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Ever-Increasing House Prices Ensured The Cash Register Kept Ringing, What Will Happen If This Last Remaining Prop Gets Kicked Out From Under Us?

A weekend topic starting with The Street. “Research from real estate investment firm Amherst Group, as cited in Forbes, shows that the housing market is overvalue by as much as 40%. Amherst manages $16.8 billion in capital for investors and is one of the country’s largest owners of single-family homes for rent with about 44,000 residences across 19 states. ‘Is this another 2009 and 2010? We don’t think so, probably not even close. But when this price condition occurs, the world is a dangerous place,’ Sean Dobson, CEO of Amherst, said. Amherst says that the pricing boom that began at the start of 2021 that drove prices 17% higher through summer 2022 can be blamed on ‘exotic monetary policy.'”

From Fortune. “After four decades of low inflation and low interest rates, the era of cheap money has ended—and the tailwinds he’s seen throughout his real estate career have turned into headwinds, Ross Perot Jr. says. High interest rates coupled with tightened credit, that’s made borrowing more expensive and more difficult, along with the transition to working from home, has Perot suggesting that ‘commercial real estate, overall, will slow down,’ and potentially head toward a recession.”

“‘It’ll be years before we really understand the damage the pandemic did to the world,’ Perot tells Fortune, adding that for one, ‘it broke the habit patterns of millions of people that used to go to work everyday in a real office.'”

“All eyes are on the office sector, and as Fortune’s previously covered, some say it’s already crashing. Fred Cordova, chief executive officer of Santa Monica–based commercial real estate brokerage firm Corion Enterprises, recently told Fortune that ‘what’s happening in the office sector is apocalyptical: We’re creating this huge class of zombie buildings, buildings that no one wants to put any money into because the capital structure is broken.'”

The New York Daily News. “Empty windows and ‘for rent’ signs line 125th Street in Harlem, one of the most iconic business corridors in New York City. On one block alone, between Frederick Douglass Boulevard and Adam Clayton Powell Jr Boulevard, where the Apollo Theater sits, there are nine shuttered storefronts. In spring 2020, when COVID lockdowns were in place, storefront businesses lost months of revenue — but they still had to pay rent. As they struggled to get by, many fell behind. When normal life started to resume, though, retail shops struggled to get back on their feet as rents rose more, making the situation even worse.”

“‘We have like these little pockets of stores that are not open,’ said Princess Jenkins, owner of The Brownstone, a clothing boutique. ‘When businesses start to close like that, especially when you have three foreclosures on one block … It’s a huge piece of the community that’s missing.'”

KTVU in California. “AT&T is the latest retailer to announce they are vacating a prime real estate location in San Francisco near Union Square. The reasoning behind the closure may sound like a broken record by now. The Powell Street area has already lost several major retailers, including Old Navy, H&M, and Uniqlo. The need and concern for downtown San Francisco to reinvent itself in the wake of rampant vacant storefronts has been well documented.”

The New York Post. “San Diego’s homeless encampment ban is ‘doomed to fail’ without tougher enforcement as homelessness reaches a crisis point in the California city, its former mayor told The Post. The ‘unsafe-camping’ ordinance was passed on Tuesday by a 5-4 vote and bans rough sleepers from many areas in the city, but former San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer said its not enough to solve the issue. ‘This is not a partisan issue — both Democrats and Republicans equally don’t want to be stepping over needles and feces on their way to work or to their local park,’ Faulconer told The Post. ‘We should take zero tolerance for tents in front of somebody’s house and in front of somebody’s business.'”

From Fox News. “Kate Monroe dodged used hypodermic needles, discarded food containers and human waste as she navigated an area of San Diego known by locals as the Bottoms. The Marine Corps veteran and business owner was there to talk to as many of the city’s homeless residents as possible, including one woman who said San Diego makes living on the streets ‘not that hard.’ ‘Usually we’re low income and when you’re low income, you get free phones, free food, free clothing, there’s so many resources that are just give and give and give,’ Mary said in a video Monroe shared. ‘I think we’re spoiled to be honest with you,’ Mary added. ‘My sister’s like, ‘Where do I sign up?’”

KOMO TV in Washington. “The Seattle City Council quietly killed a proposal to build up to 900 housing units in a part of town that has been impacted significantly by chronic houselessness. ‘It’s just a challenging environment. It’s hard to properly manage because of the deferred maintenance, and it is even harder because of all the crime,’ said Bill Vipond, who manages multiple properties south of Edgar Martinez. He says he’ll try to fill the neighborhood with temporary tenants like the Stranger Things or the Van Gogh Experiences. But he said those venues are temporary. The other issues remain after years of decay after the pandemic that took a toll on the neighborhood. ‘Just kind of putting lipstick on a pig with that stuff because after hours, It’s dangerous again,’ he said.”

