I’m Struggling With The House, I Need To Sell The Property; I Can’t Manage
A report from the Baltimore Banner in Maryland. “F.A., a 41-year-old Edgewater resident, dreamed his whole life of going into public service. ‘I got into student debt for it. I have a big student loan to prove it,’ said the man, who asked to be identified by his initials for fear of retribution for speaking out. His seven-year run with the federal government, beginning with a five-year stint at the Federal Emergency Management Agency ended recently along with scores of his colleagues abruptly fired from his contract job the U.S. Agency for International Development. ‘I have a wife. I have a mortgage. I have a 3-year-old. I have day care,’ F.A. said. ‘I’m starting to apply to everything and anything because none of us have the luxury of time to wait on the judicial system to fix our problems. We’re not rich; we’re public servants. None of us do this for the money, obviously. So here we are, with the rest of America, applying to jobs.'”
“Merissa Mirani, a 29-year-old who lives in Cape St. Claire, worked for a company in Bethesda that contracted with USAID. She and her colleagues knew they’d be impacted when Trump suspended foreign assistance for 90 days, but it soon became clear the company would struggle to pay its employees. Then came furloughs and the ensuing emotions. ‘Just helpless, really,’ Mirani said. ‘In particular for this sector, foreign aid, it’s like the whole sector was just wiped out.’ Only back from maternity leave for about three months, she now was frantically applying for jobs. Out of 150 job applications, Mirani estimated, she got just three calls. ‘Because I’m not seeing any leads, I’m having to accept that I might have to be a stay-at-home mom, which is not necessarily what I wanted. I have a career that I worked very hard for,’ Mirani said. ‘That’s where I’m at, and just constant anxiety because my husband also works for a government contractor, so he might also be let go.'”
The Star Tribune. “Just after Nancy Brand secured a seat on the resident-led board at Edina’s Windwood Condominiums, the property manager revealed that after years of single-digit increases, their property insurance rates would increase — by 400%. ‘It was hard to choke down, and we spent a lot of time searching for alternatives,’ added Larry Struck, 76, Windwood’s HOA president. The episode provided Brand and Struck front-row seats to a topsy-turvy property insurance market in Minnesota. Living in HOA communities has become more expensive in recent years, and insiders say rising property insurance costs are a major reason why. ‘In virtually every HOA, we’re hearing the same story,’ said Lynn Boergerhoff, president of the locally based educational and advocacy organization HOA Leadership Network. ‘It’s either been very difficult to get insurance, or the insurance they are able to get has reduced coverages and increased costs. That’s certainly going on very broadly throughout our metro area.'”
My 13 News in Florida. “Condo owners the past two years say they are shocked by the fees they now pay monthly or quarterly. Whether it’s money going in to the operating budget or reserves budget, the two can add up to a mortgage payment. That cost just on fees to a condo association alone has condo owners across the state asking for help. ‘It was in fact a good idea,’ Marbella Condominiums condo board member Tom Baker said. ‘The problem was it was poorly executed.’ Following hurricane Ian and Nicole in 2022, Tom Baker’s Marbella Condo in Daytona Beach Shores was hit hard.”
“It wasn’t covered by property insurance. Property insurance didn’t pay out a dime to the association or owners according to Baker. Because of that Baker and his 23 other owners in his building were each hit with an $80,000 assessment. Following the storms, his monthly dues went from $850 a month to $1,350 a month. ‘People generally do not want the dues to go up,’ Baker says. ‘They want the cheap way out, which is a mistake. The idea is you should be fully funded, always.’ Next on Baker’s to-do list for his building is improving the elevators. They work now, but like everything with a building, it all has a life span. He estimates the project will cost $200,000. ‘We are going to wait until one of them breaks, and then we will fix it, and we do,’ Baker states. The can do that with funded reserves. Otherwise that would be a $200,000 bill assessed to 24 owners.”
WOAI in Texas. “February saw a slowdown in the real estate market, with almost a 10% drop in sales, compared to the same time last year. One study found San Antonio has the third longest listing times in the country. ‘It’s really a buyer’s market right now,’ said Reagan Williamson, Chair of the Board of the San Antonio Board of Realtors. ‘We’re seeing more houses on the market. As a matter of fact, I believe that right now, we are up from last year, about 3000 homes, on average, that are on the market to sell.’ When there are more houses on the market, Williamson said, sellers are more likely to start giving incentives. ‘Maybe they’re doing a price correction, or maybe they’re offering an additional amenity or service, or they’re including a really nice refrigerator with a sale, whatever they’re doing to try to make their house stand out from the competition,’ said Williamson.”
From KESQ. “Just like everything, real estate in the Coachella Valley all seems to be going up in price, but if you are waiting to buy, the wait might cost you. ‘What steps would you tell them to have the best chance to be able to end up in a home?’ Jeff Stahl asked Stephenie Zinn, California Desert Association of REALTORS’s President. Zinn said, ‘As someone looking to get in the market, we heard that the best time was 10 years ago, the next best time is now.’ The statistics don’t lie. Gone are homes in the $200,000 to $300,000 price range from 2014. Now, median prices are near $700,000 in the Coachella Valley, a 133 percent increase since 2014. In another five years, realtors say they expect minimum prices to top a million dollars. But there is some good news.”
“The current housing inventory is at 5.6 months. Where to buy? Palm Springs and Palm Desert have the most homes for sale. Coachella and Bermuda Dunes have the least. Zinn said, ‘It’s allowed those first-time buyers to pick up properties again.’ ‘If it’s overpriced, it’s sitting,’ local realtor Stephen Powell said, adding, ‘If it’s priced right, it’s still moving.’ And back to getting financed. There is help, even with a down payment. Zinn said, ‘A lot of the times when a buyer comes to me wanting to get into home ownership, the first conversation we have is with one of our lender partners to see how they can get qualified.'”
Bisnow New York. “Desperate to rid itself of a rent-stabilized apartment building, L+M Development Partners is suing its lender for refusing to take the keys. The Westchester-based landlord filed a complaint against Santander Bank in New York County Supreme Court Thursday alleging that the lender has improperly declined to accept the deed in lieu of foreclosure at 320 St. Nicholas Ave. In court records, L+M said that the option to walk away from the Harlem property is in loan documents, while Santander is looking to seize other assets to recoup possible losses from the mortgage. L+M isn’t alone in asserting that the legislation intended to protect low-income tenants has quickly backfired, making the upkeep of rent-regulated units an economic challenge that could drain housing stock and spark foreclosures. The Securities and Exchange Commission has already begun examining the impact of the resulting distress on banks, according to a Bisnow analysis of public records.”
“As the value of rent-stabilized buildings in New York plummets, the scramble among owners and lenders to minimize losses has spread. Lenders have previously said that newly originated loans are structured around personal guarantees and other recourse provisions to ensure that borrowers can’t offload their underwater assets on their financiers. Signature’s loan book is also causing tension elsewhere in the city. A venture called Community Stabilization Partners, which bought a stake in a large portfolio of rent-stabilized loans, recently filed its first foreclosure actions against its borrowers, with more expected.”
The Real Deal. “A bank that financed the value-add plans of Sun Belt syndicators faces allegations it failed to disclose the default risk of bridge loans it made to those green operators, many of whom are struggling to hold on to their failing deals. Shareholders smacked the lender — The Bancorp — with a class action weeks after it told investors that two years of financial reporting ‘should not be relied upon,’ according to the complaint. The suit is among the first, if not the first, to tie a bank to the syndicator distress story. From 2020 through 2022, hoards of inexperienced operators seized on record-low interest rates and rising rents, snapping up fix-and-flip apartment properties across the Sun Belt. As rates rose and renovations subsequently stalled, default and foreclosures have stained the space.”
“Arbor’s lending practices have drawn the most attention. The U.S. Department of Justice and the Federal Bureau of Investigations launched a probe into the publicly traded REIT last summer after multiple short sellers accused the firm of ‘vastly’ overstating the value of its allegedly distressed loan book. Since then, Arbor’s quarterly reports have shown more cracks. Claims against The Bancorp also stem from a short seller report. This time last year, Culper Research found the bank’s books were allegedly ‘rife with unsophisticated syndicated borrowers’ drawn to investing by ‘get rich quick’ dreams, according to the complaint. ‘TBBK’s Reserve Levels Don’t Pass the Laugh Test,’ one heading in the Culper report reads.”
Bisnow Boston in Massachusetts. “The 36-story One Lincoln office building was sold to its lender at a Friday foreclosure auction that illustrated the despair of Boston’s office market. The auction took place at the corner of Kingston and Bedford streets in front of a closed exit to the 1.1M SF office tower. It was a particularly windy and chilly morning, and the auction drew roughly 40 onlookers — and no bidders. After a legal notice was read, bidding began at $500M. With no takers, auctioneer Samantha Saperstein dropped the starting bid down to $200M. ‘You got to start somewhere, folks. You’re not going to get it for that much of a steal,’ she told the crowd. Even at that price, no takers emerged, though a $400M bid was submitted from one of the lenders on the property. Saperstein pushed for $450M, but no further bids presented themselves.”
Global News in Canada. “The last 14 months have been tough for Anuratharan Nallathamby of Brampton, Ont. In December 2024, the 49-year-old experienced chest pains, was admitted to hospital and was subsequently diagnosed with blockages to his heart. Then, in January, he underwent triple-bypass surgery from which he’s still recovering. ‘My doctor said, ‘You have so much stress,’ said Nallathamby, who describes his tenants in one word. ‘Scammers,’ Nallathamby told Global News in a television interview in the park across from where he lives in Brampton.”
“Nallathamby says the five tenants occupying the Swans Acre Trail rental property purchased in 2021 completely stopped paying rent at the beginning of 2024, leaving him responsible to cover the monthly mortgage bill and many utilities. ‘I’m struggling with the house. I need to sell the property; I can’t manage,’ he said. To date, Nallathamby says the tenants owe him about $60,000, including back rent and unpaid utilities, which he’s been required to cover or risk foreclosure. Global News went to the house occupied by the five tenants listed on the lease: Jashandeep Singh, Rabalpreet Kaur, Kunwar Sher Singh, Karanbir Singh and Manpreet Kaur. None of the tenants answered the door or responded to a written request for comment by Global News taped on the front door of the home more than a week ago.”
The Hindustan Times on India. “Navi Mumbai: Aspiring home buyers from the economically weaker sections (EWS) and the lower income group (LIG) categories are up in arms against the City and Industrial Development Corporation (Cidco) over the pricing of its mass housing scheme. They are also upset that the area of the homes mentioned in the intent letters issued after the lottery draw was less than what Cidco had stated earlier, a charge denied by the government agency. The buyers, who have conducted a signature campaign and are exploring legal options, announced on Friday at a press conference that they will organise a human chain protest in Vashi on Tuesday.”
