have done a much better job. how else woudl they be able to skim if it did not work
honestly, the government can’t perform the task of delivering postage correctly or give you a driver’s license when they have your information. Why would anyone think they could effectively deliver health care?
and here I am working for a couple of shekels like a chump. What I need is to be on the receiving end of a $999,999,999 no-bid contract. Set myself up in a Starbucks on seventeen for a couple of a weekends in a row, mash some keys puppet style and I’m set.
OTOH, this is a great example of ivy alumni networks at work.
D@mn, that’s a lot of money.
Here are some of the contracts for heathcare.gov
You can see the salaries of the exes on these.
Michell’s friend makes about 600k no wonder there is no recession down in Virgina.
https://www.itdashboard.gov/investment/contracts/1001
And they had to ship the work to Canada too? Look, I like our resource rich northern neighbors (and Molson XXX) too, but really? No US-based companies with US based IT staff could have managed to f*ck this one up any less?
In retrospect, all this talk about Google not crashing, why not just give the damn thing to Google to build?
..and host the thing on Akamai’s distributed platform. Done.
I can’t believe they tried pass this off as a capacity issue.
why not just give the damn thing to Google to build?
They left hates cost conscious private enterprise and especially one that is profitable. This bunch is all about tearing things down and consolidating power using the meek-minded minions as their pawns.
I heard third/fourth hand that one of the big banks is paying the federal government $71B to “look away” from their books……
Libturd: You were on the Jerry Lewis telethon once…right? I think I found the footage of you performing….
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNuVifA7DSU
Critics: SAFE Act is Cuomo’s “Obamacare website
http://blogs.democratandchronicle.com/voteup/2013/10/28/critics-safe-act-is-cuomos-obamacare-website/
Yeah…I’m on there. Try not to laugh too hard.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIZB9suugUY
#45 Moose
My thoughts are in two parts.
Iraq. My big issue here is Daddy GWHB stopping at the gates of Baghdad during GW1, picking up the football declaring “Game Over!” and heading home. He should have finished it there and then. Yes I was against GW2 and GWB’s decision to move the field from Afghanistan (that had to answer), to Iraq who had no part in 9-11.
GWB – A f*%^ing idiot start to finish. He speeches were embarrassing, his actions painful to watch and in the end you can sum him up as “he gave it a good shot considering the hand he was dealt and the fact that he was so far out of his depth.”
My only saving grace from the whole GWB debacle, was Dick Cheney. While a polar opposite politically at least I could take solace in the fact there was an adult sitting in the passenger seat, teaching the kid how to drive.
But I can’t leave GWB without commenting on the cronyism. It can be summed up in Michael D Brown, promoted to the head of FEMA with no credentials and then has to step to the plate with Katrina and is found to have brought a Little League game to the majors.
But to let me put GWB in your terms, as a lawyer, explain Harriet Mires to me.
I like the comment at the SAFE Act article that says NY would be much better served weeding out badged policemen who belong to motorcycle gangs.
#56 grim
I will agree with most of this, but I think the bigger difference is that Google, Amazon et al, had the time to grow organically and fix the problems as they arose. They did not come out of the gate with the capability that they have today. Also they all have had their share of outages.
If you want to compare this to anything, it is closer to the Facebook IPO at Nasdaq. NASD rolled out a new system that was not capable of handling the volume Facebook threw at it.
gluteus (97)-
Your comments are of no value, since you hail from a burned-out, collapsed former superpower.
#100 Clot
Still feeling a little pain from the Mackems getting their hands on the plunger?
Has Ozil reached pub#erty yet?
Has your goalkeeper learned how to kick a football?
Do you have a central defender who doesn’t play like a stork?
Do you have a midfielder that doesn’t have glass ankles?
What a surprise it will be when Rosicky’s season-ending injury happens.
Where’s Theo?
#75 Lib
Was the quarter from the last person that used the machine and failed to pick up their change as I can’t remember the last time I saw a vending machine fail in that way.
The biggest win that came straight out of the gate with ACA was pre-existing conditions. People are foucing on the negative and the short term and missing the point that over the long term this is good for the country.
Its funny that all this rhetoric from this site is directed at the failures of heathcare.gov but as has pointed out her, no-one on this site has actually admitted to having need to use it. Let me guess, everyone is staying with last years provider? Healthcare not changing for you, anyone, anyone?
102-104 Clot
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W-PLuWH67rA
#89-90 grim
Surprising, from you.
