No Doomers, I haven’t disappeared this week. I’ve been in New England, where I thought I’d post regularly. The weather has been beautiful though, the relatives have kept me busy, and I figured that if I miss a day or two, the housing bust will still be there when I get back. Look for me on Friday.
Consider this an open thread. Catch you later!
OK, so if we bloggers can’t make fun of serious issues, who will? It’s not every day you get Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain! from WSJ and WaPo on different issues on the same day 
WaPo (8/30 ’10): “Top China bank official’s defection rumors quashed”
WSJ (8/30 ’10): “Ignore Talk of a Housing Tax Credit ‘Revival’ “
Clearly it will take Zhou no more than five minutes on the phone with Carol Off to Popper-off the first feverish speculation, but the second one is a bit more ticklish. Nick knows as well as we at Doom that Son of $8k would be a disaster, but he also knows that widespread expectation of such a dumb move, in the context of the US midterm election coming nine weeks from today, would force a panicked announcement of a resumption anyway. I think the funniest aspect of yesterday’s exercise in speculation management was Rupert’s headline editor putting that second header in the form of an order.
Who’s to blame when a house goes into foreclosure? We’ve been debating this one on Doom for quite awhile. Recently we heard from Karen Pettit, who places the blame for her foreclosure on GMAC. Here’s her story. See what you think.
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Karen Pettit’s and her husband’s long struggle with GMAC over the foreclosure of their home is documented in this extensive comment under a post about an earlier GMAC foreclosure controversy.
I have been documenting my experience as a 52 year old Slidell, Louisiana woman who is disabled and trying to acquire assistance with housing programs from our Federal Government with an eviction looming from GMAC Mortgage.
…My husband is a seminary graduate. If GMAC will lie to a minister and his terminal wife, I guess no one is safe.
There’s a TV story and video on this …
WWLTM Louisiana (6/17 ’10): “Disabled woman faces foreclosure”
SLIDELL, La. — Karen Pettit of Slidell has has been an auto dealership manager, professional singer, and artist, but will never forget working for the host of the Tonight Show at age 21. …
Well Igor, nothing special over the weekend. Just a bunch of central bankers meeting in Wyoming and plotting to take over all their host governments
Reuters (8/26 ’10): “Fiscal ‘alchemy’ must mimic monetary science”
Tax and budget policies need the same regularity and independence as monetary policy if countries around the world are to cope with looming stresses from pension programs, world central bankers were told at a Federal Reserve conference on Saturday.
For anyone who thinks that the worst is behind us for the housing market, check out this graph from Michael David White:
We are headed into the slow season for housing with massive amounts of inventory out there, both in the “shadows” and out of it. White says: Read More…
New home sales last month were at an all time record low. Prices were at their lowest in 6 1/2 years. Existing home sales dropped 27% YOY and saw their greatest MOM drop ever. Given that, it’s kind of fun to watch the ever-wrong Jim Cramer declaring last year how the bottom would be in last summer:
Consumer attitudes are changing on the “rent vs. buy” debate. When Mr. Twist and I sold in 2005 and moved into a rental, the usual response when we told friends was “Are you guys doing O.K.?” Now the usual response is “You were so smart to get out when you did.”
My personal experience is not singular. More and more people are swapping their mortgage for a lease agreement: (Thanks to Keith Jurow for forwarding us his latest. Article first appeared on the Real Estate Channel.)
There is a far-reaching change occurring now which threatens housing markets around the country. A survey conducted by Harris Interactive for the National Apartment Association in May 2010 found that 76% of those surveyed now believe that renting is a better option than buying in the current real estate market, up from 71% in 2008. Especially sobering was the fact that 78% of those surveyed were homeowners.
David Neithercut, CEO of Equity Residential, the nation’s largest multi-family landlord, believes that there is a “psychology change” in the mind of consumers. In a June address to an industry conference, he declared that there is “a change in one’s thought process about the benefits or wisdom of owning a single-family home.”
In spite of renting’s increased popularity, the number of single-family (SF) rentals continues to increase: Read More…
It unwinds shelteringly.
But there were dreams to sell, ill didst thou buy:
According to Business Insider: (Thanks L!)
The U.S. economy is in decline. The employment situation is going to go from bad to worse. Americans without jobs are Americans that cannot buy homes. Millions of Americans who are employed are finding it increasingly difficult to make it from month to month. The truth is that there is no way that Americans can afford the ridiculously inflated home prices that we have seen over the past decade any longer.
So, yes, the U.S. housing market is headed for a complete and total nightmare.
I couldn’t agree more, so here’s their list of 15 reasons that “the U.S. Housing Market Is Headed For A Complete And Total Collapse”. (And why I agree with them.) You should follow the above link though and check out all the graphs they’ve got to back up their thesis.
1. Record low home sales- New home sales are now at their lowest on record, and existing home sales began a steep decent in July. (And this is the busy time of year. Wait until winter.)
2. New home sale construction is also near record lows. There is already an excess of houses. (This is actually a good thing- but it does tell you how bad things are.)
3. Demand for mortgages is at a 13 year low. (Showing that low interest rates are insufficient to stimulate demand.)
4. Foreclosures are at record highs. (And getting worse.)
5. Repos are at an all time high. (See #4.)
6. Banks are writing off a massive amount of debt. (And they are going to be writing off a lot more before they are through.)
7. Record delinquencies- more than 10% of all Americans are behind on their mortgage. (Hence #4.)
8. Banks have significantly raised their lending standards. (Low interest rates aren’t useful to people who don’t qualify.)
9. Home prices are still too high and out of line with what people can afford. (Especially upper end real estate. With reduced income and no “wonky” financing, the McMansion market is being killed.)
10. With 28% of all households having one adult currently looking for employment, unemployment levels are high. (And unemployed people don’t buy homes.)
11. Bankruptcies are on the rise. (See #10 and #15)
12. Even Obama is bearish on housing. (Business Insider found a great “grumpy face” of the president for this one.)
13. Tax credits pulled home sales forward- shrinking current demand. (And future demand as well.)
14. Fannie and Freddie could be up to $5T in the hole. (You know, I doubt I’ve typed $XT more than a dozen times in my life. That’s a big number.)
15. U.S. economy is drowning in debt. (As well as many Americans.)
The CIA’s first challenge is Recombinant Ashbery. The plain text consists of one stanza from John Ashbery poem “A”, and two stanzas from John Ashbery poem “B”. The encoder places the single “A” stanza before, between, or after the two “B” stanzas. The title for the cyphertext is the titles for poems “A” and “B” in random order. Decoder must guess which is the “A” stanza and which is the “A” title.
Meaningful Love / Mottled Tuesday [I flipped a coin]
by John / Ashbery
There were morose gardens farther down the slope,
anthills that looked like they belonged there.
The sausages were undercooked,
the wine too cold, the bread molten.
Who said to bring sweaters?
The climate’s not that dependable.
Something was about to go laughably wrong,
whether directly at home or here,
on this random shoal pleading with its eyes
till it too breaks loose, caught in a hail of references.
I’ll add one more scoop
to the pile of retail.
The Atlantic crawled slowly to the left
pinning a message on the unbound golden hair of sleeping maidens,
a ruse for next time,
[...]
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