The Stranger in Washington. “What I want to consider in this post is one part of the social, political, and cultural impact of CHOP (Capitol Hill Organized Protest), initially called CHAZ (Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone). This part is political. And though the protest lasted barely three weeks in June 2020, it is still very much with us today. We have not left its shadow. The feeling that officers are leaving the SPD in droves is structured by this event, which has its origin in a protest that demanded nothing more or less than equal treatment under the law. The Seattle Is Dying feeling was intensified by CHOP, and we can also see it as the event that accelerated the homeless sweeps that now define Bruce Harrell’s rule of City Hall.”

“This is nothing but an identity crisis for a city that, in 2013, elected a hardcore socialist and a number of unrepentant progressives. How did we get from there to a Republican city prosecutor? Much of the answer can be found in the BLM protest, concentrated by CHOP, and its moment, a lockdown that suspended the economy. The combination (protests, lockdown) plunged not only Seattle but many American cities into a political confusion not experienced since surbanization. A homeless crisis caused by an obvious lack of really affordable housing exploded like never before.”

The Telegraph. “With nearly half a million home loan borrowers rolling their fixed-term loans every three months over the course of this year, the ratchet is tightening. As someone wryly pointed out recently, ‘When does your fixed rate end?’ has become the new ‘Have you watched any good box sets recently?’ go-to dinner party conversation starter. Investors are worried the UK has a particularly sticky inflation problem – both literally and metaphorically. Core inflation – the bit that central banks focus on because it excludes volatile elements they can’t influence much like food and fuel – is higher in the UK than in any other G7 country.”

“Given that the Bank of England is widely perceived to have been asleep at the controls when inflation first took hold, the assumption is that policymakers will err on the side of being overly vigorous in attempting to stamp out price rises in the coming months. That’s leading to higher mortgage costs. ‘The Bank of England is caught between a rock and a hard place, as it has to choose between pushing more mortgage borrowers towards the brink and letting inflation run riot,’ says Laith Khalaf, head of investment analysis at AJ Bell.”

“The total value of UK homes hit £8.7 trillion last year, according to Savills. With so much of the nation’s wealth tied up in property, ever-increasing house prices over the past few years has helped bolster consumer confidence and ensured the cash register kept ringing even as other parts of the economy have struggled. What will happen if this last remaining prop gets kicked out from under us? We may soon find out.”

“Lara Poole, 37, has discovered this first hand. Having fixed in August 2021 for two years at 1.22 per cent on her one-bedroom flat in central London, she says she was ‘blithely unaware’ of how amazingly low the rates were – back then, she could have fixed for 10 years at below 1.1 per cent but didn’t want to feel ‘tied down.’ She’s just had to remortgage with a one-year fix at 5.63 per cent.”

“Mortgage approvals are already at their weakest level since the financial crisis. This means – almost unbelievably – even fewer people are seeking mortgages now than during the Covid lockdowns. The fixed rate deals of around 1.6 million households are due to expire between the beginning of this year and the end of next. These are borrowers who have, for the most part, only ever known low interest rates.”

“Mortgage rates are already higher than at any time since the financial crisis. Yes, they are still much lower than the nosebleed levels experienced in the late 1970s and 1980s when headline average mortgage rates were frequently in the low to mid teens. But any ‘back in my day’ comments can be quickly countered by the fact that today’s house prices are so astronomical that buyers have to take out much bigger (and much longer) loans to get on the housing ladder. During Margaret Thatcher’s time in No 10, homeowners were, on average, borrowing twice their annual income; today it is more like 4.5 times.”

From Bloomberg. “Economists are warning that the UK economy faces a sharp recession and a flood of job losses if interest rates hit the 6% level financial markets believe is on the cards. Household budgets are under increasing strain again as mortgage costs spike, while rocketing corporate insolvencies suggest firms, particularly the smaller ones that account for the bulk of employment, are struggling to cope with higher borrowing costs. As companies released staff they were hanging on to, unemployment would suddenly spike, said Raghuram Rajan, a former International monetary fund chief economist.”

“‘Then you have more unemployment than you want, because these things move in a non-linear fashion. Unemployment is terrible for demand and terrible for housing because unemployed workers who can’t make their mortgage payments will sell,’ he said.”

