patrick.net

Dear Michael Holliday:

Your question was for Randy H., but I would like to offer you my un-solicited opinion: follow your passion.

If your passion is to work for Lockheed, try for that. If it is for law enforcement, try for that. If your passion is to return to the Bay Area, try for that.

There is no telling what course you take now, pension no pension, Bay Area or AZ, civil servant or private, ... will look like the smartest choice from the rear view mirror when you retire. So you might as well try to find a way, including making compromises if you have to, to do what you like.

When I graduated from San Jose State a little more than 20 years ago, I thought I'd failed because I didn't land a "safe, pensioned" career-oriented "position" at IBM in south San Jose, with a house in semi-rural (at the time) Morgan Hill. I got over it, and found something else to pursue. And, as you may have noticed when you return here, Morgan Hill is not longer the bucolic semi-rural paradise that it once was. Those who I know who did land what they thought was a lifetime job at IBM in South San Jose, have had a rocky ride. If they still work there, they work for Hitachi. Not what they signed up for.

I

Right Glen, I was just correcting some common misconceptions. If people knew and understood their rights and responsibilities we wouldn't have collectors calling 5 years later. It is improper, but it does happen. That is precisely why there is a statute of limitations.

"go spend $20k on a credit card, stop paying and then tell the nasty man on the phone that you are sending them a letter ordering them to stop contacting you!!!!
what world do you live in! you actually mad me chuckle! "

Now you are changing the parameters. If I did that they would take me to court, get a judgment and then use legal avenues like garnishment, or seizure to satisfy the judgment. BTW judgments themselves are only good for 3 years, and can be renewed one time I believe beyond that.

what world do you live in! you actually mad me chuckle!

The United Debtors of America.

Read the link, it all spelled out for you. You don't have to even take my word for it.

Guys, this is all basic business law stuff, I can't be the only one on the board who took business courses?

Yup, that is the real world. That link I sent you only allows a $1000 judgment for breaking the law so given the law of averages it is probably good business to break the law. Most of them like you said are too busy trying to run from you, rather than stand and fight.

Sybrib:

Very good insight!

My dad retired from IBM in 1993.

I worked as a co-op at the Cottle Rd. site for a few years while attending San Jose State myself.

IBM has changed. Our neighbors that did stay employed there now work for Hitachi and it seems like their jobs, security, retirement now reside in a state of flux and unsurity.

Everything you said is absolutely true.

The San Jose/South Bay I grew up in and knew has changed dramatically in the eight years I've been away. Most of my old friends are gone or scattered here and there.

I sometimes feel like I'm between two worlds & not sure which way to go.
The grass is always greener, and I guess you can never really go home.

I don't know...you know what I mean?

malcolm and glen - technically you are right but it is my job and my companies mission to get that money from debitors. we know what we are doing and have the money to pursue debitors. we know how to push the systems and the limits. we do this ever day all day long. debtors are hiding in a closet taking their kids add medicine.

What you are talking about is pushing over the limit by pursuing collections illegally. Once the statute of limitations hs run and you have received a "no contact letter," there is nothing further you can legally do to collect the date. Sure, collection agencies can break the law. But if you don't mind breaking the law, I suppose you can go break their kneecaps too, while you're at it.

This should help:

http://www.debthelp.com/kc/16-long-do-negative-marks-appear-your-credit-report.html

The Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) of 1970 states that credit bureaus can continue to include negative information on your credit report for up to seven years. If you have negative items such as late payments, collection accounts, judgments, repossessions, or even Chapter 13 bankruptcies on your credit report that are more than seven years old, you should contact the appropriate credit bureau and demand that such items be removed.

Certain items, such as Chapter 7, Chapter 11, and Chapter 12 bankruptcies, are exempt from the seven year rule, and may be reported for up to ten years. A few items, such as criminal convictions, may be reported indefinitely.

I know exactly what you mean.

I never left home, but home left me.

(The longest that I've been away has been for two weeks, a few times for vacations).

In 1988 I was a coop (grad student) at the Harry Road lab. During the time I was nearing graduation, my boss offered to help me get a "permanent job". Even though a few years before when I was finishing my B.S. I had wanted to work there "permanently", by then I could sense the tension career IBMers felt at the time, that the times were changing. It was all too familiar from the coop I'd had the year before in Lockheed, career LMSC employees stressed out that, God forbid, peace should break out with the Soviets !

I learned in the trenches, there is no "safe/secure" situation. So instead it's best to find a way, to pursue what you like.

They won't learn if it's not extremely, extremely painful.

Wipe out Casey Serin's debt, and he'll be right back there trying to flip houses. (Of course by now, nobody in their right mind would give him a mortgage...)

I am undergoing a similar experience to CB right now, although I wouldn't go so far as to say it was harrassment.

In my case I keep getting rung up about a guy who I let live at my place while he was getting his act back together.

