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A Prize-Winning Example Of That Insanity

A weekend topic starting with the Detroit Free Press in Michigan. “A new 0% down mortgage is certainly an attention grabber for the Pontiac-based, mega mortgage lender, United Wholesale Mortgage. Under the 0% Down Purchase plan, qualified first-time borrowers and others can receive up to $15,000 or up to 3% of the purchase price of a home, whatever is less, for a down payment assistance loan. It’s a second loan, in addition to the mortgage, but it has a 0% rate and no monthly payment. No doubt, some homebuyers today are psychologically keeping the possibility of refinancing in mind. They’re not waiting to buy until rates come down. Instead, they’re buying the house they want now with the expectation that they might refinance the loan and lower their mortgage payments in the future at some point. ‘It’s almost like you’re going to marry the house but date the rate,’ said Alex Elezaj, chief strategy officer for UWM in Pontiac.”

Go Banking Rates. “Ask the average would-be homebuyer what’s holding them back, and they’ll likely tell you, ‘I don’t have the money for a down payment and closing costs.’ Several government programs have tried to solve this problem, many successfully. The FHA mortgage program allows a 3.5% down payment for homebuyers with credit scores as low as 580. More recently, Fannie Mae launched its HomeReady program, and Freddie Mac its parallel Home Possible program, each allowing a down payment as low as 3%. That puts homeownership in reach for more buyers — which spurs demand and drives up home prices further. Other programs offer 0% down payment loans for certain borrowers (such as VA loans for veterans or Good Neighbor Next Door assistance for police officers and teachers) or in specific areas (like USDA loans for rural properties).”

“People with lower incomes tend to have lower credit scores. And lower credit scores can make it nearly impossible to get approved for a mortgage. That largely drove the success of the FHA loan program: It allowed borrowers with weak credit to buy with a small down payment. But these borrowers are more likely to default, which is why FHA loans now require borrowers to pay the mortgage insurance premium for the entire life of the loan, not just until they pay it down below 80% of the property value. In other words, performing borrowers subsidize these loans by paying for default insurance long after they no longer pose any risk themselves. Somebody has to pay for the higher risk associated with these mortgage loans, but it reduces affordability for everyone.”

From Newsweek. “‘USDA-guaranteed mortgages maintained their market share last week because they’re a good deal,’ Holden Lewis, a home and mortgage expert at NerdWallet, told Newsweek. ‘They don’t require a down payment, so they’re suited to buyers who lack money for a down payment. And the interest rates are competitive. There’s strong demand for housing in rural areas, and eligible borrowers are interested in these loans.'”

Chatham Journal Newspaper in North Carolina. “I had a chance to sit down with local real estate agent Eric Andrews. Andrews explains that affordable housing, sometimes referred to as workforce housing, is scarce. In Chatham County, the average family income is relatively high, around $62,000, which translates to an affordable home price range of about $200,000 to $250,000. However, the average home price in the county has soared to over $500,000, far exceeding what many families can afford.”

“The rental market also reflects this trend. The average rent in Chatham County is approximately $1,400, but with property values rising, landlords are increasingly inclined to sell their properties rather than rent them. This further exacerbates the shortage of affordable housing. ‘If a landlord can sell a property purchased for $200,000 ten years ago for $500,000 today, the financial incentive to keep renting diminishes,’ Andrews explains.”

The Reno Gazette Journal in Nevada. “For many longtime residents, the steep jump in apartment rent in the last decade is a sobering reality. Since 2014, average rent in the area doubled to a record high $1,680 by the second quarter of 2022, according to real estate appraisal and consulting firm Johnson Perkins Griffin. Prior to that, rents in Reno-Sparks hovered around the $800 mark from 2006 to 2015. The higher vacancies seen in the older or smaller apartments, for example, can reveal what’s going on behind the scenes between the different properties — especially with the large number of new units that have entered the market in recent years.”

“‘We have an oversupply right now of new Class A (apartments),’ said Floyd Rowley, founding broker of Rowley Real Estate Advisors. ‘So those are the guys cutting the deals and they are essentially sucking up some tenants from the (Class) Bs and the Bs are doing the same thing to the Cs.'”

“Greg Peek, president of ERGS Properties, sold his rental business in Reno and developed the 220-unit apartment. Peek wasn’t looking to sell at the time. The unsolicited offer from an out-of-state investor, however, was too good to refuse, he said. Peek still remembers what the new ownership did. ‘They immediately raised rents,’ Peek said. The new ownership looked at Peek’s former property as a ‘value add,’ which is when an investor comes in to take over an existing property to make improvements and raise its potential to earn even more revenue.”

“The arrival of outside institutional investors is one of the biggest changes in Reno that Peek has noticed. When Peek drives around town and sees all the new projects being built, he wonders how many of those are owned by local developers. ‘They may be using local builders but, ultimately, the ownership is out of town,’ Peek said. ‘It seems to me that those institutional investors are going to try to do everything they can to make as much money out of these properties as possible.'”

