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They Probably Had Bigger Eyes Than Brains

A report from Mortgage News Daily. “Locks are certainly not repeating 2021 levels for January, with initial anecdotal pipeline numbers down 30-40 percent. Are you reducing costs accordingly? When the residential lending market is good, owners think they’re the smartest guys in the room, and in the last two years volume and margins have covered up a lot of faults. (And now, are homeowners all real estate geniuses?) Now, however, effective management is going to be tougher. Mortgage fraud is growing, and I’ve received more than one email about kickbacks on the rise. Great. Never in the history of history of calm down has anyone calmed down by being told to calm down.”

From Business Insider. “82% of millennials regret something about buying their first home, per a new survey. Those who rushed to buy were more likely to have buyer’s remorse, and most regretted their location. With the pressure on to snap up the rare house that was both available and affordable, some buyers didn’t realize they were making a hasty decision until it was too late. Those who rushed to buy were more likely to experience financial remorse, the Clever Real Estate survey found. One in four millennials said their home value decreased while the same amount said that their mortgage was expensive. Since buyers often had to shell out more than the asking price to outdo competition, many are realizing they overpaid.”

The Los Angeles Times. “Four years ago, Aubry Bennion bought a 1950s house on half an acre just north of Salt Lake City. It was small, but she was smitten with the red brick facade with its scalloped trim. Then, in August 2019 came an exciting opportunity: Andy and Candis Meredith, a local couple known for renovating and flipping older homes, were looking for clients for a new TV show they were making for Magnolia Network.”

“Bennion implicitly trusted Magnolia; she had a relationship with the brand dating back several years. ‘For a lot of reasons, I felt like I was part of the Magnolia family,’ she said recently by phone. ‘Probably not anymore.'”

“Were the Merediths simply working parents who took on too much by trying to make a reality show while raising seven kids and renovating a dozen or so properties during a pandemic? Or were they running ‘the equivalent of a construction Ponzi scheme,’ as Kyle Adams, a lawyer for Bennion and the Hawley family, said in an interview with The Times. For the Merediths, the possibility of becoming the next Chip and Joanna may have been dangerously seductive, said Adams: ‘I think they probably had bigger eyes than brains. They saw a shot at fame and publicity, and took way too much on.'”

From CBS San Francisco in California. “A new study by San Francisco’s Office of Budget and Legislative Analysis says that 10% of all the homes in the city are vacant. The data shows the majority of vacancies lie in the Downtown, Mission and South of Mission Districts; the very areas where the most new housing has been constructed. District 5 Supervisor Dean Preston believes a lot of the units were purchased as investments to be held, unoccupied, and resold as housing prices increase.”

“While the activists argue about the best way for the city to force housing growth, realtor Karen Mai said it is the city’s tenant protection policies that are keeping landlords from leasing their properties after rent prices dropped by 25%. ‘They are afraid of renting it to the tenant,’ Mai said. ‘When they want it back, they don’t leave. And it’s going to cost them money to pay them a relocation fee and hire an attorney to evict them.'”

From Bloomberg. “Some potential buyers are walking away from the housing market and finding new investment strategies to grow what would have been a down payment. Sky-high prices for living in Canada gave Trevor Scott, president at the hedge fund Tidefall Capital, another reason to favour stocks over real estate. And then there’s the risk of rising interest rates, he said.”

“While the Bank of Canada did hold interest rates steady at January’s meeting, Governor Tiff Macklem made it clear that interest rates are coming. ‘If rates increase, a lot of these mortgages on million-dollar homes would be difficult to carry,’ Scott added. He’s not the only one who feels this way. Colby Mintram, a partner at Volt Strategic Partners, also jumped into the stock market after he decided it would be more advantageous than buying a home. ‘I’m not paying $1 million to own a one-bedroom apartment,’ he said.”

The Real Deal. “Miami developers Ophir Sternberg and Ricardo Dunin spent about four years and millions of dollars trying to turn a resort on Nicaragua’s Pacific coast into a swanky ecotourism hot spot. They failed. Left behind was a detritus of debt, unpaid taxes, missing funds, unpaid vendors and unfinished construction. The American retirees, outdoor enthusiasts and animal lovers who owned the villas were forced to clean up the mess.”