“As part of its much-hyped My Preferred Cidco mass housing scheme, the agency had in October last year initiated online registration for 26,000 homes under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (PMAY), the central government’s affordable housing scheme. They were placed in two categories: EWS (income up to ₹6 lakh per annum) and LIG (income over ₹6 lakh per annum). However, most applicants were left aghast when Cidco announced the home prices under these categories in January. In the EWS category, homes ranged between ₹25 lakh and ₹48 lakh, while those in the LIG category were from ₹34 lakh to ₹97 lakh. The buyers were further upset that the home size mentioned was 27.12 sqm (290 sqft), instead of 29 sqm (322 sqft) advertised in the letter of intent. According to Cidco, this was the carpet area of the house, excluding the balcony area, as required under Real Estate (Regulation and Development) Act.”
“The buyers claimed that Cidco had misled them. ‘The dream homes of the poor have turned out to be homes for the rich,’ said Dada Padalkar, one of the applicants. ‘We can somehow manage to pay for the ₹40-50 lakh homes with the help of loans, but not those priced over ₹85 lakh. How can auto drivers, hawkers, mathadi workers, maids, etc., afford them?'”
“Vijay Mane, another applicant, said, ‘For the last year and a half, we collected and submitted volumes of documents asked for, incurring huge expenses and time. We took loans to pay for the registration and booking amounts. Now, we realise we have been defrauded in terms of price, area and even location.'”
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‘As a matter of fact, I believe that right now, we are up from last year, about 3000 homes, on average, that are on the market to sell’
That’s not much Reagan, down the road in Houston they have 31,000 shacks on the market.
‘When there are more houses on the market, Williamson said, sellers are more likely to start giving incentives. ‘Maybe they’re doing a price correction, or maybe they’re offering an additional amenity or service, or they’re including a really nice refrigerator’
And it comes with 30 year financing!
‘The suit is among the first, if not the first, to tie a bank to the syndicator distress story. From 2020 through 2022, hoards of inexperienced operators seized on record-low interest rates and rising rents, snapping up fix-and-flip apartment properties across the Sun Belt’
I covered this extensively back when the media was spinning glory days tales of instant riches. Puddle watchers missed it entirely.
‘Arbor’s lending practices have drawn the most attention. The U.S. Department of Justice and the Federal Bureau of Investigations launched a probe into the publicly traded REIT last summer after multiple short sellers accused the firm of ‘vastly’ overstating the value of its allegedly distressed loan book. Since then, Arbor’s quarterly reports have shown more cracks. Claims against The Bancorp also stem from a short seller report. This time last year, Culper Research found the bank’s books were allegedly ‘rife with unsophisticated syndicated borrowers’ drawn to investing by ‘get rich quick’ dreams, according to the complaint. ‘TBBK’s Reserve Levels Don’t Pass the Laugh Test’
That’s some sound lending right there.
F.A., a 41-year-old Edgewater resident, dreamed his whole life of going into public service.
Dream big, parasite.
We’re not rich; we’re public servants. None of us do this for the money, obviously. So here we are, with the rest of America, applying to jobs
Forgive me if I’m mistaken, but we all work for the money, we expect to get paid.
I’m sorry you learned the hard way that you weren’t fireproof.
I’m sorry you learned the hard way
…and so late in life with so many foolish financial liabilities.
“‘We’re not rich; we’re public servants. None of us do this for the money, obviously. So here we are, with the rest of America, applying to jobs.'”
https://x.com/RealEJAntoni/status/1901608520035827831
E.J. Antoni, Ph.D. @RealEJAntoni
Gov’t workers are 42.1% more expensive than their private sector counterparts, w/ benefit packages costing 83.6% more for gov’t employees:
[See chart]
8:16 AM · Mar 17, 2025 · 179.6K Views
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rahn_curve
“The Rahn curve is a graph used to illustrate an economic theory, proposed in 1996 by American economist Richard W. Rahn, which suggests that there is a level of government spending that maximizes economic growth.”
The Rahn Curve is for total .gov spending and .gov employment is only a small part of .gov spending. Follow the 20%/80% rule. I think DJTs strategy here is to reduce .gov employment and cull the herd of the Administrative/Deep State (#resist). Must drain The Swamp. Civil service unions are illegal. Ban them. Need to continue to cut entire agencies. Cutting waste, fraud and abuse is only part of the overall strategy. Focusing on cutting the main drivers of said spending should be the priority, including entitlements (the third rail) and defense. For example, the pentagon keeps “losing” $Ts every year. Procurement is a driver.
We’ve gone WAY past the “gaining efficiencies” stage in .gov to approaching the sovereign default and hyperinflation stage.
The U.S. is clearly on a trajectory to a sovereign default. Balanced budget amendment, term limits, sound $ needed. Nothing new here. Congress is still spending like drunken sailors. Oh, and of course, end the Fed. Is it too late? IDK.
The Donald and Elon should have weekly video conferences with Xavier Milei for recommendations. Milei is an economist and is doing great things in Argentina. Same approach needed in U.S., and in the rest of the OECD countries as well.
Money is not the tool of the moochers, who claim your product by tears, or of the looters, who take it from you by force. Money is made possible only by the men who produce. Is this what you consider evil?” – Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged
“Paper is a check drawn by legal looters upon an account which is not theirs: upon the virtue of the victims. Watch for the day when it bounces, marked, ‘Account overdrawn.’” – Francisco’s “Money” Speech – from “Atlas Shrugged” by Ayn Rand
‘I have a wife. I have a mortgage. I have a 3-year-old. I have day care,’ F.A. said. ‘I’m starting to apply to everything and anything because none of us have the luxury of time to wait on the judicial system to fix our problems.
Those sound like F.A. problems, FA.
None of us do this for the money, obviously.
Be sure to mention that in all your job interviews.
BTW the New Woke World Order line last night was perfect.
Be sure to mention that in all your job interviews.
Good point. I would have loved to hear someone say that to me during an interview.
I’ve had small business owners say nonsense like that — we’re a family, it’s not all about the money! Losers and liars.
Realtors are liars.
HBB regulars: your mission for today is to report to your nearest PetSmart and teach the parrots to say, “Realtors are liars.”
‘the auction drew roughly 40 onlookers — and no bidders. After a legal notice was read, bidding began at $500M. With no takers, auctioneer Samantha Saperstein dropped the starting bid down to $200M. ‘You got to start somewhere, folks. You’re not going to get it for that much of a steal,’ she told the crowd. Even at that price, no takers emerged, though a $400M bid was submitted from one of the lenders on the property. Saperstein pushed for $450M, but no further bids presented themselves’
Yer sh$thole of a city shot itself in the fook Sam. I saw it coming at the time and mentioned it repeatedly. You can’t shut down a big city and expect everything will be fine. But you got no mean tweets for a few years!
‘You got to start somewhere, folks. You’re not going to get it for that much of a steal,’ she told the crowd.
Au contraire, Samantha. The wipeout of Yellen Bux “value” created by the gusher of Fed funny money since 2008 is going to be epic. Got popcorn?
Boston no doubt thought it was special. Just get a load of the mayor they elected. As Bolshie as they come, though she tried to disguise herself on Ash Wednesday.
So here we are, with the rest of America, applying to jobs.’”
As you struggle to find work that pays a living wage in Paul Krugman’s Strongest Economy Ever, F.A., just remember how many billions in taxpayer dollars your former FedGov employer, USAID, squandered in every 3rd World rathole around the globe.
Salt in the wound.
New York Times — Should Biden Downplay His Own Success? (6/3/2024):
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/03/opinion/biden-economy.html
Are China’s CCP overlords lying about the true rate of population decrease?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o1x-W3i3k0Q
‘In particular for this sector, foreign aid, it’s like the whole sector was just wiped out.’
This is exactly what I voted for, globalist minions and wasters of my hard-earned tax dollars.
They say it as if it were a bad thing.
The globalist minions of the Party of Soros are on a “Fighting Oligarchy Tour.” Oh the irony.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14524529/democrat-elissa-slotkin-aoc-actually-done.html
Bernie and AOC are cosplaying as populists.
Imagine if every developer and builder who turns over defect-ridden “luxury” shacks to FBs ends up getting sued for their shoddy construction. Why aren’t housing inspectors and regulators being held financially and criminally liable for signing off on such work?
https://www.news.com.au/finance/real-estate/his-jaw-dropped-luxury-homeowners-awarded-more-than-1-million-over-defective-build/news-story/6199984719cc6dcf8e812233bd14673a
Otherwise that would be a $200,000 bill assessed to 24 owners.”
Gosh, what happens if Boomers on fixed incomes can’t afford to pony up their share?
I’m sure they can skip this year’s cruises and other vacations and luxuries to come up with the 8 grand. But they want the taxpayer to cover it for them.
“But they want the taxpayer to cover it for them.”
That’s right, we’re “The Greatest Generation!”
“The Greatest Generation!”
Aren’t they all dead by now?
Right, the “Greatest Generation” is almost all dead now. That would be my fathers generation who fought World War 2, went through Great Depression. Maybe a few alive from World War One.
My dad would be 102 now.
My next door neighbor who was a, “Rosie the Riveter,” has been retired longer than her career, and she has also outlasted two husbands! Her retirement income is greater than mine when I was employed as an engineer, and she was a Boeing union employee.
But they want the taxpayer to cover it for them.
Other people’s money is always the “cure.”
“Just like everything, real estate in the Coachella Valley all seems to be going up in price, but if you are waiting to buy, the wait might cost you.
REIC shills in the garbage legacy media are still trying to drum up a false sense of urgency so their Realtor advertisers can con the gullible & stupid into Always Be Closing.
“Desperate to rid itself of a rent-stabilized apartment building, L+M Development Partners is suing its lender for refusing to take the keys.
Flopped speculators suing lenders who refuse to eat their bad loans – this is a new twist. Paging Fauxahontus…clean-up on Aisle 4!
It’s not something that one sees every day!
No, but one should be paying attention to leading indicators of the next great financial crisis, courtesy of the Fed & the Parliament of Whores on Capitol Hill.
“Desperate to rid itself of a rent-stabilized apartment building, L+M Development Partners is suing its lender for refusing to take the keys.
Seems to me that if no one wants this building and they are suing each other to not to have to own it, the propety might actually have a negative value in real terms. I am sure it won’t be the only property that has a negative value going forward.
From 2020 through 2022, hoards of inexperienced operators seized on record-low interest rates and rising rents, snapping up fix-and-flip apartment properties across the Sun Belt. As rates rose and renovations subsequently stalled, default and foreclosures have stained the space.”
I loves me a good “fleeced speculator scum turn on reckless lender” story the first thing in the morning. Thanks, Ben!
This time last year, Culper Research found the bank’s books were allegedly ‘rife with unsophisticated syndicated borrowers’ drawn to investing by ‘get rich quick’ dreams, according to the complaint.
Die, speculator scum. It’s laughable that these greedy marks were naive enough to think that a banking system overseen by the likes of Yellen the Felon, Fauxahontus, and Sen. Maxine Waters wouldn’t be rife with fraud.