The Pittsburgh Post Gazette. “Gus Faucher, a PNC economist, recently wrote in the Post-Gazette that since mid-2020, when the recovery from the COVID recession began, overall retail prices in the U.S. have increased a total of 22%. And while the rate of inflation has recently slowed, Faucher added that many consumers are disappointed that prices haven’t fallen back to pre-pandemic levels. That isn’t going to happen, he said, mainly because the deflation required would likely wreck the economy. Deflation may be impossible — but the question is why. This points to the entrenched interests of the same bankers and bureaucrats who caused the post-COVID inflationary bubble in the first place. What of the millions of Americans who saw their prospects for establishing home equity — the foundation of middle-class wealth in America — wrecked after being effectively priced out of the housing market? If deflation is impossible, whose interests are we protecting — and why?”

“The immediate response of American financial authorities after the COVID lockdowns was to create massive amounts of money from nothing, and begin handing it out. In the second and third quarters of 2020 alone, the Federal Reserve’s balance sheet increased by 66%, or nearly $3 trillion. Over the same period, annualized federal spending jumped from $4.9 trillion to just under $8 trillion, an increase of 64%. The lockdowns themselves may have been one of the most ill-advised policy responses in U.S. history, but the efforts on the part of the fiscal and monetary authorities weren’t much better. The predictable result, given an economy operating on only two or three cylinders, was the massive wave of inflation now (mostly) in our rear-view mirror.”

“If we’re not operating the economy and the financial system for the young families who are the future of America, whom are we operating it for? Shouldn’t an economy serve consumers first, with the benefits of rising productivity flowing directly into lower prices? Or have we come so far down the road of asset inflation — in order to protect Boomer retirements — that there’s no going back?”

From Newsweek. “Florida reported the third-highest number of foreclosure filings in the country between January and March, according to a recent report from property and real-estate data research firm ATTOM. Houston, Texas, saw the biggest increase among the 15 metropolitan areas with the most filings in the first quarter of 2024, up 37 percent compared to a year earlier. Three Florida metros—Orlando, Tampa and Miami—followed. ‘Upon analyzing various data points and key metrics, no definitive trend emerges to explain the foreclosure increases in Orlando and Tampa,’ Rob Barber, ATTOM CEO, told Newsweek.”

“Barber explained some of the foreclosures with higher property taxes in some areas. ‘Average residential taxes rose more than 5 percent from 2022 to 2023 in the Tampa and Orlando MSAs. But those increases added less than $100 to monthly expenses, so that is probably not a major factor,’ he said. ‘The same would be true for homeowner insurance increases, which aren’t going to add a huge amount to monthly expenses. So, amid all that, I suspect these trends may be due to nothing more than lenders with backlogs that are now being filed in court, leading to an increase in activity,’ Barber added.”

The Garden City News in New York. “Those major metro areas with populations of 200,000 or more that had the largest numbers of foreclosure starts in the first quarter including NYC, NY, (with 4,404 starts), Houston, Texas, (with 2,977 starts), Chicago, Illinois(2,867 starts), Los Angeles, Ca.(2398 foreclosure starts), and Miami, Fl.(2319 foreclosure starts). The highest foreclosure rates were in Delaware, New Jersey, and South Carolina. From my experience in dealing with foreclosures, sometimes it is a long road to remedying and rectifying your mortgage issues. Luckily in NYS, I have seen some homeowners stay in pre-foreclosure for up to 7 years; sometimes saving so much money, that they are almost able to pay cash for another residence, depending on where they live.”

The Post Independent. “Freddie Mac (Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation) the cousin of Fannie Mae, has come out with a proposal to buy second mortgages funded behind first mortgage home loans held by the government sponsored enterprise. And that’s a lot of loans. Freddie buys billions of dollars of mortgages every month. If the proposal is approved, homeowners will be able to turn their equity into cash without selling their home or refinancing the existing first, which most likely has a low rate secured in the post-financial crisis, post pandemic period of preternaturally low mortgage rates.”

“This is great news for a lot of people who currently have big equity numbers. They will be able to pull out of their home whatever flash cash they can qualify for, and keep that three and a half percent, thirty year first mortgage in place. And it will benefit others as well: the proposition should be titled ‘The Mortgage Brokers Full Employment and Income Enhancement Initiative.’ Loan hacks are going to love it. In fact, it won’t be all that bad for a couple of NBA team owners, Matt Ishbia and Dan Gilbert, who control United Wholesale Mortgage, and Rocket Mortgage respectively, the two largest producers of home loans in the country. They’ll have more money to spend on buying basketball players for the Phoenix Suns and the Cleveland Cavaliers. For the rest of us, it’s a very bad idea.”