The thing to realize here is that there are very few companies that can actually deliver this level of software and Google is not one of them. You could say why not EDS? Well I think they would have probably doubled the price and still not delivered based on their track record. I think at the price and the functionality the site seems to be showing, I would call it a win.
While I hate these big companies and their staff, the one thing I have to recognize is that for the most part they can deliver up staff that are knowledgeable in the subject matter. I could give you 100Million to deliver me a website in 2 years and I can guarantee you will not deliver, because you cant get people that granular.
You look at that White House photo and miss the point that delivering that type of system is in Toni Townes-Whitley wheelhouse.
Now please excuse me, I have to get ready for the Polish Androids.
Fab taking out of his rear again. A NO BID contract? Let’s pick open source as our signature initiative, that bone head should be canned asap……IBM or Oracle could not deliver this for 1/2 the cost or less?
http://www.slate.com/articles/business/bitwise/2013/10/what_went_wrong_with_healthcare_gov_the_front_end_and_back_end_never_talked.html
Krugman’s latest look right S(public debt) while the real action is left(private debt).
He has a point about public debt, but does not address private debt where the new Fed Chair has apparently voiced her concerns.
Either way we are all debt slaves.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/25/opinion/krugman-addicted-to-the-apocalypse.html?_r=0
What year?
Libturd at home says:
October 28, 2013 at 7:43 pm
Yeah…I’m on there. Try not to laugh too hard.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIZB9suugUY
That just kicks so much a%%….
#108 Juice
Here, let me point you towards a source that might provide you with a basis to form an independent argument. http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/10/17/usa-healthcare-technology-idUSL1N0I502P20131017
I don’t have a problem debating this issue, there are some genuine issues to be discussed. But I do have an issue having to listen to the bullsh1t coming from the right. There are some genuine points of debate here, but no-one seems to be willing to step off their partisan bandwagon to have the discussion?.
Yes you do……
Fabius Maximus says:
October 28, 2013 at 10:27 pm
I don’t have a problem debating this issue……
Light trapNow Weitz and his colleagues have found a way to get light to stick around long enough for a BEC of photons to be created details of the technique are published in Nature today3 Credit card has magnetic strip whereas DISH TV Smart Card has microprocessor inside it Some researchers believe the natural decrease in the cholesterol level of eggs could be related to the improvements farmers have made to the hens’ feed says DrPant said he was forced to push 300 corpses into the swollen Manda
If Obamacare as a whole only costs 5x or 10x more than the initial estimate, like the website, then we can consider ourselves lucky.
Social Security originally was not going to cost taxpayers anything.
Chi…had to be 2000 or 2001.
My partner, Alec, who was a pretty successful child actor, dances for a living. I wanted to try some more risque stuff, like…
Mr. Jerry Lewis, we should give him a hand. Some of his kids, why they can’t even stand.
Alec put an end to that, which is probably how we got the gig. It was fun, but glad that part of my life is in the past.
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Please tell me how you can insure against something that’s already happened? Cause I’d love to here this
Fabius Maximus says:
October 28, 2013 at 8:50 pm
The biggest win that came straight out of the gate with ACA was pre-existing conditions.
I’m laying odds…
Fabius Maximus says:
October 28, 2013 at 8:50 pm
People are foucing on the negative and the short term and missing the point that over the long term this is good for the country.
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He heard a missionary working in the impoverished country of Malawi speak to the congregation at First Assembly Church,snow boots for girls, pointing out that there were only 92 doctors for a population of 12 million people in Malawi at the time, Forbes and Fortune magazines, strewn about his office, and daily newspaper business sections Be sure to wear rubber or latex gloves, safety goggles and protective clothingHorseback Riding Along Scenic TrailsOf course, many people simply enjoy riding the
joyce (119)-
Easy. The same way you refinance negative equity.
“Please tell me how you can insure against something that’s already happened?”
joyce (120)-
Hey, in return for a little lower premium, I get a $5,000 deductible and no access to any of my current doctors.
Natch, in year two the teaser rates of year one will explode into payments that will have us all screaming for single payer, which has been the “long-term” goal all along.
Always in gubmint, you have to ask three questions about any program:
1. Who benefits?
2. Is it deliberately designed to fail?
3. What is the worst possible outcome?
Fab the only winners here are the insurance companies who get 30 million new customers to bill for services they won’t collect on.