“All the while, an ownership dispute with Armel González, a local businessman, has only made it more difficult for villa owners to sell their units. One key contention: some of the owners say they were threatened by machete-wielding laborers. That never happened, according to González. The owners have tried to move on. The resort, now fully built and operating as a hotel, has hosted weddings and events.”

“But owners say all the lingering issues around land ownership have left them in purgatory. They cannot sell the properties, which require constant upkeep because of their proximity to the ocean. One owner, who requested anonymity because he didn’t want to be defined by his investment, said he ‘owns a degrading wood house in a tropical rainforest.’ ‘I didn’t believe it would be this bad,’ he said. ‘We’re fundamentally locked into a cycle of doom for quite some time.'”

From Bristol Live in the UK. “Experts are warning that the rising interest rates, rising taxes and the increased cost of living could see the bubble burst by the autumn. The key concern for Graham Cox, founder of the Bristol-based Self-Employed Mortgage Hub, is that the currently low interest rates will have to rise, and coupled with inflation, rising taxes and the skyrocketing cost of living, people will not be able to afford a property leading to a drop in prices.”

“Mr Cox said: ‘My view is that people have become complacent about low interest rates and they can’t, they won’t stay that way forever. People are borrowing up to the hilt; they’re borrowing huge sums of money to buy a house now. And I don’t think people realise how much it’s only the low [cost of] credit that is propping up the housing market.'”

From Macau Business. “Around 7 per cent of all homes in Macau – a total of 16,655 – were empty at the end of June 2021, a ‘high’ percentage, admitted a study by the University of Macau. According to a statement from the Directorate of Policy Studies and Regional Development, Macau stands out for having an even higher unemployment rate in noble areas of the islands of Coloane and Taipa, reaching a maximum of 30.3 per cent in Taipa village.”

“The percentage of ‘large’ houses, with an area of ​​more than 150 square meters, which were empty is also high (17.2 per cent) due to ‘the high price that residents can hardly afford,’ says the study.”

From UBS. “This paper examines our default outlook for 2022, expectations for rising stars and fallen angels. The UBS-AM default study is based on a proprietary, bond by bond analysis conducted by our dedicated team of credit analysts. The team utilizes reference indices to form a comprehensive, bottom-up estimate of defaults and distressed exchanges by industry. In Asia ex Japan, we expect an approx. 15% default rate.”

“Within Asia ex-Japan HY, the real estate sector is an outlier at a 28% expected default rate, mostly emanating from China. Our view is credit losses from potential defaults within the sector are already largely reflected in current pricing. On average we expect recoveries of between 30-40pct of face value with any large variance from our range likely driven by asset quality and government intervention.”

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This Post Has 100 Comments

  2. ‘Mortgage fraud is growing, and I’ve received more than one email about kickbacks on the rise’

    WA???

    1. BTW, this is a loan industry website that most don’t know about but I’ve followed for many years. It’s a locker room kinda deal.

  4. ‘Or were they running ‘the equivalent of a construction Ponzi scheme’

    I’ve long been skeptical of these ‘reality’ shack shows. But also noted they’ve played an very visible role for the mania. Take this one: I used to see it on at the gym. It’s boring. The main actors look bored. But everybody is gonna get rich without any real work! Oh they’ll bust some drywall with a hammer. Women busting drywall seems to be the recurring theme. I’m not sure about the psychology of that, but there it is.

    How many times have we read these sweet equity riches we just made up? RE crooks and chiselers on TV.

    1. “women busting drywall”

      don’t forget in high heels. that made me laugh so damn hard back in the day watching the Montelongo’s hootchy cootchies pose for some camera time. and don’t forget his Hummer. cause he, ya know, came from nada in his father-on-laws garage!

      “Mando. Mandoooo I wanna remodel w/huge granite slab & stainless steel appliances in this flip & sell for $29,000)

      (and the absolutely ridiculous tally of low renovation costs at the end of the “show” had me falling off my chair in hysterical laughter. you just KNOW it was an advertising plug for Home Depot. now spray the dead grass green already. ahhh good times.)

      1. I had to look Montelongo up.

        I’m more familiar with the HGTV shows, where it’s usually the pathetic homeowner gf/wife who bashes the drywall to “save a little money.” It’s just camera filler. Of course, when “the trades” come through to do the actual work, there’s nary a camera to be found. I was always more interested in floorplans and layouts anyway.

    2. Social engineering perhaps. Sorta like becoming a tech billionaire from your garage while ignoring the deep state connections of the existing tech billionaires.