“In this column we’ve constantly commented on the propensity of the movers of money, banks, mortgage companies and other lenders, to repeat the same mistakes, ad nauseum, and expect different results. This idea is a prize-winning example of that insanity. So, let’s all take a deep breath and note that Freddie’s concept is being floated right at the time that, in most venues, the price of homes is at an all time high. Inevitably, this picture comes to mind, ‘Martha, hook up the boat to the Range Rover. Thank heaven we got that second lien to buy this stuff so we could get out of town before the foreclosure sale.'”

“Without question, at some point, there will be a boatload of homes that will be below water, where more is owed than their market value. There will be defaults and foreclosures with an unavoidable ripple effect on the economy. How serious that might be is unknown; but why trigger it?”

The Calgary Herald in Canada. “Ryan Fehr had grown tired of renting. Fehr, 40 and a single dad, had just broken up with his girlfriend. He found there was no limit on how much landlords could raise the rent in Calgary, and he yearned to put down some roots in a house, especially for his then-two-year-old son, whom he had with his previous partner. Property values started ballooning, in some cases exceeding $500,000. “When you’re a single guy trying to work, it’s not feasible, man, you’ll just be house-poor.” Fehr stopped scanning the apps, knowing he’d have to shell out nearly half or more of his income to afford an average house in Calgary. ‘I’m not out buying extravagant things and being crazy with my money. I have a good job. I have a career.'”

“The price of a single detached home in Calgary has more than tripled since 2000, while a townhouse has nearly quintupled in the same period, according to the Calgary Real Estate Board (CREA) . More than half of Albertans in the same Ipsos poll said they have stopped trying to buy a home. The transformation of homeownership and what it means through several economic and public policies, experts say, has fuelled a crisis that has put housing out of reach for many Albertans. ‘For a long time, the idea of owning a home was seen as a means for housing stability and security of tenure,’ said Andy Yan, director of the City Program at Simon Fraser University. ‘Then it just suddenly became like a Tesla stock.'”

“Various policies that came along since the 1980s , such as reducing the minimum down payment to qualify for a mortgage, allowing withdrawals from tax-sheltered investments such as RRSPs for first home purchases, and offering tax exemptions for investors buying second properties to rent out, made homeownership attractive. The government also introduced financial products offered by banks that pooled a bundle of property loans and sold them to investors. These products, called mortgage-back securities, allowed investors to profit from the interest households paid on their mortgages. If homeowners were to default on their payments, investors would continue to receive their returns from the Canada Housing and Mortgage Corporation — a Canadian Crown corporation created in 1946 that administers several housing programs — which insured the mortgage.”

“‘The spending that would have been done on non-market housing shifted towards a subsidy for homeownership,’ Yan said. ‘It was subsidies in terms of mortgage insurance and assurances to the bank that people were able to pay their money back for these mortgages.’ Such products allowed banks to sell their risk to other investors and replenish their cash reserves, freeing up their capacity to lend to more households. Efforts to increase homeownership became more aggressive in the 2000s. A few years later, the government stretched amortization periods up to 40 years. Mortgage insurance fees were slashed, and CMHC was allowed to insure interest-only, no-downpayment mortgages, incentivizing banks to lend money to a greater number of people. As a result, even people with insecure jobs had access to mortgages, albeit at the cost of very high levels of debt.”

“House prices rose as demand climbed. ‘Those who could become homeowners, did, but then those who couldn’t, because of X-number of circumstances, were now locked out with none of the benefits,’ Yan said. ‘We have noticed that purchasers headquartered in Toronto, Vancouver, Montreal, etc., who don’t have any real estate holdings in Calgary are taking a keen interest in entering our market and we’re getting calls from these types of groups every week,’ said Mason Thompson, an analyst with Avison Young.”

“Jamil Thobani, a realtor in Calgary, said almost all properties he has sold were bought above their listing price, and nearly half of his clients are from outside the province. ‘I’m telling you, there is a sense of frustration,’ Thobani said. ‘It’s like, ‘Ah, we lost that one or we lost another one, we’re not going to find another place. Okay, my lease is coming up. I need to get out of this.’ Then they will maximize whatever they can and outbid the next person.'”

“This is why relying merely on increasing the supply of homes is misguided, said Policy Alternatives economist Ricardo Tranjan. He said the solution also involves providing more affordable and accessible housing to people who need it the most. ‘There is nothing we’re doing at the federal, provincial or municipal levels that will move us away from an asset-based economy,’ Tranjan said. ‘(Most of what) we’re doing is increasing supply, but how much of this supply will be at a reasonable price and be purchased by someone who is not a homeowner looking for an investment property?'”

