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Now That Price Appreciation Isn’t There, Investors Are Saying, Oh Wait A Sec, There’s Some Risk In There

A report from People Magazine. “San Francisco has seen a massive drop in apartment rental prices, a new report shows. Many other big cities across the country are seeing similar trends. According to Bloomberg, studio rents in Manhattan fell 15 percent to 2,495. Likewise, in Seattle, prices for a studio dropped 12 percent to $1,490. Median rent prices for studios in the Bay Area dropped 31 percent year-over-year to $2,285, according to the report. One-bedroom prices fell 24.2 percent to $2,873, while two-bedrooms declined 21.3 percent to $3,931.”

From Multi-Housing News. “Most multifamily loans are prudently underwritten and are performing well, but cracks are starting to appear in properties in Gateway markets that were stable pre-COVID-19, according to an analysis of properties in Yardi Matrix’s database. The analysis—which encompassed more than 41,000 multifamily properties—found that the median debt-service coverage ratio (DSCR) for loans backed by multifamily properties as of August was more than 1.54, which means net income is about 54 percent more than the mortgage payments.”

“However, the proportion of properties with weaker DSCR and LTV metrics has grown in Class A properties in Gateway metros. The study found that just over a quarter (26 percent) of such properties had DSCRs of under 1.0 as of August, which means the net income is less than the mortgage payments. That’s about double the average for all properties in the study. The percentage of loans with a DSCR under 1.0 was 12.4 percent for Class B and C properties in Gateway areas, 12.5 percent for properties in Secondary markets and 11.4 percent in Tertiary markets.”

From Connect Media. “To cut a long story short, 2020 got in the way of what market participants anticipated in January would be a record year for commercial/multifamily originations.The Mortgage Bankers Association publication recently interviewed senior professionals from a credit rating agency and highly rated servicers to get their perspective on forbearance, loan workouts and portfolio management challenges for agency and non-agency CMBS amid a very changed environment.”

“Alex Killick, head of CWCapital’s special servicing business: ‘While we have dealt with abandoned or closed assets in the past, it has never been this widespread.’ Gina Sullivan, SVP of KeyBank Real Estate capital’s loan servicing and asset management division: ‘Unfortunately, the pandemic spared no geographic location or property. Most properties, regardless of type, were impacted in some way. Beginning in March, we started to receive a high volume of debt relief and loan modification inquiries.'”

“Adam Fox, senior director in Fitch Ratings’ U.S. CMBS group: ‘Beginning in March all servicers began to see a large influx of requests from borrowers for debt relief across all lending products. North American servicers responded by reallocating existing staff and, to a lesser extent, hiring new staff to increase resources to customer service to deal with the record levels of increased requests.'”

From Boston.com in Massachusetts. “Higher-than-usual apartment vacancy rates in some of Boston’s hottest neighborhoods have the city in a rare renter’s market. Neighborhoods with vacancy rates above 10 percent include downtown, Back Bay, the South End, the Seaport, South Boston, and Cambridge’s Alewife neighborhood. Rent concessions and incentives like landlord-paid broker fees aim to stimulate demand in a soft housing market. That is particularly true during a global pandemic, when college students, the source of much of Boston’s apartment demand, are learning remotely.”

From Banker and Tradesman in Massachusetts. “Even though a number of new buildings are rising around Boston and a flurry of applications for more has begun to blanket local planning officials, signs abound that the commercial real estate industry could be in for a rough patch. New office leases are essentially at a standstill, and new luxury apartment projects around Boston are offering all manner of incentives to try and fill units that are suddenly not moving thanks to the coronavirus.”

From Bisnow New York. “Asking rents in some of the world’s most famous retail high streets have seen stunning drops in the last few months, as landlords begin bending over backward to fill space. There is no doubt a major reset that was already in motion is accelerating. Silver Eagle Advisors co-founder Wendy Silverstein, who has worked at Citibank, Vornado, New York REIT and WeWork, described retail as ‘clearly’ distressed.”

“There’s been very little price discovery to what the ‘new value’ is of some of these properties,’ she said. ‘High street retail rents [in Manhattan] were so ridiculously high, they weren’t sustainable, even when the market was good … The rents have just got to be a fraction of what they are so businesses feel safe to take the risk opening up.'”

The Real Deal on New York. “In a sign of deepening trouble for a problematic condo project, the funding agreement for Manhattan’s so-called Leaning Tower of Seaport has fallen apart. Fortis Property Group’s unfinished 60-story luxury building at 161 Maiden Lane has been besieged by construction delays and litigation for years. And now its lenders have stopped funding its construction loan. This month a lender group led by Bank Leumi USA claimed that the project’s construction loan it originated in 2016 is now delinquent. It tapped the brokerage Newmark Knight Frank to sell the $120 million loan.”

“Bank Leumi claimed that the project’s inability to receive the certificate has made it difficult to sell units in the project. At one point, buyers had signed contracts for 71 of 99 units, but because of the delays, all but eight have been rescinded, according to the Bank Leumi USA’s motion to dismiss.”

