patrick.net

Bellingham Bill says

Basically our entire economy is fucked. Too much money with the "savers", not enough remaining within the paycheck economy.

3/4 of the country don't have 6 months income saved, hell 2/3 don't have $1000

You have it entirely backassward. People don't save because the incentive to save (i.e. interest) is too low. Given high enough reward in the form of interest, practically everyone would save. 3/4 of the country don't have 6 months income saved because it doesn't pay to save money.

thomaswong.1986 says

lots and lots of new rentals going up in North San Jose, Santa Clara and Milpitas. Lots and Lots of land still open... with prices still high pretty much

open to more development. It appears they really are making new land...

Rezoning anyway.

There IS a lot of land still ripe for development.

In the south bay IBM Hitachi is sitting on a HUGE amount of (contaminated) real estate. Communication Hill is still mostly vacant land right next to Caltrain and close to the new Martial Cottle farm park. Coyote Valley and Morgan Hill are still mostly farmland yet are right on Caltrain as well.

Looking eastward Newark, East SJ hills and Livermore have lots of land too. Put in a few more BART stops and you've got something!

I am old enough to remember when Japanese Investors were buying all sorts of real estate in the US when Japan's economy was booming....one in particular was Pebble Beach Golf Course and the Lodge at Pebble Beach; bought extremely high then had to sell it to Clint Eastwood and his partners for less than half of what they purchased it for.

It will happen again...these prices are way overvalued today too....keep looking at history to find the past mistakes and you will know how to invest now...

retire59 says

I am old enough to remember when Japanese Investors were buying all sorts of real estate in the US when Japan's economy was booming....one in particular was Pebble Beach Golf Course and the Lodge at Pebble Beach; bought extremely high then had to sell it to Clint Eastwood and his partners for less than half of what they purchased it for.

The other example was NYC and Chicago property which went down and they lost money.... why is it everyone keeps forgetting how many people actually lose money on RE ... Residential and Commercial...

jazz music says

The liquidity that was to trickle down

Simply Excellent Jazz Music on all points !

Where did Goran go? I thought inventory had bottomed...

Declining inventory is further evidence that we need to have as many people as possible to migrate to bay area for tech jobs in order to increase housing prices further and eventually have everyone living in soviet communal apartment conditions.

Inventory did bottom in 2013 at the US level:

dublin hillz says

S'all right, 3 single parents with 3 kids and an extra roommate can easily share a 3 bedroom apartment and take turn inviting relatives for birthday party and holidays. Whoever said that such living arrangements are un-natural and stressful is simply a closeminded brainwashed first world westerner.

Especially if the house has a garage.

HydroCabron is Kochel 271 says

apital gains tax rates are so high that the wealthy can't afford to hire that many people.

Right, why not make it zero :)?
It is zero in Hong Kong, Singapore and Switzerland along with a few other places. Unemployment hardly exists in those countries.

Heard an ad on the car radio today (in LA) along the lines of "you to can can make big buck flipping homes, making 50K or more in a matter of weeks with no money down and no credit, using our in house credit system"

That's not the exact wording, but the gist. Unbelievable. If I was really cynical, I would think that those supporting the upcoming "flippers" are indirectly the same people who have bought up rental properties in bulk, or the equity funds that are selling shares in their bulk property investments.

Doing a google search, I see that flipping homes started to get really hot again last summer (2013).

Not even the Superbowl and ducky is already doing a victory lap. Calm down for a second. Do you really think the the Dec. Redfin numbers (any day now) will confirm all times lows? At any rate, it does look tight out there. As an aside, I do know of a couple who is a flippin'; it's been a while.

How do we know that this menu is from 1977?

Tell it to that industry toadie who publishes the Calculated Risk blog.

Let them eat cake, A LA MODE.

Peasants!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Let_them_eat_cake

""Let them eat cake" is the traditional translation of the French phrase "Qu'ils mangent de la brioche", supposedly spoken by "a great princess" upon learning that the peasants had no bread. Since brioche was made from dough enriched with butter and eggs, and those ingredients were even more scarce and more costly than dough, making brioche even more out of the reach of the peasants than bread, the quote supposedly would reflect the princess's obliviousness as to the condition of the people.