#126…perhaps this fiasco will sour the populace on a single payer system, I think this may have set those “dreams’ back quite a bit…
@ianbremmer: The United States spends the most per capita on healthcare at $8,508 (Norway is #2 at $5,669)…before ACA/Obamacare.
@ianbremmer: Healthcare Spending, per capita
1 US $8508
2 Norway $5669
3 Switz $5643
4 Nethrlnds $5099
5 Luxmbrg $4755
6 Austria $4546
7 Canada $4522
Obamacare Faces A ‘Death Spiral’ — But It Turns On The Declining Participation Of Health Plans, Not Just Rising Premiums
http://www.forbes.com/sites/scottgottlieb/2013/10/28/obamacare-faces-a-death-spiral-but-it-turns-on-the-declining-participation-of-health-plans-and-not-just-their-rising-premiums/
Given the failed launch of Obamacare, there’s a real chance that the entire scheme falls into an “insurance death spiral” — but not as visibly (or rapidly) as the way these sorts of unsuccessful insurance pools usually unravel.
A death spiral happens when only the sickest beneficiaries get into an insurance pool, causing the cost of medical claims to rise, and in turn raising future premiums.
These higher premiums, in turn, dissuade healthier beneficiaries from buying coverage. This exacerbates the strains and makes sure the pool continues to attract only the sickest consumers who are most in need of the medical coverage, and willing to pay the rising premiums. This is how the downward spiral ensues.
The death spiral won’t result from a big premium spike in 2015 as a consequence of the failed launch in 2014. The reinsurance programs and risk adjustment will help guard against such an outcome. But as the pool inside the exchanges becomes more akin to a high-risk pool, which seems possible (if not likely) then there will be a stronger incentive for insurers to stay out of these markets, and select against them.
The bigger story of the Obamacare launch isn’t its failed website, but how many big insurers sat out of this program, even after brow beating from the White House.
After what’s likely to unfold this year, and the unfavorable pool that’s taking shape, these insurers will have even more economic incentive to stay out of Obamacare.
Trouble is, the architects of Obamacare never envisioned that the big insurers wouldn’t play. That’s why they forced insurers to conform to a single risk pool that assumed these carriers would be offering some of their plans inside the exchange.
Now that provision will add incentive for insurers to stay out of the exchanges altogether, and develop an exclusive risk pool in the individual market that remains behind, and price those products according to the lower risk of their members.
More chinkbots last night than real blogers. Generally I limited my conversations with these folks to my takeout order and how I like my massage.
ACA POS IS DOA
Good Morning Everyone:
Here is another nail in the Obamacare coffin:
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-10-29/obama-knew-most-americans-would-not-be-able-keep-their-existing-insurance-under-obam
hype (136)-
Anyone with the common sense of a 6th grader knew this would happen.
The whole ACA is going down in flames. It is a pre-programmed fail. The real interesting part is what TPTB really want next.
S&P Case-Shiller Home Prices Beat Expectations
The 20-city S&P Case-Shiller home price index climbed 0.93% on the month in August.
This was better than expectations for a 0.65% rise. July’s data was revised down to show a 0.6% rise.
Meanwhile, on the year home prices were up 12.82%, ahead of expectations for a 12.5% rise. July’s data was revised down to show a 12.31% rise in home prices.
Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/august-sp-case-shiller-home-prices-2013-10#ixzz2j7JMsxRq
The whole situation is made worse in that, although there was not a Requirement to make the law bi-partisan, there would certainly have been great benefits if all sides were invested in it working. As I tell the kids, just because you “can” do something a certain way, doesn’t mean you “should” do it that way.
Front page of CNN’s website pretty much calling Obama a serial liar. Crazy that he’s lost CNN as a cheerleader. It’s about 5 years too late though….
Administrations typically turn into complete zoos during the second term when the malfeasance and corruption can’t be contained any more. They collapse under the weight of their own bloat. This one doesn’t appear to be any different.
Come on… you don’t really believe that do you?
1987 Condo says:
October 29, 2013 at 9:23 am
The whole situation is made worse in that, although there was not a Requirement to make the law bi-partisan, there would certainly have been great benefits if all sides were invested in it working.
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Speaking of the limits of credulity, this one takes the cake. Thanks for the laugh!
Fabius Maximus says:
October 28, 2013 at 9:30 pm
#89-90 grim
Surprising, from you.