The Real Deal on Florida. “Wilmington Trust is suing a joint venture between Simon Property Group and Hudson’s Bay Company for allegedly failing to make mortgage payments. Ten Saks Fifth Avenue and 24 Lord & Taylor locations are named in the lawsuit, which was filed earlier this month in Miami-Dade County Circuit Court, the South Florida Business Journal reported. The lawsuit alleges that the borrowers have not made any payments since March. Wilmington, which filed the complaint as part of a commercial mortgage-backed securities trust, is suing Saks Dadeland Leasehold LLC, which leases the Saks Fifth Avenue at Dadeland Mall in Miami.”

From Socket Site in California. “In addition to 5.6 million square feet of directly vacant, un-leased office space spread across the city, which is up from around 3.7 million square feet of un-leased space at the same time last year, there is now 6.2 million square feet of office space in San Francisco which has been leased but is sitting vacant and actively seeking a subletter, which is up from 770,000 square feet of sublettable space at the same time last year, according to Cushman & Wakefield.”

“As such, there is now 11.8 million square feet of vacant office space spread across San Francisco for a citywide vacancy rate of 14.1 percent, which is up from an office vacancy rate of 9.8 percent at the end of the second quarter and versus a vacancy rate of 5.5 percent, representing 4.5 million square feet of vacant space, at the same time last year. At the same time, leasing activity over the past two quarters hit at a 30-year low, with only 385,000 square feet of leasing activity in the third quarter, versus a post DotCom-era nadir of 933,000 square feet in the second quarter of 2001, and with roughly 3.1 million square feet of office space now under construction as well.”

The Los Angeles Times in California. “The impact of COVID-19 reverberated through the Los Angeles County office market in the third quarter. Office occupancy fell by 2.7 million square feet, a worsening of conditions in the second quarter when occupancy fell by 1.9 million square feet, real estate brokerage CBRE said. The weak third-quarter leasing was roughly in line with the drop in occupancy seen in early 2009, the worst quarter for the market in the Great Recession. Overall vacancy climbed to 15% in the third quarter, up from 13.7% in the previous quarter and 12.6% in the same period a year earlier.”

“‘Leasing activity is well below pre-COVID levels,’ CBRE broker Todd Doney said. ‘A big majority of deals getting done are short-term lease renewals, sort of kicking the can down the road.'”

“The market has also seen a burst of sublease space offered by tenants looking for some income by renting out space they’re paying for but not using, a common occurrence in a struggling economy. About 2 million square feet of sublease space has hit the L.A. market since the pandemic started, Doney said. ‘Landlords are starting to get aggressive’ on concessions to tenants, Doney said.”

“One tenant well aware of that trend is Michael Pollack, vice president of real estate for Premier Workspaces. The Irvine-based company occupies about 2 million square feet in 93 locations in several states, providing co-working offices and executive suites. ‘Right now, we are not looking to sign any new leases anywhere in the country,’ Pollack said. ‘We think rental rates will be going down.'”

“Pollack predicts that landlords will have to get more generous by the first quarter of next year as the economic downturn grinds on. ‘At a minimum, concessions are going to go way up,’ he said.”

The Culver City Observer in California. “Have you noticed more lawn signs than last year advertising apartments for rent? Well, you could be seeing a trend. Santa Monica rents have decreased over 10% since the coronavirus lockdown began on March 19, 2020, according to Insurify. ‘A recent study found that over the course of the coronavirus pandemic, California cities experienced some of the greatest drops in rent prices in the nation,’ wrote Emily Leff, a spokesman for Insurify. ‘Between March and September of 2020, Santa Monica’s rents decreased by 10.3% (it is 15th on the list of 20 cities with the greatest rent reductions during the pandemic). As of September 2020, the average cost of rent for a 2-Bedroom unit in Santa Monica is $2,432. The year over year change in rent (from 2019-2020) is -11.1%.'”

The Oregonian. “The cost of renting an apartment in Portland is falling, reversing years of steady increases and outpacing declines in most other cities. ‘Portland’s year-over-year rent drop is actually quite high,’ Rob Warnock, research associate at Apartment List said. ‘Seattle, Washington D.C., Oakland and Minneapolis are relatively similar sizes and have relatively similar price drops, but the majority of cities have I think more stable rents than we’re seeing in Portland.'”

“‘The huge declines that we’re seeing are really concentrated in the markets that are the most undersupplied and the most overpriced historically,’ Warnock said. ‘I don’t think it’s a coincidence that San Francisco and New York are the two most expensive markets and are also seeing the two most dramatic decreases in rent right now.'”

From Culture Map Austin in Texas. “The median one-bedroom rent in Texas was $1,054 in January. It fell to $1,005 in October, a significant 4.7 percent decrease. Two-bedroom units that began 2020 at a median $1,306 dropped 2.3 percent to $1,276 in October. The declines in Texas can be attributed, at least in part, to oil prices, notes Abodo. Abodo recently explained the depth of the West Texas oil bust in terms of lodging prices: ‘During the recent oil boom, motel prices — even for budget brands like Motel 6 — were commonly listed $350 per night or more. Now, rooms are available for about $50.'”