The Globe and Mail. “Canada’s anti-money-laundering regime is like a pair of distressed jeans – the holes are there on purpose. That pointed analysis comes from Sanaa Ahmed, an assistant professor at the University of Calgary’s Faculty of Law. As one of this country’s leading experts on money laundering, she fearlessly scrutinizes the role of the state in Canada’s ascendence as an international haven for financial crime. Dr. Ahmed, who wrote an eye-opening chapter for a book entitled Dirty Money: Financial Crime in Canada, rejects the notion that illicit proceeds wash up on Canadian shores by accident. Indeed, she questions whether it is even reasonable to presume that Canada wants to combat money laundering given its chronic failure to keep its promises over the past 35 years.”

“If there is a lack of political will to combat financial crime, it is because the Canadian economy is dependent on dirty money. Dr. Ahmed dubs it ‘laundering as public policy.’ It’s a provocative statement, to be sure. But this is no tin-foil-hat conspiracy. The evidence shows that she is right. ‘When we talk about AML regulation, I like to analogize it with a pair of distressed jeans. We can no longer pretend that the holes are inadvertent or they just manifested overnight,’ Dr. Ahmed said in a recent interview. ‘They are part of the design of the jeans. The holes were always supposed to be part of it. And so, this pretense that, you know, this is something that’s just cropped up and maybe we need to batten down the hatches; I don’t think that’s a particularly productive way of looking at it.'”

“Canada has ostensibly been tightening its anti-money-laundering regulations since the late 1980s. And yet, as Dr. Ahmed points out, it is still profitable for banks and other businesses to run afoul of the law and for criminals to ‘snow-wash’ through provincially incorporated shell companies. Similarly, the ‘Vancouver model’ of laundering illicit proceeds through B.C. casinos remains a blight. An estimated $45-billion to $113-billion is laundered here each year, according to Criminal Intelligence Service Canada. Even so, Canada’s track record on enforcement is disconcerting.”

“Enforcement results, which include the number of investigations, charges, prosecutions, convictions and asset forfeitures, actually declined between 2010 and 2020, according to a 2023 report by the Department of Finance. If that wasn’t bad enough, the report offered this curious explanation: ‘The factors contributing to these results are complex and must be considered within Canada’s unique context.’ Undoubtedly. Only in Canada would it be acceptable for the national police to take a five-year break from investigating money laundering. That, of course, is exactly what happened when the RCMP shuttered its national proceeds of crime and commercial crime sections in 2012. No one in Ottawa said boo.”

“Part of the paradox, she reasons, is that money laundering buoys the Canadian economy through corporate profits and jobs. The state, in turn, benefits from that illegal activity through tax revenues and fees. Her argument makes a lot of sense. Not only are real estate and construction among Canada’s top drivers of economic growth, but our country is also reliant on external inflows including from immigration. Here’s an uncomfortable truth: All those activities are vulnerable to illicit financial flows.”

“A 2016 evaluation by the Financial Action Task Force, an intergovernmental body that sets standards to combat financial crime, concluded that Canada struggles to detect corruption and the laundering of money through real estate. It also found that cross-border movements of money are rarely analyzed by law enforcement in Canada. ‘Why would any government – let alone a cash-strapped government such as the Canadian government – worry about the origins of this money?’ Dr. Ahmed writes.”

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This Post Has 78 Comments

  1. ‘We have an oversupply right now of new Class A (apartments),’ said Floyd Rowley, founding broker of Rowley Real Estate Advisors. ‘So those are the guys cutting the deals and they are essentially sucking up some tenants from the (Class) Bs and the Bs are doing the same thing to the Cs’

    ‘Greg Peek, president of ERGS Properties, sold his rental business in Reno and developed the 220-unit apartment. Peek wasn’t looking to sell at the time. The unsolicited offer from an out-of-state investor, however, was too good to refuse, he said. Peek still remembers what the new ownership did. ‘They immediately raised rents,’ Peek said. The new ownership looked at Peek’s former property as a ‘value add,’ which is when an investor comes in to take over an existing property to make improvements and raise its potential to earn even more revenue’

    When Mel Watt made his pedal to the metal comment he was at a Las Vegas confab for multi-family ‘investors’. Him and obammie came up with this whole scam. It was in this time that the guberment swallowed up fannie and freddie too, making the ever increasing shack price an informal guberment department.

  2. Globalist scum media and various supranational mouthpieces are clutching their pearls and hyperventilating over the rise of the “far right” as youth with no future whatsoever on the globalists’ incorporated neoliberal plantation start looking for alternatives. Interesting that the “housing crisis” – in reality a central bank fiat currency fraud crisis – is cited as a causative factor driving young people into far right movements.

    https://www.theguardian.com/news/article/2024/may/06/fix-europe-housing-crisis-risk-fuelling-far-right-un-expert-warns

  4. “The FHA mortgage program allows a 3.5% down payment for homebuyers with credit scores as low as 580”

    As subprime as it gets

    1. They are scraping the pail, just like they did leading up to the 2007-2012 bust, insisting all the while that “this time is different” along the path to CR8R.