“Central banks have been trying to strike the perfect balance between tightening financial conditions enough to bring down inflation and going so far that they cause a crash. Persistently high prices and wages keep piling the pressure on the BOE to raise rates further, though, adding to the risk of a ‘policy error’ of doing more harm than necessary, said George Buckley, European economist at Nomura. In that event, Erik Britton, chief executive of Fathom Consulting, said the BOE would only have itself to blame for not moving against inflation fast enough early last year. ‘The BOE left it too long and was too vague about what it was trying to achieve,’ Britton said. ‘A deep recession will be seen as a failure.'”

From Vietnam Plus. “Ho Chi Minh housing is among the least affordable in the Asia Pacific region, with a median home price representing 32.5 times the median annual household income, said a report. Da Nang housing is the fourth least affordable with a median home price at 26.7 times the median annual household income. Many home buyers in HCM City are speculative investors who own multiple units, further pushing up prices, according to the report. Shenzhen in mainland China is the lowest in terms of home attainability with the highest median home prices at 35 times median household income, it noted.”

From News.com.au. “Aussie filmmaker Jack Toohey, who went viral last week with a video showing how much easier it was to buy a house in 1983, has released a follow-up pinpointing what he says is the ’cause’ of the current crisis. Toohey, whose initial video sparked a heated response from talkback radio callers demanding an end to ‘boomer bashing,’now agrees that we should not ‘squabble over which generation is to blame.'”

“He instead points the finger at the rise of ‘neoliberalism’ in the 1980s — raising the spectre of Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher — leading to the sell-off of public assets and underinvestment in public housing. ‘[Neoliberalism] views the world as economies first and societies second, which is minimising the role of government and removing safeguards in the belief that free, unregulated markets are more efficient,’ he says in the video. ‘Homes become investments, people become resources, policies become business plans. Back to 2023 and 40 years of neoliberalism has created staggering inequality — like, holy hell.'”

“He continues that ‘successive neoliberal governments from both sides of politics have defected [sic] their responsibility to plan for the future, instead opting to make a quick buck from the sale of our assets.’ ‘They’ve sold off public land, roads, air, education, rail, communications, banks, energy, water, natural resources, health and housing, and leave us to squabble over which generation is to blame,’ he says. ‘All the while the cost of living continues to grow and so do profits. The revolving door between politics and big business continues to spin. We’re in a housing crisis yet the government is only committed to build an average of 4000 new affordable homes a year. If we built at the same per capita rate as we did in the ‘60s, it would be 150,000. The neoliberal experiment has failed.'”

“Sydney and Melbourne, where the median house price is now well over $1 million, consistently rank among the most unaffordable cities in the world, alongside the likes of Hong Kong, Vancouver and San Jose. In his original video, Toohey pointed out that ‘in 40 years, the average house price has increased by 14 times, whereas full-time salaries have only increased by 4.7 times.’ In other words, a person today would have to be making $300,000 a year to be in the same starting position as a homebuyer 40 years ago.”

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This Post Has 84 Comments

    2. Essentially they’re trying to normalize the idea of “you will be in debt in every way”. How come nobody asks “who owns the stuff then and why will they be happy?

  2. ‘[Neoliberalism] views the world as economies first and societies second, which is minimising the role of government and removing safeguards in the belief that free, unregulated markets are more efficient,’ he says in the video. ‘Homes become investments, people become resources, policies become business plans. Back to 2023 and 40 years of neoliberalism has created staggering inequality’

    I don’t agree with Jacks definition, but some of the conclusions are undeniable. If you ask a globalist scum what they are they’d say neoliberal. Which is not new and it’s not liberal.

    3. They always completely miss the fact that the money supply became untethered. Most of societies ill can be traced back to fake money. We will continue to swing wildly as we move towards hyperinflation and collapse. The only question is the timing. I believe most of us will miss out on the collapse but still have to play the game we were born into.

      1. I believe most of us will miss out on the collapse but still have to play the game we were born into.

        “There is a great deal of ruin in a nation.” – Adam Smith

  3. ‘The combination (protests, lockdown) plunged not only Seattle but many American cities into a political confusion not experienced since surbanization’

    Oh they threw all kinds of things at us all at once didn’t they? Destroy the global economy – we gotta curb the envelope! We’re all gonna die if we don’t let people needing surgery die while the nurses make dancing videos! We’re never going back to normal, right Jerry and the rest of the central banking scum said in unison.

    Censorship replaced free speech. Mandatory experimental gene therapy injections. Entire cities burning and we’ve never found out who set that all up. And the media sits there asking why is everything so fooked up?

    2. “And the media sits there asking why is everything so fooked up?”

