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The Owners Are Not Making Anything, They Are Losing And Even Then We Are Not Getting Offers

A report from WFTV in Florida. “Residents in one Orlando condominium complex are fighting back after their condo association board asked each homeowner to pay more than $11,000 for a special assessment fee, due in just 3 months. Owners at the Regency Gardens Condominiums got notices saying their board planned to pass a special assessment on May 15th. Residents told Channel 9 they want to see that board replaced because of how they handled that special assessment and the association’s budget. ‘This has caused a lot of people a lot of anxiety and sleepless nights,’ said Bryan Pricher, a homeowner who led the effort to collect petition signatures. Channel 9 told you before that owners were worried about foreclosure and looking to sell their units after the special assessment was announced.”

From Moneywise. “A young Florida woman is afraid she’s going to have to sell her home after her cash-strapped condo association proposed a one-off fee for unit owners of up to $22,000 to fill its reserve coffers. Orlando-based Britney Brawdy, aged 23, took to TikTok on Sunday, May 5, to share her horrific HOA (homeowners’ association) fee plight. ‘Myself and hundreds of my neighbors need desperate help,’ Brawdy said in the clip. ‘We are facing something that is quite literally unfathomable, unimaginable.’ Brawdy bought her 810-square-foot condo unit in 2022. She described the purchase as ‘a huge deal’ because she was only 21-years-old at the time and not many Americans of that age have the opportunity to buy their own property. ‘It was great up until April 23 of this year when everything started going completely downhill,’ she said. ‘That’s when we were provided a letter in the mail that literally has pretty much changed all of our lives.'”

The Real Deal. “A receiver took over an embattled Pembroke Pines condo association that residents allege was long mismanaged by former board members, The Real Deal has learned. The lakefront Heron Pond complex, consisting of 19 two-story beige buildings, has been repeatedly slammed by the city over structural safety issues. Since last summer, Pembroke Pines officials ordered the evacuation of six buildings and 26 units in seven other buildings, rendering 122 of the 304 units uninhabitable, according to city records. Aging condo complexes across South Florida are grappling with paying for costly, legally mandated repairs and recertifications, as well as dealing with strict compliance deadlines imposed by new condo safety laws.”

“But some Heron Pond unit owners say their complex is in disrepair due to a ploy by ex-board members. In court filings, Heron Pond unit owners allege individuals used a secret entity, Federated Foundation Trust, to amass at least 109 units, took a majority on the board of directors, and then mismanaged the complex as a possible scheme to drive down the value of units and the complex. In the meantime, unit owners like Clarissa Florival-Victor are reeling in the aftermath of the alleged yearslong mismanagement. ‘Right now I am paying rent and my mortgage and association fees [of $540 a month]. I am paying over $5,000 a month, including everything,’ Florival-Victor said. ‘I just want this to be over soon. It’s financially devastating. The community is not what it was.'”

The Denver Post. “Coloradans looking to buy homes or simply hold onto their property face a barrage of challenges. You can add surging home insurance rates to the pile of problems eroding the landscape of affordable housing options. People are getting the bad news that their policies won’t be renewed. And condo owners are getting hit with special assessments and higher dues because premiums are skyrocketing for homeowners associations. The groups must often resort to non-standard carriers, which typically charge sky-high rates for lesser coverage. There were plenty of insurance options for Bryan Watts and his wife when they bought a house in Guffey in Park County, west of Cripple Creek. The premium was about $2,000 in 2019 and rose gradually to $2,522 for the 2023-2024 policy year.”

“Watts found one of the big-name companies willing to write a policy for $4,800. Like a lot of people, Watts has a mortgage on his house, which means he needs to carry insurance. ‘There are going to be very few people who are able to live out here without a mortgage,’ he said. The HOA where Jon Christianson has a rental unit saw its insurance premium leap from the $167,000 budgeted last year to nearly $607,000. His fees doubled, ‘with a special assessment coming,’ he said. Then the insurance for Christianson’s primary residence rose by 40%. ‘I’ve never filed a claim. I’ve been with same insurance company for five years,’ Christianson said. ‘This is becoming unsustainable.'”

WCSC in South Carolina. “Homeowners in Berkeley and Dorchester Counties say their new homes built by D.R. Horton are practically falling apart, despite county inspectors signing off on them months prior to moving in. In April of 2022, Dave Preston and his wife spent hundreds of thousands of dollars and moved into the French Quarter Creek neighborhood in Huger. He says upon moving in, the house was horrific with toilets backing up, outlets not working and parts of the home unfinished. ‘They [D.H. Horton] were trying to do too much, too fast. The quality’s horrendous,’ Preston said. ‘They played the blame game saying people were taking too many showers; the septic system couldn’t handle the load. I thought, ‘Wait a minute, this is a beautiful development.’ Well, it’s supposed to be a beautiful development, with houses that are fairly expensive, and things won’t work.'”

“In 2021, Scott Molway and his family moved into a Summerville neighborhood with their home being built in 2019. Two months after moving in, the roof buckled. The roof buckled again in February of 2023, and again in January of 2024. The Molways lost 70 shingles, damaging the inside of their office. The entire ceiling ended up needing to be replaced. The most recent roofing problem came with a $17,500 price tag. ‘They don’t build these homes in months or years anymore; they build them in weeks. It’s crazy how quickly they pop up, and as soon as they pop up, the builders are gone,’ Molway said. ‘Everything’s on the homeowner, and they don’t know all the shoddy work that goes on behind the scenes. How are we going to afford to do this, again?'”

The Decatur Daily in Alabama. “Work on an already controversial addition of the Foxwood Farm subdivision in the Burningtree area has been at a standstill for close to six months, according to neighbors, and dozens of lawsuits have been filed statewide against the developer. Shells of close to a dozen unfinished homes, blue containers filled with wood and other debris, construction materials and portable restrooms line the new street connected to Foxwood Drive Southeast. ‘Nothing has been going on for months. I don’t remember the last time I saw something happening there. It seems like to me … it was before Christmas,’ Kiowa Trail resident Faye Anderson said of Foxwood Farm. Her home is adjacent to the new subdivision. ‘It’s so ugly,’ Anderson said. ‘It’s an eyesore. I’ll have friends who come to visit, and they’ll make comments about how ugly it is.'”

CBS Dallas in Texas. “Kim Kromdyk doesn’t have solar panels. Not one. A couple of years ago, she did consider them. She even made an appointment with a salesperson. By the next morning, she’d made up her mind. ‘I called him and told him that I had just thought about it, and I decided … I don’t want to go through with this,’ Kromdyk said. ‘And he said ‘fine.’ That was the end of the story. Or so she thought. Earlier this year, when Kromdyk tried refinancing her home, her mortgage lender noticed a problem: all three credit bureaus showed she had taken out a loan for solar panels and there was a lien on her property. Mosaic provided Kromdyk’s attorney with a copy of a contract for solar panels it says she signed. Kromdyk insists she didn’t sign it. And when she saw it? ‘Well, I wanted to cry.’ For months, she says she’s felt stuck unable to sell or even refinance her home, all because of solar panels she’s never seen, never bought and to the best of her knowledge, never owned.”

From Newsweek. “California homeowners are facing an ongoing squatter crisis across Los Angeles. Thousands of homes are being invaded by squatters who live in them without paying rent, and many cause major property damage or even physical injury to property owners, according to Daniel Yukelson, executive director of the Apartment Association of Greater Los Angeles. Many squatters specifically go after homeowners who fell behind on payments and went into default and abandoned the property. ‘Many of these homes never actually completed the foreclosure process, so the homes were left vacant with the lender thinking that the home is still occupied by the borrower and the borrower thinking they lost their ownership interest due to the default, therefore making them a perfect squatter’s target,’ said Alan Chang, founder of Vested Title & Escrow.”

“The squatting crisis tends to be more challenging in blue states, which often pass laws advocating for tenant protection against what many perceive as overly greedy landlords. ‘The generalization is that landlords are a faceless corporation that is out for profit, but there are thousands of mom-and-pop real estate investors that are getting hit hard and losing their principal income streams due to these more known tactics now,’ Chang said.”