      And the victims currently buying houses they can’t afford are soon enough going to be offered bailouts to make them whole.

      1. They are scraping the pail, just like they did leading up to the 2007-2012 bust,
        One other thing that happened in 2006-2008 is that women were “outshining” men in purchasing homes and the media made it know. Same thing happening now from what I have read. an other Omen?

    2. ‘It seems to me that those institutional investors are going to try to do everything they can to make as much money out of these properties as possible.’”

      country/world turning into “Rollerball”. (original version)
      Jonathan E

    3. I saw that and almost swallowed my gum. I wouldn’t lend someone with a 580 score twenty dollars, much less 500,000 dollars with nothing down.

      Ridiculous
      nope, no bubble here.

    1. Yeah ,most busineses like this don’t make it nohow, Don’t invest in it if you’re not prepared to lose it, At least they tried , they’re not crooks..
      Some platitudes I’ve heard are ……
      “Don’t invest in something you don’t Understand” And
      “The Better the talk ,the quicker you should walk”
      As a landlord , I get my fair share of scammers , I’ve never listened them out, so don’t know how it ends , something about paying a years rent in advance ,etc….

    2. The stupid, it burns.

      “Vasquez, Lezlie Briggs, Encantis Anderson and Latonia Greene all say this started with the promise of building generational wealth through investments in boats, vacation rentals, tiny homes, restaurants, and even a greenhouse farm.”

      There’s no excuse for boats, restaurants and farms. Vacation rentals and tiny homes I can understand. Those business models are trickier and somewhat rely on a manipulated housing market.

    3. but the greedy fools plunged in anyway

      Working is for losers. Winners don’t work and have tons of passive income.

      What they overlooked is that they aren’t in the club.

  8. Alberta is a huge province , with very few people per sq. mile ….till just a few years ago, one could have bought an entire Ranch, though a hardscrable one, for half what it would cost for a standred House now….Somethings going to pop soon , and their government dosen’t have a clue, Canadians are the original Sheeple, will do anything thier government tells them to ,absolutely anything…..And oh ,the quoted Fehr guy comes from a self sufficient background , if he can’t deal with it , nobody can…

  9. “Ask the average would-be homebuyer what’s holding them back, and they’ll likely tell you, ‘I don’t have the money for a down payment and closing costs.’

    Can’t even muster a 3% downpayment, but they want to buy 500k houses. WTF!

  10. “The arrival of outside institutional investors is one of the biggest changes in Reno that Peek has noticed.

    Municipalities need to protect themselves from the private equity locusts by exposing and voting out their political prostitutes, then electing replacements who will disincentivize the speculator scum from making housing unaffordable, preferably by banning corporations and private equity vermin from owning SFH or multifamily in their communities.

    1. +1

      This country is not gonna survive another four years of the Unelected Occupant in the White House.

      1. One more year and the middle class will break apart. We are already staring down the cliff.

        1. I’ve been seeing Joetato fundraiser ads on youtube.

          He begs for donations, reminding viewers of how much better things are now. The first time I saw it, I burst out laughing. Things are better now? I get it it, they have to say that; but do they really expect anyone to fall for it?

          2. There’s a recent one he did with Barry Bongo and I honestly thought it was an AI spoof it was so bad. The cringe is getting really bad with them.

          3. I get it it, they have to say that; but do they really expect anyone to fall for it?

            Some industries are doing quite well thanks to all of the fiscal expansion. People in those industries are genuinely happy.

            But that’s not most of the country.

          4. Some industries are doing quite well thanks to all of the fiscal expansion.

            Those benefiting from the largesse are already voting D, they don’t need to be convinced.

          5. Those benefiting from the largesse are already voting D, they don’t need to be convinced.

            Turning off the spigot would mean less turn out for an election!

          6. “There’s a recent one he did with Barry Bongo and I honestly thought it was an AI spoof it was so bad. The cringe is getting really bad with them.”

            Barry Bongo: “Hey, for the price of a cup of joe…”

            They’re trying really hard to reach the socialist incels in mom’s basement to donate some of their disability check to the campaign.

    2. Having lived in a Trump building in NYC when HRC carpetbagged the NY Senate seat, I clued in pretty early on into her and the media’s tricks in 2015/2016. Trump has been the only political candidate I have ever supported.

      1. HRC carpetbagged the NY Senate seat, I clued in pretty early on into her and the media’s tricks in 2015/2016.
        HRC grew up fairly close to where I did and I despise her.
        She is a disgusting human.

          1. There is a beautiful path in Seneca Falls with statues of all the famous women suffragettes of the area from long ago. For some odd reason Hillary cam here to attend some kind of party and they put a bronze of her on the trail. As if!