      Indeed. Official narrative has replaced investigative journalism.

  4. ‘Economists are warning that the UK economy faces a sharp recession and a flood of job losses if interest rates hit the 6% level financial markets believe is on the cards’

    6% is probably half the current inflation on that sh$tty little island. When Bernanke made the decision to react to a housing crash caused by artificially low interest rates and too much money printing, by doubling down on the exact same things, lots of people asked how the hell is that going to work? Now we know.

    1. The globalist billionaire and hundred millionaire scvm want everything – every asset, commodity and enjoyable corner of the globe to themselves. And after that they want to cull a large portion of the human race. These people are evil. Period.

  5. ‘AT&T is the latest retailer to announce they are vacating a prime real estate location in San Francisco near Union Square. The reasoning behind the closure may sound like a broken record by now’

    I remember when the broken record in K-fnia was ‘shack prices to the moon Alice!’ Now yer stepping over needles with poop on yer shoes hoping you don’t get mugged. How the mighty have fallen.

    1. If you want to fully understand why SF will not be fixed any time soon all you need is this short clip of the mayor responding to a mostly (he’s a loon too) reasonable question from a council member. The question begins around the 1 minute mark:

      https://youtu.be/72295fvAcc0?t=59

      There is no solution when you keep electing people like this.

      2. I thought San Francisco Mayor London Breed’s sister was an astronaut who wanted to explore strange new worlds; to seek out new life and new civilizations; to boldly go where no man has gone before!

        1. The woman loves to bring up how she overcame insurmountable odds to be in a position to destroy San Francisco.

  6. A reader sent these in:

    I remember when you could get a car for less than an Apple Vision Pro

    https://twitter.com/GuyDealership/status/1668733446775091201

    Inflation is at its lowest in 2 years. Time to reminisce: 2008 Kia Optima. 153k miles. 5 years ago: $1,500. 15 months ago: $6,400.

    https://twitter.com/GuyDealership/status/1668609519037956098

    Auto lending is experiencing a once-in-a-decade contraction. But, as a dealer, it feels like 2 of the deepest subprime lenders are actually *ramping up*. Their names? Westlake Financial and Credit Acceptance. They’re either the smartest or dumbest in the room. Time will tell.

    https://twitter.com/GuyDealership/status/1667908453824593921

    People also forget that US Unemployment Rate on April 1929 was 0.7%…

    https://twitter.com/INArteCarloDoss/status/1669742014936543232

    People forget that the http://dot.com blow-off top came a few weeks after Fed increased it’s B/S by double digits by injecting liquidity into the system out of fear of Y2K collapse. Well, this AI craze came on the heels of SVB collapse and more Fed liquidity + TGA draw-down. Nothing new under the sun.

    https://twitter.com/INArteCarloDoss/status/1669741636639653888

    Already has been spreading. Trashy hosts have been infiltrating communities where neighbors have $ & means to enforce code violations. I’m watching an attorney in a Sarasota community enforce injunctions & sue AirBnB.

    https://twitter.com/TrishaFLsun/status/1669844972802023430

    Might this be the start of a trend that spreads to other cities to mitigate crime? “20 % of STRs have received a 311 or 911 call in the last 4 months compared to 9% for non-STRs. We cannot ignore that.”

    https://twitter.com/DiMartinoBooth/status/1669815858305040385

    Office Bloodbath Is Near With Banks in Retreat @business A day of reckoning is coming for lower quality office buildings over the next few years and it will be made worse by tightening credit at US regional banks says the head of one of Canada’s largest institutional investors

    https://twitter.com/danjmcnamara/status/1669363701898420226

    Real estate data is filtered through “it’s a great time to buy” before it is shared with the public. If it shows this, we see it, if it doesn’t, we don’t. That’s why the metrics we are given always change.

    https://twitter.com/joshbickford/status/1669863099631910912

    At what point are you basically a renter..“I’ve had many clients with amortizations, that are 70, 80, even 90 years remaining, in the extreme cases, and that’s simply because their payments are not going towards any principle at all”

    https://twitter.com/mortimer_1/status/1669824302399778817

    Shift in county-level home prices through the first 5 months of 2023.

    https://twitter.com/NewsLambert/status/1669847347755466754

    Housing market braces for wave of forced selling

    https://twitter.com/macro_business/status/1669525364958429184

    Since COVID over a Million homes will be built by 2024. Do you still think we have a shortage?

