HousingPanic Stupid Question of the Day

July 30, 2006

HousingPanic Stupid Question of the Day

Why did people think it was different this time?

46 comments:

Anonymous said...: because we're stupid; July 30, 2006 1:40 PM
Anonymous said...: dunno... ask george w...; July 30, 2006 1:59 PM
Anonymous said...: because we're ignorant of history, because our kids do not receive any kind of financial education, and because we believed what our leaders and media told us; July 30, 2006 2:01 PM
Anonymous said...: Because the " dumming down of america " is working.; July 30, 2006 2:27 PM
Bill said...: Because the corrupt establishment, instilled the thought of free money and spend , spend spend. And as usual dumb fat ass americans fed into the grand scheme of things.; July 30, 2006 2:39 PM
Anonymous said...: "Why did people think it was different this time?"

It's human nature. That's why some of the greatest investors in the world call themselves contrarians.; July 30, 2006 3:09 PM
Anonymous said...: Two things, greed and herd mentality. It will get them every time.; July 30, 2006 3:39 PM
Anonymous said...: because of bush's call for an "ownership society"

because greenspan took his eye off the ball

because the least financially savvy amongst us got suckered in

because we hate seeing the shoe shine guy getting rich; July 30, 2006 4:23 PM
Anonymous said...: Remember the so-called New Age, same idea.

All's great in spirit but nothing's practical, down to earth, and in sync with realities of the world.

I'm still waiting for a bunch of ascended masters to materialize and guide the top meditators to lead the world's govts.; July 30, 2006 4:24 PM
delilahboyd said...: I think everyone thought there would always be those new buyers getting into the housing game behind them.

Isn't that how all pyramid schemes work?

Pssst! The House Next Door is for sale... Again. Still. Sort of.; July 30, 2006 5:07 PM
Anonymous said...: ah... the Housing Bubble... one piece of the big web.. great fun indeed.

Want to see another facet of the collapse?

Google these:

Plunge Protection Team

Naked Shorting

www.thesanitycheck.com

... and then take a peek into the world of CMKX.

www.cmkmtaskforce.com

Happy tripping down the rabbit hole!

=); July 30, 2006 5:47 PM
foxwoodlief said...: So far what is different? Cycles are normal. If they weren't, that would be different. People still talk as if every American owns a home they can not afford, doesn't have a job not related to Real Estate, is in debt up to their eyeballs. Over built in some areas? Most likely. Over priced in some areas? Definitely. People will loose jobs or suffer finanicial losss? Yes, so what is different, people do that in good times.; July 30, 2006 6:24 PM
foxwoodlief said...: So far what is different? Cycles are normal. If they weren't, that would be different. People still talk as if every American owns a home they can not afford, doesn't have a job not related to Real Estate, is in debt up to their eyeballs. Over built in some areas? Most likely. Over priced in some areas? Definitely. People will loose jobs or suffer finanicial losss? Yes, so what is different, people do that in good times.; July 30, 2006 6:25 PM
Anonymous said...: Look, we can all accelerate the coming real estate crash, and we all know the sooner the better because it's already gotten so out of hand already, and here's how:

Despite our amazement about it, there are still prospective homebuyers out there still looking to buy a home, who are unaware that they are being led to financial slaughter, and it's these people who are postponing the inevitable, so here's what we do:

Post links to this housing bubble site and a dozen others "ONLY" where prospective homebuyers are looking because that's the only way they'll find out. Post all over Craigslist and every other real estate listing site you can get into and use tinyurl.com links so they won't know where they are being referred to. Explanations to those links should be preceded by caveat emptor warnings like "Don't buy any real estate until you've read what's happening to the real estate market" or "Here's why you'll be able to buy real estate for 25% to 60% less in the next 12-36 months".

The few idiot buyers still out there (I know they deserve it, but let's get this over with already) will disappear and then we'll have a pricing freefall, initiated by lender REOs.

I've been told lately by many people how surprised they are at how many REOs they are seeing or how many neighbors they now know are in trouble for having bought in the last 3 years and who HELOC'd on top of an exotic or no down payment loan.