CTV News in Canada. “An Ontario man found out that a line of credit he thought was insured actually isn’t after his wife of 50 years died. ‘When I found out I wasn’t insured, I was just devastated,’ said John Richards of Uxbridge, Ont. Richards said he and his wife Sandra wanted to take out a Home Equity Line of Credit (HELOC) for $150,000, but they said they also wanted to have life insurance on the loan in case anything happened. It’s estimated about eight million Canadians have a HELOC as a way to tap into the capital of their homes and access money for renovations, trips or general expenses. In 2018, Richards said, his wife was 69 years old when she signed for a $150,000 HELOC and he said they both thought the line of credit came with life insurance.”

“But when Sandra died in November of 2023, Richards found out the line of credit was not covered by life insurance. Their bank has a policy to terminate life insurance when a customer turns 70 years of age. ‘I had no idea they could say, ‘At 70, well we are not insuring you anymore,’ said Richards. who explained he was not aware he wasn’t paying insurance premiums because he thought the insurance was included in his monthly interest payments which are now almost $800 per month. Richards said he wishes he would have known about the policy as paying the money back will be difficult. ‘I can’t pay that off. I’m sitting here on a fixed income. If I have to pay that off I could be dead by that time,’ said Richards.”

From BBC News. “Kasun Kalirai feels ‘stuck’, struggling to sell the flat he loves, that he would never have put on the market had it not been for the service charge of £4,300 per year – up more than four times since he moved in. He has become numb to the bills and admits feeling powerless in the face of the increasing costs. So why have these eco apartments in Peterborough been left with service charges ‘spiralling out of control?’ The increase in service charge Kasun pays to the management company appointed by the developers, Premier Estates – one of the UK’s largest – has been ‘really significant.’ It has risen from about £900 a year when he moved in to where it stands now.”

“Donna Nicholls bought her flat under a shared ownership scheme run by Cross Keys and had a leak on-and-off in her flat for about four years, before it was fixed in December. Donna, 40, said last year it was £87 per month, down from an average of about £250 per month, so she had been expecting a rise, but when she opened her letter in March it was £445. ‘I was upset, angry, I just couldn’t stop crying. I got on the phone straight away to Cross Keys. I just knew I was going to struggle,’ she said.”

“Back at Spring View, Kasun said it was the second time in three years he had put his flat on the market. But viewings are low and the feedback is the same. ‘It’s too expensive – £4,300 a year is out of a lot of people’s budgets, so it’s becoming increasingly difficult to sell,’ he said. People questioned him about speaking to the media while his house was on the market, but he said: ‘I feel the information needs to be out there. A lot of leaseholders, there’s four million of us out of there, feel like we’re stuck because the flats are becoming unsellable.'”

One Roof in New Zealand. “Some New Plymouth homeowners are slashing their asking prices by tens of thousands of dollars and those who bought at the peak of the market are selling at a loss if they need to move now. Agents told OneRoof the market is flat and buyers are in no hurry to buy because they have so much choice and might be able to pick up a bargain. First National salesperson Jamie Gemmell said some people were losing up to $150,000 if they bought two years ago in 2021 and had to sell now. While it was initially a bitter pill for some sellers to swallow, she said they eventually got their heads around the fact they were buying and selling in the same market so were also paying less for the next property. Other homeowners had been forced to reduce their asking prices, she said, and even then some were struggling to attract buyers who had plenty of choice and were in no rush to buy.”

“Gemmell is also selling brand-new homes such as the executive three-bedroom, two-bathroom home at 35 Sycamore Grove, in Vogeltown, priced at $1.095m, which she believes would cost more to build. ‘You couldn’t build them for what they are asking. The owners are not making anything, they are losing and even then we are not getting offers.'”

“ReMax New Plymouth sales manager Angela Maindonald said people were finding it harder to get finance and were having to sell their homes before they could move. In some cases, this had created long and complex buyer chains and meant houses were staying on the market for longer. ‘People by nature are at the moment very cautious and spending their money very carefully. They don’t want to buy what they perceive might be a lemon. So, if it’s an older home people don’t seem to want to do any work, they want everything modern and new and done.'”

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This Post Has 97 Comments

  1. It’s FB Sunday!

    ‘‘They [D.H. Horton] were trying to do too much, too fast. The quality’s horrendous,’ Preston said. ‘They played the blame game saying people were taking too many showers; the septic system couldn’t handle the load’

    Ah-HA Dave, you are eating!

    1. “They played the blame game saying people were taking too many showers”

      Thanks for the Sunday morning chuckle. Pure comedy there.

  2. ‘Thousands of homes are being invaded by squatters who live in them without paying rent, and many cause major property damage or even physical injury to property owners…Many squatters specifically go after homeowners who fell behind on payments and went into default and abandoned the property. ‘Many of these homes never actually completed the foreclosure process, so the homes were left vacant with the lender thinking that the home is still occupied by the borrower and the borrower thinking they lost their ownership interest due to the default, therefore making them a perfect squatter’s target’

    This is troubling Alan, cuz UHS say it’s red hotcakes. How could there be foreclosures, they can always sell in California!

      1. Dried lawn, weeds, old newspapers, etc., really stand out to these prowlers who roam neighborhoods like coyotes.

  3. ‘Shells of close to a dozen unfinished homes, blue containers filled with wood and other debris, construction materials and portable restrooms line the new street connected to Foxwood Drive Southeast. ‘Nothing has been going on for months. I don’t remember the last time I saw something happening there. It seems like to me … it was before Christmas,’ Kiowa Trail resident Faye Anderson said of Foxwood Farm. Her home is adjacent to the new subdivision. ‘It’s so ugly,’ Anderson said. ‘It’s an eyesore. I’ll have friends who come to visit, and they’ll make comments about how ugly it is’

    Are we there yet Faye?

  4. ‘unit owners like Clarissa Florival-Victor are reeling in the aftermath of the alleged yearslong mismanagement. ‘Right now I am paying rent and my mortgage and association fees [of $540 a month]. I am paying over $5,000 a month, including everything,’ Florival-Victor said. ‘I just want this to be over soon. It’s financially devastating. The community is not what it was’

    Well, it was cheaper than renting Clarissa. I have been saying for a long time these commie HOA deals are a rip off and then they got bust.

  5. “Everything’s on the homeowner, and they don’t know all the shoddy work that goes on behind the scenes. How are we going to afford to do this, again?’”

    And they didn’t even buy you breakfast in the morning. You’ve been schlonged!

  7. “California homeowners are facing an ongoing squatter crisis across Los Angeles”

    I’m all for it! Pick a blue state, find a home and occupy it. It’ll also teach the banks not to hold on to defaults. Spank the blue stated and the banks. Win-win!

  8. 80,000+ people came to see DJT in Wildwood, New Jersey yesterday. Pedo Joe can’t get more than ten people in a room to hear him mis-read off a teleprompter.

    81 million votes my @ss. The 2020 election was stolen.

      1. I still suspect that Joe will step down and be replaced by another candidate, possibly Gruesome.

  9. We have never seen this in The Villages Real Estate
    Realty Executives in The Villages

    Streamed 1 day ago

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yBs4Nb8YIy4

    17:35. This sh$thole is in Florida. From the comments:

    Lots of homes to choose from but MANY still way overpriced

    People are sick of high insurance costs

    Insurance costs and taxes are driving people away not counting the people that have to buy with a mortgage because of high interest rates

    Really great info! Florida is getting hit hard. Now that the pandemic is over and mandates are lifted, people are moving “back home”. They’re fed up with their pockets being drained. Thank you for the great video. Greetings from West Palm Beach ️

    Smart money wants to cash out before the music stops lol

    I live on Long Island near water and have flood insurance and been dropped by State Farm and was lucky to find small company to write policy.The number one reason I don’t think I can move to Florida is the homeowners insurance price and company after company leaving the state.This can be extremely stressful.

    Lots of new homes have come into the TV market because the developer is delivering new homes. Those new builds are for people that want a new home for the first time in their lives and sold up North and have cash. Our northeast market has no inventory because many people have dirt cheap interest rates and are stuck in the homes they have. So inventory in the northeast is low and expensive. Florida homeowner insurance cost make the homes more expensive not to mention that car insurance is double.Bottomline is that buyers in the TV want homes that have no issues. Done Done roofs, AC. Flooring, Kitchen and Baths, not to mention a decent lot.