It was a particularly windy and chilly morning, and the auction drew roughly 40 onlookers — and no bidders.
Gosh, I’m no economics major like AOC, but auctions going bidless means it becomes impossible to price the underlying collateral on the banksters’ CRE portfolios – which is exactly what caused the 2008 Great Financial Crisis. Thankfully, Yellen the Felon has assured us there will be no new financial crisis “in our time” thanks to the Fed’s stewardship of the financial system. I am Jack’s huge sense of relief.
Global News went to the house occupied by the five tenants listed on the lease: Jashandeep Singh, Rabalpreet Kaur, Kunwar Sher Singh, Karanbir Singh and Manpreet Kaur.
These globalist Great Replacement imports are the “New Canadians” that Trump is wisely barring from unrestricted entry into the United States.
I recall reading that it is estimated there are 500,000 Indians living illegally in the US. And these aren’t code monkeys, but mostly unskilled invaders who sold the farm back home to get here.
You will own nothing.
https://x.com/SamanthaLaDuc/status/1903224386343051737
Is now the time to buy whatever, just because?
Is the Stock Market Cheap Yet?
US stocks are trading at a 5% discount to their fair values, according to Morningstar’s analysis.
Sarah Hansen
Mar 20, 2025
…
https://www.morningstar.com/stocks/is-stock-market-cheap-yet
“This sucker could go down” — George W. Bush
Sure……you first.
From the Baltimore link:
In Maryland, one of 10 workers is a federal employee. Almost half live in the D.C. suburbs of Montgomery and Prince George’s counties, but there are plenty in the Baltimore area. Approximately 60,000 Anne Arundel County families and individuals rely on federal incomes, according to the county. Of the workers who live near Fort Meade, about 42% were employed by the federal government.
Steven, who asked to be identified only by his first name, had been furloughed, too. Like Mirani, he was worried about his family — his wife and her son are immigrants — and mourning a dream career.
“Folks who are in international development, it’s not something you just stumble into,” said Steven, who lives in Edgewater. “It’s something that you work towards. It’s something that you really want to be in, you want to have an impact in the world. To lose that over the course of a weekend is just devastating.”
Folks who are in international development, it’s not something you just stumble into
It takes careful planning to become a highly paid parasite.
you want to have an impact in the world
I’m sure that those LGBXYZ comic books in Peru and the free money given to terrorists are making the world a better place.
And I’m not against helping the truly needy, but USAID became so corrupt and subverted that it needs to be burned down and replaced with something new.
No, it doesn’t need to be replaced, ever. We need to see to our own first. Any “foreign aid” program will always be usurped & subverted by the globalists & their stooges.
By my careful scientific calculations, USAid has been closed long enough for the media to find scores of foreign populations who are now starving to death or dying of some scary disease. Where they at??
Mirani worked as an Ethics & Compliance Strategist for DAI.
Who is DAI? One of the top companies that doles out the USAID contracts. Their current CEO, Tine Knott, worked at USAID before DAI.
https://www.devex.com/news/is-the-aid-sector-suffering-from-compliance-itis-one-ceo-thinks-so-105099
Layers and layers of grift.
I wouldn’t be surprised if less than 10% of the money actually went to those in need. Which is why ISAID needs to be burned to the ground and rebuilt from scratch
“Layers and layers of grift.”
+1 They’re dug in like Alabama ticks!
[Charts can be fun …]
https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F84b1bc62-9503-4dc2-9c54-abfb9883761c_1822x1446.jpeg
And it was flat from about 1950 to 1980, mostly because deficits back then were miniscule by today’s standards, yet many were rightly alarmed back then.
The FJB regime will go down in history as the Great Looters of the Public Purse, having either grifted or squandered trillions of dollars.
The nightmare scenario for the Fed & its bullion bank market riggers: millions of red-pilled investors ditching their debauched Yellen Bux for God’s money.
https://www.kitco.com/opinion/2025-03-20/mechanics-silver-price-suppression
Seethe harder, Democrat-Bolshevik Comrades of Proven Worth, as the fraud, waste, and abuse that sustained your high living and FedGov excesses is exposed and you are cast into the Outer Darkness of Paul Krugman’s Strongest Economy Ever to fend for yourselves.
https://x.com/lukerosiak/status/1902412374318923833
Never give your allegiance to the dark one, for in the end he will throw you from his mount, to be trodden under.
WESH 2 sits down with buying agent of Seminole Towne Center
Seminole Towne Center in Sanford is set to be transformed into a mixed-use development.
WESH2 sat down with the buying agent who helped close one of the biggest deals in Central Florida real estate.
“The mall was dying. It’s one of many that has seen better days. Orlando built way too many malls,” said John Dottore with Atlantic Retail.
The current plans include retail, multifamily apartments, and a hotel.
“At this moment, there is no specific plan for the entire project; there are plans for part of it, but the rest will unfold as we market it,” said Dottore.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/realestate/wesh-2-sits-down-with-buying-agent-of-seminole-towne-center/ar-AA1Bh9UR
Pulte Takes Top Spot In Fannie, Freddie Board Shake-Up
Bill Pulte isn’t wasting time. Less than a week after being confirmed by the Senate to lead the Federal Housing Finance Agency, Pulte has shaken up the board of directors at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, replacing several members and appointing himself the chairman of both firms.
The two agencies have conducted expansive fraud investigations in the last two years and have tightened oversight rules to help root out bad loans. Fannie Mae boosted its funds for losses to $725M in February and conceded in its annual report that it remained vulnerable to fraud from bad actors in the mortgage industry.
https://www.bisnow.com/national/news/capital-markets/fannie-mae-and-freddie-mac-board-shakeup-sees-pulte-take-top-spot-and-musk-ally-get-a-seat-128529
“…remained vulnerable to fraud…”
That’s a feature, not a bug.
Home builders are expected to slow down. That’s bad news for America’s massive housing shortage.
Construction of new homes rose 11.2% in February as builders coming off a harsh winter ramped up new projects. But most economists expect home builders to pull back in the coming months, which could worsen the housing-affordability crisis in the United States.
In February, housing starts rose to a 1.5 million annual pace from 1.35 million the previous month, the government said Tuesday. That’s how many houses would be built over an entire year if construction took place at the same rate every month as it did in February.
“Our premise that the jump in housing starts in February was more payback from weather-related disruptions in January than builders gearing up for the spring sales season would seem to be supported by the permits data,” Richard Moody, chief economist at Regions Financial Corporation, wrote in a note.
Builders are also sitting on a large number of finished homes that they have yet to sell. That figure is “uncomfortably higher for many builders, whose main focus right now is paring those inventories down,” Moody said. “If we’re correct on this point, the March data will show a slower pace of starts.”
https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/realestate/home-builders-are-expected-to-slow-down-that-s-bad-news-for-america-s-massive-housing-shortage/ar-AA1BayOo
Home builders are expected to slow down. That’s bad news for America’s massive housing shortage.
Why would they not build if there was genuine demand and lack of supply? They’re pulling up their stakes because they are already getting stuck with unsold inventory,
Wells Fargo Forecloses On Westside Portfolio For Half Of 2021 Price
One of the nation’s largest banks is now in possession of a portfolio of Atlanta office and retail buildings leased to a brewery, an events space and a Michelin-starred restaurant.
An affiliate of Wells Fargo has acquired the Westside Collective, four adaptive reuse projects in West Midtown and Upper Westside, in a foreclosure sale for a value of $56M, according to a transfer document filed with the Georgia Superior Court Clerks’ Cooperative Authority.
The section of West Midtown where the properties are situated has suffered from an oversupply of office space. More than 50% of the Class-A office in the submarket was available at the end of 2024, according to Lincoln Property Co. A slew of restaurants have also been forced to shutter amid lower-than-expected foot traffic.
https://www.bisnow.com/atlanta/news/capital-markets/wells-fargo-forecloses-on-portfolio-of-prominent-westside-buildings-128523
Lone Star Hands Keys To EY’s Atlanta Tower Over To Lender
A Dallas-based private equity giant has relinquished control of a 14-story Atlanta office building as its anchor tenant eyes the exit.
Lone Star Funds surrendered the 14-story 55 Allen Plaza building in Downtown Atlanta to its lender on March 12 in a deed-in-lieu-of-foreclosure transaction, valuing the building at $57.8M, according to Fulton County records.
Lone Star purchased 55 Allen Plaza from the Teachers’ Retirement System of the State of Illinois on March 6, 2020, for $79M — less than a week before the coronavirus was declared a pandemic.
Other major foreclosures in recent months include the Hilton Atlanta convention hotel, a 1.2M SF portfolio of suburban office properties formerly owned by Adventus Realty Services and a 623-unit South Buckhead apartment tower.
https://www.bisnow.com/atlanta/news/capital-markets/lone-star-loses-control-of-downtown-ey-tower-128569
The Atlanta high rise buildings provide shade for the homeless who have taken over the city center since COVID.
Site Once Pitched As Atlanta’s Tallest Residential Tower To Become A Park
An infamously fallow Midtown site that has been the source of sky-high development ambitions is now set to become a public park.
The Midtown Improvement District is under contract to purchase 98 14th St. from Benmark Capital and Peachtree Group, Kevin Green, CEO of Midtown Alliance, confirmed to Bisnow. Midtown Alliance runs the day-to-day operations of the BID.
“This is seen as a generational opportunity with a cooling market,” Green said said. “It’s the biggest and boldest thing we’ve ever done.”
“There’s a lot of opportunities here. I hesitate to call it a park because people think of a grassy meadow where people lounge around and throw Frisbees,” Green said. “I think about how this site can become one of the best free things to do in Atlanta.”
The undeveloped site near the intersection of 14th and Peachtree streets is in the heart of Midtown proper, next to towers like One Atlantic Center and 1180 Peachtree and across 14th Street from the Four Seasons Hotel Atlanta. It has been a site where multiple developers have tried and failed to build their own towering projects.
Earlier this century, the site was targeted for a new Atlanta Symphony Orchestra music hall, but those plans faltered during the Great Recession. It was sold in 2014 to New York-based Olympia Heights Management, which announced plans for a three-tower project that would include a condominium tower that would span 60 stories. The plan was eventually revisioned into a single luxury condo tower with office space called No2 Opus Place.
But Olympia Heights struggled to realize those dreams, and in 2023, it lost the parcel to foreclosure to its lender, the partnership between Benmark Capital and Atlanta-based Peachtree Group. Peachtree Group CEO Greg Friedman declined to comment.
“This is not a site where you’d have a Music Midtown scale thing, [but] art and performance would seem to have a role here,” Green said. “How to make a site that’s flexible so it can accommodate lots of different things at different times in the day? Look to public spaces that work around the world. There needs to be places to get a cup of coffee or wine.”
https://www.bisnow.com/atlanta/news/land/former-opus-site-to-become-public-park-128561
This Opus thing has been a rolling money pit for over 15 years, maybe longer.