            I had to stop going there for walks.

          2. For some odd reason

            Not odd after you’ve gone down enough rabbit holes. Hunter Biden has a tattoo of the Finger Lakes on his back. Many (most?) of his businesses have Seneca in the name. The Clintons, Obamas and Bidens are part of the same “club.”

            As if!

            A coattail riding, “bimbo” bashing b!tch.

  12. In the second and third quarters of 2020 alone, the Federal Reserve’s balance sheet increased by 66%, or nearly $3 trillion. Over the same period, annualized federal spending jumped from $4.9 trillion to just under $8 trillion, an increase of 64%.

    Every dollar the Fed creates out of thin air steals value from every honestly-earned dollar in existence.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lK_rYS8L3kI

    1. How curious, the price inflation I have observed (vs. the fake Orwellian numbers they publish), is about 60%

  13. “They’re not waiting to buy until rates come down. Instead, they’re buying the house they want now with the expectation that they might refinance the loan and lower their mortgage payments in the future at some point. ‘It’s almost like you’re going to marry the house but date the rate,’ said Alex Elezaj, chief strategy officer for UWM in Pontiac.”

    How are higher-for-longer interest rates working out for the rate daters?

    1. I read in the MSM that rates will be cut in September now.

      So I’m hoping for 0% money again by Christmas.

  14. “If there is a lack of political will to combat financial crime, it is because the Canadian economy is dependent on dirty money. Dr. Ahmed dubs it ‘laundering as public policy.’

    Hey, remember when HSBC & Wachovia were caught laundering billions for the Sinaloa Cartel, and Fauxahontus bloviated for the cameras about how bank officials needed to go to prison? Of course nothing of the sort happened: nobody went to prison, and the banks were “hit” with tax-deductible, slap-on-the-wrist fines equivalent to a fraction of the profits they reaped in from laundering drug money. That’ll teach ’em….

    https://inews.co.uk/news/long-reads/hsbc-money-laundering-scandal-why-no-banker-jail-1700793

    1. HSBC was created to launder money and has been doing so since it’s inception. Any deal they are involved with can generally be considered suspect.

  15. Tomorrow is election day in Mexico. Tribe member and Globalist Claudia Sheinbaum is the hands down favorite to win the presidency.

    Unlike the incumbent, AMLO, she has promised to go all in on green energy. This means that we should expect Mexico’s economy to crash and for the Mexodus to go into overdrive.

      1. The other question is how many seats in the congress and senate will Morena win. If they don’t have a majority, then Shenbaum will have to make deals with the opposition to get her “reforma energetica” passed.

        AMLO refused to go green, much to Brandon’s chagrin. It is quite possible that AMLO might be able to pull strings with the new congress and keep Mexico carbon based. This is a topic of discussion in Mexico: will Sheinbaum really be in charge, or will she have to defer to AMLO on some matters?

        Meanwhile, the cartels are still murdering candidates they don’t like. Yesterday a Green party candidate for the mayorship of a smaller town was gunned down. Looks like the cartels have no use for communists and understand the threat they pose.

          1. Mexico has no solution to this problem and politicians like Sheinbaum do not talk about it. The cartels have infiltrated almost every aspect of the economy and everyone who runs a business is expected to submit to their extortions and pay up. It makes you wonder how the Mexican economy even works.

            Anyway, this campaign year has been deadly. According to Reuters, 37 candidates have been murdered this year.

          2. It makes you wonder how the Mexican economy even works.

            Human and drug trafficking are high-margin businesses.

    2. Al Gore’s 30 Years of Climate Errors: Snow Job

      by Ken Braun
      FEBRUARY 13, 2023

      Snow Job

      Gore’s prophecy regarding Kilimanjaro National Park in Tanzania was more precise, and just as wrong.

      “Within the decade there will be no more snows of Kilimanjaro,” he said to the audience in An Inconvenient Truth. This occurred moments before he makes his prediction for Glacier National Park.

      As of November 2022, Snow-forecast.com, a webpage for skiers, reported that an average of 93 combined inches of snowfall (almost 8 feet) hits just the middle altitudes of Kilimanjaro during November and December. And 9 inches of combined snowfall is the average expected for the middle elevations for July and August, the lightest two-month period for snowfall on the middle part of the mountain.

      The upper altitudes of Kilimanjaro supposedly get pummeled with an average of 171 inches (more than 14 feet) of snow during November and December. Another 127 inches (10 more feet) is expected during April and May. The expectation for September and October is 59 inches. According to Snow-forecast, every two-month period on Kilimanjaro’s higher elevations is expected to feature well over a foot of snowfall.

      For perspective, Syracuse, New York, sometimes crowned America’s snowiest city, records average snowfall of 127.8 inches for the entire year.