    I guess there’s no way to really know but my guess is all of those biyers from the North are no longer able to sell their big expensive homes and bring their buckets 9f cash to TV. So sales will continue to slow. Then you have current TV owners who can no longer afford insurance or the new roof that insurance now requires and so they list their home. And of course, you have interest rates that for second homes is probably in the 7 to 8% range. Inventory will grow and prices will fall

    Hopefully retiring soon and praying my commercial property sells and want to move to TV…hopefully prices come down!

    I have to add a few more data points here as well (from the Federal Reserve Bank of St Louis). In the Villages, the Active Listing inventory levels are currently at similar levels as pre-covid (489 vs today’s 484). The big Red flag for anyone selling/buying a home is the median home price per square foot in 2019 was $160 vs today’s $255. I think its safe to assume the inventory levels and days on market statistics will trend North.

    The problem in Sarasota county is they are still building houses..too many for this market for sure

    People trying to take profits from prices doubling

    Better time to buy will be after this Fall when everyone figures out there will be NO rate cuts and inflation is still roaring.

    Next year price will be 50% less

    Sorry, I respectfully disagree with this is the good time to buy as home prices are +30% to high. For the true picture you have to look back past 2017 to set the normal market trend lines for all the data. It is so easy to look at prices history in Zillow to see the +40% home price increase between 2020-2022 (total artificial increase). I saw a home yesterday that sold a few months ago in the Villages for $700k and then listed for sale by the new owner 45 days later list for $1.4m. Pure greed. If you are waiting for mortgage interest rates to come down you have a couple of challenges. First the Fed has already stated they are still not confident the data supports decreases (i.e. will stay flat the rest of 2024) and the other is the Fed announce it was capping the amount of mortgage debt it buys meaning interest rates could go up without the Fed raising rates (the double whammy). The only thing that will make this market correct is the pricing needs to drop significantly. There will be sales as people that have to move will. If you can wait to buy, you might be better served to put the money into an investment vehicle (CDs at 5%) to generate a little bit of income until this market corrects.

    1. “If you can wait to buy, you might be better served to put the money into an investment vehicle (CDs at 5%) to generate a little bit of income until this market corrects.”

      That’s where I parked my shekels. I’m currently real estate free. Took that money and parked it CD’s and treasures. The money from those pays my rent and utilities with a good chunk after that going back into savings. With that money taking care of housing costs I can now devote a big chunk of my salary to more savings. No brainer.

      1. How are you getting around capital gains, assuming you had a good bit? Don’t you have 1-2 years to spend on more RE or pay up? I’ve never sold and didn’t spend the profit…it would be nice to do what you’re doing though. I can’t…too many toys and a basement of junk. And 4 dogs. Lol.

        I did have some friends that made out great on a condo in Charlotte on Lake Wylie….bought in the last RE crash for like 125k and sold for over 300k. They are in a nice apartment waiting out the next crash.

        2. What BlueSkye said. Common knowledge that two years of property being primary residence gets you completely tax exempt profit. After 1 year and tax ain’t that bad. Under a year and you’re hosed. What isn’t widely known is that even if you sell under 2 years there are all sorts of legal loopholes. There a tax code that has a list of exemptions. Change of job, moving to take care of elderly or infirm relatives, financial hardship, etc. You apply with IRS and he approve or disqualify. My wife and I don’t have kids and I’m a GC so we’ve built done the live-it-for-2-years-and-sell several times. Also rode out a couple bubbles renting instead of having to buy. We’ve done well, but it’s been a bit of bouncing around. We don’t mind it though. But here’s the thing….who cares about capital gains? Way overblown. If you’re paying capital gains it means you made money. And yeah I think it’s a scam and all that, but it ain’t gonna stop me from selling and taking profit when the time comes.

          1. Wow, a lot more to it than I thought. Capital gains is large when you made $500,000. I’ve a neighbor that did just that…they sold for 1.1 million and they are downsizing…just wondering how it works. Thanks for the info!

            My mom’s sister made a killer deal too….bought a Bank of America Executives home In blowing rock North Carolina. It was during the last recession And the house sold for 1.5 million and she picked it up around $700,000…..I think now it’s 2 million. But that’s a crazy market.

          2. I actually looked it up…jc….they are going to make out like bandit. It looks like $500,000 is exempt if you’re married and file jointly. Payday.

          3. Oh it’s great. Benefits mostly rich people who live in rich states who like to gamble with multiple shacks every few years and then do it again.

            If you want to make a profit from the sale of your house, you will owe capital gains taxes. However, there are some legal methods to minimize those taxes, such as: The 2-out-of-5-year rule: You don’t have to live in the house for years consecutively, but cumulatively. That helps you meet the use and ownership tests. As a result, you may qualify for an exclusion up to $250,000 as an individual or $500,000 as a joint filer.

            https://smartasset.com/taxes/avoid-capital-gains-tax-when-selling-house

          4. Never let the tax tail wag the dog. I smile when I write out my quarterly payments to the IRS and GA Dept. of Revenue. It means that I made money that quarter and I’m still keeping the majority of it. For now anyway.

          5. The thing is I wish we lived in a world where there weren’t bubbles, booms and crashes. But as long as they exist it’s better to ride the beast than to let it eat you alive. But I think this one will implode the whole thing. Who knows what it looks like on the other side of this one.

    2. ‘In the Villages, the Active Listing inventory levels are currently at similar levels as pre-covid (489 vs today’s 484). The big Red flag for anyone selling/buying a home is the median home price per square foot in 2019 was $160 vs today’s $255’

      Oh dear…

  10. Gallup — American Public Opinion and Vaccination Requirements (9/3/2021):

    “The variation across these party/vaccination status groups is extreme. For example, 96% of vaccinated Democrats favor the requirement for proof of vaccination before flying on an airplane, compared with 12% of unvaccinated Republicans. Ninety-four percent of vaccinated Democrats favor the requirement for attendance at events”

    https://news.gallup.com/poll/354506/update-american-public-opinion-vaccination-requirements.aspx

    Never forgive.

    Never forget.

    No amnesty.

    Only nooses ☠️

  11. IRS Threatens to Target Biden’s Critics, Those Who Question Washington’s ‘Ability to Govern’ (5/11/2024):

    “The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is threatening to come after individuals or organizations who question Joe Biden or the federal government’s “ability to govern,” it has confirmed.

    According to a report from independent journalist Ken Klippenstein, the IRS is planning to expand its investigative interests to those who threaten the federal government’s “ability to govern” or present a “threat to the public safety or national security interests of the United States.”

    https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2024/05/irs-threatens-target-bidens-critics-those-who-question/

    Ability to govern?

    You are living under an unelected, illegitimate, occupation regime. Democrat Party is a criminal domestic terrorist organization.

    And yes, the 2020 election was stolen.

    FJB

  12. Given the booming stock market and green shoots of recovery in housing and cryptocurrency, is it safe to ignore the Debbie Downers and back up the truck?

    1. From a 65% stock market crash to an imminent recession, here’s a roundup of recent high-profile bear forecasts
      Matthew Fox May 12, 2024, 2:12 AM PDT
      Two bears appear to converse with each other
      Sidra Monreal Burshteyn/Comedy Wildlife Awards

      Despite a stock market that’s less than 1% away from record highs, bearish forecasts are out in full force.
      Top economists and portfolio managers are warnings of everything from an imminent recession to the potential for a 65% stock-market crash.
      Outlined below are assorted high-profile bear forecasts from across Wall Street.

      Even with the stock market less than 1% away from a record high, top forecasters who have consistently leaned bearish can’t shake the idea that a painful decline is imminent.

      Some warn of an imminent recession following a weaker-than-expected April jobs report that coincided with a jump in weekly jobless claims, while others suggest a stock market crash similar to 1929 is about to happen.

      While these forecasts have fallen flat on their face so far, they’re still worth monitoring as a way for investors to poke potential holes in the consistently bullish narrative that the economy, corporate profits, and stock market are doing just fine.