I've not searched. How many auto makers can or will do this?

zzyzzx says

You obviously do not live in Maryland.

Nope, live in Texas ... Thank God.

Every car makers GPS system knows every damn thing about you. So does your cell phone. Soon most hand held GPS units will transmit your location. Don't like it don't buy a car or phone with GPS.

gsr says

It is zero in Hong Kong, Singapore and Switzerland along with a few other places. Unemployment hardly exists in those countries

It's really easy to have low unemployment when you use foreigners to do most of the work and boot them out of the country when they lose their jobs.

A lot of cars have something like this. Should be easy enough to disable if you own a factory service manual (which you should already own for every car that you have).

bob2356 says

It's really easy to have low unemployment when you use foreigners to do most of the work

Hmm, did you think it through? Cheap foreigners lower unemployment rate?
How does that make unemployment low? Don't we mostly hear the opposite argument on this forum?

Since I sold my modern car in 2012, whenever I go out of town I rent a car for the trip. About a year ago I went to the Enterprise office at the local Ford dealership and was put in a Focus for my trip to Dallas. Immediately I started driving and a ringing came from the dash and a note on the dashboard "Please Observe All Speed Limits, Drive Safely". When I entered Hill County on I-35 where the speed limit is now 75, I increased the speed and another came: "Vehicle is Approaching Maximum Speed", and stayed on until I returned to 65 in Ellis County. When I returned the car I asked what was going on and the lady said oh all the Fords are set not to go above 80, which to me would be very dangerous in an emergency. I wish I'd known that so I could have tested it. She said the computer (I guess the GPS) knows the speed limit everywhere and it will remind you when you go above it. Needless to say, I've avoided Fords since then.

I'm good with this, but is there a way he could have allowed our veterans to pass through his digestive tract unharmed, so as to visit war memorials throughout Manhattan?

I believe blocking veteran access to war memorials to be the highest of crimes. There are several WWII and Vietnam War memorials through Manhattan. Veteran access to these sites should remain unimpeded 24x7x365.

Call it Crazy says

I love these stories..... Boycott Ford... but let Google, Facebook, your cell carrier, etc. track everything you do with your phone... Hilarious...

Robert Samuelson made the same point in his column yesterday:

"People do not open Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Instagram accounts because they wish to shroud their lives in secrecy. They do not use online dating services or post videos on YouTube because they cherish their anonymity. The Internet is a vehicle for self-promotion, personal advertising and the pursuit of celebrity."

"If Americans think their privacy is dangerously diminished, there are remedies. They can turn off their PCs, toss their smartphones and smash their tablets. Somehow, this seems unlikely, even though another Pew survey finds that '86 percent of adult Internet users have taken steps . . . to avoid surveillance by other people or organizations.'"

HydroCabron is Kochel 271 says

There are several WWII and Vietnam War memorials through Manhattan. Veteran access to these sites should remain unimpeded 24x7x365.

I concur, and would add Grant's Tomb to the access list. Due to the continuing mystery about who is actually buried there, all veterans should have a right to inspect and see for themselves at any time. You never know when terrorists or illegal aliens might try to bury themselves in Grant's Tomb.

bgamall4 says

I think this effort to disarm Americans may have more to do with the shooting down of drones than anything. Anyone have thoughts about this?

Fuck, Gary, have it ever occurred to you that people don't hunt birds with rifles? It's true, they don't. Do you know why? Because it's impossible.
Do you know what they use? Shotguns. Do you know the effective distance of a shotgun shot when hunting birds? It's fucking 30 yards. 40 is a stretch. What kind of drones are you expecting to fly by you closer than 40 yards?

PS. What's your profession? Did you go to a college and what was your major? Is there any subject area in which you have at least basic educated knowledge?

APOCALYPSEFUCKisShostikovitch says

He would have had the state transportation department lift him with a crane and lay him gut down on the Fort Lee exit ramp facing the city, so he could eat the cars of evil, uncooperative Democratic voters whose scum-sucking mayor defied him.