People, this giant boulder of a coming crash is just teetering on the edge of a cliff. If we all join together and give it a big push, we can make it happen sooner and get our economy back on track - What do you say? Heave Hoooooo!; July 30, 2006 6:31 PM
Rob Dawg said...: Why did people think it was different this time?

Because an irrational hatred of GWBush has driven all reason from intellects so small these only room for one thought at a time. Minds so small they need to change Presidents before changing their mind.

Ohhh... sorry. You weren't talking about politics were you? That's okay, the same arguement goes for real estate cheerleaders as it does for Bush haters. THe funny thing is those who take every opportunity to bash Bush don't see the parallels.; July 30, 2006 6:52 PM
Anonymous said...: Expanding Homeownership. The President believes that homeownership is the cornerstone of America's vibrant communities and benefits individual families by building stability and long-term financial security. In June 2002, President Bush issued America's Homeownership Challenge to the real estate and mortgage finance industries to encourage them to join the effort to close the gap that exists between the homeownership rates of minorities and non-minorities. The President also announced the goal of increasing the number of minority homeowners by at least 5.5 million families before the end of the decade. Under his leadership, the overall U.S. homeownership rate in the second quarter of 2004 was at an all time high of 69.2 percent. Minority homeownership set a new record of 51 percent in the second quarter, up 0.2 percentage point from the first quarter and up 2.1 percentage points from a year ago. President Bush's initiative to dismantle the barriers to homeownership includes:
American Dream Downpayment Initiative, which provides down payment assistance to approximately 40,000 low-income families;
Affordable Housing. The President has proposed the Single-Family Affordable Housing Tax Credit, which would increase the supply of affordable homes;
Helping Families Help Themselves. The President has proposed increasing support for the Self-Help Homeownership Opportunities Program; and
Simplifying Homebuying and Increasing Education. The President and HUD want to empower homebuyers by simplifying the home buying process so consumers can better understand and benefit from cost savings. The President also wants to expand financial education efforts so that families can understand what they need to do to become homeowners; July 30, 2006 7:00 PM
Anonymous said...: gotta love bush pushing the homeless to get homes through creative financing at the exact top of the bubble

conspiracy? probably not. stupidity? probably yes.; July 30, 2006 7:01 PM
Anonymous said...: Iran forces urged to prepare to hit Israel

The Basij and Revolutionary Guards should prepare to get even with the Zionists and Americans," Yahya Rahim-Safavi was quoted as telling Islamic militiamen by the conservative Fars news agency.

The Basij are volunteer Islamic militiamen.

"The timing of the this will be announced by the leader," he added.

An Israeli air strike killed 54 civilians, including 37 children in the southern Lebanese village of Qana on Sunday, the bloodiest single attack since Israel's 19-day-old war on Lebanese Hizbollah guerrillas began.

Iran's Revolutionary Guards are historically close to Hizbollah and were deployed in south Lebanon during the 1980s. Mostafa Chamran, spiritual father of the Guards, forged his reputation fighting in Lebanon.

The Basij and Revolutionary Guards are directly answerable to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Although Iran funded and armed Hizbollah in the 1980s, it has insisted recently its support is mainly moral and political.

However, many sources have said Iranian arms are being used against Israeli civilian and military targets.

An Israeli military source has said an Iranian-made C802 radar-guided land-to-sea missile with a range of 60 miles (95 km) hit and badly damaged a ship during Israel's offensive against Lebanon.

Hizbollah said it fired "Raad (Thunder) 2" and "Raad 3" rockets at a rail depot in Haifa. Raad missiles are Iranian.

Israel's army said it destroyed an Iranian-made Zelzal missile with range of between 74 and 99 miles before it was launched.; July 30, 2006 7:04 PM
Anonymous said...: "Because an irrational hatred of GWBush has driven all reason from intellects so small these only room for one thought at a time."

(1) Invades Iraq under phoney intel claims.

(2) 100,000+ dead Iraqis.

(3) 2570 dead US troops.

(4) The mideast about to explode.

(5) Corruption everywhere in US government.

(6) Corruption everywhere in the funding of the Iraq "reconstruction".

(7) Survelliance of american's phones to protect us from some miniscule threat.