      Here’s a roundup of the most recent bearish forecasts coming from Wall Street.

      Gary Shilling: Recession by year-end means 30% stock market plunge
      Wall Street veteran Gary Shilling told Business Insider this week that he expects a recession to materialize in the US economy by the end of the year as the labor market shows signs of weakening. And a weakening in the labor market will crush investor confidence and send the stock market falling by as much as 30%.

      “You look at all the kind of speculation that we’ve had out there, it’s indicative of a lot of overconfidence, and that usually gets corrected and corrected violently,” Shilling told BI’s Jennifer Sor. “I think that the safe bet is for a recession starting later this year if we’re not already in it.”

      Shilling is known for correctly identifying the US housing bubble in the mid-2000’s, though most of his consistently bearish views over the past decade have yet to pan out.

      John Hussman: A 65% stock-market crash wouldn’t be surprising
      John Hussman, president of the Hussman Investment Trust, issued a bearish warning on stocks this past week, arguing that the S&P 500 is trading at similar extremes seen in the run-up to the 1929 Great Depression as the fear-of-missing-out takes over investors.

      “Statistically, the current set of market conditions looks more ‘like’ a major bull market peak than any other point in the past century, with the possible exception of the 1929 peak,” Hussman said, adding that the combination of “extreme valuations, unfavorable market internals, and dozens of other factors” give him comfort in having a bearish outlook on the stock market.

      Hussman said he wouldn’t be surprised if the S&P 500 crashed 65%, which would erase a decade of stock market gains and put the index at about 1,800, or where it traded at back in February 2014.

      Hussman is famous for successfully warnings about the 2000 dot-com bubble and the 2008 housing market crash, though his consistently bearish predictions since then have yet to fully materialize.

      BCA Research: A recession in early 2025 will cause 30% stock market decline

      BCA strategist Roukaya Ibrahim warned that a 30% correction in the stock market could be sparked by a recession early next year.

      Ibrahim told Bloomberg TV that the combination of elevated stock valuations and decelerating growth would send the S&P 500 back down to 3,600, which is around where the index bottomed in October 2022.

      Ibrahim pointed to the April employment report, which saw 175,000 jobs added to the economy, revealed lower job openings, hires, and quit rates, all of which signal a shifting narrative toward economic downside, not upside.

      “Eventually, the unemployment rate is going to take higher and that’s going to lead to concerns about a recession,” Ibrahim said.

      David Rosenberg: Signs are growing of a potential hard-landing in the economy

      The US might be “sleepwalking” into a recession as the labor market shows signs of weakening, according to top economist David Rosenberg.

      “We’re constantly asked when we’re planning to throw in the towel on our recession call, but perhaps it’s time folks started asking when the rest of the street is going to pick their towels back up,” Rosenberg said in a note this week. “We’ve seen a downshift in the data flow that are starting to indicate that the downturn in the economy may not be as far away as many believe.”

      Rosenberg said the Sahm Rule is on the verge of flashing a recessionary warning after the unemployment rate ticked higher to 3.9% in April, and that manufacturing activity contracted for the 17th month out of the last 18 months.

      “Don’t get complacent. The labor market is cracking, a slowdown in services activity is dragging on real-time growth, and forward looking financial signals still point to a coming slowdown,” Rosenberg said.

      Rosenberg famously predicted the 2008 recession, but his consistently bearish economic outlooks since then have largely fallen flat.

      The counterpoint: A bullish take to balance out the doomsayers
      One investment strategist who has been consistently bullish, and therefore right, over the past few years is market veteran Ed Yardeni.

      Yardeni said in a note on Friday that the economic doomsayers are likely once again too early in their recession predictions following the weaker-than-expected April jobs report and weekly initial jobless claims data.

      “The most widely anticipated recession of all times is turning into the longest widely anticipated recession of all times,” market veteran Ed Yardeni said. “One day, the diehard hard-landers will be right.”

      But that day probably won’t come anytime soon, according to Yardeni, as corporate profit estimates continue to hit record highs.

      “Forward earnings rose to a record high during April, consistent with a solid labor market. So we don’t buy the claim that the latest jobless claims is just the beginning of a significant downturn in the labor market and the economy,” Yardeni said.
      …
      https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/stocks/stock-market-crash-predictions-recession-soon-inflation-corporate-profits-decline-2024-5

        1. “If money isn’t loosened up, this sucker could go down” —George W. Bush, Sept 2008

    2. I still standby my thinking that the economy is still living off the trillions PPP money printed in 2020. It’s so much equity that it’s going to take years to spend through. Things were actually slowing in 2019….the money repo crashed and the Fed did their magic to keep dollars moving…..and then the world’s largest loto hit!!!

      2. Plus the government has been on a hiring spree, all financed with borrowed money, most of it conjured into existence by the Fed.

      3. yes yes yes. couple of stories together:

        One bill, A-4161, would allow school districts to exceed a state-mandated 2% cap on tax levy increases one time and to raise school taxes by as much as 9.9%.

        Turnout low at public hearing for Savannah schools’ $882M proposed budget

        https://www.aol.com/kids-heartbreaking-nj-schools-forced-093855680.html

        Schools across the country are announcing teacher and staff layoffs as districts brace for the end of a pandemic aid package that delivered the largest one-time federal investment in K-12 education.

        The funds must be used by the end of September, creating a sharp funding cliff as schools also struggle with widespread enrollment declines and inflation.

        https://www.yahoo.com/news/schools-bracing-widespread-teacher-layoffs-170002002.html

    3. Do you smell trouble ahead for the irrationally exuberant stock market? Something like smoke blowing your way from an approaching California wildfire?

      1. Finance
        Warren Buffett’s selling stocks like Apple as he sees trouble ahead — but he’ll spend if markets crash: elite strategist
        Theron Mohamed
        May 12, 2024, 2:02 AM PDT

        – Warren Buffett is selling stocks because he’s getting out at the market high, Paul Dietrich told BI.

        – The Berkshire Hathaway CEO will pile back in once a crash or recession hits, the strategist said.

        – Berkshire cashed in stocks like Apple last quarter, raising its cash pile to a record $189 billion.
        …
        https://www.businessinsider.com/warren-buffett-berkshire-apple-stock-sales-dietrich-market-crash-recession-2024-5

      2. If you believed that the stock market would soon CR8R by 31% only to soon rise by 40%, would it be smarter to HODL through the dip, or sell now and pocket the 40% gain without first incurring the 31% loss?

        Plan A: (1-0.31)*(1+0.4) – 1 = -3%

        Plan B: (1+0.4) – 1 = 40%

        I dunno which one is better.
        Math is hard!

        1. This Forecasting Tool Is Sending Its Strongest Warning Since the Great Recession. It Could Signal a Big Move in the Stock Market.
          By Trevor Jennewine – May 10, 2024 at 7:38AM

          Key Points

          – The Conference Board Leading Economic Index (LEI) has fallen 13.1% from its record high in December 2021, its sharpest decline since the Great Recession.

          – Historically, whenever the Conference Board LEI has declined at least 5% from its record high, a recession has followed within 21 months.

          – The S&P 500 has declined by an average of 31% during recessions, but it has also returned an average of 40% during the 12 months following its recessionary trough.
          …
          https://www.fool.com/investing/2024/05/10/strong-warning-since-great-recession-stock-market/

          1. Well yes … but the expert “knows”
            that stocks are going to fall by 31%, followed by a 40% gain … for a 3% overall loss by the way. Wouldn’t it be prudent to dump your stocks if you expected a loss, even after the massive future rebound you predict will happen? These are in nominal terms, by the way; after inflation the real loss would be larger than 3%.

      3. ‘We only swing at pitches we like’: Warren Buffett is sitting on $182 billion of cash, warns ‘more can go wrong’ — 2 strategies to diversify beyond the stock market
        Warren Buffett participates in a panel discussion at Georgetown University March 13, 2007.
        Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
        Jing Pan
        Updated May 11, 2024

        In the world of investing, few have achieved a track record as remarkable as Warren Buffett.