“The cost of oil and other challenges in apartment leasing amid the pandemic have impacted Texas rent prices, and Abodo expects statewide rents to stay at their current levels or decrease slightly as we head into 2021. The Austin market is falling right in line with Texas’ downward trend. Abodo attributes the ‘slight weakness’ in Austin rents to the general economic slowdown, as well as a lack of renewed interest in living downtown.”

From Huffington Post Canada. “With the COVID-19 pandemic severely reducing the demand for rental housing in cities, and all but killing off Airbnb rentals, Toronto’s supply of condos for sale has shot up to record highs over the past few months. The number of resale condos available in the City of Toronto more than quadrupled from around 1,500 before the pandemic to 6,455 in mid-October, the highest number ever recorded in the market. It has been climbing steeply upward from week to week.”

“‘I don’t know when this is going to stop. As long as it keeps going up, things are going to keep softening,’ said Scott Ingram, a Toronto real estate agent.”

“And that doesn’t include newly-built condos, which are set to hit the market in record numbers over the next few years. The area has had a record of nearly 80,000 condo units under construction over the past year, according to Urbanation. Toronto had more cranes in the sky in the third quarter of this year than New York, L.A., Chicago and San Francisco combined, according to a recent survey. Toronto isn’t the only place where the supply of condos is soaring, though other cities aren’t seeing it to the same extent. Vancouver’s active listings were up 44 per cent in September, compared to a year earlier.”

“Re/Max declared that Toronto ‘condo prices, as well as rents, are expected to decline in the coming months.’ It pointed the finger at the ‘collapse’ of the Airbnb market, which has convinced many owners to either sell their units or rent them out in the long-term rental market ― where rents have been falling precipitously in recent months in many large cities in Canada.”

“‘Rental rates falling are a major reason why supply is growing,’ Ingram told HuffPost Canada. ‘You’ve got some investors cashing out, and to double down, you’ve got fewer investors who’ve been snapping these things up.’ Ingram noted that, in recent years, many condo investors accepted negative cash flow (rents that didn’t cover their costs) because they expected price appreciation on their condos. Now many are beginning to realize that might not happen.”

“‘Now that price appreciation isn’t there it’s a different ballgame,’ he said. ‘(Investors are) saying, ‘Oh wait a sec, there’s some risk in there.’… The risk is up in peoples’ faces a lot more now.'”

From Domain News in Australia. “Apartment rents in one of Sydney’s most sought-after inner-city areas have plummeted by nearly 27 per cent over the past year in a massive windfall for tenants seeking homes that were previously out of their budget. The weekly unit rent in Millers Point has dropped by 26.9 per cent to a new median of $708, the biggest fall of all the reductions mainly hitting apartments in the city and eastern suburbs, according to the Domain Rent Report.”

“‘I am lucky enough to have a very, very compassionate landlord,’ said award-winning wedding photographer John Laham, 67, who rents an apartment in the prestigious Highgate building in Millers Point in the northern CBD. ‘He agreed to give me a great reduction where my rent almost halved until things pick up.'”

“At the same time, many of the old terraces in the suburb that were converted into apartments for short-term lets for tourists are now back in the residential pool, says John McInerney, the past president of the Millers Point Residents Action Group. ‘That’s been the biggest change, so rents have fallen with a lot more supply when before they’d priced out the long-term residents,’ he said.”

“Malabar, in the east, is another suburb where house rents, this time, have dropped by 20.8 per cent to $950, while Pyrmont house rents are down by 16.5 per cent to $710 and unit rents by 15.1 per cent to $620. Meanwhile, Haymarket units are down 15.2 per cent to $700, units in The Rocks by 15 per cent to $850, and those in the city of Sydney by 14.7 per cent to $640.”

“Unit rents in other areas beyond the city and east have been hit too as tenants relocate to houses, taking advantage of cheaper rents, according to Domain senior research analyst Dr Nicola Powell. Apartment rents have dropped by 18.2 per cent in Bass Hill for instance, 17.3 per cent in Dundas Valley on the Upper North Shore and 14.3 per cent in Tempe in the inner west.”

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This Post Has 90 Comments

      1. The decline could be reversed virtually overnight by legalizing concealed carry and stand your ground/castle doctrine laws in these sh!thole cities.

        Call it guntrification.

        1. guntrification.

          Hahah…the statistics would be worse for a day or two and then get much much better.

    2. All the cops Gulliani hired have 20 or more years of pension credit. This wave of retirements was coming regardless.

      1. “All the cops Gulliani hired have 20 or more years of pension credit. This wave of retirements was coming regardless.”

        – That’s not what I’m hearing, and it’s not just NYSh*tty
        – Socialism=Communism=Western Civilization in retrograde.
        – Coincidence? I Think NOT!