(8) Record debt and deficit.

Yeh Bush hatred is just all soo irrational. Get a brain budy. Ow and use it.; July 30, 2006 7:36 PM
Anonymous said...: I blame Greedscam, oh, and GWB too.;-o The culture of corruption has permeated to the central core of society. They see leaders in politics and industry scamming the system for big bucks and they want a piece of the pie too. What they don't realize is that everyone can't be rich, otherwise being rich means nothing.; July 30, 2006 7:37 PM
Anonymous said...: Oh pleeeeeeeease Iran, attack Israel so we can see your freedom-hating country ANNIHILATED!

Try and attack us too morons. Al Quaeda knocked down two buildings in the USA, and we responded by invading and conquering the two countries that assisted them. How's that for payback!

Bring it on! Maybe with martial law, we can rid of all the liberals in the USA that the internet has helped "out" : ); July 30, 2006 7:50 PM
Anonymous said...: Because the "information age" born in the 1990s when the internet spread like crazy and became afforable convinced people that we would all just have servers buy and sell things for us and we could live like this while the "stupid people" did manual labor work and our goods were built overseas.

The economy thrived on the wealth built out of thin air in the 1990s. There was just no end in sight and the indulgences fueled by this were bound to be forced to switch to something else to power them. That something else was housing.

In the post housing scheme of things the new plan was seemingly to fuel the domestic economy with pretend bullshit money from the govt. used on spending for world conquest.

That plan pretty much went into the shitter when Iraq turned out to be a now 3 year + conflict when it was supposed to last only a few months according to the pentagon.

Now there is no bullshit means by which to create wealth based on nothing. To add to this there is not even anything to sustain the BS wealth created on housing; yikes!; July 30, 2006 7:57 PM
Anonymous said...: Because realtors have the art of lying down to a perfection, and the NAR has had a lot of people in their back pockets to help them along.; July 30, 2006 8:07 PM
Anonymous said...: hey, let's not all forget (or have we already, george?) the GIs with missing arms, legs, parts of their brain... remember, it was supposed to be over the next morning! that's irrational!

ownership society.

what a load'o crap!

it's more like "i own your ship society"... so "you owe me" society.; July 30, 2006 8:23 PM
Anonymous said...: Because we didn’t listen to our Founding Fathers.

James Madison, the main drafter of our Constitution, called them "Money Changers".

Madison said:

"History records that the Money Changers have used every form of abuse, intrigue, deceit and violent means possible to maintain their control over governments by controlling money and its issuance."

Thomas Jefferson was just as strong in his condemnation when he said:

"I sincerely believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. Already they have raised up a money aristocracy that has set the government at defiance. The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people to whom it properly belongs."

Click Here; July 30, 2006 8:47 PM
Anonymous said...: Here are the monthly increases for various price points as interest rates increase

Loan/Rate/Increase
100K/2%
100K/4%/$107
100K/6%/$230

300K/2%
300K/4%/$323
300K/6%/$690

500K/2%
500K/4%/$539
500K/6%/$1,150

700K/2%
700K/4%/$755
700K/6%/$1,610

Assumptions:
Term: 360 months
Increase: P&I only

Error: ~10% (due to not taking into account various factors like decreasing term and loan balance)

Given that subprime ARMs have been the financing tool of choice during the last 3 years all I can say is....OUCH; July 30, 2006 9:12 PM
Anonymous said...: "the same arguement goes for real estate cheerleaders as it does for Bush haters."

Robert, you are a respected bubble blogger but by revealing your love of Bushco.....; July 30, 2006 9:17 PM
Anonymous said...: BCDD