        From 1964 to 2023, he steered Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.B) to a staggering total return of 4,384,748%, far surpassing the S&P 500’s already impressive gain of 31,223% during the same timeframe.

        Despite his knack for making savvy investments, the Oracle of Omaha doesn’t always go all in on the markets. In fact, Berkshire’s latest quarterly report reveals that as of the end of Q1 2024, Buffett’s company was holding more than $182 billion in cash.
        …
        https://moneywise.com/news/investing/warren-buffett-invest

  13. Russia Today, because Russia Today:

    https://www.rt.com/

    Whatever the New York Times and Washington Post support, you should oppose, because they are, as DJT wisely observed, the enemy of the American people.

  14. zerohedge
    @zerohedge

    Your Tax Dollars At Work: In Two Years, $7.5 Billion Has Produced Just 7 EV Charging Stations

    · May 11, 2024

    When people gripe about paying taxes and the government being a poor the absolute worst possible capital allocation, this is what they are talking about: $7.5 billion in investments for electric vehicles has – in two years – produced just 7 charging stations across four states.

    The Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, signed by Biden in November 2021, allocated $7.5 billion for EV charging, the Washington Post writes. Of this amount, $5 billion went to states as “formula funding” for the National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure program to establish a network of fast chargers along major highways.

    Today, there’s seven chargers with a total of just 38 parking spots. And, come on: when the Post is calling it out, you know the results have been horrible.

    https://x.com/zerohedge/status/1789473098955182351

  15. Illegal immigrant accused of attacking 11-year-old girl in Florida as mom watches in horror
    LiveNOW from FOX

    1 day ago

    A Guatemalan illegal immigrant who is now charged in Florida with the kidnapping and sexual assault of a child, had been freed into the U.S. with a court date for 2027, officials said this week.

    The Palm Beach Sheriff’s Office announced that Marvin Perez Lopez, an illegal immigrant from Guatemela, was arrested on Saturday for kidnapping a minor under 13 and sexual assault.

    Detectives learned that he arrived in January after crossing into the U.S. via Mexico and turned himself into Border Patrol. Authorities say he was given a court date for some time in 2027 and released into the U.S.

    He is currently being held in the county jail on no bond, the office said.

    Perez Lopez is alleged to have grabbed an 11-year-old girl and forced her into his van, according to the arrest report, reported by CBS 12. The girl’s mother is said to have spotted them and started banging on the door, before the suspect jumped out of the van and fled, according to sheriff’s deputies.

    When deputies arrived at his apartment, Perez Lopez is alleged to have fled into an alleyway before he was eventually caught.

    “Here’s a Guatemalan, who came into the country illegally, was stopped by the border people, released, and made his way to South Florida. And now he commits a crime where he held an 11-year-old girl against her will and sexually assaulted her,” Sheriff Ric Bradshaw told the outlet.

    In a statement, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) confirmed that Perez Lopez was encountered by Border Patrol, issued a notice to appear and released on an order of recognizance after being encountered on Jan 19. A spokesperson said that ICE ERO officers have since lodged a detainer on him since his arrest on May 5. A detainer is a request by ICE that the agency be notified before a suspected illegal immigrant is released from local police custody and to hold them until ICE can take custody of them and put them into deportation proceedings.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M2GAa5W0ucg

    3:34.

    2. “Illegal immigrant accused of attacking 11-year-old girl in Florida as mom watches in horror”

      I saw that story on the local news a few days ago.

      Then again, I see similar stories to that one what seems like every few weeks on the local news.

      That sleezy b@stard Mayorkas never seems to see them though.

    1. “No tendrás nada y serás feliz” = “You’ll have nothing and you’ll be happy.”

    2. No tendrás nada

      A great example of how double negatives are used in Spanish. Literally translates as “You will not have nothing.”

  17. A reader sent these in:

    Boomers sacrificing the young for higher zestimates

    https://twitter.com/NipseyHoussle/status/1787621074839974245

    Housing godzillas Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are threatening the countryside again, and better hide the children. It’s not enough that taxpayers stand behind their $7.5 trillion in mortgages. Now Freddie wants taxpayers to back second mortgages—i.e., de facto consumer loans. What could go wrong?

    https://twitter.com/JohnWake/status/1787470935521653111

    Looks like the whole, “I’ll just Airbnb my property so someone else pays my mortgage” mindset Is coming home to roost in Cape Coral, FL
    Many homes delinquent on mortgage payments in pre-foreclosure and bankruptcy

    https://twitter.com/texasrunnerDFW/status/1787233086809223588

    5 housing markets where inventory is up the most—and 5 where it’s down the most
    The furthest ABOVE pre-pandemic levels:
    Killeen-Temple, TX
    The furthest BELOW pre-pandemic levels:
    Bridgeport-Stamford-Norwalk, CT

    https://twitter.com/NewsLambert/status/1787285018663924201

    Australian property and general quality of life is over. There is no coming back from this. Let the great replacement begin.

    https://twitter.com/crashm111/status/1787018886615044149

    Friend of mine told me his daughter graduated Bucknell University and he spent $360k on her education there last 4 years. Majored in Animal Behavior. Living at home now making $18/hr at a job at an amusement park.

    https://twitter.com/DGretta_Author/status/1787158194164310459

    It’s been over a decade since Austin has seen these levels of inventory. Even zip codes that are at 1.5 months still have a days on Market of 60±.. when I say it’s low ball season.. I mean it’s looooooooow ball season..

    https://twitter.com/trooper91/status/1787136386182656371

    When home prices cannot be misreported any longer, @redfin
    just hopes it’s “not too much”. There’s no obvious conflict of interests that you would report to the public the market indicators for the assets you own & attempt to profit from, is there?

    https://twitter.com/windgineering/status/1786938488337686989

    Excellent description of the STR backdrop here. Huge liquidity injections encouraged a lot of inexperienced and overzealous investors into the space in a highly distorted market with inflated prices.

    It will be fun watching many of these speculators receive an expensive lesson.

    https://twitter.com/dfwaaronlayman/status/1786775373969060090

    If you cook from home and leave more than 2 bags of trash at an airbnb it’s considered “excessive”

    https://twitter.com/LoganHaskett/status/1786784705532002338

    Understanding Short Term Rental data is super critical. Many amateur investors just listen to a realtor or buy based on what a friend says.

    https://twitter.com/MrJonesSTRs/status/1786755489017073713

    I heard a statistic yesterday, that in the Denver Metro area there are about 30,000 unoccupied apartments/multi-family units. Anybody?

    https://twitter.com/EdZarenski/status/1786791402589847763

    Biden and the Fed trying to combat inflation:

    https://twitter.com/eliant_capital/status/1789362664910573584

    1. “Friend of mine told me his daughter graduated Bucknell University and he spent $360k on her education there last 4 years. Majored in Animal Behavior. Living at home now making $18/hr at a job at an amusement park.”

      ROTFLMFAO!!

  18. This Florida retiree says ‘everyone’s looking for a job’ because seniors can’t survive on Social Security alone

    Ricky Bowman didn’t expect to return to the workforce at 66 years old — but he’s hoping to get back to painting in order to cope with the rising cost of living.

    “Everything is almost doubled — I mean, $8 for a box of cereal?” Bowman asks in an interview with ABC Action News Tampa Bay.

    https://finance.yahoo.com/news/florida-retiree-says-everyone-looking-111800093.html

    1. Hmmmm … I see double boxes of name brand cereal at CostCo and Sams Club for $5-6

    2. “Everything is almost doubled — I mean, $8 for a box of cereal?”

      Paul Krugman says you don’t know how good you have it now, Ricky.

  19. Keep the bad news away. That’s what China plans from Monday as it is set to halt the real-time transmission of foreign stock flows aiming to bolster confidence by eliminating a potential stream of unfavourable data.