        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ssnw2GA657s
        Coincidence, I Think NOT!
        810,426 views
        •Feb 2, 2012

      1. Most of the larger buildings have security in the lobby, which are included in the CAMs, “common area maintenance” expense.

        Some companies go well beyond that when you exit the elevator on their floor with additional security screening and issue badges upon signing a visitor list, and wait behind locked glass partitions until an employee arrives to escort.

  2. According to Bloomberg, studio rents in Manhattan fell 15 percent to 2,495. Likewise, in Seattle, prices for a studio dropped 12 percent to $1,490. Median rent prices for studios in the Bay Area dropped 31 percent year-over-year to $2,285, according to the report.

    Is that a lot?

  3. ‘While we have dealt with abandoned or closed assets in the past, it has never been this widespread…Beginning in March, we started to receive a high volume of debt relief and loan modification inquiries’

    Is that enough global carnage for ya? Cuz I could have posted double or triple what’s above. This is a credit event.

    1. “This is a credit event.”

      It’s a nice feeling having NO DEBT and never signing a financial obligation longer than 12 months.

      Loanowners are SLAVES.

      1. Yep, slaves produced by persuasion rather than by coerersion.

        I like it, I love it, I want more of it.

  4. ‘Unit rents in other areas beyond the city and east have been hit too as tenants relocate to houses, taking advantage of cheaper rents’

    That’s the spirit!

  5. “Most multifamily loans are prudently underwritten and are performing well, but cracks are starting to appear in properties in Gateway markets that were stable pre-COVID-19, according to an analysis of properties in Yardi Matrix’s database.

    Echoes of “subprime is contained” dissembling from “Zimbabwe Ben” Bernanke months before Housing Bubble 1.0 imploded.

  6. ‘in Class A properties in Gateway metros…The study found that just over a quarter (26 percent) of such properties had DSCRs of under 1.0 as of August, which means the net income is less than the mortgage payments’

    I said this was going to happen many years ago. Just wait til the free cheese illusion goes away.

    1. I said this was going to happen many years ago. Just wait til the free cheese illusion goes away.

      It seems like the entire US is in a holding pattern, waiting for more free cheese.

  7. “Alex Killick, head of CWCapital’s special servicing business: ‘While we have dealt with abandoned or closed assets in the past, it has never been this widespread.’

    But…but…V-shaped recovery!

  8. ‘the funding agreement for Manhattan’s so-called Leaning Tower of Seaport has fallen apart. Fortis Property Group’s unfinished 60-story luxury building at 161 Maiden Lane has been besieged by construction delays and litigation for years. And now its lenders have stopped funding its construction loan. This month a lender group led by Bank Leumi USA claimed that the project’s construction loan it originated in 2016 is now delinquent. It tapped the brokerage Newmark Knight Frank to sell the $120 million loan’

    Is that a lot?

    ‘Bank Leumi claimed that the project’s inability to receive the certificate has made it difficult to sell units in the project. At one point, buyers had signed contracts for 71 of 99 units, but because of the delays, all but eight have been rescinded’

    He he, get an “inventory loan”. NYC is fooked.

    1. oxide
      October 17, 2020

      ‘When is all this crater going to actually show some actual defaults and fire sales?’

    2. ‘The lawsuit alleges that the borrowers have not made any payments since March’

      $846 millions! Now that is a lot.

        1. Here you go …

          The Money Bin | Disney Wiki | Fandom
          https://disney.fandom.com/wiki/The_Money_Bin

          “The Money Bin is a large storage building where Scrooge McDuck houses his three cubic acres of cash. Scrooge has a great affection for his money, and his favorite hobby is to dive and swim around in the money in his bin. The building and the surrounding lot are full of booby traps, burglar alarnms and other contraptions to fight off Scrooge’s countless uninvited guests, like panhandlers, beggars, door-to-door salesmen and, most importantly, crooks who try to break into the Bin (most often the Beagle Boys). It was originally featured in the Uncle Scrooge comic book stories created by Carl Barks. It has also been featured in many of Scrooge’s animated appearances, such as Scrooge McDuck and Money, Sport Goofy in Soccermania and DuckTales.”

          1. Trivia
            Flintheart Glomgold, too, has a Money Bin, located in South Africa. Flintheart’s Money Bin is similar to Scrooge’s, but it has a pound symbol (£) instead of a dollar sign. It, along with Glomgold himself, first appeared in the 1956 comic book story “The Second-Richest Duck” by Carl Barks.
            The reason Scrooge stores all his money in the Money Bin is because he doesn’t trust banks.
            In the DuckTales reboot, it is mentioned that Scrooge spends $15,000,000 a year for protection against magic on the security of the bin, as apparently, he has acquired a long list of vengeance curses (most likely from several treasures he’s raided), much to the confusion of his board.
            In DuckTales the Movie: Treasure of the Lost Lamp, when Dijon wished for Scrooge’s fortune. A Giant “D” was on the bin resembling a dollar sign.