The thing to realize here is that there are very few companies that can actually deliver this level of software and Google is not one of them. You could say why not EDS? Well I think they would have probably doubled the price and still not delivered based on their track record. I think at the price and the functionality the site seems to be showing, I would call it a win.
While I hate these big companies and their staff, the one thing I have to recognize is that for the most part they can deliver up staff that are knowledgeable in the subject matter. I could give you 100Million to deliver me a website in 2 years and I can guarantee you will not deliver, because you cant get people that granular.
You look at that White House photo and miss the point that delivering that type of system is in Toni Townes-Whitley wheelhouse.
Now please excuse me, I have to get ready for the Polish Androids.
96 Vinton St, Long Beach, NY 11561 – Look at these wacky sales from this storm damaged house
06/25/2013 Sold $186,250 -75.2% $96 Public Record
05/31/2012 Sold $750,000 -31.8% $388 Public Record
05/27/2012 Listing removed $1,100,000 — $569 CENTURY 21 Dallow Realty
05/11/2012 Listed for sale $1,100,000 — $569 CENTURY 21 Dallow Realty
02/08/2012 Listing removed $1,100,000 — $569 CENTURY 21 Dallow Realty
11/20/2011 Listed for sale $1,100,000 69.2% $569 CENTURY 21 Dallow Realty
01/12/2010 Sold $650,000 — $336 Public Record
nwnj best par about it I hate these big companies and their employees.
Of course you do everyone hates companies that provide efficient services at reasonable or no cost while employing people for their labor to also add to the at large economy. How dare those people dare to engage in free enterprise.
what I can’t stand about large companies is the crony capitalism, and pay for play regualtions that favor some companies over others. Farm subsidies, solar, environmental, banking. Hell even pharma. Regulation which denies competition and favors some over others is not free enterprise.
JJ [145];
2010 buyer should consider themselves lucky. 2013 buyer bought the dirt (mud?). Just rolling the dice until the next 100 year storm (in about 5 years).
And the hits keep on coming.
Obammy killed my Mommy!
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/10/29/pakistani-drone-victim-congress_n_4171975.html
The 2010 buyer was a flip gone bad gone good.
He paid 650K renovated whole house, sat on it for one year paid a realtor a fee and sold for 750K at best broke even, counting in time value of money lost big.
Guy who bought it remember Biggert Waters took effect July 2012 so he bought flood insurance May 2012 and primary residencies with flood insurance in homes with subsidized policies guaranteed that low rate for life. That house is water front with bulk head and docks all redone for 750K on a big plot to boot. And dirt cheap flood insurance for rest of your life.
Well Sandy hit just five months later, homes damaged in excess of 50% of home value minus land value lose their cheap flood insurance and must be raised or torn down. FEMA only gives 20K for that. So guy sold. Flood Insurance is a max of 250K so he took a bath. After Dope sold in June 2013 Cuomo announced in October 2013 he will pay folks up to 350K on top of 250K if your house is totalled and you need a new one. So this guy if he waited just Four more months he would have got a new home for free.
People forget water is an amazing wildcard. Even worse FEMA gave Long Beach millions to shore up and raise bulkhead so house most likely even if we had another Sandy suffer much less damage.
06/25/2013 Sold $186,250 -75.2% $96 Public Record
05/31/2012 Sold $750,000 -31.8% $388 Public Record
05/27/2012 Listing removed $1,100,000 – $569 CENTURY 21 Dallow Realty
05/11/2012 Listed for sale $1,100,000 – $569 CENTURY 21 Dallow Realty
02/08/2012 Listing removed $1,100,000 – $569 CENTURY 21 Dallow Realty
11/20/2011 Listed for sale $1,100,000 69.2% $569 CENTURY 21 Dallow Realty
01/12/2010 Sold $650,000 – $336 Public Record
Speaking of Sandy, anyone see the this old house series covering the rebuild?
http://www.thisoldhouse.com/toh/tv/video/0,,20741161,00.html
1 server? Cumon now……the woman in the wheelhouse would never let that happen.
This little diddy from CNN “Monday brought the latest worrisome disclosure: that the entire Obamacare website operates on a single computer server in Virginia — without any backup, according to Congressman Rogers”
http://www.cgi.com/en/management/toni-townes-whitley
No way….that can’t be right.
http://money.cnn.com/2013/10/29/technology/obamacare-security/index.html?source=yahoo_hosted
The flaw wasn’t mentioned at last week’s congressional hearing, when government contractors CGI Federal and Quality Software Services Inc. testified about their responsibilities in the project. But another point was made by Congressman Mike Rogers, R-Mich.: companies keep patching up the website’s holes, and adding thousands of new lines of computer code, exposing the entire system to unforeseen security problems.