    According to Bloomberg, the Shanghai and Shenzhen exchanges intend to discontinue the real-time display of local stock purchase or sale figures via trading links with Hong Kong opting instead to offer daily turnover details along with the 10 most-traded stocks via the northbound channel.

    https://www.firstpost.com/world/china-set-to-halt-real-time-foreign-stock-data-flow-amid-housing-crisis-focus-on-positive-market-factors-reforms-13769895.html

  21. here is a new problem

    When Luann Barker and her husband moved to Citrus County three years ago, they traded the beaches of South Florida for a different kind of beach outside their front door. They live in Inverness Village 4, a Citrus County neighborhood that was somehow built with no drainage system. Years of erosion have turned roads that were never paved into deeply scarred sand pits. It’s so bad that neighbors in Inverness Village 4 just lost another modern convenience: mail delivery. In a May 3 letter to neighbors, the U.S. Postal Service described the roads as impassable.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wl-bh3Ww5HY

  22. Would you be willing to buy an ENTIRE TOWN in San Diego County for the price of six North County McMansions?

    How can this opportunity even exist!?

  23. A lot of leaseholders, there’s four million of us out of there, feel like we’re stuck because the flats are becoming unsellable.’”

    Cue Debbie Downer sad trombone notes. And here I thought getting up on that property ladder was the key to building “generational wealth.” Every REIC shill assured me of this.

  24. The Proof Of Censorship Is…Censored.

    It’s not been a good week for the Censorship Industrial Complex.

    https://www.zerohedge.com/political/proof-censorship-iscensored

    The machine has been built and put into action over nearly a decade but largely in secret. Its way of doing business has been via surreptitious contacts with media and tech companies, intelligence carve-outs in “fact-checking” organizations, payoffs, and various other clever strategies, all directed toward boosting some sources of information and suppressing others. The goal has always been to advance regime narratives and curate the public mind.

    And yet, based on its operations and insofar as we can tell, it had every intention of remaining secret. This is for a reason. A systematic effort by government to bully private sector companies into a particular narrative while suppressing dissent contradicts American law and tradition. It also violates human rights as understood since the Enlightenment. It was a consensus, until very recently, that free speech was essential to the functioning of the good society.

    Four years ago, many of us suspected censorship was going on, that the throttling and banning was not merely a mistake or the result of zealous employees stepping out of line. Three years ago, the proof started to arrive. Two years ago, it became a flood. With the Twitter files from a year ago, we had all the proof we needed that the censorship was systematic, directed, and highly effective. But even then, we only knew a fraction of it.

    Thanks to discovery from court cases, FOIA requests, whistleblowers, Congressional inquiries thanks to the very narrow Republican control, and some industrial upheavals such as what happened at Twitter, we are overwhelmed with tens of thousands of pages all pointing to the same reality.

    The censors developed a belief at the highest levels of control in government that it was their job to govern what information the American people would and would not see, regardless of the truth. The actions became truly tribal: our side favors banning gatherings, closing schools, says the Hunter Biden laptop is a fake, favors masking, mass vaccination, and mail-in voting, and denies the import of voter fraud and vaccine injury, whereas their side takes the opposite approach.

    It was a war over information, undertaken in total disregard for the First Amendment, as if it doesn’t even exist. Moreover, the operation was not only political. It clearly involved intelligence agencies that were already hip deep in the “all-of-society” pandemic response.

    “All of Society” means all, including the information you receive and are allowed to distribute.

    A vast swath of unelected bureaucrats took it upon themselves to manage all knowledge flows in the age of the Internet, with the ambition to turn the main source of news and sharing into a giant American version of Pravda. All of this occurred right under our noses – and is still going on today.

    Indeed, censorship is a full-on industry now, with hundreds and thousands of cut-outs, universities, media companies, government agencies, and even young people in school studying to be disinformation specialists, and bragging about it on social media. We are just one step away from a New York Times article – as follow-ups to their recent praise of the Deep State and also government surveillance – with a headline like “The Good Society Needs Censors.”

    Incredibly, the censorship is so pervasive now that it is not even reported. All these revelations should have been front page news. But so captured is the news media today that there are very few outlets that even bother to report the fullness of the problem.

    Not receiving nearly enough attention is the new report from the Committee on the Judiciary and the Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government of the US House of Representatives.

    Running nearly 1,000 pages including documentation (however many pages are purposely blank), we have here an overwhelming amount of evidence of a systematic, aggressive, and deeply entrenched effort on the part of the federal government, including the Biden White House and many agencies including the World Health Organization, to tear out the guts of the Internet and social media culture and replace them with propaganda.

    Among the well-documented facts are that the White House directly intervened in Amazon’s own marketing methods to deprecate books that raised doubts about the Covid vaccine and all vaccines. Amazon responded reluctantly but did what it could to satisfy the censors. All these companies – Google, YouTube, Facebook, Amazon – became acquiescent to Biden administration priorities, even to the point of running algorithmic changes by the White House before implementation.

    When YouTube announced that it would take down any content that contradicted the World Health Organization, it was because the White House instructed them to do so.

    [An exhibit appears here …]

    As for Amazon, which is like every publisher in wanting full freedom to distribute, they faced intense pressure from government.

    [Another exhibit appears here …]

    These are just a few of thousands of pieces of evidence of routine interference from government against social media companies, either directly or through various government-funded cut-outs, all designed to enforce a certain way of thinking on the American public.

    What’s amazing is that this industry was allowed to metastasize to such an extent over 4-8 years or so, with no legal oversight and very little knowledge on the part of the public. It’s as if there is no such thing as the First Amendment. It’s a dead letter. Even now, the Supreme Court seems confused, based on our reading of the oral arguments over this whole case (Murthy v. Missouri).

    One gets the sense when reading through all this correspondence that the companies were more than a bit rattled by the pressure. They must have wondered a few things: 1) is this normal? 2) do we really have to go along? 3) what happens to us if we just say no?

    Probably every corner grocery store in any neighborhood run by a crime syndicate in history has asked these questions. The best answer is to do what you can in order to make them go away. This is precisely what they did time after time. After a while, the protocol probably begins to feel normal and no one asks anymore the basic questions: is this right? Is this freedom? Is this legal? Is this just the way things go in the US?

    No matter how many high officials were involved, how many in the C-suites of big companies participated, however many editors and technicians of the best credentials played along, there can be no question that what took place was an absolute violation of speech rights that very likely exceeds anything we’ve seen in US history.

    Keep in mind that we only know what we know, and that is severely truncated by the force of the machinery. We can safely assume that the truth actually is far worse than we know. And further consider that this censorship is keeping us from knowing the full story about the suppression of dissidents, whether medical, scientific, political, or otherwise.

    There might be millions in many professions who are suffering right now, in silence. Or think of the vaccine-injured or those who have lost loved ones who were forced to get the shot. There are no headlines. There are no investigations. There is almost no public attention at all. Most of the venues that we once thought would police such outrages have been compromised.

    To top it off, the censors are still not backing down. If you sense a lessening of the grip for now, there is every reason to believe it is temporary. This industry wants the entire Internet as we once conceived of it completely shut down. That’s the goal.

    At this point, the best means of defeating this plan is widespread public outrage. That is made more difficult because the censorship itself is being censored.

    This is why this report from the US House of Representatives needs to be widely shared so long as doing so is possible. It could be that such reports in the future will themselves be censored. It could also be the last such report you will ever see before the curtain falls on freedom completely.

    1. I see it differently. It was a massive failure. Just don’t use these web sites and you can still find anything you want. Plenty of people knew about it as it went along cuz we talked about all the time. On the internet!

      But the biggest benefit from this sick joke was people like me will never, ever, trust the guberments, the medical industry, drug companies, pentagon/cia/fbi, central banks. I’ll never trust the sillycon dogs again, more are aware their dark nature and most certainly will never trust the globalist scum media ever again about anything. Most everybody who matters chose a side. And so we all know who it was that did this to us and who supported them.

      1. people like me will never, ever, trust …

        I have no travel plans this year, and that’s a good thing because the thought of parking my keister in an airliner seat is not appealing at this time.

        1. That’s another one – airlines. I will fly as little as possible from here on out. And I don’t have to fly.

    1. From what I read, they were quickly removed by the Florida State Patrol.

      It does strike me as an odd choice to boycott. I know that Disney has an official “gay days” in their parks. Perhaps they could have “intifada days” too.