          2. Talk about hero’s. Uncle Scrooge is mine.

            The first comic book I ever read was ‘Uncle Scrooge’

            Remember one issue in which the Beagle Boys tried to drill their way (with an oil rig) into the money bin. But Uncle Scrooge foiled them, removing all his money via a secret passage and then filling the money bin with castor oil.

            Lots to learn from Uncle Scrooge.

  9. ‘Right now, we are not looking to sign any new leases anywhere in the country…We think rental rates will be going down…At a minimum, concessions are going to go way up’

    That’s the spirit! Kick em when they’re down.

  10. “Asking rents in some of the world’s most famous retail high streets have seen stunning drops in the last few months, as landlords begin bending over backward to fill space. There is no doubt a major reset that was already in motion is accelerating.

    Retail is toast, especially now that Gimme Dats in cities with progressive DAs realize they can walk into high-end establishments, grab armloads of merchandise, and not be challenged because no merchant wants to be targeted by the Instagram Red Guard “anti-rayciss” lynch mobs.

    1. Stealing Soho: Luxury retailers terrorized by shoplifting mobs

      Bands of shoplifters are terrorizing Soho’s high-end boutiques, lifting hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of designer merchandise, and in some cases, threatening security guards to keep quiet — or be labeled racist, The Post has learned.

      The disturbing pattern began in late May during the riots that rocked the city in the wake of the George Floyd police custody death. High-end Celine was looted of $1.5 million in merchandise then, and the blatant thievery continues “every week” in ritzy stores such as Prada, Moncler, Dior and Balenciaga, one plugged-in local said.

      “This is happening every week. Walk around Soho on Wooster Street and Greene Street, Mercer Street. … You have huge bouncers out there trying to deter hit-and-run activity,” the source, a restaurateur, said.

      https://nypost.com/2020/10/10/grab-and-run-shoplifters-terrorize-luxury-nyc-boutiques/

    2. Well you’ve got me curious now. For my impending move I was originally going to land in Eugene and branch out from there, but maybe Portland would be a better starting place. I need to buy a truck, so Portland would have a larger selection, and who wouldn’t want to witness a literal City in Flames?

  11. ‘Even though a number of new buildings are rising around Boston and a flurry of applications for more has begun to blanket local planning officials, signs abound that the commercial real estate industry could be in for a rough patch. New office leases are essentially at a standstill, and new luxury apartment projects around Boston are offering all manner of incentives to try and fill units that are suddenly not moving’

    This is from the Warren Group. They used to be somewhat cautious, but became yet another “trees grow to the sky” outfit. Eat yer crows Tim, Boston is fooked too.

  12. Ten Saks Fifth Avenue and 24 Lord & Taylor locations are named in the lawsuit, which was filed earlier this month in Miami-Dade County Circuit Court, the South Florida Business Journal reported. The lawsuit alleges that the borrowers have not made any payments since March.

    The fictitious “V-shaped recovery” is falling apart before our eyes, though you wouldn’t know it from watching the permabulls on CNBC and the other corporate news financial channels. “Everything is awesome – buy moar stawks!”

  14. “As such, there is now 11.8 million square feet of vacant office space spread across San Francisco for a citywide vacancy rate of 14.1 percent, which is up from an office vacancy rate of 9.8 percent at the end of the second quarter and versus a vacancy rate of 5.5 percent, representing 4.5 million square feet of vacant space, at the same time last year.

    WeWork and its “investors” are screwed, blued, and tattooed.

    1. WeWork and its “investors” are screwed, blued, and tattooed.

      Seems like Adam “blue eyes” Neumann made bank.

  15. “The rents have just got to be a fraction of what they are so businesses feel safe to take the risk opening up”

    What’s going to reassure them that the rents won’t be raised to stupid levels again?

    2. “What’s going to reassure them that the rents won’t be raised to stupid levels again?”

      Nothing, and this is the beauty of it.

      The schmuck rents the spot then HE HIMSELF ADDS VALUE TO THE SPOT by opening up a business and pouring money into it. The schmuck works hard and it is his money that is put at risk but it is the owner of the spot that benifits.

      In the spirit of the parasite not killing the host the owner of the spot can then artfully jack the schmuck by jacking up the rent to the max which means just short of pushing the schmuck over the edge.

        1. Indeed, rational decision making would thus push comercial rentals into the ground…but people are rarely rational.

  17. ” noted that, in recent years, many condo investors accepted negative cash flow (rents that didn’t cover their costs) because they expected price appreciation on their condos. Now many are beginning to realize that might not happen.”

    Die speculators scum

    1. ” noted that, in recent years, many condo investors accepted negative cash flow (rents that didn’t cover their costs) because they expected price appreciation on their condos. Now many are beginning to realize that might not happen.”

      Not just condos – everything. House prices are so high that 50% down won’t even cash flow in some areas. It’s absolutely ludicrous.

    1. The stepson of a former Democratic state lawmaker is charged with assaulting a police officer and planning sophisticated attacks against police.

      The video of the assault, which showed an officer hit in the helmet with a bat, went viral after a night of intense, escalating violence against police officers.

