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FAB,

Where you been btw? Great analogy! I had an earful of that "flight to quality" last go round thankyouverymuch.

"Oh, I'm not concerned in the least about the sell-off in the NASDAQ, I own "quality" issues like ____!"

I've been emailing the authors of the late-wave of "look at fortress Marin" articles. The NYT piece claimed that prices are steeply rising in Mill Valley.

My response was along the lines of "would it have killed you to actually do something so radical as checking facts, or is a phone call with one realtor enough?"

FAB one of the addresses you researched for me is looking like it's heading into foreclosure eventually. If you recall the owners paid $2mm with very very very little down 2 years ago. They tried to list at $2.3mm and gave up at $1.9 & change and pulled the listing. I asked the agent if they were being foreclosed and she wouldn't say now, only that they were considering options and looking for lease-option renters now. I asked how much and she said "blah blah blah executive housing, $9,000/mo...". The conversation ended when I asked if they've received a NOD yet.

But, prices are steeply rising in Mill Valley, right? Such bullshit. The media should be ashamed of themselves. I mean wretchedly ashamed. I'm of the opinion that since the media is primarily just a big paid placement regurgitation machine the whole mess can be offshored for 1/10 the price to big Indian media processing centers.

>> I’m of the opinion that since the media is primarily just a big paid placement regurgitation machine the whole mess can be offshored for 1/10 the price to big Indian media processing centers.

Randy ... I admire you for such an wonderful idea! Will this happen?

Randy H,

Funny you should bring up offshored "journalism". The Portland Housing Blog implied exactly that when "all is well in Lane County" was proclaimed after ONE call to a local realtor!

You shouldn't take "the conversation ended" as a personal slight. Bringing up NOD's is pretty much off limits w/realtors everywhere.

Randy:

Back when I was a broker we had a service that mailed us a list of all the Notices of Default (NODs) filed in the County each month. I'm sure that you can ask around and find a similar service today. If you know that a guy is not making payments you can often work with him and the bank do a short sale.

DinOR Says:

> FAB, Where you been btw?

Working more and blogging less…

> Great analogy!

I have another one…

This weekend my Mom told me that few more homes on the Peninsula sold last month for more than $100K over list (all three bought by kids that grew up on the Peninsula with “help” from their parents).

I told this to a friend (from business school who works on Sand Hill Road and rents a few blocks away from me).

My friend (who grew up in Portola Valley) said he just heard that his parent’s neighbors gave their daughter and her husband $1mm in cash to “help” them buy a home in West Menlo.

He said that the Real Estate Bubble reminds him of the Dot Com Bubble where everyone’s parents were happy to give the kids cash to invest in pre IPO shares since they saw it as a “sure thing” investment.

Once the crowd at the Circus Club and Sharon Heights learned (the hard way) that pre IPO dot com stocks was not a “sure thing” the cash flow to pre IPO stocks ended (and they started giving the kids cash to buy Peninsula Real Estate)…

We need a North + South blog event…

That would be great, but given the distance, we may have to settle for short-commute local affairs for now. The next time you guys are planning an NCal get together, please let me know. If it's possible (like over a holiday weekend), I'll attend.

FAB,

Excellent story. In the late 90's a lot of recent grads would stay at home and just day-trade their graduation money! Then, uh... reality set in. I can't speak for others but "a little help" in most cases means hitting the old man up for 500 bucks? Tell ya' what "pops"! What say you just give me the mil. and we skip the house thing? Oops, too late.

Homes in the desirable neighborhoods in San Francisco are still going up in price. In the less desirable neighborhoods, home prices are flat, as they are in the more desirable neighborhoods in Berkeley.

That is all I am tracking. We shall see what DQ says when it comes out, but that is what I am seeing.

I'm renting a 3/2 SFH in Menlo Park (the area that goes to Redwood City schools) for 2550 a month. A house a block a way just went up on the market, it's a 3/2 SFH, and they're listing at 850k.

At today's interest rates (6.75ish) that's 5500k a month in just PI. Taxes are an additional 1k a month, and we'll wash insurance out with the tax savings.

Absolutely no way will we buy right now.

A bit OT, but this news story caught my eye this morning:

Ex-Broadcom exec alleged to have sex, drug lair

Yet *another* prime example of that wonderful "economy-stimulating" and "jobs creating" type of behavior so typical among our elite class (I guess the prostitutes who actually got paid are grateful, anyways).