      1. Sorta like becoming a tech billionaire from your garage

        Is that even still possible? “Startups” are now funded with hundreds of millions, if not billions, in venture capital.

  5. ‘realtor said it is the city’s tenant protection policies that are keeping landlords from leasing their properties after rent prices dropped by 25%’

    Remember that? It’s actually closer to 35% if you compare to the peak in 2015.

    ‘They are afraid of renting it to the tenant…When they want it back, they don’t leave. And it’s going to cost them money to pay them a relocation fee and hire an attorney to evict them’

    Rents way down and you don’t want to rent anyhoo so fooked. Where can I sign up?

  6. ‘he ‘owns a degrading wood house in a tropical rainforest.’ ‘I didn’t believe it would be this bad,’ he said. ‘We’re fundamentally locked into a cycle of doom for quite some time’

    I’ve seen this garbage on TV too. The funniest is Belize. They follow around some star eyed gringos looking at tiny worthless sand bars on the coast. Bugs, lots of bugs. Hurricanes, thieving locals. If you don’t get killed the police will take what’s left.

    Nicaragua is a sh$t hole.

    2. Nicaragua is a sh$t hole.

      There is youtube clown called the Nomad Capitalist. He actually recommends Sandinista Nicaragua as a place where to live.

      1. There is the visual and reality. This area can look spectacular. I once flew over Nicaragua and saw a volcano inside a lake. The first time I landed there (all Panam flights had to land in every CA country they passed over in the 80’s to be taxed). The sandanistas had taken over. 14 YO girls in camouflage holding military rifles.

        Take Belize, the water color is stunning. But they got a gringo price and a locals price. I knew a guy who went to Honduras. He saw this pretty little island and asked to be taken out there. As soon as he set foot, he was immediately attacked by swarms of sand fleas. The list of diseases on the eastern coasts are as long as my arm.

          1. Yes, and from your description on this blog, they all live in *YOUR* neighborhood with cars parked on the lawn and 20 primos living in each house.

          3. Even Mexico looks down their nose at Central America.

            For all its faults Mexico has an industrial base. Central America has nothing.

    1. 82% of millennials regret something about the shack they bought?

      Based on how they vote, and their support for unscientific medical tyranny, they deserve all of that and worse.

      Bed. Made. Lie.

      1. “82% of millennials regret something about the shack they bought?”

        It’s been a long time since I listened to Dave Ramsey but I will paraphrase what I remember…

        Never buy a home unless you have a 20% down payment, a 6 month or 1 year (can’t remember which) emergency fund (that will pay all of your bills if you lose your job until you find another) that does not have a payment of more than 25% of your income or…

        Murphy will move in and bring his 3 brothers, Broke, Desperate, and Stupid.

        2. Dave Ramsey still 🙄 advocates a 15-year mortgage with a 20% down payment, payments no more than 25% gross income. If you can’t afford that, then you need to humble yourself and buy a more “modest” house.

          Yeah, that might have worked in Nashville in 1993. But Ramsey hasn’t changed his schtick at all since then. His baby steps were designed for blue collar families. You know, the type that made adequate working-class money but got a little extravagant with a nice car or put too many restaurant dinners on a low-limit credit card. At the time, it was easy for Dave to lecture to the plebs to never get a credit card (“you don’t need a FICO score”), trade down to a beater car, stay in the modest house, cut the Natty Light, beans and rice and rice and beans, track your everydollar, and achieve financial peace in a year.

          Nowadays, people are calling in to Dave saying they are on Baby Step 2 with $85,000 income but they have $92,000 in high-interest student loan debt and rent in a Class B unit that is 50% income and wondering how are they going to make it, never mind buying any type of house (modest or not) or saving for retirement. Of course for modern issues, Ramsey is way out of his depth on this. So his solution is to “go talk to your pastor” and then hand the caller off to his average daughter or the big minority guy, or the flakey god-dependent psychologist.

          Yeah, I don’t plan on being a Ramseybot.

          2. “Yeah, I don’t plan on being a Ramseybot.”

            You know an amazing amount of details about his show and advice. Maybe you already are one and just don’t know it?

          5. You know, it IS possible to watch something and not become and instant bot. I watched a lot of his youtube videos and decided to disagree with his views, as I thought they were outdated.

        3. “Never buy a home unless you have a 20% down payment…”

          As I remember things in “walk away” California, you could not buy a home unless you had a 20% down payment.