    https://twitter.com/geoeconomic10/status/1669782030794498054

    🗣️”The root of all evil in this country is the astronomical price of housing.” @matt_barrie joined us on today’s episode to talk about The Great Australian Scream – in other words, his thoughts on how house prices are impacting the cost of living and the Australian dream. 🏡

    https://twitter.com/EquityMates/status/1669125402311409664

    “The thinking was that offering homes to rent would be attractive to (translated: a perfect way to financialize more housing stock and prey upon) people who may have damaged credit from the housing crisis.” 🤑

    https://twitter.com/dfwaaronlayman/status/1669677678339801089

    I’ve been saying this since last year. Housing supply was never the real issue, speculative demand fuelled by money printing and ultra low interest rates was the issue. Why did it take them so long to report this?

    https://twitter.com/JonFlynnREstats/status/1669365139550744579

    Pb&j sandwiches in LaGuardia are $14, and I just watched somebody buy one. Brb revising up my personal terminal rate forecast.

    https://twitter.com/jeannasmialek/status/1669321067486224384

    Price cuts on boomer fart boxes in Northern Virginia are coming fast and furious and deep.

    https://twitter.com/JoeChrysostom/status/1669402410240884744

    If this doesn’t sum up every student loan whiner

    https://twitter.com/GRomePow/status/1669356206165757954

    Houston home sales slid for the 14th consecutive month in May. Median prices down 3.1%, a fourth consecutive month of lower year-over-year prices. Many TX markets experiencing record high property taxes with lower real home values. Oops!

    https://twitter.com/dfwaaronlayman/status/1669130044877275138

    I wonder what it could possibly be? 🧐

    https://twitter.com/ToxicBitcoiner/status/1669016042612432899

    Imagine having the ability to click a few buttons and get a 5% return on risk free govt bonds, and instead invested in an apartment complex.

    https://twitter.com/LumberTrading/status/1668981077359185923

    Been driving past this property regularly for the past 3.5 months and zero activity. Seeing more & more of this situation.

    https://twitter.com/TrishaFLsun/status/1668971853216399360

    “A de­cline in ask­ing rent over a 12-month pe­riod has only happened one other time since the 2008 fi­nan­cial cri­sis…when the rental mar­ket briefly dipped in 2020 be­cause of the out­break of Covid-19”

    https://twitter.com/m3_melody/status/1668942218009231362

    I keep hearing that businesses are crying out for workers and hence we need a huge immigration program. Yet these same businesses won’t pay wages that are higher than they were in 2012? Mmm…

    https://twitter.com/DrCameronMurray/status/1668919378518368256

    Visited an open house in McKinney, TX. It was empty. Listed for $650k in 2018. Listed for $1.2M now. Nobody showed up. You can buy a similar sized new build 10 mins away in the same school district for $700k & interest rate buy downs. Builders > mom & pop investors

    https://twitter.com/akm515/status/1668796343731597312

    Here comes Waterloo with the tax hikes …We ready?!? What happens to the 2M sh$tboxes y’all purchased out there?!? Y’all got the extra 2K?!!

    https://twitter.com/ManyBeenRinsed/status/1669754154263228422

    Coming to a country near you … Like we didn’t see this coming 12 months ago.

    https://twitter.com/ManyBeenRinsed/status/1669497030174031878

    Housing bulls when Bank of Canada dropped the 25bps stink bomb after pausing for 4 months 👇🏽

    https://twitter.com/ManyBeenRinsed/status/1669317203416498176

    1. Coming to a country near you … Like we didn’t see this coming 12 months ago.

      “a cost of living crisis”

      These liberal hacks and their central bank grifters caused this whole thing. And the media has been covering for them the entire time. Only when honest conversations can be had, and the people who caused these problems get fired and held accountable, will things improve.

  7. $135,000 2 bd 2ba 1,298 sqft
    Price cut: $4K (6/16)
    1954 W Riverbend Cir, Bullhead City, AZ 86442

    https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1954-W-Riverbend-Cir-Bullhead-City-AZ-86442/8357996_zpid/