Tzadik property foreclosure documents filed
SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (Dakota News Now) – Certain tenants of Tzadik Properties continue to deal with unresolved garbage and sewer issues, broken entry doors that allow transients inside and other issues.
Now, tenants of several Tzadik properties in Sioux Falls and Rapid City are facing another concern; foreclosure.
Sioux Falls Mayor Paul TenHaken voiced his frustration with Tzadik Properties in January. The company owns and manages about 2,000 apartments in the Sioux Falls area.
“I believe how this specific property management company continues to operate is morally and ethically wrong, and quite frankly, I’m tired of it,” said TenHaken.
A newly formed tenants group, East River Tenants Union, has volunteers looking to help renters navigate concerns.
“Created the union so that we can help more people,” said East River Tenants Union Founder Samantha Scarlota.
She searched Tzadik at the Clerk of Courts office.
“And that’s how we came across the foreclosure,” said Scarlota.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/realestate/tzadik-property-foreclosure-documents-filed/ar-AA1B72Vs
Lawsuit filed against Harmony Tower owner
HARRISBURG, Pa. (WHTM) — Harmony Tower residents aren’t living in Harmony while months-long hot water issues persist. Meanwhile, a commercial mortgage foreclosure action was filed against the property owner on Feb. 26.
Luz Gonzalez has been boiling her water to take a shower. Julia Rivera joined a gym and pays for a membership to shower. Rivera said on Wednesday that she had hot water for the first time in seven months, but that half a dozen of her neighbors still only have lukewarm water at best.
“It takes a long time for the hot water to come on, like I have to let it run for about 45 minutes,” Rivera says.
The lawsuit states that a man affiliated with the owner of Harmony Tower on N. 2nd St. faced previous felony charges related to his ownership of housing complexes outside of Pittsburgh and at least eleven other “nuisance properties” in the area, which he allegedly caused to face deplorable conditions.
A receiver has been appointed which Tenant Association Facilitator Debrah Wire says is good news.
“Now our rent money is no longer going to an absentee landlord owner,” Wire says. “They cannot just squander our money away and now the receivership, they have to use our rent money for repairs of the building and upkeep.”
The lawsuit alleges a commercial mortgage loan in the amount of $5,355,000 was issued to finance the multifamily residential apartment complex that is the subject of a Section 8 Housing. Since then there have been multiple recurring events of default.
According to court documents, Silber used stolen identities, has already pled guilty to mortgage fraud and is currently incarcerated.
Court documents state, “there is evidence of fraud and illegality,” and Silber “was recently charged by the commonwealth with a host of additional crimes related to mismanagement of multi-family properties for which he received subsidies from HUD.”
https://www.msn.com/en-us/public-safety-and-emergencies/health-and-safety-alerts/lawsuit-filed-against-harmony-tower-owner/ar-AA1ANXr3
Blue Owl Capital, UIP Hand Navy Yard Apartment Building To Lender
One of the first apartment buildings from Navy Yard’s early 2000s redevelopment wave has been taken over by its lender.
Torchlight is now the owner of the 266-unit Onyx On First building at 1100 First St. SE, a result of the bankruptcy proceedings of the prior owner, Onyx Owner LLC.
Torchlight acquired the ground lease in lieu of foreclosure for $98.8M, according to documents filed with the D.C. Recorder of Deeds on Tuesday. It paid with a credit bid, according to bankruptcy records.
Onyx Owner LLC filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in Delaware at the end of last year. As part of those proceedings, Eastdil Secured was selected to market the property in November — a process that resulted in the selection of Torchlight to purchase the property. The judge approved the sale last Wednesday.
The bankruptcy filings cite pandemic-era tenant protection measures as the overarching reason for the property’s financial distress. Several landlords have told Bisnow they are facing millions of dollars in unpaid rent that are putting properties at risk of foreclosure.
“The Covid-19 pandemic and the associated tenant protection measures were catastrophic to the Debtor,” one of the filings says. “As an increasing percentage of the Property’s residents were unable to pay their rental obligations as they came due, the Debtor was not able to take action against non-paying tenants.”
https://www.bisnow.com/washington-dc/news/multifamily/lender-takes-over-navy-yard-apartment-building-128567
“..residents were unable to pay their rental obligations as they came due, the Debtor was not able to take action against non-paying tenants.”
Is it unable or more probably unwilling.
“…not able to take action against non-paying tenants.”
Being a landlord can be frustrating especially in a blue state.
1500 Broadway Owner Coughs Up $20M To Hang Onto Struggling Tower
Tamares Group has agreed to pay a special servicer’s pound of flesh to modify a $335M mortgage and hang onto an iconic tower in the heart of Times Square.
The London-based property investment firm defaulted on the mortgage at 1500 Broadway when it matured last year. After failing to find a lender to refinance the debt, it struck a forbearance deal last week, according to special servicer commentary surfaced by Morningstar Credit.
The property was appraised at a value of $335M in December, a 59% cut from its $810M valuation in 2014. The new value is the same as the senior loan balance but below the $505M in total debt tied to the building — it is also encumbered with a $170M mezzanine loan, according to a Morningstar report.
https://www.bisnow.com/new-york/news/capital-markets/1500-broadway-tamares-group-loan-extension-128436
Ovation Hollywood Appraised At 24% Drop In Value
An updated appraisal for Ovation Hollywood, formerly known as Hollywood & Highland, pegged its value at $257M, 24% below its $338M valuation in 2019, when the loan was securitized.
Gaw Capital USA and DJM acquired the property in 2019 for around $320M, Commercial Observer reported at the time.
The mixed-use property moved to special servicing in June ahead of the August 2024 maturity date on a $211.3M CMBS loan secured by the property, according to Morningstar, which reported the new valuation.
The Hollywood Boulevard property holds a mix of retail, event space and offices.
Occupancy was 90% at issuance of the CMBS loan on the property, but it had dropped to 77% in 2023 and was last reported at 69% in December 2024. Morningstar noted that, despite the occupancy slump, the property’s 2024 net cash flow improved, surpassing issuance level cash flow by 6%.
Gaw and DJM spent $100M on renovations and updates to the property that were completed in 2023.
https://www.bisnow.com/los-angeles/news/retail/ovation-hollywood-appraised-at-24-drop-in-value-128564
Northern Virginia officials prepare for, push back on federal layoffs
Regional governments are navigating mass layoffs in the federal government by offering resources to job seekers and data for the public to understand the threat of recession looming over local economies.
More than 320,000 Virginians work for the federal government, according to data presented in the meeting by Clark Mercer, executive director of the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments. But as the Trump administration empowers the Department of Government Efficiency to fire scores of workers across numerous agencies, tracking the change in employment rates is a challenge.
The Weldon Cooper Center for Public Service, a policy and research group at University of Virginia, modeled the potential impact of a 10% reduction in the federal workforce. Up to 40,000 lost jobs and $6 billion in lost state revenue could signal recession for the commonwealth.
Falls Church City Councilmember David Snyder called the layoffs “inhumane policies being pursued inhumanely” and said the local impact will be felt by the rest of the nation soon.
“This is something that is not just affecting our region, but it’s affecting the entire country in terms of the reduction and deterioration of fundamental government services that everyone in this country relies upon,” said Snyder.
Phyllis Randall, chair of Loudoun County Board of Supervisors, echoed Snyder’s comments. “It might be that it just takes a little more time for the country to truly feel the pain that is happening to us,” Randall said.
Fairfax County Supervisor James Walkinshaw cautioned his colleagues not to accept the reality of the past two months as a new normal.
“There’s a sense of fatalism in the region that’s creeping in, as if these cuts and the continuation of these cuts are inevitable, and we’re all preparing for that,” Walkinshaw said. “And as we adapt and prepare for that possibility, I think it’s really important that we continue to fight. Because one thing about this president is he does respond to pressure. And when he touches a hot stove and burns his hand, he pulls it back.”
Walkinshaw, a Democrat, also took a jab at Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin, saying the governor is not advocating on behalf of Virginias.
The governor announced at a Feb. 24 press event in Northern Virginia the launch of the “Virginia Has Jobs” initiative to showcase various employment opportunities in the Commonwealth. According to the Youngkin, Virginia has more than 250,000 jobs “waiting to be filled.”
“I don’t believe that the federal government downsizing is wrong,” Youngkin told reporters at the event in Tysons Corner.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/markets/northern-virginia-officials-prepare-for-push-back-on-federal-layoffs/ar-AA1BoLu4
Federal workers, supporters rally at Virginia State Capitol against mass layoffs
RICHMOND, Va. (WRIC) — Dozens of federal workers, union representatives and allies gathered at the Bell Tower in Richmond’s Capitol Square to protest recent mass layoffs Friday afternoon.
“It seems like we are being attacked on our own land by our own people,” said Samantha Reed, president of AFGE Local 1178. “People want to serve. People are passionate about this country.”
“It came as a shock to be laid off after nine months, especially after getting a performance award,” Hyde said. “So, when I got the email that said you’re terminated because of a reduction in force and performance, I was like, ‘No, that can’t be right.’”
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/other/federal-workers-supporters-rally-at-virginia-state-capitol-against-mass-layoffs/ar-AA1Bq8b0
Fired by Elon Musk’s DOGE, then reinstated by a judge, thousands of federal workers are living in limbo
The IRS employee was a nervous wreck.
He had been worried for weeks that his job would be cut as part of the next round of President Donald Trump and Elon Musk’s cuts to the federal workforce. The worker, who prefers to remain anonymous for fear of retribution, was constantly searching for updates on a Reddit forum for federal workers, and glued to a group chat with his coworkers.
“I was just kind of a mess because I knew it was pretty much over,” he says.
That’s why when the ax finally fell, and his manager called to let him know he had been cut, it felt almost like a relief. He was fired along with thousands of other probationary workers in what was dubbed the “Valentine’s Day Massacre.”
“There was a period of expectation that this was going to happen— I was more or less just waiting for it. When I got the call, I was not surprised,” he says.
“It’s beyond demoralizing to be stuck in this depressing and inefficient limbo—fired one moment, then supposedly rehired with no clarity about pay or benefits,” one Housing and Urban Development employee, who prefers not to be named for fear of retaliation, tells Fortune. “I don’t even know if I should look for another job or prepare to show up at HUD tomorrow.”
The HUD employee’s termination, on the other hand, immediately triggered financial uncertainty, and her retired parents have stepped up to help pay bills. As someone with chronic illness, the loss of health insurance in particular triggered immense anxiety.
“It’s been one of the worst points of my life, in my marriage, [as] a mom, as a daughter,” she says. She adds that there were at least three days when she “just stayed in bed after my kids went to school and cried.”
While the IRS worker said he would be happy to be reinstated, and would gladly go back to the IRS if and when they allow him to do so. But he acknowledges that “it’s certainly not an avenue that I can rely on over the long term.”
The HUD employee says she’s applied for 168 jobs, and has had one informational interview. She thought she had chosen a stable career when she left the private sector to work for the government, but now says she has to think of her family’s future.