      An anecdote: many years ago I was in line at the Disneyland Haunted Mansion. The queue winds through a nicely trimmed garden. Anywho, I saw a foreign looking dude jump the queue railing into the garden, where he unfurled a rug and began to pray. Disney staff did not intervene. He completed his ritual and hopped back into the line for the attraction. I’m pretty sure that had I jumped the railing I would have been escorted out of the park.

    1. Managing Money
      Budgeting
      ‘Oh please, get a job’: Joy Behar slams young Americans for feeling left behind — but as a new study shows, it may be baby boomers who are stopping them from getting ahead
      Joy Behar seen looking aghast on the set of the View.
      The View/YouTube
      Serah Louis
      Updated May 6, 2024
      (3 mins)

      It’s no secret that young Americans feel like they’re being left behind by the economy and can’t fathom ever being able to buy a home. But they shouldn’t look to Joy Behar for sympathy.

      “Boohoo,” Behar said derisively in response to The View co-host Sunny Hostin’s discussion of her Gen Z kids, who Hostin says have lived through the COVID-19 pandemic and “the worst of times” and feel uncertain about the future.

      “Oh please, get a job,” Behar, an 81-year-old actress and comedian interjected on the daytime talk show. “There’s a million job openings in this country.”

      She’s not the only baby boomer who’s famously criticized younger Americans for being unable to move out of their parents’ basements (read: Dave Ramsey) and climb the property ladder.

      However, a recent report from Redfin reveals that boomers are the generation least likely to be able to afford their current homes if they bought them today.

      Nearly half (45%) of the group say they couldn’t purchase a similar home in their neighborhood now, compared to 39% of Gen Xers and 24% of Gen Zers and millennials — and experts say this pervasive issue is only contributing to the housing woes of younger Americans today.
      …
      https://moneywise.com/managing-money/budgeting/baby-boomers-show-gen-z-no-sympathy

  29. [Meanwhile, in Ireland …]

    Here’s why Ireland is at boiling point over mass immigration.

    https://www.yahoo.com/news/heres-why-ireland-boiling-point-130747692.html

    The Irish government’s unwavering commitment to housing and feeding an unprecedented influx of migrants in the wake of a severe housing and cost of living crisis has brought the Irish electorate to boiling point. It has many similarities to the migrant crisis in the U.S.

    Hundreds of protests in towns have sprung up around the country with people calling on the government to end what they say is an “open borders” globalist agenda that is putting the needs of migrants ahead of its citizens — many of whom are struggling to pay for everyday items and unable to buy or rent homes as Ireland’s homeless numbers skyrockets.

    Several high-profile crimes linked to migrants have also driven fear into the native citizenry, culminating in the shocking knife attacks on young children and their teacher by an Algerian-born Irish citizen in November that triggered rioting and looting in the nation’s capital.

    Those who want immigration laws enforced and numbers reduced say they are being ignored by the political establishment.

    “Ireland is a tinderbox at the moment,” Irish journalist Fatima Gunning told Fox News Digital. “At this point, I don’t think anything would surprise me.”

    On Monday, thousands of protesters carrying Irish flags rallied in Dublin calling for an end to mass migration and demanding that a new nationalist government take its place.

    Chants of “get them out” in reference to the government, echoed throughout the nation’s capital while others carried signs reading “Irish lives matter” and “under siege, invasion.” Large banners reading “mass deportations” and “end the plantation” hung from a bridge.

    The protesters say they represent the silent majority of the electorate – around 75% based on several polls – who say immigration is too high and that the country has taken in too many refugees.

    Their anger is also being fueled by how they are being treated by the mainstream media, which is dominated by liberal news outlets as well as the semi-state-run broadcaster RTE, who seldom cover protests or do so with bias, they say.

    Think of an America without Fox News.

    For example, last Monday’s march was described as a “large crowd” by RTE and afforded just six lines of coverage on its website. Gript, a relative newcomer to the media scene, has been filling the void and has covered many anti-mass immigration protests.

    “For the past two years, they’ve been calling people like that ‘racist’ or ‘far-right extremists,’” Gunning says. “Politicians and the mainstream media, official Ireland, that of strata of society say immigration is just totally positive. There’s no negatives whatsoever and then anyone who even says something like, Oh, ‘I do agree with immigration but I think there should be controls on the numbers,’ is a racist, that’s how it is.”

    Immigration into Ireland has more than doubled over the last 20 years with 22% of the population now made up of non-citizens, meaning Ireland has the fourth largest non-national population of all 27 EU member states percentage-wise, according to published EU statistics.

    The steady increase in migration first started with the free movement of people agreement under the EU’s Nice Treaty in 2003. It posed little problems as mainly eastern Europeans traveled to Ireland to work in the Celtic Tiger economic boom era.

    But in recent years, droves of high numbers of asylum seekers have been arriving at Ireland’s shores and are being handed all sorts of taxpayer-funded welfare benefits and housing, while Irish citizens struggle to make ends meet with high inflation, a crippling housing crisis and an overwhelmed health system.

    For instance, Ireland has taken in more than 104,000 Ukrainian refugees since the onset of the war, the largest number per capita in Western Europe despite Ireland being the most westerly located nation in the whole of Europe. The figure equates to 2% of Ireland’s 5.12 million population and every Ukrainian refugee has been provided with free accommodation, free health care and, until recently, was being paid a weekly wage of around $235.

    Another 30,000 non-Ukrainian refugees are currently being housed by the Irish government with taxpayers churning out more than €1 billion in the first nine months of 2023 accommodating migrants, according to government data. Meanwhile, the country’s debt is among the highest in the world per capita, standing at €223 billion in 2023.

    Accommodations, including modular homes, have been built for migrants but very little, if anything, they say, is being done for the homeless population, which hit an all-time record last month. Planning rules to build some of these homes have been ignored in order to get the refugees housed at rapid speed.

    “There’s a really palpable feeling that these non-national people are being prioritized over Irish people, which they are,” Gunning says. “I mean, it’s not even a matter of opinion that they are. There are Irish people who cannot get medical cards (health benefits) for whatever reason. These people are all given medical cards regardless of need and that’s obviously a priority [of government].”

    And it’s not just the perceived unfairness that has angered Irish people. Just like in the U.S., Irish people feel that many of those seeking asylum have dubious claims and are essentially economic migrants who are draining taxpayer coffers.

    [There is more to this article, much more, too much more to post it all here. Go to the link to read the rest.]

    1. ‘Their anger is also being fueled by how they are being treated by the mainstream media, which is dominated by liberal news outlets as well as the semi-state-run broadcaster RTE, who seldom cover protests or do so with bias, they say.’

      ‘Think of an America without Fox News.’

  30. ‘bought her 810-square-foot condo unit in 2022. She described the purchase as ‘a huge deal’ because she was only 21-years-old at the time and not many Americans of that age have the opportunity to buy their own property. ‘It was great up until April 23 of this year when everything started going completely downhill,’ she said. ‘That’s when we were provided a letter in the mail that literally has pretty much changed all of our lives’

    You gotta roll with it Britney.

  31. The talking corpse accidently slipped and spoke truth in an interview with a Spanish radio show last week.

    “It’s even a bigger influx now in terms of Hispanic voters! Err, Hispanic citizens.”

    RNC Research
    @RNCResearch

    Biden says Hispanic immigration to the U.S. is “a little bit like back in the 1840s and the great exodus of Ireland”:

    “It’s even a bigger influx now in terms of Hispanic voters! Err, Hispanic citizens.”

    May 7, 2024
    ·
    https://x.com/RNCResearch/status/1787945925089927584

  32. A 10-foot-wide house was built ‘out of spite’ on a leftover piece of land in Florida and is selling for $619,000. See inside.

    Jordan Pandy May 11, 2024, 6:05 AM EDT

    If the neighborhood had its way, there wouldn’t be a house there at all. The neighborhood attended the public hearing voicing concerns — mainly from a next-door neighbor who used the untouched lot as a garden — and persuaded the board to disallow any adjustments.

    “And to be honest, the builder almost built this out of spite just because of that fact, ‘Oh, you don’t think we can build, hold my beer,'” Wetherhold said.

    https://www.businessinsider.com/jacksonville-beach-florida-10-foot-wide-house-2024-5

  33. ‘Like a lot of people, Watts has a mortgage on his house, which means he needs to carry insurance. ‘There are going to be very few people who are able to live out here without a mortgage’

    That may be Bryan, but you can always sell cuz you are a winnah!

