patrick.net

E-man says

This guy hasn't lived oversea so he doesn't appreciate how cheap real estate in the Bay Area compared to other 1st world countries. This is not bad at all so bear with him

I've lived overseas a lot. Which 1st world countries are you talking about that makes BA real estate look cheap?

Tim Aurora says

You do not have to live in SF. Move out to Atlanta, Charlotte or Austin. Nice warm weather, good winters and a mighty big yard.

Warm but humid. Great BBQ though.

tts says

That is why those charts showing productivity increasing while wages stagnate are so important. Proof positive that working harder and "taking responsibility" are anything but economic cure alls:

That is a national average BTW. There is nowhere to move to in the US that allows you to avoid the reality that chart shows.

Exactly the problem. I know it's long, but worth the time: http://www.filmsforaction.org/watch/ethos/ I like that it offers a solution.

Tim Aurora says

You do not have to live in SF. Move out to Atlanta, Charlotte or Austin. Nice warm weather, good winters and a mighty big yard.

E-man says

You should have listened to edvard before he bought a house in spring 2012. He was constantly whining and bitching about real estate in the Bay Area, and how he was going to save money and moving out of here, blah blah blah. Before he bought a house here, he talked up Austin, TX and some other cities. Now, he's trashing Austin every time someone brought it up as the next Silicon Valley, etc.

Let me help correct some of your assertions. Yes, I'm not going to deny that back in the day I bitched a lot about Bay Area real estate. But I'm going to give you some more details so next time you might not feel compelled to mis-paraphrase.

First of all, the housing market sucked back then. I mean really sucked. Any house at all was around 600k+ in my area or more. If you threw in interest rates at that time, there was zilch affordability. Back then it made absolutely no sense to buy and it was ridiculous given the rather decent income I make. So for starters, the market was TOTALLY different than today's even though we're now back in a new bubble that seems to be tracking the same as the previous.

Yes- Austin, Raleigh, and a few others were on that list as possible relocation cities. I spent about a year making some aggressive efforts to land a job in Austin. I even visited it a few times. Yes- Austin is nice. The food is great. The people ere awesome. Overall I liked it. But the job situation was not ideal and the pay was not fantastic. I also found that real estate wasn't exactly cheap if you added in their high property taxes. So it made less sense when I went through that experience. I don't "Trash" Austin. I simply explain my experiences having actually gone there and seen what the deal is.

At about that same time interest rates fell dramatically, we had a lot of savings, and at one point the rates dropped so low that the cost of a mortgage on a decent house actually had parity with our rent. Then it made sense to buy and thus we did.

It would say that in hind site it was maybe one of the best financial decisions we made. But that outcome wasn't planned nor do I count on the home's appreciation for my financial well-being. I'm also not saying that moving elsewhere someday isn't out of the question either because while I like the Bay Area, certain aspects of its hurried lifestyle is a pain in the ass.

But to conclude, yes- I like many people bitched about BA real estate but it was because the housing market was totally insane and when it makes no mathematical sense it can be outright frustrating.

Tim Aurora says

So, you had a choice and I bet many others like you do too. But the reason the property prices and rents are so high in San Fransisco is exactly for that reason. ( and of course the weather is nice too). It has high paying jobs which no other place in the world has.

So either live with it or move out. It is not that people do not have an option

I've been here long enough to say that there isn't a defined reason why the Bay Area is as expensive as it is. Its a number of factors. The takeaway for me after having gone through the dot-com crash, the housing bubble and crash, the recession and the new housing bubble we're in is that its a crap shoot. Its all about a very narrow window of opportunity before things start to suck again. Had we not bought when we did, we would probably have vacated because who knows how long this bubble will last?

curious2 says

but mainly the issue was about domestic politics incluuding specifically the intentions of the Democratic party as shown by their actions which speak louder than words.

I think you made a good point earlier about how the health care law passed on party lines, so the anger should really be focused on the Dems that refused to support some of the better options rather than on the Republicans.

I just didn't understand why you chose to pick a fight with the definition of 1st world or difference between universal health care and single payer.