“I don’t want to count on this federal job. I don’t know if it will last.”
https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/markets/fired-by-elon-musk-s-doge-then-reinstated-by-a-judge-thousands-of-federal-workers-are-living-in-limbo/ar-AA1Br1bX
The IRS employee was a nervous wreck.
Now that is turning the tables. Instead of taxpayers fearing IRS employees, it’s now the other way around.
LOL
LOL
I did the same thing!
would gladly go back to the IRS if and when they allow him to do so. But he acknowledges that “it’s certainly not an avenue that I can rely on over the long term.”
Almost sound like a private sector career issue.
Thousands of fired federal workers reinstated but not back to work: ‘Emotional whiplash’
In interviews with half a dozen fired probationary federal employees, they describe a rollercoaster of emotions, with growing fears their jobs will once again be on the chopping block after federal agencies implement reduction-in-force plans they submitted to the Office of Personnel Management last week.
“It’s been emotional whiplash — you’re fired, no you’re not fired, you’re on administrative leave — so many mixed messages,” a reinstated employee at the Department of Transportation told the Washington Examiner, requesting anonymity out of fear of retaliation. “This is taking a toll on my mental health, and I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t looking for opportunities elsewhere.”
“I’m glad that I’m getting paid again eventually — I guess I’ll find out when the next check is supposed to drop, whether or not they’re actually honoring that,” said an employee at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration who was reinstated on Monday. “I don’t trust a word in this document. They’ve broken any trust that they would have gotten, period — based on the way everyone’s been treated.”
“I’m looking for another job — I don’t want another job, I want to be very clear,” the person said. “I took a pay cut to go into federal service in the first place. So, we are reluctantly, in a lot of cases, looking for other jobs.”
Adding to the tension is that another phase of large-scale reorganization plans for agencies is expected soon. A White House memo instructed agencies to submit more plans about how they will consolidate management and relocate offices to less expensive parts of the country by April 14 and then to implement plans by Sept. 30.
“We don’t want to wait it out and see what happens with our positions because they can decide to get rid of us again,” the NOAA employee explained. “It’s incredibly frustrating. It’s also depressing.”
“I received a letter from Blue Cross healthcare system stating I was terminated from the system and haven’t received anything saying I’m re-enrolled,” said the person, who also works at NOAA. “My wife is pregnant with our second, and we are worried about the impact on our insurance and ability to pay for things.”
“I never received my separation paperwork beyond the termination email, so I had to track down all the details about the insurance on my own,” he explained. “On top of that, the reinstatement letter contained no details, so we are unsure if we have insurance again.”
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/thousands-of-fired-federal-workers-reinstated-but-not-back-to-work-emotional-whiplash/ar-AA1BnS8c
Thousands of fired federal workers reinstated but not back to work: ‘Emotional whiplash’
it would have been nice if a judge had reinstated me and thousands of my private sector coworkers after we were mass laid off. But no one seemed to care. I wonder why?
Memo to FedGov workers: This is why there is little sympathy out there for you. I still remember the FedGov parents at my son’s soccer team gloating about how they were fireproof.
FedGov employees in Panem on the Potomac who suddenly find themselves jobless and adrift thanks to DOGE might gain some newfound solidarity with millions of their fellow Americans experiencing job and economic insecurity in our globalist-looted economy.
My wife is pregnant with our second, and we are worried about the impact on our insurance and ability to pay for things.”
Consider signing up for TCC. When you have children, you have a responsibility to set aside emergency funds.
Oh dear…billions in fictitious Yellen Bux “value” is growing wings and flying off to debauched currency heaven as Miami’s condo market implodes.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/real-estate/article-14526121/wealthy-east-coast-city-condo-owners-sell-hoa-hike.html
“There’s never been a better time to buy in Anchorage.” — Alaska NAR
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-14515141/scientists-warn-mount-spurr-alaska-eruption-weeks-seismic-activity.html
More People in ICE Custody Means Smaller Meals and Delayed Medical Care, Detainees Say
Immigration detention facilities are facing shortages in food, clothing, hygiene products and staff as the Trump administration chooses to hold more people in custody, according to detainees in multiple states.
People in the custody of Immigration and Customs Enforcement in California, New Mexico, Texas and Washington told Beyond the Border that since President Donald Trump took office, they’ve noticed a deterioration of already difficult conditions in facilities run by various entities, including private prison companies CoreCivic and GEO Group as well as ICE itself.
“It keeps getting worse, and it’s going to get worse. It’s horrible since Trump came,” said Ledys Isea in Spanish. “They bring people, they bring people, and they bring people.”
Originally from Venezuela, Isea was held until recently in El Paso Service Processing Center, a Texas facility run by ICE.
A GEO Group spokesperson said that the company strongly disagreed with claims about conditions at its facilities.
“Our secure support services are audited by federal contract monitors on a regular basis to ensure they are fully compliant with all federal standards,” the spokesperson said. “These allegations are part of a long-standing, politically motivated and radical campaign to abolish ICE and end federal immigration detention by attacking the federal government’s immigration facility contractors.”
People held at Northwest ICE Processing Center in Tacoma, Washington, and Golden State Annex in McFarland, California — both run by GEO Group — and at El Paso Service Processing Center said that food portions have shrunk since late January and that meals are often served late.
Elenilson Armando Coto Delgado, originally from El Salvador, said that at Northwest ICE Processing Center, those being held used to receive two corn dogs but now get only one. Similarly, portions of rice and beans have shrunk, he said, and on days when they have meat, they get fewer slices as well.
Isea said that at El Paso Service Processing Center, most meals consist of bread and salad and that every few days they get a more filling meal.
“We’re all losing a lot of weight,” he said. “They don’t take into account how dangerous it is.”
Dinner sometimes isn’t served until 9 or 10 p.m., the detainees said. It used to be hours earlier.
“Things in every department, whether it’s the dorm living conditions, medications, the dining hall — everything is deteriorating. Everything is going downhill,” said Gustavo, who is in custody at Golden State Annex.
Gustavo, who is originally from El Salvador but grew up in the United States, asked not to be fully identified due to safety and retaliation concerns.
“We want to be treated like humans, like human beings,” Jose Valencia Mata said in Spanish.
He said that ICE officers injured his arm when they arrested him in Oregon, and he’s been waiting months for surgery. In the meantime, getting pain medicine has become increasingly difficult at Northwest ICE Processing Center, he said.
Jose Cisneros said that he has struggled to get treatment for a hernia.
“Every day I feel bad. It’s very swollen. I finished my pills and put in a refill, and they denied me,” he said in Spanish. “They didn’t talk to me for days. I told them my hernia hurts, and they said, ‘That isn’t my problem.’”
In addition to the problems with food and medical care, the three facilities don’t have enough clothing to give to new arrivals, particularly socks and underwear, the detainees said. ICE detention standards require facilities to provide two pairs of socks and two pairs of underwear.
“They keep bringing people, but there’s no underwear for new people, just pants,” Isea said.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/more-people-in-ice-custody-means-smaller-meals-and-delayed-medical-care-detainees-say/ar-AA1Bp0S6
This is easily avoided, invaders. All you have to do is self deport. There’s even a new feature on the CBP app for that.
And if you get caught, just agree to be summarily deported, that will minimize your time in those awful detention centers.
“They keep bringing people, but there’s no underwear for new people, just pants,” Isea said.
Maybe instead of making a big show of crying over empty parking lots at migrant detention facilities, AOC & her ilk could use the fortunes they’ve amassed during their “public service” to assist the ICE detainees.
[Donald Trump lives in Rosie O’Donnell’s head rent free …]
Iconic comedian reveals health benefits of quitting Trump’s US for Ireland.
https://metro.co.uk/2025/03/21/iconic-comedian-reveals-health-benefits-quitting-trumps-us-ireland-22766448/
‘I’m telling you, I feel healthier. I’m sleeping better without the stress and anxiety about what was happening politically in the US,’ she told the camera on Thursday.
Rosie also mentioned her historic sparring match with Trump – which has been ongoing since she hosted The View current affairs show in 2006 – has contributed to her move.
Elsewhere, Rosie revealed that having struggled with her weight for years, she’s dropped several dress sizes since moving to Ireland.
‘I’m on Mounjaro for my diabetes and one of the side effects is you lose weight. But it’s also because I had a chef for over two years in LA. I don’t have a chef now. It’s me cooking for Clay and me,’ she said.
Canadian arm of China’s largest bank repeatedly broke money-laundering rules despite multiple warnings from regulators
The Canadian subsidiary of China’s biggest bank repeatedly broke the law by failing to review risky clients, report suspicious transactions and respect police production orders despite multiple warnings from FinTRAC about its faulty financial-crime controls, according to the regulator’s findings in confidential documents reviewed by The Globe and Mail.
Industrial and Commercial Bank of China Ltd., the world’s largest bank by assets, is a Chinese state-controlled financial institution headquartered in Beijing. Although some of its shares trade on stock exchanges in Asia, ICBC’s controlling shareholders are the Ministry of Finance of the People’s Republic of China and Central Huijin Investment Co., a Chinese sovereign-fund company.
For the past 15 years, ICBC has operated a Canadian subsidiary called Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (Canada). The lender is known as ICBK to distinguish it from the Insurance Corporation of British Columbia, which also uses the ICBC acronym.
But as ICBK churned out fatter profits, it cut corners on financial-crime compliance. A previously undisclosed paper trail comprising regulatory and bank documents exposes ICBK’s failures to fix problems with its anti-money-laundering and anti-terrorist-financing controls despite repeated regulatory examinations.
FinTRAC, for example, uncovered problems with ICBK’s handling of police production orders. In one instance, the RCMP was investigating a Beijing resident suspected of drug and money-laundering offences.
The regulator also found examples of unreported suspicious transactions that involved large sums of money and high-risk clients, including a B.C. business with links to a Chinese state-owned arms and explosives dealer subject to U.S. sanctions.
FinTRAC further determined that ICBK’s transaction-monitoring system was failing to scan for risks associated with correspondent banking – a lucrative service that allows a bank to facilitate cross-border transactions on behalf of a foreign lender.
Ottawa’s lack of sophistication in mounting effective defences against transnational organized crime, terrorist groups and hostile foreign actors poses a national security threat, says Kim Manchester, founder of ManchesterCF, an online financial intelligence training company based in Toronto.
“Foreign influence is a component of that environment,” says Mr. Manchester.
The recent public inquiry into foreign interference, however, did not probe tampering through Canada’s banking system even though illicit financial flows are inextricably linked to meddling by rogue states.
“Foreign influence is a function of violence or money, or both,” Mr. Manchester says. “Either Canada addresses the problem as a whole, or we simply accept the consequences of the loss of our nation state as it submits to the will of others.”
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/article-canadian-arm-of-chinas-largest-bank-repeatedly-broke-money-laundering/
Canada’s Liberal Party is a de facto subsidiary of the CCP.