      Hurricane Hyperbole

      These failed prognostications about the future disasters of climate change were bad enough. But the hyperbole over hurricanes in An Inconvenient Truth was far worse.

      “We have seen in the last couple of years, a lot of big hurricanes,” said Gore, in the 2006 film. “The summer of 2005 has been one for the books.”

      In his history lecture on the hurricanes of 2005, Gore claimed the lesson to learn was that we had been ignoring “warnings that hurricanes would get stronger” because of human-inflicted climate change.

      What Gore knew (or should have known) but did not mention when he claimed there had been “a lot of big hurricanes” was that the four “major” storms of 2005 were all measured at Category 3 intensity when they made landfall. This includes the star of Gore’s presentation, the obviously devastating Hurricane Katrina that ravaged New Orleans in August 2005.

      Category 3 is the lowest category that still qualifies as a “major” hurricane by the NOAA’s definition.

      What neither Gore nor anyone else knew was the hurricane silence that would follow.

      In 2006 not a single hurricane of any kind made landfall in the continental United States. And then, over the next 10 years through 2016, not a single major hurricane hit the USA. During seven of those years (2009–2015) just four total hurricanes of any kind made landfall, three of them Category 1 and one a Category 2.

      No comparable era of docile hurricanes appears in the NOAA records going back more than a century. This period of unprecedented calm following immediately on the heels of Gore’s hurricane hyperbole really was—to borrow his analysis— “one for the books.”

      If Gore proved anything at all, it was that Mother Nature might be real, with a wicked sense of humor, and she decided to spend 11 years making a mockery of his movie.

      https://capitalresearch.org/article/al-gores-30-years-of-climate-errors-part-2/

    1. Markets
      Homebuyers Are Starting to Revolt Over Steep Prices Across US
      Key selling season is disappointing so far, economist says
      Higher portion of home sellers are cutting asking prices
      Single family homes in a residential neighborhood in San Marcos, Texas.
      Photographer: Jordan Vonderhaar/Bloomberg
      By Prashant Gopal and Michael Sasso
      June 1, 2024 at 7:30 AM PDT

      The US housing market — long crippled by an inventory drought — is finally starting to see listings rise. But now, in many places, the buyers just aren’t showing up.

      Sellers are grappling with the fact that higher-for-longer rates are choking off demand during what’s typically the key season for the market. And more of those owners are cutting asking prices than any time since November 2022 as inventory grows stale, according to Redfin Corp.
      …
      https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-06-01/homebuyers-are-starting-to-revolt-over-steep-prices-across-us

  18. ‘That puts homeownership in reach for more buyers — which spurs demand and drives up home prices further’

    Hurray! This has been going on for decades.

  19. ‘We have an oversupply right now of new Class A (apartments)’

    They have a clusterfook going on in Reno, read the article to see. Floyd and company are fooked

  20. ‘Average residential taxes rose more than 5 percent from 2022 to 2023 in the Tampa and Orlando MSAs. But those increases added less than $100 to monthly expenses, so that is probably not a major factor,’ he said. ‘The same would be true for homeowner insurance increases, which aren’t going to add a huge amount to monthly expenses. So, amid all that, I suspect these trends may be due to nothing more than lenders with backlogs that are now being filed in court, leading to an increase in activity’

    Rob is saying this is shadow inventory.

    1. But those increases added less than $100 to monthly expenses, so that is probably not a major factor,’ he said.

      Given the cost of living crisis that $100 a month is probably a big deal for many, if not most people.

  21. ‘If the proposal is approved, homeowners will be able to turn their equity into cash without selling their home or refinancing the existing first, which most likely has a low rate secured in the post-financial crisis, post pandemic period of preternaturally low mortgage rates’

    As this is stated, aimed at the loan footprint of minor respitory illness, they will lose mucho dinero on every loan they make. How the heck can you do billion$ in refis/helocs at those rates? That’s below the GSE borrowing rate.

  22. ‘There is nothing we’re doing at the federal, provincial or municipal levels that will move us away from an asset-based economy,’ Tranjan said. ‘(Most of what) we’re doing is increasing supply, but how much of this supply will be at a reasonable price and be purchased by someone who is not a homeowner looking for an investment property?’

    ‘I’m telling you, there is a sense of frustration,’ Thobani said. ‘It’s like, ‘Ah, we lost that one or we lost another one, we’re not going to find another place. Okay, my lease is coming up. I need to get out of this.’ Then they will maximize whatever they can and outbid the next person’

    The knife catchers are speculators too. The math doesn’t work.

  23. ‘If there is a lack of political will to combat financial crime, it is because the Canadian economy is dependent on dirty money’

    It’s been this way for decades.

        2. I just searched ‘donate to trump’.

          The third organic result is for ‘joebiden.com’.