But for goodness sakes, whatever happens, don't TAX THOSE POOR RICH PEOPLE! Forcible "redistribution of wealth" is evil, right? Unless, of course, the tax happens to apply to the earnings of regular middle and working-class schmucks (then it's perfectly ok).

... And from the same SF Chronicle article FAB cited:
Although home sales slumped more than 10 percent from last year in the city, the median price increased by 4.4 percent. In fact, DataQuick found the median price paid per square foot for a home in San Francisco hit $673 -- a record. Prince Prospero says party on.... (although there were rumors of an unwelcome guest, Nod, traveling through Marin).

@HARM,

The story would've been funny (if not pathetic) had it not been for the death threats to lowly construction workers just trying to get paid? Was this guy around the bend or what? Drugs, sure. Hookers, maybe but what is up with the need for a "secret lair"? Dude... just get a divorce and get it over with!

It looks like the only time he was coherent enough, long enough was to give himself favorable dating on his stock options, and then back to the party!

To be fair, everybody wants a secret lair.

When they're eight. And then it's to pretend to be Batman, not for hookers and blow.

Now, now, DinOR --careful with those "around the bend" type comments.

Remember: rich people are "special" and have extraordinary superhuman abilities none of us 'W-2 loosers' have. That's why they can command 430X (or is it 500X nowadays?) the salaries of their lowest paid employees.

After all, the "market" sets the price of labor, right? I mean it's not like the Board of Directors happens to be packed with the CEO's buddies or CEOs from other companies (who regularly collude with each other re: compensation voting). It's not as if executive pay is determined by some cartel-esque, mutual-aid, back-scratching society or anything, right?

To imply otherwise, might get one branded a "Socia1ist". :roll:

If you guys want something to cheer you up, look at the stock ticker for AHM. It is imploding as we speak.

RandyH, you were right on this one. I got stopped out ages ago, but I should have listened to you in the first place.

I just want to point out, that ultimately YOU (generally speaking) put up with this sort of salary imbalance. To try and rectify things on the backside with fiddling with the tax rules, always strikes me as cowardice. I had a boss once who did virtually nothing and made a bunch of money off my work. After it was apparent this situation was not going to fix itself, I made it clear how I felt about this situation and left.

I really wonder about the people who work at Home Depot at ANY level whether it be floor sales or middle management, who sat around and did nothing about the fact that useless CEO Bob Nardelli made so much money. WTF?

"When they're eight"

I can't figure out if these clowns visualize themselves as some kind of Sherlock Holmes (The 7% Solution) working on a very important case and at the same time trying to control their towering intellect? Or if they just like giggling through their nose (on X) while getting a kn@b job?

My brother did the finish carpentry on a dot.com founder's house that had secret passageways to a helo launch pad! (Just in case of some sort of an abduction). It's incredible the sense of self-importance some of these guys have?

Vicente,

In ways I do hear ya' but these guys are VERY effective at justifying their "take" and quickly and decisively squelching the slightest dissent. In fact, so much so that you -could- say that justifying their "comp package" IS their job!

@Vicente,

RE: Personal action. This sounds all well and good, but realistically how many rank'n'filers at most companies have the ability (or financial self-sufficiency) to make any meaningful impact as isolated individuals? If I were to march up to my company CEO today and rebuke him for being overpaid, the end result would be I'm out of a job. And then he would quickly replace me and go back to "business as usual".

"Fiddling with the tax rules" is one of the few avenues we have as taxpayers and voters to make a COLLECTIVE (meaningful) impact on the situation. I don't see it as cowardice at all, just common sense.

Q: Which decade in the U.S. saw the highest wealthy individual and corporate tax rates?
A: the 1950s (individual brackets for millionaires went as high as 91%).

Q: Which decade saw the least unequal distribution of wealth and greatest gains for the middle class?
A: the 1950s

Coincidences? I think not. If "redistributive taxation" is the only way to get the job done, I say, let's give 'er a whirl before admitting defeat.

Something for all you apologists for the idle rich out there:

“Don’t forget that most men with nothing would rather protect the possibility of becoming rich than face the reality of being poor.”
–John Dickinson (character from the play "1776")

I think I may have just found my next thread topic.
How about: "Fuck the Rich -- Let's Tax the $hit out of them"?