[This is good news for Republicans …]
Ocasio-Cortez takes on assertive new role as Democratic anger grows.
https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/5208462-ocasio-cortez-leadership-democrats/
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) is positioning herself in a leading role among Democrats as discontent grows among the party’s base in the second Trump era.
At some point there’s going to be a civil war in the Democrat-Bolshevik party between the corrupt, crony capitalist Old Guard epitomized by Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer, and the Red Guard militants who want a bigger cut of Democrat patronage and graft rackets, especially now that the lucrative kickbacks from Ukraine, USAID “international aid,” etc. might have an end date.
Human smuggling investigation leads to 8 arrests in Quebec, Ontario
The RCMP arrested eight people Thursday morning in Quebec and Ontario as part of an investigation targeting a smuggling ring that allegedly transported migrants across the U.S. border.
RCMP spokesperson Cpl. Martina Pillarova says seven men and one woman — all between 20 and 30 years old — were arrested in Montreal and Brampton, Ont.
Police raided three homes in the two cities, and Pillarova says one of the homes in Montreal is believed to have been used as a “stash house” to hide migrants before they were smuggled into the United States.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/montreal-brampton-arrests-human-smuggling-1.7489058
Fidelito’s globalist quisling government is all-in on the Great Replacement, knowing that the hordes of unassimilable 3rd World benefits spongers, fraudsters, and criminals they’re bringing in won’t just be staying in Canada, but will take full advantage of our unguarded northern border to infiltrate the USA.
I always thought that having health care insurance tied in with ones job wasn’t that great. Health care insurance premiums based on your income is pretty commie.
They started out by making employer paid cheap health care a employee benefit , and it morphed into high premiums forced health care.
And people like Bernie Sanders is talking “Medicare for all, “without talking about what kind of tax increases wood be necessary to fund something like that. The Medical Cartel is not about to give up
extraction of about 5 trillion a year and lower the costs by about half to be like Countries that provide
Medical Services for all.
Not sustainable or payable based on current costs, let me just put it that way.
Health care insurance premiums based on your income is pretty commie.
In my experience, my premiums were never based on my income. My first out-of-college job which included health insurance took a massive percentage of my gross pay. As I’ve gained experience and a higher salary the burden of health insurance decreased. I’ve also been fortunate in my last several jobs to have access to a good plan with reasonable prices.
In my experience, my premiums were never based on my income.
Medicare is income based. However, I agree, as none of my jobs had income based health care. One job did have 5 levels of HC cost but those variances were all based on health markers.
Seemed like the lower income cohort consumed most of the health care in our office. The women with office automation skills acquired from our local junior college usually provided the family’s health care since the unskilled husband was typically employed on a seasonal basis.
Lorne Gunter: Carney likely to deliver more of already-too-much Trudeau ‘green’ agenda
If you think Prime Minister Mark Carney is a brand-new tire (and not just some Trudeau retread), maybe a trio of developments from Thursday will convince you otherwise.
First came early-morning reports that Edmonton Mayor Amarjeet Sohi is likely to take a leave from his local political job to try to regain a seat in the House of Commons.
Sohi had been the Liberal MP for Mill Woods from 2015 to 2019. It’s hard to understand how reaching back into the past to revive Sohi’s federal ambitions could be seen as proof of a new start for the Carney Liberals.
To grasp just what a rehash it would be for Sohi to rejoin the Liberal caucus in Ottawa, remember that during his one term in Parliament he sat at the cabinet table while the Trudeau government passed its no-more-pipelines law (C-69), its ban on Alberta oil (and only Alberta oil) in tankers off B.C.’s northern coast and implemented the federal carbon tax.
More pertinent to the current trade war with the United States, anyone who thinks Prime Minister Carney is assembling a team that will help build pipelines to the East and West coasts (so Canada can be less vulnerable to the American oil market), should know that as a member of the Trudeau cabinet, Sohi was in on the decision to kill the Northern Gateway pipeline to the West Coast and the Energy East pipeline to the East Coast.
Sounds like the same old, same old to me.
Also on Thursday, Carney’s new environment minister, Terry Duguid from Winnipeg, admitted to The Canadian Press it is unlikely the Liberal government will remove the hard cap on emissions set for the oil and gas industry by Trudeau’s radical environment minister Steven Guilbeault.
Duguid’s words on Thursday make it obvious that request is going nowhere under the “new” Liberal government, just as it is unlikely the ultra-“green” Carney will repeal the Trudeau mandate that all new vehicles in Canada be fully electric by 2035 and that all electrical generation be net-zero for emissions.
Clearly the environmental regulations that stunted Canada’s economic growth (and cost us at least $300 billion in oil and gas investment) during the Trudeau decade will continue to stunt our growth under Carney.
The third indicator that nothing of significance is changing under Carney was his announcement Thursday that the feds will be putting more money into affordable housing.
The problem with housing prices in Canada (and homelessness) is not lack of government money in the marketplace. Indeed, government subsidies tend to drive up prices by distorting the market.
It’s not too little government, it’s too much. Too high taxes, too high lot servicing costs, too many regulations, too many harebrained schemes such as densification, 15-minute neighbourhoods and net-zero home heating.
Like Trudeau, though, Carney is a true believer that enough tax dollars can solve any problem.
Carney might, in some ways, seem like a change from Trudeau. He’s promised a middle-class tax cut, an elimination of the increased capital gains tax, a reduction in government spending, an end to deficits, a reduction of the national debt, a cap on immigration and a trimming of the public service.
But since those are all problems created by the Liberals, do we really want to trust Liberals to solve them?
https://www.msn.com/en-ca/money/topstories/lorne-gunter-carney-likely-to-deliver-more-of-already-too-much-trudeau-green-agenda/ar-AA1BnMiv
Carney and Trudeau answer to the same globalist puppet masters, and will do their bidding as ordered.
The real estate world is fighting over secret listings and the future of how homes are sold.
A controversial policy enacted in 2020 was designed to reduce so-called pocket listings, which never hit online real estate sites.
https://www.yahoo.com/finance/news/the-real-estate-world-is-fighting-over-secret-listings-and-the-future-of-how-homes-are-sold-123021108.html
[a snip …]
They’re most common in high-end real estate, where celebrities or other VIP clients may be keen on keeping a transaction low profile. Those sellers also sometimes want to test their listing prices in more private channels to avoid the stigma of publicly cutting prices or having a home linger on the market for months for all to see.
I read these sob stories about the anxious job-seeking unemployed with young kids at home, and it tugs at my heart. Then I remember they are all Democrats and I quickly get over it. Democrats cannot be reasoned with or convinced to change their evil ways. They must be destroyed financially and emotionally or nothing will ever change.
“It can’t be bargained with, it can’t be reasoned with. It doesn’t feel pity! Or remorse or fear and it absolutely will not stop!… ever… until you are dead!”
The above quote was describing the Terminator. It could easily be describing someone with a severe case of TDS.
Somehow it doesn’t bother me in the least to see Democrat-Bolshevik apparatchiks who want nothing good for me and mine pried off the levers of power and economically disenfranchised, which is what FedGov has been doing to white Heritage American males for decades.
It’s really quite amazing how quickly – in less than 60 days – Trump has managed to dismantled a swamp that took decades to build. Sure, there are judges ordering it to be swamped up again, and some employees are getting rehired, but the palpable fear is there, and for many, going into work means doing nothing at all, which is the far better alternative to going into work and destroying America.
Canadian opposition, oil CEOs call for scrapping federal carbon price system
The future of Canada’s six-year-old carbon pricing system is on shaky ground after 14 oil and gas CEOs and the political opposition leader this week called for its repeal.
Scrapping the system, which aims to reduce pollution by giving heavy industry a financial incentive to cut carbon emissions, however, puts the viability of a high-profile carbon capture project to reduce oil sands pollution in doubt.
Canada is grappling with changing priorities as U.S. President Donald Trump’s tariff threats spur calls to find new markets for energy. The shifting political tides have emboldened some in Canada who believe the country has for too long prioritized its climate goals over the economy.
Canada’s newly sworn-in Liberal Prime Minister Mark Carney, who is narrowly leading polls against Poilievre’s Conservatives, told reporters on Tuesday the country needs industrial carbon pricing if it wants to grow its trade volumes with allies. Britain, for example, has said it plans to implement a carbon levy on products imported from countries with less strict climate policies.
An example is the Pathways Alliance, a group of Canada’s six biggest oil sands producers that has proposed a C$16 billion ($11.47 billion) carbon capture and storage project in northern Alberta aimed at significantly reducing the industry’s greenhouse gas pollution.
“Until there is clarity on the future of policy . . . we are unlikely to see that (Pathways) investment materialized,” said Michael Bernstein, CEO of the think-tank Clean Prosperity.
In recent months, Pathways has been in talks with the federal government to provide a backstop to the industrial carbon price, aiming to insure against a future government eliminating carbon pricing.
No agreement has been reached.
A weakened carbon pricing system would leave governments with little way to incentivize projects like the Pathways plan, other than through direct subsidization, said Chris Severson-Baker, executive director of clean energy think-tank the Pembina Institute.
“It (Pathways) might just end up becoming another thing the taxpayers are paying for.”
https://www.msn.com/en-ca/money/topstories/canadian-opposition-oil-ceos-call-for-scrapping-federal-carbon-price-system/ar-AA1Bp2Ib
‘Carney…told reporters on Tuesday the country needs industrial carbon pricing if it wants to grow its trade volumes with allies’
Get the queen to protect yer frozen wasteland Mark.
Get the queen to protect yer frozen wasteland Mark.
She be dead.
These are your questions about the future of AUKUS with Donald Trump back in the White House
The ABC’s Your Say project suggests there’s deep concern among some Australians over the reliability of our nation’s military alliance with the United States under Donald Trump, and the $368 billion submarine deal known as AUKUS.
AUKUS (an acronym standing for Australia, the UK and the US) is a security pact that was signed by the three allies in 2021.
The future of the deal — and Australia’s security — has sat alongside housing, climate change and cost of living as major themes raised by respondents to Your Say.
These are some of the big questions you’ve asked.
Most common are worries about how the Trump administration is treating its closest allies — like Canada and Europe — and where it leaves Australia.
Get out of AUKUS and look to protect ourselves because there is no way the USA will go to war to protect Australia. — John, Melbourne, 70s
Why is Australia putting all its eggs in one basket, with the largest transfer of wealth in the country’s history, to a country which is no longer a reliable ally? — John, Sydney, 60s
The USA has changed permanently and we can no longer trust them. — Phillip, Yorke Peninsula, 60s
Some Your Say comments directly referred to Donald Trump’s possible lack of awareness of AUKUS, after he was asked about it last month at an Oval Office press conference with UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer.
“Will you be talking about AUKUS?”, a reporter asked.
The president replied, “What does that mean?”