Cyberattacks on Obamacare exchange websites are already underway. At least one state, Connecticut, has seen outsiders attempt to gain “irregular” access, according to Jim Wadleigh, chief information officer of Access Health CT.
Congress’ inquiries continued Tuesday, when the Ways and Means Committee posed questions about the site’s glitches and security to Marilyn Tavenner, head of the health department’s Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services.
The security hole is just the latest in a series of mishaps for the Obamacare website’s launch. In the first weeks, system errors prevented people from signing up to the newly launched insurance exchanges. Over the past weekend, a government contractor’s network failure again left users unable to apply.
Monday brought the latest worrisome disclosure: that the entire Obamacare website operates on a single computer server in Virginia — without any backup, according to Congressman Rogers
Absolutely free Folks created a modest field “Fashion Week”, but only “off-street beat”,Bailey Button Triplet, the most recent catalog this months theme is self-evident. Cost-free People We invited many supermodel, such as Karlie Kloss, Ali Michael, Hanne Gaby Odiele, Aline Weber, as well as three Style blogger Rumi Neely, Alexandra Spencer and Natalie Suarez to participate shoot. Afterwards grateful catwalk models imitating a scene is captured within the streets of New York along with the organ
Sounds like we need to investigate where all of the money went.
The End Is Nigh (Crossbred JJ/clot Zoological Edition):
Dolphins are evil. Sea otters are evil. Penguins are really, really evil.
In fact, look up any animal in the encyclopedia. If you think it’s adorable, it’s probably evil. That’s the cynical attitude we were left with after reading this article from Slate, which methodically crushed our naive assumptions about the world’s cutest animals.
Let’s start with dolphins. You probably think of the dolphin as a cheerful, harmless version of the shark.
Actually, dolphins are vicious gang rapists who kill their own babies, along with the babies of other species, and occasionally try to have sex with human swimmers. They have even been known to use young sharks as volleyballs.
Slate also dismantled the unjustifiably clean reputation of the sea otter. Male otters have developed a bad habit of humping and fatally wounding baby seals in their desperation to mate, sometimes continuing to have sex with the seals up to a week after killing them.
Not that sex between consenting otters is much better. Males often kill females from their own species by biting their faces during sex.
That said, these crimes pale in comparison to the atrocities committed by Adelie penguins. Male penguins mate with other males, injured females, lost chicks and corpses. The most desperate penguins even try to mate with the ground, Slate reports.
In one scientific study, researchers set out a dead penguin which had been frozen in its mating posture. The males found this corpse “irresistible”.
Then the scientists placed “just the frozen head of a the penguin” on a rock, just to see how far the male penguins were willing to go. They weren’t deterred.
Brian Switek, who wrote the Slate article, was careful to stress that we shouldn’t judge animals by human standards.
That’s a fair point. Even so, we’ll never look at penguins or dolphins the same way again.
Anyone interested?
You are cordially invited to attend an event in New York City
The Panama Canal Expansion: Is the Port of New York and New Jersey Ready?
Wednesday November 6, 2013 • 5:30-8:30 pm
Ivy Room, Cornell Club of New York
6 East 44th St (between 5th & Madison) New York City
The Keynote Address
The New Panama Canal Locks: A Modern Engineering Marvel
Jorge de la Guardia ’74 MEng Manager, Panama Canal Authority Locks Project
Management Div.
A Panel Discussion
With distinguished guests:
Admiral Richard Larrabee Director, Port Commerce Department, the Port Authority of NY/NJ
Jon Berger ’81 CEO, Great Lakes Docks & Dredging
Guy Buzzoni VP Infrastructure Development, Global Terminal
H. Oliver Gao Associate Professor, School of Civil and Environmental Engineering
Rick Geddes • moderator Director, Cornell Program in Infrastructure Policy, and Associate Professor, Department of Policy Analysis & Management
Schedule
5:30 pm Doors open; networking buffet reception
6:30 – 8 pm Featured speaker and panel discussion
8 – 8:30 pm Networking reception continued
Details
Cost: $25 per person
The event is presented by the College of Human Ecology and the Cornell Program in Infrastructure Policy (CPIP) in partnership with:
• Cornell Institute for Public Affairs
• School of Civil and Environmental Engineering
• Systems Engineering Program
Top 7 songs used by US military to torture people
“Baby One More Time” and “Oops! I Did it Again” are reportedly most effective.