      Jacob Greenberg, 19, is in King County jail on charges of assault in the first degree, attempted arson in the first degree, and reckless burning in the first degree (a charge from an earlier case). Note: charging documents misspell his last name as “Greenburg.”

      Greenberg is the step-son of former Democrat representative Laura Ruderman of Kirkland. Last month, the Jason Rantz Show on KTTH first reported Greenberg was the suspect in the assault. She used her position as a state lawmaker to convince a judge to lower the bail on the previous charge and release him to her custody.

      “He is basically a good kid, straight ‘A’ student,” Ruderman said. “I’ve served the state in the legislature we will make sure he follows all the provision.”

  19. An Ex-Liberal Reluctantly Supports Trump

    ‘Mr. Siegel’s third reason goes to the heart of his own political philosophy. He sees the president as a champion of “bourgeois values,” under threat from the “clerisy,” Mr. Siegel’s word for the dominant elites who “despise” those values. He regards Mr. Biden as a “captive” of this clerisy, and running mate Kamala Harris as the “embodiment of it.”

    ‘In Mr. Siegel’s view, “hard work, faith, family and autonomy” have enabled America to thrive, and Mr. Trump stands for these values, even if he doesn’t always exemplify them. “The elite is largely detached from the middle class,” Mr. Siegel says. “The two major sources of wealth in the last 20 years have been finance and Silicon Valley. Neither of them has much connection to middle-class America, or Middle America.” Mr. Trump is “in favor of manufacturing jobs, which are often middle-class.” The president also “recognizes the ways in which China is a threat to the survival of middle-class life in America, directly and indirectly.”

    ‘Mr. Siegel takes heart from Mr. Trump’s hostility to political correctness. “Wokeness is a force that undermines the middle class,” he says, “and you couldn’t have had wokeness without an elite contempt for the values of the middle class.” Middle Americans see political correctness “as a threat to the democratic republic they grew up in, where people could speak their mind.” I ask Mr. Siegel to define political correctness: “The inability to speak the truth about the obvious.”

    ‘As we sit on his porch in the Brooklyn neighborhood of Ditmas Park, his opinions—unfashionable in a borough where Mrs. Clinton outpolled Mr. Trump by more than 60 points—cause passersby to turn their heads. When he offers examples of political correctness that annoy him, a young man walking by the house looks startled. “Why can’t you say ‘Wuhan virus’?” Mr. Siegel exclaims. “Why can’t you say there are two genders?”

    ‘By the late 1980s Mr. Siegel had become “a centrist Democrat—part of a group that no longer exists.”…“Wokeism is not liberalism,” he says. “I don’t want to be unfair to liberals. I was very critical of liberals, but they were in favor of debate; they were in favor of empiricism, of open argument.” Wokeism, by contrast, is a “new secular revealed religion,” which involves no “investigation or empirical study.”

    ‘In Mr. Siegel’s understanding, wokeism holds that “the important truths are already known, and that the American aristocracy has to impose those truths on the country.” These are “given positions”—irrefutable and sacrosanct. Wokeism, he says, is a “perilous threat” to America and particularly to the First Amendment. “It says we don’t need debate. We don’t need free speech. We don’t need freedom of religion. We need to obey.”

    https://www.wsj.com/articles/an-ex-liberal-reluctantly-supports-trump-11602875814

      1. we were taught behavior comes first aka content of character. so floyds behavior was so rotten there was never a reason to march or demand”justice” ………but to clarify if a law abiding black college professor was yanked out of the car tased or shot,over a minor traffic violation i would be there, but when has that ever happened?

        1. I don’t know the answer to your question. But I do agree that the real disagreement is over whether everyone should be required to submit to “white”/majority laws/social norms. Everyone likes rule of law when it’s working in their favor but lots of people don’t like it when it restricts them. Myself included at times. But I generally submit rather than testing the limits and when I do test the limits I go out of my way to make things easy for the cops if I get caught. I have no desire to die just to make a point that I think the law is too restrictive…I’ll save my argument for court. Some people don’t have the self control to do that…so we argue about how much leeway they should be allowed.

          1. I had a few interactions with the police a few (3) minor speeding tickets when i was a youth. Twice in South Carolina i had headlight taillight out, so i said Sears is just down the road i’ll get it fixed now and you wont have to write a fix it ticket or show up in court….they agreed…and followed me there Thats why it amazes me how many “minorities” get stopped for traffic violations and yet have thousands in cash drugs or guns in the car.

          2. get stopped for traffic violations Tim McVeigh the OKC bomber, shortly afterward the bomb went off, was stopped on the interstate because his car had no license plates.

        2. “…but to clarify if a law abiding black college professor was yanked out of the car tased or shot, over a minor traffic violation i would be there, but when has that ever happened?”

          I saw a Frontline episode a long time ago about two adult black males being pulled-over on the Interstate, harassed, physically bullied, etc., until a search of the vehicle turned-up body armor, firearms and a couple of FBI badges. They had never identified themselves preferring to just let things take their course.