For a while I was proud to call curious2 my very own personal troll, he would follow me around saying stupid shit about me because of this one time when I had little tolerance for his stupidity.

He's sure to chime in as a response to this about what a fool I am for using the ignore feature to not see 99% of his posts, but occasionally read one that references me from the front page.

PErhaps he's becoming your very own troll now.

I would think of it as flattering, that he's so interested in you.

marcus says

For a while I was proud to call curious2 my very own personal troll, he would follow me around saying stupid shit about me because of this one time when I had little tolerance for his stupidity.

Wait, curious george is my personal troll I thought. How many people does he follow around? Very creepy.

Lol not one word of this thread has made any sort of a logical argument as to why US housing prices should be compared to prices in socialist shitholes.

edvard2 says

the new housing bubble we're in is that its a crap shoot. Its all about a very narrow window of opportunity before things start to suck again. Had we not bought when we did, we would probably have vacated because who knows how long this bubble will last?

Exactly. We also don't know when it sucks again, whether the bottom would be higher or lower than today.

tatupu70 says

My lord. I've listened and patiently explained everything to you.

Nope. Not at all. Everything you have "explained" is already patently obvious, and you have explained NOTHING I asked you to explain.

tatupu70 says

One only has to look at the Nasdaq in 2000 to prove it

Are we talking about the NASDAQ?

tatupu70 says

Whatever starting point you pick, you measure the % gain (or loss) vs. that point.

Percent of what?

Comparing the DJIA of today versus even 30 years ago is meaningless. It used to consist of "industrial" stocks, you know, MAKING MONEY in America. Alcoa, US Steel, etc.

Now, many of the companies in the index are service and marketing companies. Home Depot comes to mind. The higher the dow, the more foreign goods these companies are churning, driving the numbers up, but the underlying economic activity in the USA is less skilled and paid American workers moving and selling the stuff, and a small number of CEO and investor class people actually collecting an increasing profit from it.

As for the chart comparison 1929 to now, what are we supposed to compare here? One could call two huge bear traps on the current chart, if we are ONLY to consider the graph Homeboy posted, out of every other context.

Homeboy says

Nope. Not at all. Everything you have "explained" is already patently obvious, and you have explained NOTHING I asked you to explain.

It is patently obvious--I agree. That's why I'm having so much trouble understanding what you don't get.

Homeboy says

Are we talking about the NASDAQ?

lol--you're kidding, right? So, your contention is that the DJIA only moves in the "upper reaches" but the Nasdaq isn't so constrained?

Homeboy says

tatupu70 says

Whatever starting point you pick, you measure the % gain (or loss) vs. that point.

Percent of what?

% Gain or Loss in the index. I think you're just trolling at this point, so I'll be done now.

APOCALYPSEFUCKisShostikovitch says

There is no reason at all that an abandoned ranch house in Detroit should not cost at least as much as a townhouse in Kensington. Get real!

I would think more. Much more.

Tim Aurora says

But get this, Santa Barbara is 3 times more affordable than Beijing, Shanghai and Mumbai.

So you expect actors from Bollywood to be moving to SoCal soon?

I guess its news to Realtors in the USA BRIC nations economies are booming...

Tim Aurora says

Also, this is the reason why Chindians are buying property in US

no...more like they might be hiding embezzled government funds. and they wrongly believe they will get away with it. Or another question is how do you allow a member of the Communist Party own US property since they are not allowed to entry and hold residence this country.

Tim Aurora says

But the reason the property prices and rents are so high in San Fransisco is exactly for that reason. ( and of course the weather is nice too). It has high paying jobs which no other place in the world has.

Once you get into Tech, you find your not the only kid on the block and Tech employers are global with distributed workforce... which we compete and sometimes loose to DRAM Business is all Japanese control... it was otherwise only true in the 80s we had all our workforce locally, the number of employers and employees is shrinking...

ah the weather... or the other side of the coin... lack of water ! While it may be true the East is suffering a cold blizzard... they are getting far more rain and water which we (CA) could do with...