Here are 5 other songs being used to torture people, according to Time:
1. “I Love You” by Barney the Dinosaur
2. “Panama” by Van Halen
3. “The Real Slim Shady” by Eminem
4. “Copacabana” by Barry Manilow
5. “Born in the U.S.A.” by Bruce Springsteen
I need to get out more…..
A Chinese woman arranged a hot sex blind date with a mysterious online lover — only to find out it was her own father-in-law.
Lili, 28, and Wang Pai, 57, were both using fake profiles when they started talking in an Internet chat room.
After hitting it off, and unaware of each other’s true identity, they agreed to meet in person — at a hotel in Heilongjiang province, northeast China — for some raw, passionate loving.
But when a scantily clad Lili opened the door to her room, she was stunned to find her in-law waiting at the door.
Then — to make matters even worse — her husband, Wang Jai, turned up after reading her emails, punched her in the face and attacked his pop.
“When I opened the door, I don’t know if she was more surprised or me,” said Pai, according to the Daily Star.
“She turned and ran off down the hallway into her husband, my son, who had been following her. He started shouting and then he attacked her, and then he attacked me,” he said.
Jai — who allegedly knocked out two of his wife’s teeth and gave his father a head injury that required hospital treatment — was arrested and held for five days.
I heard of a frat that used to make their pledges go into the basement and listen to My Sharona all night in the dark during hell night. That would test your sanity.
#138 street,
Just remember to asterik that 12% price improvement does not apply to NY metro. I’m sure Sparks Nevada mobile home owners are feeling better. September pending sales fell off a cliff in terms of sales btw..
[148] I expect another Nobel Peace Prize will come of it.
Bill McBride, author of Calculated Risk is one of the most accurate housing forecasters.
He was on the money about the housing crash and its impact on the economy.
He also accurately called the bottom in housing in 2011.
Now McBride argues that home prices will slow going forward. From McBride:
“It appears house price increases have slowed recently based on agent reports and asking prices (a combination of a little more inventory and higher mortgage rates), but this slowdown in price increases is not showing up yet in the Case-Shiller index because of the reporting lag and because of the three month average (the August report was an average of June, July and August prices). I expect to see smaller year-over-year price increases going forward and some significant deceleration towards the end of the year or in early 2014.
“I also think it is important to look at prices in real terms (inflation adjusted). Case-Shiller, CoreLogic and others report nominal house prices. As an example, if a house price was $200,000 in January 2000, the price would be close to $276,000 today adjusted for inflation.”
In real terms, McBride points out that home prices are back to early 2000 levels.
McBride isn’t the only one who expects home price growth to slow. Some, like Paul Diggle at Capital Economics and Michelle Meyer at Bank of America, have also argued for some time that home prices are set to cool this year.
Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/bill-mcbride-home-prices-will-slow-2013-10#ixzz2j9UmXDEZ
@BarackObama: If you’re a young adult looking for health insurance on the new marketplace, you could #GetCovered for $50 a month. http://t.co/hDZLfuQgBG
Anon – keep drinking that Koolaid.
In New Joisey a single 24 year old making 43k a year and also nonsmoker with no kids will cost $208 per month in NJ for the BRONZE PLAN. Go and do the math and stop guzzling…
@Anon: Baa, baa!
http://www.northjersey.com/news/229739791_NJ_home_values_to_rise_5__a_year__appraiser_predicts.html?mobile=1&ic=1&iphone=1
NJ home values to rise 5% a year, appraiser predicts
Tuesday, October 29, 2013 Last updated: Tuesday October 29, 2013, 4:45 PM
BY KATHLEEN LYNN
STAFF WRITER
The Record
A growing demand for housing will push up New Jersey home prices about 5 percent a year for the next several years, appraiser Jeff Otteau predicted Tuesday.
The state’s slowly improving job picture is “like oxygen to the housing recovery,” Otteau said at a seminar in East Hanover for real estate agents.
Otteau, an East Brunswick appraiser who researches real estate statewide, said the state is on track to add about 40,000 jobs this year, after adding more than 66,000 last year – the highest number in more than a decade. However, New Jersey’s unemployment rate was still 8.5 percent in August, compared with a national rate of 7.3 percent. Moreover, the state lost jobs in July and August, though Otteau said that was largely the result of sluggish hiring at the shore because of damage from Superstorm Sandy.