    Date Event Price
    6/16/2023 Price change $135,000-2.9% $104/sqft

    5/31/2023 Price change $139,000-12.6% $107/sqft

    5/18/2023 Listed for sale $159,000+17.9% $122/sqft

    5/4/2020 Listing removed $134,900 $104/sqft

    4/28/2020 Price change $134,900-3.6% $104/sqft

    3/10/2020 Price change $139,900+5.3% $108/sqft

    2/1/2020 Listed for sale $132,900+101.4% $102/sqft

    4/14/2014 Listing removed $66,000 $51/sqft

    12/12/2013 Listed for sale $66,000+209.1% $51/sqft

    7/4/2013 Listing removed $600

    6/4/2013 Listed for rent $600-11.1%

    4/2/2013 Listing removed $675 $1/sqft

    1/4/2013 Price change $675+12.5% $1/sqft

    12/28/2012 Price change $600-11.1%

    11/28/2012 Listed for rent $675 $1/sqft

    10/4/2012 Sold $21,350-37% $16/sqft

    7/26/2012 Price change $33,900-7.9% $26/sqft

    6/16/2012 Price change $36,800-33% $28/sqft

    6/14/2012 Listed for sale —

    4/10/2012 Sold $54,915+104.1% $42/sqft

    3/24/2012 Price change $26,900-10% $21/sqft

    2/24/2012 Listed for sale $29,900+75.9% $23/sqft

    6/17/2003 Sold $17,000-29.2% $13/sqft

    10/17/2002 Sold $24,000 $18/sqft

    2. Looks like something you’d find in the lowest-bidder CCP quarantine camp, but less charming.

    3. LOL at that Barn Door medicine cabinet in the bathroom, #21 of 28. Ben is right, not much curb appeal. Also needs a couple chickens standing on some kids toys, IMHO.

    3. Clean up on Isle 3 – Clean up on Isle 3

      Why did Biden say ‘God save the Queen, man’ during CT visit?
      Connecticut Public Radio

      Published June 17, 2023 at 12:09 PM EDT

      As he wrapped up his appearance at Friday’s gun safety summit in Connecticut, President Biden said: “God save the Queen, man.” That generated a lot of social media attention – and confusion.

      Video of his remarks were quickly shared via social media and “God save the Queen” was trending on Twitter. Queen Elizabeth II died last year and her son, Charles, became king.

      Later on Friday, a White House spokesperson offered an explanation for Biden’s remarks.

      “He couldn’t do the full ropeline due to weather, and was commenting to someone in the crowd,” deputy press secretary Olivia Dalton told reporters in an email.

      https://www.ctpublic.org/news/2023-06-17/why-did-biden-say-god-save-the-queen-man-during-ct-visit

    4. As long as Fetterman is around all they have to do is trot them out together and he looks like a genius.

        3. Fetterman’s not the problem. The real problem is his voters. Our fellow American’s.

  11. Uncle Buck is doing so poorly that the lowly Mexican Peso is appreciating against it. Less than a year ago it took almost 21 Pesos to buy a Dollar. Now it only takes 17 Pesos.

        1. Ok most of them are drugs

          Not really. 2 million vehicles per year are exported to the US. Lots of petrochemicals, appliances, electronics, produce, etc. too.

  13. “borrowing twice their annual income; today it is more like 4.5 times.”

    4.5 times?!! What are you complaining about. In my neck of the woods (somewhere out West) median household income just a shade over 60K. Entry level homes…I repeat ENTRY….start at 500k. Assuming a 10% down that’s borrowing what?….around 8 times income for the cheapest home in this hood? And since I’m using numbers for the cheapest homes we know that number is more like 10 times. Let’s do it the other way. At todays rates that’s roughly $3500+ PITI. Without any other debt or other expenses tallied in that close to 70% of your monthly nut. Yeah….that’s totally sustainable. Nothing to worry about here.

    1. Yup. 10x median household income doesn’t even get you a decent house around here. You have to go closer to 20x median income.

  14. Re: Core inflation – the bit that central banks focus on

    Instead of focusing on price inflation which is the effect, they will forever keep chasing their tails unless they understand and focus on its cause which is monetary inflation resulting from the combination of Fiat (say-so/fake/counterfeit) money created out of thin air with an intrinsic value to match (smoke) and foisted upon the public at the gunpoint of Legal Tender Law which is exacerbated by the Fractional Reserve system (mirrors/renting the same apartment to multiple tenants in the hope they will never meet) which forms the basis of today’s economics with its completely predictable outcome . . .

  15. There’s no way I’m taking down this chimney by myself, it’s too dangerous. I can work on demo on the part of the house that’s slab on grade.

      1. Kudos to the crew that did the brickwork on that chimney, it is not on the list of things we lost in the fire.

        Think that demo job through several times and push or pull once, gravity is going to be working overtime when the top of that sucker comes down.

    2. Just hook it up to your truck with a chain and pull. Make sure to set up cameras first so we can enjoy the show. 😉

    3. That’s nothing, my friend. Throw a noose around it using some 17k lb tow rope from Tractor Supply, making sure it anchors near the flashing at the mid-section, hook it up to a 1 ton truck and just creep forward in low range. She’ll collapse and come down easy.