Get out of AUKUS. Trump doesn’t even know what it is. — Rob, Perth, 60s
What is Australia’s position regarding the realignment of American support of its allies, especially when the US President is unaware of AUKUS when pressed? — Wayne, Ipswich, 60s
We’ve given the US millions of dollars for AUKUS and Trump didn’t even know what it was. Do we really believe that we can still rely on the US?? — Joelle, Melbourne, 50s
WE HAVE TO LEAVE AUKUS! America will renege on the deal. — Harold, Perth, 30s
Can’t depend on Trump. He will pull the plug on AUKUS. — Wayne, Busselton, 70s
The likelihood of the US selling us any submarines in the next 20 years is unlikely as the US is short of submarines. — Mark, South Coast, 70s
And the whole program is at the mercy of Trump’s thought bubbles and the ability of the British to design a submarine on time. — Peter, Hobart, 40s
The U.S. will not deliver the nuclear submarines promised (witness their shortfall in the budget for their submarine building program). — Richard, Perth, 60s
Why don’t we cancel AUKUS and go back to the French subs, and save some money? — Martin, Grampians, 70s
https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/australia/these-are-your-questions-about-the-future-of-aukus-with-donald-trump-back-in-the-white-house/ar-AA1BpdHj
The ABC’s Your Say project suggests there’s deep concern among some Australians over the reliability of our nation’s military alliance with the United States under Donald Trump
Go ahead, throw in with the Chicoms, we’ll see how that goes.
I just got this email from the foreclosure listing service I subscribe to:
We completed the pre-foreclosure lists for our major counties on Wednesday and Thursday last week, and the smaller outlying counties a week or so after.
Something really interesting I wanted to share with you – a lot more foreclosures this month!
Dallas County way up with 318 postings this month compared last year to 276 (15% increase!!)
Bexar County has 373 postings this month compared last year to 351
Tarrant County has 235 this month compared last year to 278
Collin County 116 this month compared last year to 85
Victor Davis Hanson: The ‘Shameless Left’ Knew It Was Lying All Along, Has ‘Permanently Damaged the US’.
https://archive.ph/dO8PA#selection-611.0-611.103
“For years, the left advanced utter untruths for cheap partisan purposes that it knew at the time were all false. And now when caught, they just shrug and say they were lying all along.”
Such is the summation of conservative political commentator Victor Davis Hanson with respect to the bottom-line truth about the insidious lies of the left — including the Biden administration, Congressional Democrat, and of course the left-wing so-called “legacy media” — from the moment Donald Trump announced his candidacy for the presidency in June 2015.
While the biggest and most harmful of those lies have been well-documented, the Democrats and their left-wing comrades in the media, academia, and even in the medical field, have never apologized to the American people for, as VDH wrote, “permanently damaging the United States.”
First, let’s revisit some of the most consequential lies the left has knowingly pushed.
Russian ‘Collusion’ Hoax and Hillary Clinton
In addition to blatantly lying, Democrats — like children — are masters of deflection, meaning they project on others (Donald Trump and conservatives) what they themselves are guilty of doing. Nowhere was that more apparent than in the Democrat Party’s narrative that Trump “colluded” with “the Russians” to rig the 2016 presidential election.
Just one problem.
Special counsel John Durham’s damning report on the Russian hoax concluded there was no basis to immediately launch a full-fledged investigation against Trump; that the FBI failed to follow up on intelligence reports that Hillary Clinton had approved a plan to manufacture the hoax, and that her campaign funded opposition research to supply the FBI and media with the false narrative; and that FBI leaders willingly subverted FBI policy, quashed investigations into Clinton’s potential violations of the law, and more.
Hunter Biden’s Infamous Laptop
Surely, the Democrats declared Hunter Biden’s infamous laptop was actually part of a “Russian disinformation plot.” Serial liars like Sen. Adam Schiff (CA), a congressman at the time, continually promised “smoking gun” proof more times than I can remember. Unfortunately (for the left), every one of Schiff’s promises (lies) went up in smoke. Meanwhile, the left-wing media continued to parrot the lies.
Just one problem.
As VDH wrote, by 2017, the public knew three truths about the so-called Christopher Steele dossier:
One, it was completely fallacious — fabricated by a has-been, ex-British spy Christopher Steele.
He childishly had cobbled together lurid sex stories, James Bond spy fictions and Russian-fed disinformation to destroy the Trump candidacy and later presidency.
Two, it was paid for by the Hillary Clinton campaign.
She hid her checks behind the Democratic National Committee, the Perkins Coie law firm, and Fusion GPS paywalls.
Three, the FBI under James Comey hired Steele as an informant.
It helped disseminate his concocted files and was also instrumental in trying to subvert the Trump campaign and later administration.
Here’s the thing: the Democrats and their media pals knew they were lying, we knew they were lying, and they knew we knew they were lying.
So why did they continue to lie, the more obvious their prior lies became?
Here’s the dirty little non-secret secret of the left: Democrats couldn’t care less whether or not we believe their lies, but they very much care about low-information Democrat voters believing their lies — which are tirelessly pushed by the left-wing media.
Biden’s Intentional Illegal Alien Crisis
Cast your mind back to Joe Biden’s 2016 basement presidential campaign.
For months, Biden virtually promised to welcome illegal aliens to cross the Southern Border any way they could. As I wrote at the time, he might as well have stationed welcoming mariachi bands all along the border and supplied piñatas full of candy for the kiddos.
Welp, sans the mariachi bands and piñatas, that was exactly what happened, as millions of illegal aliens continued to stream across an open and unsecure border that Team Biden continued to insist (lie ab out) was closed and secured.
Some 12 million illegal aliens later, a growing number of whom continued to commit horrific crimes against American citizens, Biden and his administration continued to lie, eventually claiming congressional legislation was required to stop the flow of illegals into the country.
Just one problem.
Within days of Trump’s inauguration, he stopped what Biden had deliberately engineered (and lied about) for four years.
COVID-19 and Anthony Fauci
“Once it was known that the first COVID-19 case originated in or near a Chinese communist virology lab engineering gain-of-function deadly viruses, with help from Western agencies,” wrote VDH, “the left went into full persecution mode.”
They damned as incompetent, racist and conspiratorial any who dared follow logic and evidence to point out that the Chinese government and its military were both culpable for the virus and lying.
A million Americans died of COVID. Millions more suffered long-term injuries.
The lies were designed to protect the guilty, such as Anthony Fauci and Francis Collins. The Biden government also tried to use the lab theory to ridicule a supposedly pro-Trump “conspiracy.”
Western corporate interests deeply invested in China did not want their partner held responsible for veritably killing and maiming hundreds of millions worldwide.
And last but certainly not least…
The Cover-Up of Biden’s Cognitive Decline
Beginning with Biden’s basement presidential campaign, and becoming more and more obvious after his January 20, 2021 inauguration, the left was well aware of his steady mental deterioration.
And that was precisely the point:
The Democrats and their media, knowing Biden was in steady decline, frantically and deliberately worked to cover it up — from limiting his public appearances and press conferences to firing up the lies and propaganda machine to “prove” that the dazed and confused president was sharp as a tack. No one bought the lies, including the left, whether Democrats admitted it or not.
The lies and cover-ups of were largely responsible for the most disastrous four years in modern presidency history, and the salient objective of those lies and cover-ups were to keep Biden — “designed as a waxen figure,” VDH wrote, “for hard-left agendas that, without the “old Joe Biden from Scranton” pseudo-moderate veneer, could never have been advanced.”
The end result was the most disastrous four years in modern U.S. presidential history:
His handlers operated a nightmare administration: the destruction of deterrence abroad, two theater wars, 12 million illegal aliens, a weaponized justice system, hyperinflation and $7 trillion more in debt.
In his final summation, VDH wrote:
All these lies have divided the country and permanently damaged the United States. The perpetrators have neither apologized for their lies nor tried to either deny or substantiate them. No one involved has ever been held legally accountable. The legacy media permanently ruined its reputation and will likely never be seen as credible again. The Biden administration, overseer of many of these lies, will be regarded as the most duplicitous and dishonest presidency in modern history.
While one might argue that since Biden is no longer president and Donald Trump is, America can rest easy in the Second Age of Trump. That assumption is not only flawed; it’s also dangerous an irresponsible.
Ok, just saying that still dispute over what Covid actually was. See below
A famous French Scientist in infectious diseases, etc was on the Highwire with Del Bigtree yesterday, if you want to pull the interview.
Pretty mind blowing some of the things that came out of that interview in terms of real science.
For instance he said that they don’t do big clinical trials if they can see that a medicine kills a pathogen in a test tube.
Said that the West is done in terms of Science.
This Dr said in summary that they can’t currently produce a gain of function disease from a life form that would create a widespread panademic for humans.
He also said that pathogens mutate a bunch of times.
He talked about how he was suppressed when he was treating Covid with simple cheap drugs.
I can’t summarize the interview because to much covered, so better to just pull up the long interview.
Now that the stock market storm has blown over without serious incident, is it safe to tiptoe back in?
ETF Edge
‘Some more banana skins in front of us’: Why investors may want to increase exposure to bonds
Published Sat, Mar 22 2025 11:00 AM EDT
Yaritza Diaz
Investors may want to get back to the basics when it comes to navigating the stock market volatility.
According to F/m Investments CEO Alex Morris, they should consider increasing their exposure to bonds.
“Particularly on the short end of the curve … there’s a lot of safe haven to be had there,” Morris said on CNBC’s “ETF Edge” this week. “If you look at where the equity market is going, you didn’t like the wipeout of a couple of weeks ago — there’s some more banana skins ahead of us.”
…
https://www.cnbc.com/2025/03/22/bonds-as-protection-play-against-stock-market-volatility.html
Economy
Recession alarms are ringing on Wall Street. Here are 4 warnings economists are pointing to.
Jennifer Sor
Mar 21, 2025, 7:41 AM PT
Photo collage of recession related imagery
Bet_Noire/Getty, Jim Lin/Getty, SusanWoodImages/Getty, Tyler Le/BI
– Investors and economists have grown concerned about a potential recession this year.
– Prominent bears say a downturn could emerge as early as July.
– Here are four warning signs economic forecasters have flagged recently.
Recession talk is growing louder on Wall Street, and forecasters are pointing to a handful of warning signs that suggest am economic downturn may be on the horizon.
…
https://www.businessinsider.com/recession-2025-warning-economy-outlook-growth-slowdown-debt-stocks-rates-2025-3
What will Boomers do for money if stocks and housing both CR8R, like in the 2007-2012 episode?
Boomers are in big trouble if the stock market keeps sliding
Theron Mohamed
Mar 22, 2025, 2:13 AM PT
A older couple looking at a large downward stock arrow hitting the ground
J Studios/Getty, Ljupco/Getty, Tyler Le/BI
– Baby boomers’ hopes of retiring comfortably could be at risk if stocks keep falling.
– Older Americans could be forced to delay retirement, resume working, or cut back on spending.
– Retirement gurus shared a range of strategies to preserve their nest eggs.
Baby boomers’ dreams of a comfy retirement are in jeopardy as a flagging stock market threatens to spoil their plans.