          1. I saw a Frontline episode In the 1950’s Alfred Hitchcock had a fictional episode like this featuring a couple playing a sting on corrupt local police forces.

    2. “The elite is largely detached from the middle class,” Mr. Siegel says. “The two major sources of wealth in the last 20 years have been finance and Silicon Valley. Neither of them has much connection to middle-class America, or Middle America.”

      Yep. These are the people who are destroying the country. And let’s not call them “the elite” or “the globalists” or any of than nameless, faceless garbage anymore. Let’s name them. It’s Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, George Soros, Warren Buffett, etc. These people are destroying America.

  20. I broke down and watched some football today.

    My friend’s 10 year old son’s team was on the short end of an 18 – 6 game. Sat next to Devin Hester’s uncle in the bleachers, his grandson was playing and broke one off for about 80 yards besides delivering a pretty vicious 10 year old hit on defense.

    PS

    Talked to the Mom of the 10 year old last night, I said I’ll go if no one takes a knee for the National Anthem. She said if any kid of hers in little league, college or pro takes a knee for that their getting dragged off the field by their ear.

  21. The Money Pit (no, this post has nothing to do with the Federal Reserve or our stupid consumer-based economic system) …

    “The Oak Island mystery refers to stories of buried treasure and unexplained objects found on or near Oak Island in Nova Scotia. Since the 19th century, a number of attempts have been made to locate treasure and artifacts. Theories about artifacts present on the island range from pirate treasure, to Shakespearean manuscripts, to possibly the Holy Grail or the Ark of the Covenant, with the Grail and the Ark having been buried there by the Knights Templar. Various items have surfaced over the years that were found on the island, some of which have since been carbon-dated and found to be hundreds of years old. Although these items can be considered treasure in their own right, no significant main treasure site has ever been found. The site consists of digs by numerous people and groups of people. The original shaft, in an unknown location today, was dug by early explorers and known as “the money pit”. “The curse” is said to have originated more than a century ago and states that seven men will die in the search for the treasure before it is found. To date, six men have died in their efforts to find the treasure.”

    Apparent excavation, with a standing man for scale
    Money pit on Oak Island

    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oak_Island_mystery#:~:text=The%20Oak%20Island%20mystery%20refers,to%20locate%20treasure%20and%20artifacts.

  22. “We need to obey.”

    That’s one of the biggest things about the powers that have shown their true colors is that they don’t want debate and just obey rings loud and clear.
    It’s so offensive that they think they can call you a racist or your offensive to get out of debating the lucency of their assertions.
    It’s really all Commie playbook stuff to take power.
    I have never seen anything as sinister as these forces that have come out with their true colors in the last 4 years. Biden/Harris embraces this corruption of the USA that kicked up starting about 24 years ago. They want you to vote against your own interest and freedoms and how dare you want to discuss the lack of merits of their assertions.

    For example if you prove that Globalism just fostered class warfare and racism isn’t the root cause of wealth disparity, but rather monopolies, they wouldn’t want that talk. It’s all about keeping the rigged systems.

    Oh, can’t talk about the looting of the USA by the Globalist. Just brainwash people into a false narrative so powerful forces can keep their wealth extractions going.
    It’s going to take a lot to undue the damage done by Politicians that betrayed the USA citizens interest and welfare. And they go so far as to attack white Citizens in their never ending quest to transfer blame to innocent parties.

  23. In Cambridge, across the Chahles Rivah (spoken with Boston accent) I’m definitely seeing a decrease in rents. Last year around this time dumpy – and I do mean dumpy and tiny – studios in my neighborhood near Harvard U were going for $1,800 and up. I have to move at some point (top floor walk up is no longer much fun) but I’m going to stick it out until the spring and see how everything shakes out. Then I will decide between renting and buying – oh joy.

    The whole one month broker fee thing even if you found the apartment yourself online is annoying and rather ridiculous. I guess realtors have to eat too.

    But at the end of the Boston.com article: “Most folks view this as a temporary — but not insignificant by any means — market condition,” Jodka said. “People believe we will have a vaccine, and the Boston we have grown to love will return to that structure. We continue to see strong valuations.”

    I guess Mr. Jodka means the Boston that he, those who bought 20 years ago or in 2012, and the many R.E. “professionals” and investors have come to love – Ka Ching $$!

    1. but when is the FBI going to start arresting corrupt high-level U.S. officials?

      Haha. Are you kidding? Surely you jest.

  25. ‘The Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden’s campaign manager reportedly admitted that the national public polling numbers, which show Biden overwhelmingly leading President Donald Trump, are inflated.’

    “Please take the fact that we are not ahead by double digits,” Jen O’Malley Dillon reportedly said during a grassroots summit of the campaign on Friday. “Those are inflated national public polling numbers.”

    ‘The video of the live event seems to have been deleted but her comments were posted on Twitter by New York Times reporter Shane Goldmacher.’

    ‘This is not the only circumstance Dillon cautioned about the leading position of Biden. She reportedly said in a three-page memo obtained by Fox News that Trump can still win the November election and the race is “neck and neck” in certain states like Arizona and North Carolina.’