    4. Probably a local excavator guy around with a tracked excavator and a dump truck willing to do a day or two job. easy peasy. esp for cash.

      1. “Throw a noose around it using some 17k lb tow rope from Tractor Supply”

        Just pickup a US-made Javelin anti-tank weapon on the black maket and take that sucker down with one squeeze of the trigger.

        Western weapons in Ukraine leaking to black market, says report

        Sunday, April 23, 2023

        The Pulitzer Prize winner, speaking to Afshin Rattansi on his program ‘Going Underground,’ said the West is aware of this black market trade, as some reports about missing arms shipments have even appeared in the US media.

        Hersh claimed that, according to his data, almost immediately after the conflict broke out between Kiev and Moscow last February, “Poland, Romania, other countries on the border were being flooded with weapons we [the US and allies] were shipping for the war to Ukraine.”

        https://www.thecitizen.co.tz/tanzania/news/international/western-weapons-in-ukraine-leaking-to-black-market-says-report-4211222

    5. We took down a chimney using a tractor and some chain. Came down easy as pie. Way simpler and more straightforward than we thought it would be. I have a great slow-mo video I took of it because I expected something disastrous and I wanted to capture it.

  16. “Toohey, whose initial video sparked a heated response from talkback radio callers demanding an end to ‘boomer bashing,’now agrees that we should not ‘squabble over which generation is to blame.’”

    “He instead points the finger at the rise of ‘neoliberalism’ in the 1980s — raising the spectre of Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher”

    Sounds like either he only blurted out the truth by accident in the first place, or someone paid him a visit.

    By the way, since Reagan and Thatcher caused all this, who does he think voted them into office? Xers were in elementary school.

    1. By the way, since Reagan and Thatcher caused all this, who does he think voted them into office? Xers were in elementary school.

      What good does trying to figure out who or what is to blame for the current situation? Totally useless exercise. Where is this all going and is there any way that all of this can be repaired is a better use of energy.

      1. What good does trying to figure out who or what is to blame for the current situation? Totally useless exercise.

        Nope, very useful exercise. You can’t fix a problem without identifying the cause, and eradicating it. These people need to be held to account.

        1. Agreed. We know how to fix San Francisco, but the people in charge make it impossible.

          1. Agreed. We know how to fix San Francisco, but the people in charge make it impossible.

            Who put those “people in charge”? Did they just drop out of the sky? With the complexities of modern societies, there never is a “cause” or set of “causes” for an event or situation. Take Hitler and Germany in the 1930s. How did Hitler take control like he did? Or look at China–the “Great Leap Forward”, what was behind that? Millions and millions of people died. Surely, good ole Adolf and Mao did kill them, lots of people were involved.

            A simple explanation is that human beings can quickly turn into mobs and mobs can easily turn into ruthless killers. That’s always been the case throughout history. That may be part of the problem today. The problems seen today here have lots of similarities to events seen throughout history and the Bible. How is it going to be possible to fix this?

          2. ‘human beings can quickly turn into mobs and mobs can easily turn into ruthless killers’

            Nobody has calculated how many people died waiting on surgery when hospitals were closed, although NPRs first report on it said 5000 to 10,000. How many suicides/ODs/domestic violence from the lockdowns? I haven’t seen any numbers. We are just a short time away from when politicians were getting on their knees in the capital and vowing to abolish police with no realistic plan to replace them.

          3. Who put those “people in charge”?

            Voters, and so far there seems to be no will to remove them. Witness how Chicago chose to replace mayor Frogface with someone even worse.

          4. “We are just a short time away from when politicians were getting on their knees in the capital and vowing to abolish police with no realistic plan to replace them.”

            Indeed. Our politicians reacting to doting dad, George Floyd, out shopping with counterfeit currency while high on an illegal drug laced suppository self inserted in his rectum, and then combative and resisting arrest dies from a fentanyl overdose, and we put the arresting officer, Derek Chauvin, in prison?

  17. Yet another Biden / Mayorkas gift to the United State of America

    Florida Police: Illegal Alien Kidnapped, Beat, Raped Woman in ‘Sadistic’ Attack

    JOHN BINDER
    17 Jun 2023

    Julio Velazquez, an illegal alien who arrived at the United States-Mexico border in 2021, was arrested by the Lee County Sheriff’s Office and charged with sexual assault and kidnapping after allegedly picking up a woman from a nightclub, taking her to a wooded location, and beating and raping her before she eventually fled.

    According to police, the woman was leaving the Romance Nightclub at around 6:00 a.m. on Saturday when she got into Velazquez’s vehicle, which she, at the time, believed was a taxi cab.