Bob, if you aren't merely a toxoplasmotic troll, why can't you answer my question, i.e. why can't you produce any evidence to support your false accusation? And what impelled you to comment on this thread, which was about domestic politics, when your only comments have been to troll me, without even attempting relevance to the OP? Surely a healthy person with the intellect you claim to possess could think of something better to do - go find a cure for cancer or something if your t. gondii will allow you a break from swimming with sharks and driving sidewise at 80mph and trolling for fights all over the world.

Perhaps there is a lesson about the OP after all. With the preponderance of fight clubs, voter allegiances fall along the divide and misrule lines of "the enemy of my enemy is my friend." Of the hundreds of PatNet users, less than 1% troll me, and they don't even agree among themselves about much if anything else. Yet, in what's left of their infected and decaying minds, they are "everyone". (To quote their patron saint, "My name is Legion: for we are many.") The moment I make the mistake of indulging one of them, the gang's all here, like junkies hoping for their fix. The Republicans are having a civil war about whom they hate most, and the "Texan" Cruz is their Bob, who also boasts of having real estate in Texas. The lucky "winner" will be allowed to join them at their fight club convention, until such time as they decide they hate him more.

mell says

tr6 says

mell says

I suspect the dollar will continue to weaken as they can't stop printing in order to keep the market at these levels and gold will rise.

Dollar is hitting records against some EM currencies. If liquidity is removed by taper, dollar might continue getting stronger.

On full taper towards zero I can see that happening, also likely any short maket bloodbaths will strengthen the dollar. But I cannot see it gaining significant strength against the EUR, I think while rangebound for now the EURUSD will eventually go to 1.40+.

We crossed 1.37 in the EURUSD. Dollar down and gold up - keep printing, piling on debt and burning the country down.

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/asian-stocks-steady-dollar-wobbles-001354042.html

Gold is viewed as a safe haven particularly when the dollar was sinking back in 2005 - 2007. Look at how well GLD did since 2004. When it became overbought then investors dumped it, as its annual rate of return was average 20% per year. I believe it is a good buy when its 10 year average annual rate of return is within the range of 8 to 12%.

Looking at VGPMX (Vanguard Gold and Precious Metals Fund) with the annual rate calculator on buyupside.com, the average annual return for this fund is

8.36% from 1987 to 2014
14.69% from 2001 to 2014

I choose 2001 because that is when the Federal Reserve loose monetary policies started. One could reasonably assert that the stock market gains leading up to the peaks in 2007 and possible 2014 were due primarily to Federal Reserve policies. I heard about 4 months ago on CNBC a panel saying that 1/2 of the stock market gain is due to the Fed policies.

Any comments about this ?

I never thought gold could correct anywhere significantly below $1300. It definitely has been weaker than I thought with briefly breaching $1200, but now that the Fed is caught with their pants down printing into oblivion gold has resumed its uptrend and the dollar is in the toilet, with the EURUSD heading towards $1.38 as we discuss. Way to ru(i)n an economy ;)

Tim Aurora says

And Atlanta, a flourishing city with job is one of most affordable places in the world. Go look for yourself.

have you been to Atlanta? I went a lot when I lived in the region. It sucked back then. It sucks even more now. Go visit and get back to us...

Tim Aurora says

I live here in Atlanta and love it. Lush and Green. Good weather, snows once in a while. Good Airport, close to the hills .

And best of all lot of tech and finance jobs.

The freeway system there is a nightmare. I just always felt that Atlanta was basically like a Southern version of LA without any of the positives and all the negatives. Its problem is that it grew too fast and all of the residential areas were built way outside of the city. I remember whenever we went to the beach and had to drive through ATL everyone in the car had to be quite as Dad drove through it on the 12 lane freeways. Even here in the Bay Area, the traffic is never as bad as ATL. Not by a long shot.

How much you wanna bet the Liberals bail out the Soda industry before 2016?

Americans are waking up to not needing diabetes and osteoporosis in a can? One can hope.

Who's America's biggest Water distributor?

That chart is really misleading. The least affordable cities are also highly sucessful ones with robust economies. Meanwhile the "Most affordable" ones are rust belt cities... well most of them on the list except ATL. The thing is that the houses might be comparatively cheap in Detroit, but the job market sucks so are they actually affordable? Probably not.