The interesting features:
1. This guy never used my phone number, he had his own line. He didn't even have access to my phone. The debt collectors must be doing address matching.
2. He moved out over 2 years ago, and he is in the local white pages at his new address.
3. I have an answering machine permanently on, so I don't always get to the phone before it kicks in even when I am home. (This does wonders in deterring junk calls by the way, and my family and friends know by now to start a message. If I'm home I pick the phone up when I get to it.)
This might be the reason why I never get more than a polite 'please call xxxx and quote reference number yyyy'.

In passing, the guy in question is a moron, in the technical sense rather than the insulting sense. I actually met him through Intellectually Disabled sport. He's about 8 when it comes to mental maturity, just able to function independently.

Now I know for an observed fact he was constantly being sent credit-card mailouts, to the point where I actually rang a couple of issuers to explain the situation and ask them to desist. Would they? Would they hell; to paraphrase one response "he's an adult so we have a right to send him material and it's up to him whether he wants to take up our offer or not".

In this case I am not particularly sorry that the lenders are not being repaid, my main concern is that the guy doesn't do anything desperate in panic over the harrassment.

As DinOR likes to say, when you refi your house, you are essentially “re-buying” it.

Ahhhemmm. mmmm. "clears throat", ahhhhhmmmmm.

I believe that is a Surfer-X quote.

BLOG PARTY

BLOG PARTY

Where? When?

$$$$$anta Barbara, spring solstice.

http://www.mercurynews.com/breakingnews/ci_5454586

"Subprime fallout strands some borrowers mid-loan"

Cry me a river.

lunarpark - thanks for the link - no one raises the question of whether she pays taxes on her stated income!

Okay, if no docs are out, why don't they use their tax returns - doh!

They are not declaring all the earmings to the IRS?

Or, maybe, the other contributers to the mortgage are not legally in the country and/or not declaring their income?

Those mean nasty mortgage brokers, actually acting responsibly for a change!

sybrib Says:

I never left home, but home left me.

I learned in the trenches, there is no “safe/secure” situation. So instead it’s best to find a way, to pursue what you like.
_____

Great first phrase! I never heard that one.

I'm going to really ponder those words.

Thanks!

Bit outside the Bay Area, I know, but Jon Lansner's blog at the OC Register has a Q&A thread today on housing bloggers.

http://blogs.ocregister.com/lansner/archives/2007/03/insider_qa_chats.html

(Hope I've typed correctly, this is a public PC and doesn't have cut/paste enabled.) :(

So anyway, Lansner has got Ben Jones, Rich Toscano from Piggington's and (* drum roll *) Patrick as his examples of housing bloggers. Holy dooley, where's Goldilocks 'cos we've got the 3 Bears!!!

Wow, looks like we hit the big four-oh!

Claire, a lot of those taxes, and stated income issues are on a very good thread on this site. Some people had really good thoughts on it, and there was a diversity of opinions. If you are interested, I also added links where informants of those people can get a 10% reward for reporting tax evaders to the IRS. Basically someone swearing on a loan application that their non reported income is true and correct should be a confession IMHO.

I followed a few links in my usual circuit of reading this morning and ended up enjoying a lede from Stephen Roach at Morgan Stanley.

He doesn't address much that hasn't been covered very well here, but my pleasure came from seeing the by-now-familiar ideas gaining circulation where they're likely to gain a wider readership and also to introduce a few home truths to those inclined to write off the blogosphere as less than credible.

http://www.morganstanley.com/views/gef/index.html#anchor4577

FormerAptBroker, I used to agree entirely with that point of view until I noticed no tobacco or alcohol bilboards in my neighborhood, but for some reason in minority areas that is all they see day in and day out. I tried to imagine what that would be like to grow up with constant marketing like that. The movie Supersize me also helped alter my view. Although in general it is individual choices, there is a vast fast food conspiracy in this country.

My MBA classes also impacted my view. When you learn how companies will do anything to get a product to you (ie pharmaceuticals stretching the truth about their products and now wanting to use India as a fresh population of guinea pigs, or companies like Metallic Power a startup who existed for the sole purpose of going public for a VC harvest event) all of this makes you start to question things that you had accepted.

There is also a perpetual lie to fool the masses that private industry is always superior to anything the government does. As you learn that 75% of all money invested in product development is waste, and about 400 million per year oil executives one has to ponder these assertions. One thing about all of this is the assertion that innovation only comes from the private side. This is an absolute lie. I wrote my thesis on a hybrid model of innovation involving social partnerships otherwise known as public private partnerships. It was an eye opening experience.

lunarpark,
Claire beat me to the punch on that one. From your link:

In Peña's case, she's seeking 100 percent financing using a combination of a first and second mortgage, and applied for the loans using a "stated income" process, because she cannot document her full income using pay stubs or W2 forms.

"I feel like I was discriminated against," said Peña, who is a U.S. citizen. She spoke in Spanish, with Smith translating.