The benchmark S&P 500 index dropped 10% between February 19 and March 13 — a seven-month low — fueled by fears that the Trump administration’s policies could tip the economy into recession. It’s still in the red for 2025.
The sell-off has pinched older Americans’ portfolios, shrinking their nest eggs and stoking worries about affording the retirement they imagined.
Most boomers are in their 60s and 70s, getting ready to exit the workforce or already in early retirement. They own stocks worth nearly $20 trillion — almost half the US market — between their direct holdings and 401(k)s, David Rosenberg, the president of Rosenberg Research and former chief North American economist at Merrill Lynch, told Business Insider.
They’ve “ridden the wave with nary a move to take profits, diversify, or rebalance,” leaving them heavily exposed to market downturns and with limited time to recover losses, he said.
If their portfolios keep declining while they’re withdrawing money to cover living expenses, they won’t recover fully even if the market rebounds — a danger known as “sequence of return risk.”
Rosenberg warned that if the pullback continues, “many will be forced to re-enter the labor market— packing bags at their local Walmart.”
Those who refuse to sell stocks could find themselves “cutting back their retirement lifestyle spending like it’s nobody’s business — wave bye-bye to cruise lines, tablets/e-readers, and cosmetic surgeries,” he wrote in a research note this week.
Sweeping fallout
“If these portfolio losses continue, we could be looking at a retirement crisis,” Tim Schmidt, the founder and CEO of Gold IRA Custodians, told BI.
Millions might have to delay retirement by three to five years, creating a “workforce bottleneck” that blocks younger employees from advancing, he said. “For individuals, the consequences could be devastating — depleted savings, increased debt, and psychological distress.”
Selling at lows might lock in permanent losses, Schmidt continued. Reduced spending could create a “negative feedback loop” that results in slimmer corporate profits, job losses, further asset price declines, pressure on housing markets as retirees abandon downsizing plans, and younger generations having to support parents whose “retirement funds have evaporated,” he added.
Dan Doonan, the executive director of the National Institute on Retirement Security, said widespread delays in retirement could make it harder for businesses to control costs. If a recession hits, people might respond by saving less for retirement, further reducing their chances of comfort in old age.
The whole economy could suffer if retirees cut back when consumer spending is already under pressure. Markets could also be hit if more people are selling stocks to cover living costs, Mark Hamrick, Bankrate’s senior economic advisor and Washington bureau chief, told BI.
Prepare for trouble
Current and future retirees might be tempted to cash out, fearing further declines for stocks. However, “making impulsive decisions, like pulling out of investments in a panic, can disrupt years of careful planning,” Judith Ward, a thought leadership director at T. Rowe Price and a certified financial planner, told BI.
The “urge to react is high” in uncertain times, but overhauling investments or fleeing markets can backfire, Rita Assaf, a vice president of Fidelity Investments’ retirement division, told BI. Investing too conservatively can result in less retirement income and a tougher time keeping pace with inflation, she said.
Doonan noted that markets typically recover within a few years, so “fear selling after prices collapse and buying back in after it ‘feels safe’ can leave you selling low and buying high.”
…
https://www.businessinsider.com/baby-boomers-retirement-planning-stock-market-fall-wealth-portfolio-strategy-2025-3
Boomers have come to expect the Greenspan put.
“There’s no Trump put.” – Scott Bessent
You’re raining on my parade, love!
The idea that millions of boomers are reaching retirement age and eventually leaving workforce cannot be denied. Combine that reality with a market that is at least double the historical valuations of the historical trend line, measured in just about every way and an adjustment seems to be baked in the cake.
Our country, like a business, cannot function forever with such a large percentage of unproductive workers.
Everyone cannot be a Park Ranger and expect eggs to be cheap.
It takes a special kind of hubris to be mostly invested in stocks the year or two before your retirement.
Wealth
Investing
How to Diversify Your Portfolio With Markets Hitting Turbulence
Financial advisers who gathered at a conference in Miami earlier this week offered tips on investment opportunities with US stocks lagging.
Photographer: Michael Nagle/Bloomberg
By Suzanne Woolley
March 22, 2025 at 7:00 AM PDT
It was financial nerd heaven in Miami Beach — a roughly 2,500-strong crowd of advisers and industry professionals with answers to your every investing question.
Wondering how to transfer wealth effectively? How to scrutinize a private market investment? How to navigate inflation and global uncertainty? At the Future Proof Citywide conference earlier this week an answer was likely only a few strides away.
…
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-03-22/should-i-sell-stocks-financial-advisers-offer-tips-on-investment-opportunities
Are you worried about a big shit in the housing market?
shift (sometimes my thumb misses a letter!)
03-22-2025
42 housing markets see home prices fall. Is a bigger shift coming?
Among the 300 largest metro-area housing markets, 42 are seeing falling home prices on a year-over-year basis, according to ResiClub’s monthly analysis.
42 housing markets see home prices fall. Is a bigger shift coming?
[Map: Lance Lambert, created with Datawrapper]
BY Lance Lambert
1 minute read
National home prices have risen by 2.1% year-over-year from February 2024 to February 2025, according to the Zillow Home Value Index. That’s a deceleration from the 4.6% year-over-year rate last spring. However, not every housing market is seeing rising home prices.
Among the 300 largest metro area housing markets, 42 markets are seeing falling home prices on a year-over-year basis. That’s up from last month when just 31 of the nation’s 300 largest metro area housing markets had falling year-over-year home prices.
While home prices continue to rise in regions with tight inventory—such as much of the Northeast, Midwest, and Southern California—some housing markets in states like Texas, Florida, and Louisiana, where inventory has now surpassed pre-pandemic 2019 levels, are experiencing modest price corrections.
…
https://www.fastcompany.com/91302912/housing-market-42-metros-home-prices-fall-bigger-shift-coming
‘It was in fact a good idea…The problem was it was poorly executed’
So too little too late Tom. Central planing!
‘It wasn’t covered by property insurance. Property insurance didn’t pay out a dime to the association or owners according to Baker’
See Tom, you don’t have insurance, you don’t get a dime. But the lenders all thought you did have insurance so sound lending!
‘As someone looking to get in the market, we heard that the best time was 10 years ago, the next best time is now.’ The statistics don’t lie. Gone are homes in the $200,000 to $300,000 price range from 2014. Now, median prices are near $700,000 in the Coachella Valley, a 133 percent increase since 2014. In another five years, realtors say they expect minimum prices to top a million dollars’
California UHS have never been wrong before!
median prices are near $700,000 in the Coachella Valley
The median income is 1/10th of that.
And California housing never stops going up!
‘Nallathamby of Brampton, Ont. In December 2024, the 49-year-old experienced chest pains, was admitted to hospital and was subsequently diagnosed with blockages to his heart. Then, in January, he underwent triple-bypass surgery from which he’s still recovering. ‘My doctor said, ‘You have so much stress,’ said Nallathamby, who describes his tenants in one word. ‘Scammers’…the five tenants occupying the Swans Acre Trail rental property purchased in 2021 completely stopped paying rent at the beginning of 2024, leaving him responsible to cover the monthly mortgage bill and many utilities. ‘I’m struggling with the house. I need to sell the property; I can’t manage,’ he said. To date, Nallathamby says the tenants owe him about $60,000, including back rent and unpaid utilities, which he’s been required to cover or risk foreclosure’
I know it may not feel like it today, and probably not tomorrow. But some day Anuratharan, you will see that you are the winnah!
Is anyone in Canada still … you know … Canadian?
‘The dream homes of the poor have turned out to be homes for the rich…We can somehow manage to pay for the ₹40-50 lakh homes with the help of loans, but not those priced over ₹85 lakh. How can auto drivers, hawkers, mathadi workers, maids, etc., afford them?’…Mane, another applicant, said, ‘For the last year and a half, we collected and submitted volumes of documents asked for, incurring huge expenses and time. We took loans to pay for the registration and booking amounts. Now, we realise we have been defrauded in terms of price, area and even location’
Calm down Dada, Vijay and remember. It was still way cheaper than renting
Thelonious Monk – Blue Monk (Norway, 1966)
The Jazz Estate
3 years ago
Thelonious Monk performing “Blue Monk” with Charlie Rouse on tenor saxophone, Larry Gales on bass and Ben Riley on drums live at the University Aula in Oslo, Norway, 1966.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yHKl0euhZI0
10 minutes.
Jeff Beck and ZZ Top – Ernie Ford’s SIXTEEN TONS
Apr 29, 2012
https://youtu.be/J2aqvKY6zLc?si=woVmmqNKgutb-0t-
The video above is actually 3:40
Here is the original which is 2:38
Sixteen Tons · Tennessee Ernie Ford
Jan 5, 2017
https://youtu.be/B9j91-18Kb4?si=pvyUmJdL8URFQ9Xt
Trump Receives Thunderous Applause as He Arrives at NCAA Wrestling Championship
Elizabeth Weibel
22 Mar 2025
As President Donald Trump entered the Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, for the NCAA wrestling championship, he was greeted with thunderous applause and chants of “USA! USA” from the crowd.
In a video posted to X by the official Rapid Response account for the White House, the crowd could be heard loudly cheering as Trump entered the arena. Trump could be seen shaking hands with a few people in the crowd and waving.
Rapid Response 47
@RapidResponse47
🚨 WATCH: President Trump enters the Wells Fargo Center arena for the Division I NCAA wrestling championships
7:35 PM · Mar 22, 2025
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https://x.com/RapidResponse47/status/1903591403910803534
Thomas Hern
@ThomasMHern
Jamaal Bowman just called Elon Musk an “incompetent thief” and “Nazi” on CNN.
A lawsuit waiting to happen.
11:08 PM · Mar 20, 2025
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https://x.com/ThomasMHern/status/1902920132437086297
Do you sometimes wish you had ignored all the hype about the Magnificent Seven companies?
The Magnificent 7′s lousy year, by the numbers
Published Fri, Mar 21 202510:30 AM EDT
Updated Fri, Mar 21 202512:52 PM EDT
Samantha Subin
– Meta Platforms is the only Magnificent Seven stock in positive territory for 2025.
– Macroeconomic uncertainty, recession fears and concerns over the impact of tariffs have fueled a market sell-off that’s pushed all the major averages into negative territory for the year.
– Tesla is the worst performer this year, with shares down more than 40%.
…
https://www.cnbc.com/2025/03/21/the-magnificent-7s-lousy-year-by-the-numbers-meta-tesla.html
“Tesla is the worst performer this year, with shares down more than 40%.”
Technically that’s a 40% loss over one quarter. The year has just barely started!
Waiting for the inflection point.
This crash is just getting started and it’s going to take a while. I’m somewhat surprised by the lack of panic currently but when you consider the lack of introspection that goes on with most of the population, maybe inflection isn’t even possible until everything is on fire. Yet, if we look to LA where fire did consume a large portion of the city, inflection is still lacking. We live in interesting times.