Brain Cell Deficit Disorder from watching too much Faux news channel .; July 30, 2006 9:21 PM
Anonymous said...: It's going to be great entertainment to watch "progressives" in blue cities like Detroit, LA, and Miami when the riots break out and they're running like rats for the safety of red states where people still respect moral values and distrust the federal government.; July 30, 2006 10:19 PM
Anonymous said...: because it IS truly different this time - housing prices never fall, all the demographic trends are in housing's favor, US housing is relatively cheap vs. the rest of the world, and the only way to riches in our society is through real estate

or something like that.; July 30, 2006 11:27 PM
Anonymous said...: f'ing great picture; July 31, 2006 12:27 AM
Anonymous said...: because an entire generation of people, who as children were taught that they can earn something for nothing, have now grown into adulthood without any financial wisdom nor common sense...; July 31, 2006 12:44 AM
Anonymous said...: Tom nailed it.; July 31, 2006 2:25 AM
Anonymous said...: People in Red States "distrust" the Federal Government? You mean like they trusted the Neo-Cons with the Iraq war and causing 9/11? Stupid post son, ignorence, that the urban decay has moved into the rural areas. Learn or get out, My gun is ready to pop your noggin.; July 31, 2006 5:49 AM
Anonymous said...: I sincerely believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. Already they have raised up a money aristocracy that has set the government at defiance. The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people to whom it properly belongs. --- T. Jefferson

By the way, this is a perfect example of the delusion that some people have that the 19th century didn't have any "fiat" currency.

It sure did. Individual banks issued their own, with disasterous effects and huge problems with cheating and corruption. Sure there was convertibility to gold---but this was often more theoretical (when banks had runs) than actual. This also resulted in very bad economic panics and needless monetary problems.

The Federal Reserve (closer to what T Jefferson wanted) was much better than the alternative.

By the way, the euro is a fiat currency as well, and EU has at least as many structural problems as the USA. And Mexican immigrants, even illegals, want to cut our lawn and drink beer, not commit global jihad like some of EU's bad seeds.; July 31, 2006 6:42 AM
Anonymous said...: Let's dispense with Jimmy Bob Six Pack.

He's always been a boob and does stupid things with Free Money(*).

(*) some restrictions may apply.

In the past, excess idiocy was stopped due to the fact that Freddlly Flipper COULDN'T buy ridiculous homes at ridiculous prices because he didn't have the money, and the banks wouldn't lend money to an obvious idiot. Anybody who paid cash was generally richer (and as a result smarter) and those kinds of people are canny skinflints anyway.

The real question is this: why did the bankers think It's Different This Time?

Mortgage lenders: J'accuse!

my hypothesis: massive securitization which entirely removed long-term credit risk from the people who supposedly """underwrote""" the loan and checked it out. They shafted the Asians.

That may have been very unwise. (cue Bruce Lee); July 31, 2006 6:50 AM
Out at the peak said...: The biggest problem was that many naive people didn't know any difference existed. They only know that houses have gone up in value, and that it's "the best investment."

I might be young myself, but a lot of peers just dove in at the wrong time because of the above beliefs.; July 31, 2006 8:22 AM
Anonymous said...: I would like to invite Borkafatty, Skytrekker, and the rest of you useless, bitter, liberal, left Dems to have sex with yourselves. Oh, and btw, I met Anne Coulter last night in NYC, and tod her about this nutbag, left blog. She might hop on once in a while.; July 31, 2006 11:55 AM
Anonymous said...: Because our "leaders" decided to abandon high-tech industrial manufacturing, handing it over to India and China. Instead they gave us a glorious service "economy". Since this "economy" is inherently unsustainable and illusory, the only way to keep up the American standard of living is to provide easy crediting and drive everyone into austerity. The Housing market is just one aspect of this.; July 31, 2006 2:05 PM
Anonymous said...: The consumers brought the demise of American manufacturing upon themselves. Now instead of shopping for cheap chinese crap at walmart they can work there selling the C3.; July 31, 2006 8:51 PM
Anonymous said...: Because historically, it's ALWAYS been different this time.

For a while.; July 31, 2006 11:14 PM
Anonymous said...: BTW, If the likes of Ann Coulter are to be found here I'm out. I can't get from my keyboard to the shower fast enough.; July 31, 2006 11:15 PM
Anonymous said...: it's the trickle down theory, when the president is such a moron, it trickles down from there.; August 01, 2006 6:10 PM
Anonymous said...: It's truly incredible how short people's memories are! The dumbing down of Amerika iz alive and well!; August 07, 2006 5:16 AM
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July 30, 2006

HousingPanic Stupid Question of the Day

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