        4. Never forget Dave Ramsey started his career as a real estate pimp, and still holds an active real estate broker’s license in Tennessee.

          Realtors are liars.

      2. 82% of millennials regret something about the shack they bought? Based on how they vote, and their support for unscientific medical tyranny, they deserve all of that and worse.

        What is with the recurrent millennial bashing here? Where I live, all the vax pushers are in the boomer and “seasoned citizen” cohorts.

        1. Where I live, all the vax pushers are in the boomer and “seasoned citizen” cohorts.

          Recipients, perhaps. The people I see on TeeVee screaming that you need to get jabbed or you will die are much younger.

  9. Today is Thursday, February 3rd and Joe Biden is not the legitimately elected president of the United States.

    The 2020 election was stolen.

    1. “The 2020 election was stolen.”

      America scrambles to take part in the Mark Zuckerberg $250 million gold rushA feeding frenzy has begun.

      By Theodore Schleifer@teddyschleifer Oct 7, 2020, 3:55pm EDT

      In rural America and the nation’s biggest cities alike, the cash bonanza is proving to be a godsend for election administrators who have insufficient budgets and who have been faced with the possibility of forgoing critical safety measures to protect voters from the coronavirus. But because Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan, unveiled the gift just two months before Election Day, election officials are now scrambling to get their hands on the cash on an awfully pinched timeline.

      Almost 2,000 election offices — about one-fifth of the country’s total election administration jurisdictions — have applied for the money, generating so much interest that the group awarding the funds, the Center for Tech and Civic Life (CTCL), had to extend the tight application deadline from October 1 to October 15. In some of these districts, the late checks are allowing them to increase their election budgets by as much as 30 or 40 percent, with the Zuckerberg gift replenishing coffers that were depleted by a deteriorating economy and stretched further by the costs of the pandemic.

      https://www.vox.com/recode/2020/10/7/21502789/mark-zuckerberg-center-for-tech-and-civic-life-donations

      Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan donate $100 million more …
      https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/zuckerberg-chan-elections-facebook/2020/10/12/0e07de94-0cba-11eb-8074-0e943a91bf08_story.html – 337k – Cached – Similar pages
      Oct 13, 2020

      Greater Georgia Sues for Transparency on Zuckerberg’s $5.6m Donation to Raffensperger in 2020 Election

      By Kathleen Sanford -November 24, 2021

      Meta Platforms CEO Mark Zuckerberg is once again making headlines about his donation of around $5.6 million to the Georgia Secretary of state’s office.

      In his report, he accused that the CTCL funded thousands of government officials with this money around the country which hugely affected the elections.

      https://leedaily.com/2021/11/24/greater-georgia-sues-for-transparency-on-zuckerbergs-5-6m-donation-to-raffensperger-in-2020-election/

        1. Serious question: how much do you think Zuck can bench press? I’m going to guess maybe 75 pounds on a good day, after having a tofu/quinoa/hemp/chia protein shake.

  10. “It would take another burst of inflation to justify an aggressive interest rate increase when the Federal Reserve starts to raise rates next month, said Philadelphia Fed President Patrick Harker on Tuesday … In the interview, Harker said he now expects four quarter percentage point rate hikes this year. He said he wants the Fed to shrink its balance sheet in such a way that the market gets bored with the issue.”

    I think he is partly referring to the fact that the Fed is re-investing MBS principal payments back in to the mortgage market to the tune of $35B every two weeks: https://www.newyorkfed.org/markets/ambs_operation_schedule#tabs-2

    In essence, the Fed has taken the place of the subprime institutional bagholders of yore.

    1. I’m not keeping track too closely. The whole “taper” thing seems to have fallen off the radar. Is Powell even tapering significantly? If he is, why hasn’t the market thrown a taper tantrum like it did in 2018?

      1. They are significantly slowing the rate of treasury purchases. They were at $80B purchases/month; now down to $40B. MBS, however, with new monthly purchases + principal reinvestment is still crazy high. IDK … if we follow the 2005-08 script, to keep this turd afloat for the next couple years, mortgage bankers will shoehorn FBs in to ARMs, then interest only, etc right up to the flushening.

        1. Thanks for the into. IIRC, they were buying $120B total. They’re down to $40B treasuries, but how much in MBS? Enough that they’re still printing $120B total? And what does it mean? A little less inflation but house prices stay high?