This is exactly what he did, but it's not being reported because of massive coverup and rep/con/tea media bias. His cockeyed right arm is a dead giveaway though.

BFD, buy a car without built-in GPS. They become obsolete much faster than the car itself anyway. The unit in my 05 Toyota feels like something from completely different era, even though it has a touch screen. And it doesn't know about a street I drive every day to work. And they want $120 for the map update. Fuck them very much.

SFace says

The system has too much money with brutally nowhere to go and for basic property in coveted area (and you are competing for the same 5% of the housing stock in the SFBA) , no one is selling or even close to selling. (housingtracker) Not only are there too much money, you'll have a permanent low transactions due to the majority locking interest rate sub 3.5%. Worst, there is no new homes for sale, especially SFH as an alternative. Household income for the top 20% are rising and wealth is exploding, those will not change anytime soon.

You are competing for the same 5-10% of the housing stock so stop thinking in terms of median.

You hit the nail on the head for the situation in SFBA.

APOCALYPSEFUCKisShostikovitch says

If Cristie Was a Real GOP Governor Bad Ass . . .

What are you talking about? Just look at Christie take down the Mighty Morphine Power Rangers after Boehner gets his ass kicked.

http://www.youtube.com/embed/8g3TUg2Jp0Q

If he is responsible for the gridlock it's clearly manslaughter.

Strategist says

If he is responsible for the gridlock it's clearly manslaughter.

If the lady was black, it's also clearly a civil rights violation. And the fact that he didn't eat her face means that he killed for pleasure, not out of hunger.

Straw Man says

If the lady was black, it's also clearly a civil rights violation. And the fact that he didn't eat her face means that he killed for pleasure, not out of hunger.

an "eat crime"?

Sorry, but murder doesn't rise to the level of closing off war memorials.

Another note about housing in places like Bakersfield / Fresno is the huge amount of new construction going on. It's in full swing now. In Bakersfield you have DR Horton, Lennar, Castle & Cooke, KB Home, Meritage, McMillin, Lenox,etc. and more than a dozen local tract and custom home builders! Most are late to the game, paying a premium for undeveloped land, and in turn most are not selling homes. The MLS does not reflect new homes with exception to a few builders that are starting to list them. Tons of inventory available.......Spring will be interesting, I will keep everybody posted. I think prices will continue to slide abit.

APOCALYPSEFUCKisShostikovitch says

Right. Closing off war memorials is exactly like shooting every single veteran who ever lived.

As far as my vote is concerned, I think Christie has a path to redemption here: He is the presidential candidate most likely to eat Congress.

With Obama, you have to hope for some cannibalistic Kenyan tribal orgy involving roasting pits on the National Mall, and the pitchforking of mass quantities of congressmeat into the gaping maw of The Oprah.

I think Christie would pop them in raw, like peanuts: munch, munch, munch.

If he eats Congress - alive! - I don't care how many veterans Christie physically blocks from war memorials.

bgamall4 says

This is why I have said there has to be a wealth tax.

There is a wealth tax:

Basics of the Net Investment Income Tax
http://www.irs.gov/uac/Newsroom/Net-Investment-Income-Tax-FAQs

8. What is included in Net Investment Income?

In general, investment income includes, but is not limited to: interest, dividends, capital gains, rental and royalty income, non-qualified annuities, income from businesses involved in trading of financial instruments or commodities and businesses that are passive activities to the taxpayer (within the meaning of section 469). To calculate your Net Investment Income, your investment income is reduced by certain expenses properly allocable to the income (see #13 below).

What you meant to say was that he found a couple fall guys, right?

John Bailo says

There is a wealth tax:

Basics of the Net Investment Income Tax

Uh--the title is Net Investment INCOME Tax. I think it's pretty clearly an INCOME tax, not a wealth tax.

She was 91. If it ain't this, the death panel would have gotten her soon enough so no charges should be filed and savings from not having to pay her social security anymore should be invested in an index fund.