Can you believe this? She feels "discriminated against" because she can't document enough income to pay for a 100% financed stated income mortgage loan? She should be thankful that she's being saved from likely foreclosure in the next 2-3 years. Add to that the "two other adults" in her household contributing to the mortgage. Sheesh - so that's one of the faces behind this whole real estate runup? God help us all.

All joking aside almost every person I have ever met that is a big fat gross tub of goo has a hard time managing their life since they are usually lazy and stupid.

FAB,
You crack me up! Given the field I work in, I see a LOT of fat people. This is what I often think, but I can't really ever say it out loud. Thanks for making my day.

I heard of a woman so fat she needed someone to help wash her bottom because she couldn't wipe or reach back there in the shower. Morbid obsesity has to be one of the most disgusting things in the country.

Can you believe this? She feels “discriminated against” because she can’t document enough income to pay for a 100% financed stated income mortgage loan? She should be thankful that she’s being saved from likely foreclosure in the next 2-3 years. Add to that the “two other adults” in her household contributing to the mortgage. Sheesh - so that’s one of the faces behind this whole real estate runup? God help us all.

Yeah, maybe she'll bring up a lawsuit to get the extra money required for a down payment so she can buy the overpriced POS. Then, after she falls behind on payments in a year or two, she'll sue again claiming she was taken advantage of.

It's very sad, but I'm afraid that this is what our country has come to.

How desperate can you get, this agent needs to advertise herself! Not even a link to a property or anything else. I wonder what else she offers ;). She would probably do better in craigslists erotic section.

Malcolm Says:

> FormerAptBroker, I used to agree entirely with that
> point of view until I noticed no tobacco or alcohol
> bilboards in my neighborhood, but for some reason in
> minority areas that is all they see day in and day out.
> I tried to imagine what that would be like to grow up
> with constant marketing like that. The movie Supersize
> me also helped alter my view. Although in general it
> is individual choices, there is a vast fast food conspiracy
> in this country.

Lucky we don’t have any tobacco or alcohol billboards in the north part of town since after driving past the billboards for a couple weeks I bet both me and SF Woman would be smoking menthols and drinking malt liquor every day…

I’ve taken more marketing classes than most people and don’t think that driving past a billboard with a smoking cowboy will get many people on their way to the gym to pick up a pack of smokes but it has a good chance of getting a guy on his way to 7-11 to pick up some cheap cigarettes to spend the extra buck for a pack of the name brand.

I also think that a billboard that says “don’t let the smooth taste fool you” might get a guy on his way to buy a 40 oz. bottle of Colt 45 to pick think about King Cobra, but it probably won’t get the guy on his way to buy a bottle of Flowers Chardonnay to even think about buying a bottle of malt liquor…

Malcolm says, "There is also a perpetual lie to fool the masses that private industry is always superior to anything the government does."

Absolutely not true. The government is unsurpassed when it comes to providing private industry with the means to subvert the free market.

Sorry to disagree, but while I don't subscribe 100% to the libertarian viewpoint, I do believe our government is evil incarnate and should be severely curtailed.

Malcolm, for example... without the Fed, we would never be in the midst of a housing bubble that is about to implode.

Allah, man that girl has the big hair thing going on.

How desperate can you get, this agent needs to advertise herself! Not even a link to a property or anything else. I wonder what else she offers . She would probably do better in craigslists erotic section.

I remember her! She was one of the burnouts in high school who was always hanging out in the smoking lounge wearing the "Poison" T-Shirt.

"My MBA classes also impacted my view"

Of course, another dime-a-dozen MBA drone :-)

Well Frank we will disagree, because even though I can follow the logic of cheap money causing the bubble I don't agree that it did. It was free market innovations of subprime lending, and non accountability that came with always passing the buck to someone else that caused it. Interest rates from 94-2000 (when I wasy buying) were very low in comparison to rates prior to that, but that didn't cause prices to triple. For most of my holding period my homes went up at a nice nominal steady rate. Then every clown around me who saw I made money, and bought in to the hype jumped in and bought without regards to the fundamentals. That's what really caused it.

Nice insult.

I'd say you are the lemming, oh the free market cures everything, private industry is noble, and good. Come on man, it is the most efficient way of disbursing goods and services, but it is not the moral institution it is made out to be. Private industry does way more evil in this country than the government does. The government is just incompetent a lot of times because it lacks a profit motive.

BTW a drone follows the view, where in my case I dissented from it so learn proper English.

Just reading up on past real estate booms. In the 1920s, Florida had a big boom that had people buying and selling options on property. Before it imploded, an acre of land sold for $6000. After, an acre couldn't be sold for $2.

Banks ended up with thousands of acres of negative cash flow and all they could do was hope for improvement sometime in the future.

Improvement eventually did come for banks and individuals about 30 years later in the 1950s. It's true when they say that eventually real estate will come back. Unfortunately for many, 30 years was beyond their life times.