    While the woman first believed Velazquez was taking her to her residence, she told police she quickly realized he was headed in a different direction, and they eventually ended up in a wooded area where the illegal alien allegedly demanded she get out of the vehicle.

    From there, the woman said she attempted to fight Velazquez off of her with a broken bottle, but he overpowered her, beat her up, and raped her. Marceno said the woman was left “violently battered and bruised” with “bone-chilling” injuries.

    “Even though it’s a poor choice to get into a vehicle with someone you don’t know, that gives no one the right, nobody the right, to act this way,” Marceno said. “This criminal behavior is sickening.”

    Police allege that Velazquez, while raping the woman, was strangling her and threatened to kill her. The woman said she eventually escaped and ran into a wooded area nearby, where she hid for hours before running to a neighborhood and asking residents for help.

    https://www.breitbart.com/crime/2023/06/17/florida-police-illegal-alien-kidnapped-beat-raped-woman-in-sadistic-attack/

    1. Even though it’s a poor choice to get into a vehicle with someone you don’t know, that gives no one the right, nobody the right, to act this way

      Experience keeps a dear school, but fools will learn in no other.

    1. I’ve heard numbers closer to $20 to $30 million between the two of them. And the silence continues from:

      New York Times
      Washington Post
      The Guardian
      ABC
      NBC
      CBS
      CNN
      NPR

      Et cetera…

  20. ‘Given that the Bank of England is widely perceived to have been asleep at the controls when inflation first took hold, the assumption is that policymakers will err on the side of being overly vigorous in attempting to stamp out price rises in the coming months’

    Or you could characterize it as, if you hit the brakes late, stuff happens.

    3. policymakers will err on the side of being overly vigorous in attempting to stamp out price rises

      Now that’s a knee slapper!

  21. “Research from real estate investment firm Amherst Group, as cited in Forbes, shows that the housing market is overvalue by as much as 40%.”

    It will only take a prive decline of 0.4/1.4 = 28.6% to reverse the overvaluation.

  22. At California Pizza Kitchen, a popular affordably priced family restaurant in our area. My wife showed up early expecting a long wait.

    Instead, it’s half empty on a Saturday night, an early warning sign of recession.

    1. Forbes
      Consumers Bracing For A Deep Recession, According To New Survey
      Gary Drenik
      Contributor
      Jun 16, 2023,10:00am EDT
      Recession Concerns

      As high inflation persists and interest rates are rising, Americans are concerned about the current economy and a future recession. According to Nationwide’s 2023 Economic Impact survey, more than two-thirds of Americans (68%) expect a recession within the next six months and nearly 80% of those who do, expect it to be severe.

      I met with Nationwide Chief Economist Kathy Bostjancic to discuss these findings, as well as her economic outlook for the remainder of the year and what tradeoffs consumers are making to afford heightened expenses.

      Gary Drenik: The majority of consumers are predicting a deep recession within the next 6 months – with many expecting it to be as bad or even worse than the Great Recession of 2007-09. As an economist, what is your outlook on a recession and what would you say to people to help quell their fears?

      Kathy Bostjancic: It’s understandable that consumers are fearing a recession. So far this year, we have experienced elevated inflation, trouble in the banking sector and multiple consecutive interest rate hikes. What is currently keeping us out of a recession is the strong labor market. If it continues to hold up and earnings don’t tank, we may be able to avoid a hard landing. But we’re already starting to see cracks in the labor market with a slight increase in jobless claims.
      …
      https://www.forbes.com/sites/garydrenik/2023/06/16/consumers-bracing-for-a-deep-recession-according-to-new-survey/?sh=6dd826335a35

    2. a popular affordably priced family restaurant

      I’ll bet it costs close to $100 to take a family to eat there.

    1. The Financial Times
      Chinese equities
      Investors sour on Beijing’s bid to boost state-owned enterprises
      Government tried to increase valuations by emphasising socialist credentials but rally in shares has fizzled out
      The Shanghai Stock Exchange has said it considers it an important task to drive up the share price of state-owned enterprises such as banks
      Sun Yu in Beijing
      June 17 2023

      Beijing’s bid to persuade investors to value its giant state-owned enterprises according to their socialist credentials, rather than by conventional western capitalist measures, has flopped after a rally in their shares fizzled this month.

      The stocks rose after officials in November called for the creation of a “valuation system with Chinese characteristics” that departed from traditional market methods by recognising the merits of “Communist party corporate governance”.

      To bolster the move, government-backed asset managers set up 16 mutual funds, nine of them index-linked, with a mandate to invest in state-owned listed companies.
      …

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