          1. After it’s January meeting the Fed said it was reducing Treasury purchases to $20B/month, and it’s MBS to $10B/month, and then ending new purchases altogether in March. However, they will continue to re-invest MBS principal payments … so … who knows. The New York Fed’s website seems to indicate they are currently purchasing a lot more than $10B/month.

            I personally think Fed MBS purchases are a total wild card. If housing prices start to decline significantly, then the Fed might just re-up their MBS purchases to soften the landing. i.e. fighting consumer goods inflation while specifically protecting the recent home price inflation. IDK, the Fed board members all seem like sociopaths to me, so … anything’s possible.

        2. They are significantly slowing the rate of treasury purchases.

          Well, since Brandon and friends didn’t get their BBB boondoggle, I suppose that the Fed can taper down its Treasury purchases.

        3. My online bank has always told me to use them as a mortgage lender, but in the past few weeks I’ve noticed the emails include ARMs. I did not see those back in 2020.

          1. @Paoburen yup, banks will see a huge drop off in origination income as mortgage rates rise. However, with the very slow Fed Funds rate increases, the banks will see very little increase in net interest income for some time. So the banks will be busy pushing “affordable” 2.8% 5/1 ARMs to cover the shortfall. Hopefully, the Fed raises rates quickly enough that this behavior is short-lived. We all remember the infamous UBS ARM reset graph from the 2000s.

  11. I came across this DR Horton call earlier:

    Ken Zener — KeyBanc Capital Markets — Analyst

    OK. I mean it seems to me that’s the way you’re approaching it. And I guess, realizing these conference call is long already, David, could you just — we spoke about this in the past, the interest rate you paid on your first home. You highlighted obviously the very strong demand, strong job growth.

    Can you guys just comment — I mean we recently wrote about it, but can you comment on the fact with your perspective about your comfort with the real rates being negative now compared to when you took your first mortgage rate? Just as a kind of a broad thought. Appreciate it.

    David Auld — President and Chief Executive Officer

    It’s a great time. I think it’s more affordable today than it certainly was in the ’80s. The ability to get into a house, lock down your homeownership or your housing cost for the next 20 years is a significant driving force in what’s going on because as overall cost inflation, interest rates, as those continue to move up, the people that have bought a house today, even if it’s at a price that’s 15%, 20% higher than it was last year, are — I mean it’s just a great thing. So the other thing, Ken, that we really don’t talk much about, but it’s — when I was 20, I mean that was just — that was what was expected.

    You figured out a way to buy a house and that became less cool for use of a stupid term, as the millennials came into their 20s. But what I’m seeing and what my millennial daughter is telling me is, now it’s — that’s a big part of the narrative on social media is, it’s — people want to own homes again. And it’s just — I’m amazed sometimes at some of the conversations around housing and I look at what it was and look at what it is. I look at the — just the demographic demand that’s out there, I look at the wealth effect of everything that’s happened over the last 10 years and the American public is.

    They’re in a good place and from an affordability standpoint, home ownership is better than it was in the ’80s. So I’m very optimistic about what’s going on. I’m very optimistic about this company and I’m just in all of our people and how — what they are accomplishing out there. So I don’t know if I answer your question, but I told you what I’m willing.

    Ken Zener — KeyBanc Capital Markets — Analyst

    Always clear. Thank you.

    https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/topstocks/dr-horton-dhi-q1-2022-earnings-call-transcript/ar-AATpFS6

      1. ** ” They’re in a good place and from an affordability standpoint, home ownership is better than it was in the ’80s. So I’m very optimistic about what’s going on. I’m very optimistic about this company and I’m just in all of our people and how — what they are accomplishing out there. So I don’t know if I answer your question, but I told you what I’m willing. ”

        so pretty much blah blah blah & blah blabbity bibbity blah blah . . . but I’m all in. I’m optimistic.

        OMG! GEEE, WHAT A SURPRISE from someone who’s pay is depending on sales.
        well sign me up for a dozen. I’m cashing out my retirement, maxing out my credit cards, 2nd mortgaging & borrowing every cent I can from the relatives. why, I might even dump my spouse of 20 years for that hotty giving me side-eye in the carpool lane every morning.

        its my density, Lorraine. DENSITY

        1. His millennial daughter told him that everyone wants to buy a house!! A CEO of a multi-billion dollar company talks anecdotally about his daughter and her friend group. Look out below

    1. mercenaries that are unlawfully protesting and occupying our communities.

