property

Land prices rising even after year of record drought

"American farmers may have suffered an historic drought last year, but the price of their land is skyrocketing. In Iowa, the land prices jumped 24% in 2012 and and have gained 63% over the last three years, according to a study by Iowa State University. Last year, farmers recovered some $14.7 billion in insurance payments for crop damage, a record sum. US government forecasters expect overall farming income to gain 14 percent this year. 'Farmers have cash on hand and with low interest rates, the best place to make investments is to buy more land that they can farm to be more profitable in their operation,' said Lyle Hansen, a real estate agent." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingLand prices rising even after year of record drought

“If Quoting the Constitution Makes Me a Terrorist, We Are in Hitler’s America”

"Cops in New Jersey arrested a homeschooling mother -- the daughter of Jewish folks who survived the Nazis -- because she quoted the Constitution at a tax-protest. They agreed to release her if she turned over her guns. As she explained, '[So I] sit in jail and my daughter doesn’t have a mother…?' ... , implying that she didn’t really have a choice in the matter. Hart turned over her two firearms and associated equipment, and was told that she’ll get them back 'when this is all over.' For all you fans of 'privatization,' the 'private' company doubling the Harts' real-estate 'assessment' is the one that sicced the thugs-in-blue on Ms. Hart." Continue reading →

Continue Reading“If Quoting the Constitution Makes Me a Terrorist, We Are in Hitler’s America”

Think New York Is Costly? In New Delhi, Seedy Goes for 8 Figures

"Real estate prices in the heart of New Delhi, especially for the bungalows built nearly a century ago during the British Raj, are among the highest in the world. The obvious question about the prices, in a country where hundreds of millions of people still live on less than $2 a day, is: Why? To a large degree, India is experiencing the sort of real estate boom common to big, emerging economies. When Japan’s economy was soaring in the 1980s, prices in Tokyo were so frothy that the 845-acre compound of the Imperial Palace was valued at more than all the real estate in California. More recently, China has seen a boom, with values rising in some cities by 500 percent." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingThink New York Is Costly? In New Delhi, Seedy Goes for 8 Figures

What Could Go Wrong with the Housing Recovery in 2013? Plenty.

"Given the preponderance of housing in bank assets, household wealth, and the perception of wealth, the key policies of Central Planning largely revolve around housing: keeping interest rates (and thus mortgage rates) low, flooding the banking sector with liquidity to ease lending, guaranteeing low-down-payment mortgages via FHA, and numerous other subsidies of homeownership. At least three aspects of this broad-based support are historically unprecedented." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingWhat Could Go Wrong with the Housing Recovery in 2013? Plenty.

What Could Go Wrong with the Housing Recovery in 2013? Plenty.

"Given the preponderance of housing in bank assets, household wealth, and the perception of wealth, the key policies of Central Planning largely revolve around housing: keeping interest rates (and thus mortgage rates) low, flooding the banking sector with liquidity to ease lending, guaranteeing low-down-payment mortgages via FHA, and numerous other subsidies of homeownership. At least three aspects of this broad-based support are historically unprecedented." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingWhat Could Go Wrong with the Housing Recovery in 2013? Plenty.

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to begin merging operations

"The regulator of mortgage finance giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac detailed plans Monday to begin contracting their business while merging their securitization operations. Federal Housing Finance Agency acting director Edward DeMarco said the two, rescued by the government in 2008 in a $180 billion bailout after the housing market collapse, needed to begin reducing their dominance of the market as private financing makes a comeback. One effort planned for this year is to raise the fees they charge to mortgage lenders for guaranteeing their loans, reducing the market’s near-complete dependence on the two." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingFannie Mae and Freddie Mac to begin merging operations

Whence the Housing Bubble?

"The chart below shows the ratio of the average existing home sales price to average household income. The long term average (LTA) of this ratio has been slightly above 3.0. At the beginning of 2001, however, it began to rise rapidly, reaching a peak 33 percent higher than the LTA during 2005, and then declining precipitously back to its LTA during 2008. Peshut’s chart also shows that, as of the beginning of 2012, Fed monetary policy had been unable to restart a bubble in the housing market unlike it had done in financial asset, farmland, and commodities markets. In fact housing prices were still falling both absolutely and in relation to household income." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingWhence the Housing Bubble?

China’s Property Bubble – Why Is ’60 Minutes’ Telling the Tale?

"Western Money Power doesn't have the same control in China. China has a Western system but ultimately the ChiComs are the ones that run it. And maybe they have run it into the ground. Either it was planned or it was not. Or a combination of both. But we wrote that when the property bubble burst, if it did burst (as all bubbles must) then the Chinese Communist Party itself would be in trouble. So listen to this video snippet, excerpted above: the part where one of the largest builders of homes in China (and thus the world) is interviewed. He seems paralyzed by fear, and says a housing bust would be a disaster. He even predicts regime change." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingChina’s Property Bubble – Why Is ’60 Minutes’ Telling the Tale?