    “[T]he reality is that this race is far closer than some of the punditry we’re seeing on Twitter and on TV would suggest,” Dillon allegedly wrote in the memo. “[E]ven the best polling can be wrong and that variables like turnout mean that in a number of critical swing states we are fundamentally tied.”

    https://www.theepochtimes.com/we-are-not-ahead-by-double-digits-biden-campaign-manager-reportedly-admits-polls-inflated_3542817.html?utm_source=news&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=breaking-2020-10-17-3

    1. Yep, more fake than his meth head swindler sons teeth. See those pictures? Yikes.

      Still, not as fake as the fake news organizations that published those laughable polls and try to cover up the massive corruption that has completely engulfed the left and a fair bit of the right too. Funny how they all just happen to hate DJT.

    2. Somehow I don’t think the “if you’re white, you’re racist” message crafted by Demorats as a campaign strategy is working.

      1. I dunno, I’ve met a lot of people who believe they’re racist even when they’re asleep, and who think they need to be reeducated. They remind me of Tom Parsons in 1984, who is grateful that his daughter turned him in for what he allegedly said in his sleep.

        1. I dunno, I’ve met a lot of people who believe they’re racist even when they’re asleep, and who think they need to be reeducated.

          You keep odd company. Never in my life have I met such a person.

          1. I didn’t say they were my friends. But I’ve heard this nonsense from colleagues, strangers, the woman who cuts my hair, etc. They tend to be younger, which I take as meaning their brainwashing in school worked.

            I was on a zoom work meeting one day and every single one of my colleagues praised Biden and trashed talked Trump.

            It’s worse than you think.

          2. I had a discussion with one of them about “subconscious” racism. I said there is no such thing. You’re only racist if you behave like one. I was told that I was wrong. These people actually believe in thought crime.

  29. “The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.”

    — H. L. Mencken

    UPDATE: Suspects Say Ring Leader in Plot to Kidnap Wretched Governor Whitmer Was an Alleged FBI Informant — Who Pushed the Entire Plan

    https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/10/update-ring-leader-plot-kidnap-wretched-governor-whitmer-alleged-fbi-informant-pushed-entire-plan/

      1. It served its purpose in changing the newscycle from Kamala’s abysmal VP debate performance to orange man bad incites right wing extremists.

    1. French police arrest 9 people after 18-year-old decapitates teacher in terror attack

      The 47-year-old history and geography teacher was decapitated with a butcher’s knife in the street about three hundred metres from the school in Conflans-Sainte-Honorine, north-west of Paris at around 5pm. A photo of his severed head was posted by a Twitter account, thought to belong to the murderer.

      “From Abdullah, the servant of Allah, to Macron, the leader of the infidels, I executed one of your hell dogs who dared to belittle Muhammad,” the Tweet said.

      Witnesses told police they heard the assailant shouting “Allahu Akbar” [‘God is the greatest’ in Arabic] before he was shot by officers.

      Of course Twitter was right there to help.

  33. The Main Stream News has become the agent of obstruction of justice for the Dem Party. The outrageous distraction of fake Russian Hoax and Impeachment to frame and slander Innocent people like Trump and Flynn is a outrage.
    So, viable information on Bidens corruption is being obstructed two weeks before the election.

    Hilary Clinton’s crimes should of disqualified her to run in 2016, but instead this false framing of Trump and Flynn in collusion with the FBI to distract and slander.

    All evidence shows that the CIA and FBI knew that it was Hilary disinformation to distract from Hilary Clinton’s crimes.
    Again evidence of Joe Bidens corruption has come out two weeks before election and obstruction of it by news media and computer companies is obvious.

    It really doesn’t matter what Biden says, what matters is that evidence has come out that shows treason by bribery from Foreign Companies to Joe Biden and his Son.
    I believe this was why Joe Biden ran to bury the crimes of himself and his buddies.

    78 year old senile men usually don’t run for President, and worse are they protected by this collusion of obstruction of evidence by the press.
    No doubt the Globalist who own the news want the corrupt Dem Party to maintain the power grab they obtained over the sell out Politicians that started under the Bill Clinton Administration 25 years ago.
    Government by actual US Citizens was replaced with Globalist Big Money and Commie takeover.
    Trump was such a threat to this power grab that had already occurred.
    Why do you think the Dems under Obama bailed out the Global Bankers in 2008. At the same time Obama passed a Commie Obamacare that would insure a Monopoly price gouging health care system that would be enforced by the IRS. Prices skyrocketed as a result .
    So, you have Trump who is fighting this Swamp takeover of America and it’s clear the Resistance want to win, and the ends justify the means.
    How dare the Trump Voters not want their life to be ruled by Rich Globalist and Commie scum. They should just be taxed to death , looted and throw into poverty, give their jobs to foreign Countries, be called racist, have their guns and free speech taken, and do so willingly.
    It’s just mind-blowing that you have Americans that are so brainwashed that they don’t seem to realize what is at stake.

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