      “Unlawfully protesting”, Imagine if they were mostly peaceful like BLM and Antifa, instead of picking up after themselves.

      Anyway, this shows that the quislings are getting unnerved. Meanwhile, Trudeau remains in hiding in British Columbia.

  13. Some news,

    French Protesters surrounding Plizer headquarters, shouting

    ” Assassins ”

    Concise, to the point, accurate….no need for a big sign……easy to shout.

  14. ‘I’m not paying $1 million to own a one-bedroom apartment,’ he said.”

    Uh oh. We’re getting close…closer.

    1. “16 Domino’s slices”

      Dipped in ranch, I hope. And with a 64 oz. Dr. Pepper big gulp to wash it all down.

  16. Important science lesson: RNA uses Uridine. The mRNA jabs use Pseudouridine (with symbol “psi”), a chemically modified form of Uridine. Pseudouridine can cause cellular machinery to ignore a STOP codon leading to mistranslations. Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna knew this and inserted 2 and 3 STOP codons, respectively. Dr. David Wiseman in this clip at 11m25s from Senator Ron Johnson’s COVID-19: A Second Opinion is justifiably concerned. I highly recommend watching the entire 13m53s of Dr. Wiseman highlights.

      2. I wouldn’t think so, considering the Pfizer/BioNTech RNA only codes for a single protein – the “S” spike protein. Rather, if the stop codon is missed, then the “untranslated regions” referred to in the video (which includes the 3’-UTR region and poly(A) tail) might get translated into additional amino acids, creating some random protein that is larger than the intended spike protein. For cancer to be an issue, I would think the vaccine would need to contain reverse transcriptase like HIV does. That said, the vaccine forcing some random spike protein to be expressed all over your body is playing Russian roulette with your immune system IMO.

  17. “Never in the history of history of calm down has anyone calmed down by being told to calm down.”

    DON’T PANIC!

  18. “District 5 Supervisor Dean Preston believes a lot of the units were purchased as investments to be held, unoccupied, and resold as housing prices increase.”

    Easy fix: Tax the speculative HODLers of empty properties a nuisance tax for keeping empty properties off the market. This would have the combined benefits of discouraging unproductive speculation and making housing prices more affordable for people who contribute to the city’s economy and need a place to live in. The city would come out ahead on multiple levels.

  19. Kari Lake for AZ Governor

    ‘WATCH: The Media just won’t learn their lesson. They continue to try and stump me, but I know their game better than they do.’

    ‘I did an interview with @ABC… will they include this portion of it in their piece? Why won’t they just do their job and report the truth?’

    https://twitter.com/KariLake/status/1489064622321807363

    I will disagree with Ms Lake on one point. She said the corrupt senile pedophile was in the WH. At a ‘WH’ press conference not long ago a plane flew over. Planes never fly over the WH.

    1. At a ‘WH’ press conference not long ago a plane flew over. Planes never fly over the WH.

      Everything is smoke and mirrors with this crew. Remember the video showing Buttjudge taking a bike out of the back of an SUV a few hundred yards from the WH, then riding it up to the event in his suit and tie and dress shoes as if he rode the whole way? These people are completely devoid of honesty, morals and ethics.

    2. “When you are lying to the people and you are in Media, it’s a bad business model.”

      That does explain the mass exodus of viewers.

  20. This is a urine soaked mattress article.

    The Atlantic — The COVID Jerk (2/3/2022):

    “We all know the type. First appearing in the spring of 2020, the COVID jerk strutted unmasked through the supermarket, exhaling clouds of risk on worried shoppers and employees, and daring low-paid workers to try to enforce the new policies. Flaunting their disdain for scientific consensus, they stepped close behind you in line, breathing on your shoulder, complaining about maximum-occupancy requirements.”

    Who is this alleged “we” you and the rest of Blue Checkmark Twitter? People on Reddit (i.e. all of Reddit) who haven’t been outside in two years?

    “The classic COVID jerk still thrives. But because highly effective vaccines have been available for a long while, and as the Omicron wave subsides, reasonable people will disagree about what now constitutes a jerk move. The boundaries of responsible behavior are less clear than they once were.”

    https://archive.fo/rmKrF

    Author bio: Eric Schwitzgebel is a philosophy professor at UC Riverside and the author of A Theory of Jerks and Other Philosophical Misadventures.