    1. FOX 5 San Diego & KUSI News
      San Diego among top ‘move-out cities,’ according to PODS moving company
      Kelsey Thompson and Jeremy Tanner
      8 hours ago

      AUSTIN, Texas (KXAN) — Which U.S. cities saw the most people move in – and out – last year?

      Moving and storage company PODS revealed its data showing which cities across the country attracted the most new residents, and which saw the most pack up and leave.

      You may have seen the Clearwater, Florida-based company’s shipping containers on driveways in your neighborhood. The company, which started in 1998, lets movers fill up the PODS with their belongings, then ships them to the new address.

      Cities with highest levels of move-outs

      – Los Angeles, California (ranked first in 2023)

      – San Francisco area, Northern California (ranked second in 2023)
      Miami area, South Florida (ranked fifth in 2023)

      – Long Island, New York, serving parts of New York City (ranked fourth in 2023)

      – Austin, Texas (not ranked in 2023)
      Central Jersey, New Jersey (ranked sixth in 2023)

      – Chicago, Illinois (ranked third in 2023)

      – San Diego, California (ranked 14th in 2023)

      – Stockton-Modesto, California (ranked ninth in 2023)

      – Hudson Valley, New York (ranked 11th in 2023)

      – Santa Barbara, California (ranked 10th in 2023)

      – Denver, Colorado (ranked 18th in 2023)

      – Boston, Massachusetts (not ranked in 2023)

      – Baltimore, Maryland (ranked 12th in 2023)

      – Hartford, Connecticut (ranked 20th in 2023)

      – Portland, Oregon (not ranked in 2023)

      – Fresno, California (not ranked in 2023)

      – Bakersfield, California (not ranked in 2023)

      – Northern New Jersey, serving parts of

      – New York City (ranked 15th in 2023)

      – Minneapolis, Minnesota (not ranked in 2023)

      PODS data found California had the highest concentration of move-outs among U.S. states, with seven cities or regions represented in PODS’ Top 20 rankings.
      …
      https://fox5sandiego.com/news/local-news/san-diego/san-diego-among-top-move-out-cities-according-to-pods-moving-company/

  27. Have you heard so many stock market warnings that never came to fruition that you routinely ignore them now?

    1. MARKETS
      A 32-year market vet shares 2 charts showing stocks could be entering a major market peak — and warns a coming recession will send the S&P 500 plummeting more than 60%
      William Edwards Jun 1, 2024, 2:50 AM PDT
      New York Stock Exchange 1987
      AP Images

      – The S&P 500 has risen 26% since late October, but one bear says a pullback may be imminent.

      – Historical trends show stocks falter when the Federal Reserve cuts rates amid looming recessions.

      – Investors also seem complacent about inflation and high rates, warns Jon Wolfenbarger.

      It’s been a near-frictionless seven months for the S&P 500, with the benchmark index up a cool 26% since late October.

      But as the rally continues to placate investors — changing the minds of even some of the most bearish strategists on Wall Street — the market may be quietly starting to roll over.

      That’s according to Jon Wolfenbarger, the founder of investing newsletter BullAndBearProfits.com and a former investment banker at JPMorgan and Merrill Lynch. In a recent note, he laid out several charts showing why stocks could be in the process of topping out as the threat of a recession looms.

      The first draws on history. In prior Federal Reserve rate hiking cycles, stocks have continued to rise until around the time the central bank starts to cut. But as soon as the Fed has started easing policy, the market has run into trouble. Such was the case in 2000 and 2008, two of the biggest market sell-offs in history. With the Fed expected to start cutting rates later this year, it could spell trouble for stocks.
      …
      https://www.businessinsider.com/stock-market-crash-recession-warning-signals-sp500-outlook-wolfenbarger-2024-5

  29. Are you a rate dater cargo cult member who is losing the faith?

    What is your plan in case rates never come down?

    1. Housing Market
      Interest Rates
      Housing Market Update: When Will Rates Fall?
      Published May 31, 2024 at 10:00 AM EDT
      Updated May 31, 2024 at 1:00 PM EDT
      By Omar Mohammed
      Reporter, Economy & Finance

      The Federal Reserve’s preferred inflation measure for April came in line with expectations, the Commerce Department showed on Friday, in what could be a signal that price increases are slowing, which could lead policymakers to slash borrowing costs.

      The Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) price index accelerated on a monthly basis by 0.3 percent in April—the same as March—matching estimates by economists. On an annual basis, PCE inflation increased 2.7 percent, equaling the level from a year ago, government data showed.

      The trajectory of inflation is key to determining the cost of loans, including for mortgages. The Federal Reserve hiked rates to a more than two-decade high to slow soaring inflation. The move helped to push up borrowing costs, including for mortgages. Any indication that inflation is slowing could contribute to a drop in rates.
      …
      https://www.newsweek.com/housing-market-update-when-will-rates-fall-1906787

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