For the record, while rank'n'file employees are generally powerless to do anything about the situation (other than quit or speak up and be fired), "shareholder activism" has been a new way of making some progress on the issue of excessive executive pay. Unfortunately, progress has been slow and blunted, mostly thanks to (surprise, surprise) the fact that these guys have rigged the game in their favor.

If you think it's easy for shareholders to get rid of an incompetent greedy a$$hole CEO, take a look at the recent history of Disney, Inc. and shareholders dogged efforts to oust "star" CEO, Michael Eisner.

Off topic: the Google-aires are about to become slightly less wealthy:

http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/070719/earns_google.html?.v=2

And it only took about a decade and CALPERS getting involved to get rid of that "star".

If you look at many of the CEO's of the 90's they were frequently from totally unrelated industries. Why? Not so much for their expertise, but rather their ability to negotiate "primo" packages for board members!

Another thing they talk about CEO pay based on performance.

How do you judge the performance of:

Oil companies executives when prices go from $20/barrel to $70/barrel.
Financial companies when they were slicing CDO tranche.
Home Builders during housing boom.

HARM Says:

> Q: Which decade in the U.S. saw the highest wealthy
> individual and corporate tax rates?
> A: the 1950s (individual brackets for millionaires went
> as high as 91%).

> Q: Which decade saw the least unequal distribution of
> wealth and greatest gains for the middle class?
> A: the 1950s

> Coincidences? I think not. If “redistributive taxation” is the
> only way to get the job done, I say, let’s give ‘er a whirl
> before admitting defeat.

Every country in the last couple thousand years has had an unequal distribution of wealth with the exception of a country founded just over 200 years ago by a bunch of immigrants from Europe who welcomed more waves of immigrants from Europe and let them have free land as long as they moved west killing any native people that got in their way. Just like every other country in the last couple thousand years this new country was moving toward an unequal distribution of wealth after 100 years. The rapid progression toward the huge unequal distribution was slowed in the first part of the second 100 years by two big wars and a lot of government debt and social programs. In recent years the unequal distribution of wealth has increased and there is no way to stop it (since very few working class people vote and most never even bother to vote)…

FAB,

I'm not yet convinced that extremes in wealth disparity is *always* an historical inevitability. It's not happening to the same degree in Western Europe & Oz, which granted, do have much higher voter participation rates and much stronger public support for social programs. In the end, a very unequal distribution of wealth and power, is IMO, very unhealthy and a seriously destabilizing situation for any society.

If tinkering with the tax structure can help reverse that a little, I'm open to at least trying first.

New thread: Fuck the Rich — Let’s Tax the $hit out of them

EBGuy,

things look much better (from our perspective of course) for raw land. They are simply not moving, except a couple of cheap lots ($500K-600K) in good school districts. Gilroy, Morgan Hill, Almaden are just sitting with no movements, not even one transaction. 5 lots that I have been monitoring in LG, Cupertino foothills went into escrow (priced below $500K - 1.1M, all are priced significantly cheaper than comparables)

I continue to argue that the banks have not shut down the tap. For someone with a decent credit score and high paying job (as of now), he can still borrow 90% or even more in BA. Job market is the key. When the job market goes, the foreign cash injection into BA will start to go too, because elites in Asia are essentially making money from middle class spending in America. Once American consumption shuts down, Asia will hurt badly as well.

Man I hate to bring up the UNION word, but I mean really, are employees these days all frightened sheep? So terrified that they might lose their jobs they take any abuse management will heap on them?

Then go home and once in a while pull a level in a secret ballot, that a POLITICIAN *PROMISES* them will redistributed the wealth? Come on, we all know most of this money goes to the IRS flunkies, accountants, and tax lawyers anyhow, it doesn't help you one damn bit.

Quite simply, yeah you worked for Home Depot under Bob Nardelli and put up with that crap, you got what you deserved. Organize a wildcat strike, or a union, do something. Even if it's just speak up at a company meeting about compensation. Sure I'd ask why I'm not getting a raise this year if the CEO just got 300 mill in stock options. Where do you think the manager's salary comes from, from YOUR labor. If they start forgetting that maybe it's time to remind them.

Geez! I'm trying not to use the P word here.

Vicente Says:
Man I hate to bring up the UNION word, but I mean really, are employees these days all frightened sheep? So terrified that they might lose their jobs they take any abuse management will heap on them?

Yes.