    That’s all you’ve done with your life? UC *Riverside* must be terrifying with all the unwashed rabble of the Inland Empire just outside the gates of your campus.

    And worse yet, you probably consider getting published in The Atlantic to be a career milestone.

    1. THE COVID JERK

      You take a step to the right, than a step to the left,
      Than you turn around , and stick out your leg….

      Lets do the Covid Jerk again
      Lets do the Covid Jerk again
      Than you take a step to the left , and a step to the right
      If you really like it , you can do it all night, oh

      Let’s do the Covid jerk again, yea
      Lets do the Covid jerk again

    2. UC “Riverside” aka UC “Rejects” (From other UC campuses like UCLA, Berkeley, Davis, Irvine and San Diego).

    1. The Financial Times
      Markets Briefing Equities
      US stocks record worst day in almost a year after downbeat tech results
      S&P 500 falls 2.4% and Nasdaq loses 3.7% as Meta’s warning over growth shakes investors
      A New York Stock Exchange trader looks at a computer monitor
      The Nasdaq’s losses on Thursday ended a four-day streak of gains © Allie Joseph/AP
      Kate Duguid and Eric Platt in New York, Naomi Rovnick in London and Hudson Lockett in Hong Kong 2 hours ago

      Stocks on Wall Street slid by the most in almost a year on Thursday after a disappointing earnings report from Facebook parent Meta reverberated through the market.

      The S&P 500 index fell 2.4 per cent, its biggest drop since February 2021, driven largely by falls in tech stocks that dominate the blue-chip US index. The slide ended a four-day rally and took the S&P’s declines this year to 6.1 per cent.

      The losses for the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite were more intense, with the index that counts Meta and Amazon as members, declining 3.7 per cent, its worst day since September 2020.

      Investors were shaken by Wednesday’s results from Meta, sending the company’s shares down 26.4 per cent and wiping more than $230bn off its valuation, an unprecedented single-day loss for a listed company.

      Meta overnight reported its first decline in daily active users and warned of increased competition from rivals such as ByteDance’s TikTok platform.

      Shares of PayPal fell 6 per cent, bringing their total decline to just under 30 per cent since the closing bell on Tuesday when the payments company warned that a weakening ecommerce environment would slow its growth rate. Music streaming platform Spotify also delivered a weak outlook for first-quarter subscriber growth, sending its shares down 17 per cent on Thursday.
      …

      1. How many 2.4% drops would it take for the S&P 500 index to lose half its value? About one month’s worth?

        1. “U.S. Markets
          Stock Futures Rise After Tech Selloff
          Amazon.com and Snap shares leap in premarket trading after posting profits, boosting broader indexes”

    1. “Even Texas urbanologists concur that money and not politics is the big motivator — many folks prefer to cash out and get financial security even if it means leaving California’s salubrious climate, beaches, and national parks.”

      Boomer’s timing is the defacto lottery!

  24. Thank God Biden is going to stop those guns from looting stores, jumping turnstiles and pushing people in front of trains, punching toddlers, carjacking and being let out of jail without bail when they are arrested without firing themselves.

    Joe Biden arrives in NYC to address surging gun violence with Eric Adams

    By Steven Nelson, Larry Celona, Craig McCarthy, Emily Crane and Bruce Golding
    February 3, 2022

    One day after a funeral for the second of two NYPD cops gunned down last month, Biden met with Mayor Eric Adams and Gov. Kathy Hochul at One Police Plaza, where he delivered a rhetoric-heavy speech and said they were all on the same page when it comes to combating the surge in gun violence plaguing the city.

    But the president’s remarks were quickly dismissed as hot air by rank-and-file cops who said they didn’t hear anything that would actually help stem the shootings.

    “Typical political mumbo-jumbo. They talk a good game, but they don’t help,” a Brooklyn detective told The Post.

    “The guns are already here. We have to keep the people that we arrest with guns in jail. That is the only hope for innocent victims that get shot.”

    A Staten Island cop agreed, saying ruefully, “I promise you, people will get shot this weekend.”

    “They have to change the laws and allow us to do our job and lock people up. And then, they have to keep them in jail,” the cop said.

    https://nypost.com/2022/02/03/joe-biden-arrives-in-nyc-to-address-surging-gun-violence/

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