So which is it, are we drinking 17 cases of water a year, or 17 cases of Coke?

Two companies dominate the world market for branded bottled water: Groupe Danone, based in Paris, and Nestle, S.A., based in Vaud, Switzerland. The former markets Evian, Volvic, and others, including Dannon spring water. Nestle markets such majors as Perrier, Vittel, San Pellegrino, Poland Spring and Deer Park.

The US subsidiaries of these global giants are jockeying for shelf space with private label, regional and niche products, and with two formidable soft drink giants: Coca-Cola and PepsiCo, marketing their own brands of water.

Just last week, Loyola University in Chicago announced it would stop selling bottled water in cafeterias and on-campus stores this fall, and remove bottled water from vending machines starting in 2013. Loyola joins at least 15 other schools in the U.S. and Canada in banning bottled water sales, including the University of Vermont, Washington University, DePauw University, and Harvard’s School of Public Health.

At least four major municipalities — New York, Seattle, San Francisco, and Chicago’s Cook County — have banned use of government funds to purchase bottled water.

Despite the record amount of water sold — 2011 beat out the previous, pre-recession year of 2007, when volume was 8.8 billion gallons — 2011 was not a record year in dollar sales of bottled water.

At retail, Americans spent $21.7 billion on bottled water in 2011, just under 2007’s spending.

The big three bottled water companies — Coke, Pepsi and Nestlé — have been discounting water heavily in the last few years, to sustain sales through the recession and the growing opposition.

OK everybody stop drinking anything, until the Liberals get to the bottom of what we should all dink and NOT Drink!

Don't drink the soda,
don't drink the soda with artificial sweetener
oh and Don't drink the water...

Don't drink the Kool-Aid comrades.

It seems as though the so called market experts who trade gold don't know what the hell is going on either with the price movements.

Analyzer says

It seems as though the so called market experts who trade gold don't know what the hell is going on either with the price movements.

SFAce was buying GDX in December, easy 25% in two months.

bgamall4 says

Real tears come with a real emotional experience. Liz Taylor was not a method actor, and drew on real emotion from the past. The fact that these bad method actors did not cry a single tear or have a single red eye condemns Sandy Hook to being a total fake. Give it up Bigsby, you are making a fool out of yourself. No tears by all the participants. Obvious method acting in hyperventilation for Carlee and Robbie.

Don't continue to be a dwarf, Bigsby.

Why didn't the folks in charge of Sandy Hook hire better actors then? Crying on cue isn't exactly a difficult skill to acquire--I would think there are thousands of actors out there that could have fit the bill.

In fact, I question whether there are any professional actors that can't cry real tears. That's pretty much a basic skill. A better argument can be made that they can't be actors because all actors can produce real tears when needed.

tr6 says

Analyzer says

It seems as though the so called market experts who trade gold don't know what the hell is going on either with the price movements.

SFAce was buying GDX in December, easy 25% in two months.

And how many picked the opposite trade?

Tim Aurora says

The chart is a stat, so it neither pointing or misleading.

It is because the way its being presented is that here are the most and least affordable cities when in fact a city like Detroit which has lost 60% of its population and is bankrupt simply does not operate on the same economic scale as the rest of the cities on that list. Given that a huge chunk of its population lives in poverty shows that there's not hardly a huge number of people who can afford even the houses there. So is it affordable? Not really. It might even be less affordable than some of the ones at the top of the list ranked as least affordable.

My point is, we'll be bailing out Pepsi and Coke before we know it.

The to big to Gulp act.

bgamall4 says

So, Tatupu, you don't get it. People aren't actors and don't notice most of lthe time unless they are trained to notice. Many Sandy Hook Hoax proponents are trained or are learning like I am. No tears, no red eyes, you can be considered a good actor, but you are not being real.

How many kids died? How many parents are you saying are actors? Remember when I asked you how many family and friends you have? How many family and friends do these people have? How many of those have come forward to say that they are actors playing a role? Do you get the point, and do you get how bloody stupid you are being?