Bergen County is among the areas leading the way in the housing revival, with a five-month supply of homes for sale, said Otteau, whose reports are widely followed in the industry. A supply below eight months generally results in rising prices. Passaic has a 6.4-month supply.
Eight of the 21 hottest markets in the state are in Bergen County, according to Otteau: Glen Rock, Wyckoff, Midland Park, North Arlington, Ridgewood, Emerson, Mahwah and Ho-Ho-Kus.
Otteau’s optimistic outlook was matched Tuesday by new data from the S&P/Case-Shiller home price index, which said that prices in the New York metropolitan area, including North Jersey, rose 3.6 percent from August 2012 to August 2013. Nationally, home prices were up by a more substantial 12.8 percent year over year. Both nationally and in the region, prices are back to the levels of mid-2004, and about 20 percent below the housing-boom peaks of mid-2006.
The area’s home prices have not been rising as quickly as national averages recently in part because they didn’t fall as far during the housing bust, and have less ground to make up. In addition, the foreclosure process in the region is among the slowest in the nation, leaving an overhang of distressed properties that put downward pressure on prices.
Otteau said that several New Jersey housing markets are still suffering, including the market for 55-and-up housing; the market for homes priced above $2.5 million, and markets in South Jersey and Sussex County, which are far from job centers. With gasoline above $3 a gallon, home buyers don’t want long commutes, Otteau said.
He also said the housing market is likely to cool in about two years, as higher mortgage rates and home prices make buying less affordable. Otteau predicted that home prices would return to their 2005 housing boom peaks by 2018 – a similar timeline to his earlier predictions.
“What happens over the next two years depends on the creation of jobs that pay enough to afford a house,” he said.
Email: lynn@northjersey.com
Up 3.6% in NY metro (includes North Jersey)
Bystander says:
October 29, 2013 at 4:36 pm
#138 street,
Just remember to asterik that 12% price improvement does not apply to NY metro. I’m sure Sparks Nevada mobile home owners are feeling better. September pending sales fell off a cliff in terms of sales btw..
very a propos libturd. can imagine your hard on and salivating lard recounting every one of your pennies under your mattress every nite
@ianbremmer: If you think your mattress is the only safe place to store your money, think again. #bedbugs
always full of surprises…..I guess we can add anti-semite to your throne of hypocrisy
anon (the good one) says:
October 29, 2013 at 9:22 pm
very a propos libturd. can imagine your hard on and salivating lard recounting every one of your pennies under your mattress every nite
@ianbremmer: If you think your mattress is the only safe place to store your money, think again. #bedbugs
Putting aside the computer issues (I know the government contracting side but I don’t profess to know about computing than more than a first day geek at code monkey school), there isn’t anything wrong with Obamacare that wasn’t pointed out on this board three years ago.
We said that Obama lied about keeping your coverage, and now the havoc in the individual market and the employer dumping/avoidance is being proved daily.
We said that Obama lied about the taxes and the cost, and that is being proved daily it seems.
We said it was a preprogrammed fail and the democrats themselves confirmed this by trying to delay parts before implementation date, and by advocating for Obamacare’s successor before it was ever even tested.
Fabius and anon can defend it all they want by pointing out how a few people make out. Most won’t. We said it then and we stand by it. In fact, I’ll accept all the IT drivel coming from North London as it really is irrelevant—systems can be fixed but this worst of all possible solutions can’t be. And the folks who think otherwise are dwindling by the day.
I’m looking forward to the train wreck.
(N.B., I am using the democratic definition of “lying” which is an affirmative statement that is later proven untrue (e.g., Bush on Iraq) irrespective of intent on the part of the speaker, and irrespective of whether the speaker possessed or should have possessed contrary knowledge).
[175] anon (the odd one)
That’s just strange. Were you going for strange or did CVS run out of your medication?
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That was the piece that launched a thousand rightwing talking points, leading inexorably to Boehner trying very hard to stop his staff and his members staffs from suffering a massive salary cut while also pretending in public to support that cutIf you want to stay for lunch, bring hot dogs and buns “It’s a thematic brand campaign with subtle cues of the brand’s range of products,” Iyer saysFox News, which says it is the “fair and balanced” network, has long been accused by Democrats and liberals
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