  34. ‘They don’t build these homes in months or years anymore; they build them in weeks. It’s crazy how quickly they pop up, and as soon as they pop up, the builders are gone’

    I know Scott and they tell us with a straight face that there’s a shortage.

  35. ‘Mosaic provided Kromdyk’s attorney with a copy of a contract for solar panels it says she signed. Kromdyk insists she didn’t sign it. And when she saw it? ‘Well, I wanted to cry.’ For months, she says she’s felt stuck unable to sell or even refinance her home, all because of solar panels she’s never seen, never bought and to the best of her knowledge, never owned’

    You can contest a signature fraud Kim. Anyhoo, it was cheaper than renting!

  36. ‘‘I had no idea they could say, ‘At 70, well we are not insuring you anymore…I can’t pay that off. I’m sitting here on a fixed income. If I have to pay that off I could be dead by that time’

    John, I’m sure if you explain that to the insurance company, they will see you meant well and are in a hard spot. Otherwise thanks for playing ‘sell yer igloo to the bank’!

  37. ‘I was upset, angry, I just couldn’t stop crying. I got on the phone straight away to Cross Keys. I just knew I was going to struggle’

    OK Donna, calm down. Take a deep breath. This thing is manageable. Have you thought about, if you stop eating expensive food you can also unplug the fridge?

    ‘A lot of leaseholders, there’s four million of us out of there, feel like we’re stuck because the flats are becoming unsellable’

    No, no no, Kasun. UHS have made it abundantly clear. You can always sell.

  38. ‘Gemmell said some people were losing up to $150,000 if they bought two years ago in 2021 and had to sell now. While it was initially a bitter pill for some sellers to swallow, she said they eventually got their heads around the fact they were buying and selling in the same market so were also paying less for the next property. Other homeowners had been forced to reduce their asking prices, she said, and even then some were struggling to attract buyers who had plenty of choice and were in no rush to buy’

    ‘Gemmell is also selling brand-new homes’

    That’s the spirit Jamie, dump those zeros and get yer self a hero!

  39. Nancy Sinatra – Bang Bang
    John1948NineD

    13 years ago

    Sinatra began her career as a singer and actress in the early 1960s, but initially achieved success only in Europe and Japan. Then she had a transatlantic number-one hit with “These Boots Are Made for Walkin'”, which showed her provocative but good-natured style, and which popularized and made her synonymous with go-go boots. The promo clip featured a big-haired Sinatra and six young women in tight tops, go-go boots and mini-skirts. The song was written by Lee Hazlewood, who wrote and produced most of her hits and sang with her on several duets, including “Some Velvet Morning”. In 1966 and 1967, Sinatra charted with 13 titles, all of which featured Billy Strange as arranger and conductor.

    Sinatra also had a brief acting career in the mid-60s including a co-starring role with Elvis Presley in the movie Speedway, and with Peter Fonda in The Wild Angels.

    In the late 1950s, Sinatra began to study music, dancing, and voice at the University of California in Los Angeles. She dropped out after a year, and made her professional debut in 1960 on her father’s television special with Elvis Presley, home from the army. Nancy was sent to the airport on behalf of her father to welcome Elvis when his plane landed. On the special, Nancy and her father danced and sang a duet, “You Make Me Feel So Young/Old”. That same year she began a five-year marriage to Tommy Sands.

    Sinatra was signed to her father’s label, Reprise Records, in 1961. Her first single, “Cuff Links and a Tie Clip”, went unnoticed. However, subsequent singles charted in Europe and Japan. Without a hit in the U.S. by 1965, she was on the verge of being dropped. Her singing career received a boost with the help of songwriter/producer/arranger Lee Hazlewood, who had been making records for ten years, notably with Duane Eddy. Hazlewood became Sinatra’s inspiration. He had her sing in a lower key and crafted pop songs for her. Bolstered by an image overhaul — including bleached-blonde hair, frosted lips, heavy eye make-up and Carnaby Street fashions — Sinatra made her mark on the American (and British) music scene in early 1966 with “These Boots Are Made for Walkin'”, its title inspired by a line in Robert Aldrich’s 1963 western comedy 4 for Texas starring her father and Dean Martin. One of her many hits written by Hazlewood, it received three Grammy Award nominations, including two for Sinatra and one for arranger Billy Strange. It sold over one million copies, and was awarded a gold disc. The song has been covered by artists such as Geri Halliwell, Megadeth, Jessica Simpson, Lil’ Kim, Little Birdy, Billy Ray Cyrus, Faster Pussycat, KMFDM, Symarip (band), Operation Ivy and the Del Rubio Triplets and The Supremes.

    A run of chart singles followed, including the two 1966 Top 10 hits “How Does That Grab You, Darlin’?” (#7) and “Sugar Town” (#5). “Sugar Town” became her second million seller. The ballad “Somethin’ Stupid” — a duet with father — hit #1 in the U.S. and the UK in April 1967 and spent nine weeks at the top of Billboard’s easy listening chart. It earned a Grammy Award nomination for Record of the Year and remains the only father-daughter duet to hit No.1 in the U.S. It became Sinatra’s third million selling disc. Other 45s showing her forthright delivery include “Friday’s Child” (#36, 1966), and the 1967 hits “Love Eyes” (#15) and “Lightning’s Girl” (#24). She rounded out 1967 with the raunchy but low-charting “Tony Rome” (#83) — the title track from the detective film Tony Rome starring her father — while her first solo single in 1968 was the more wistful “100 Years” (#69).

    Sinatra enjoyed a parallel recording career cutting duets with the husky-voiced, country-and-western-inspired Hazlewood, starting with “Summer Wine” (originally the B-side of “Sugar Town”). Their biggest hit was a cover of the country song, “Jackson”. The single peaked at #14 on the Billboard Hot 100 in the summer of 1967, when Johnny Cash and June Carter Cash also made the song their own. In December they released the “MOR”-psychedelic single “Some Velvet Morning”, regarded as one of the more unusual singles in pop, and the peak of Sinatra and Hazlewood’s vocal collaborations. It reached #26 in the USA. The promo clip is, like the song, sui generis. The British broadsheet The Daily Telegraph placed “Some Velvet Morning” in pole position in its 2003 list of the Top 50 Best Duets Ever. (“Somethin’ Stupid” ranked number 27).

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BkKDSFYvxKU

    2:41.

  40. Pelosi Shredded Over Her Elitism: ‘Populism Isn’t a Threat To Democracy — Populism IS Democracy!’

    Infowars.com
    May 12th 2024, 11:28 am

    Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D) was taken to the woodshed by British folk rock guitarist Winston Marshall during a recent Oxford Union debate over her stance against populism and “contempt for ordinary people.”

    Marshall, host of the UK’s “Marshall Matters” podcast for The Spectator and former guitarist for Mumford & Sons, eviscerated Pelosi to her face over her demonization of populism and the working class.

    https://www.infowars.com/posts/pelosi-shredded-over-her-elitism-populism-isnt-a-threat-to-democracy-populism-is-democracy/

  41. Opinion: At Minimum Wage in California’s Biggest City, Rent Requires 100% of Income
    by Michael Weinstein
    21 hours ago
    Home for rent
    A home for rent in Southern California. REUTERS/Mike Blake

    Two decades ago, could we have imagined that a Los Angeles resident working a full-time, minimum wage job would have to pay more than 100 percent of their income to afford an average apartment in the city?

    Well, that is the place we find ourselves today. The minimum wage in LA is $16.78 an hour, or barely $2,900 before taxes per month. The average apartment in Los Angeles costs $2,719. That is rent slavery.

    The low-wage employee must combine their income with another or double and triple up to have a decent place to live. Even then, how much will that worker have left for basic necessities such as food, utilities, transportation, a cell phone, or anything else? Nothing.
    …
    https://timesofsandiego.com/opinion/2024/05/11/at-minimum-wage-in-californias-biggest-city-rent-requires-100-of-income/

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