drbubb

A Nautilus mortgage?

A JUMP in Viewings - per SCMP "More clients have asked to make appointments to view flats and I believe some of them will buy in the next few days." - per Estate agent at Centaline's Taikoo Shing branch. Midland Realty said that it had scheduled 1,385 viewings at 15 big housing estates this weekend, an 18.4 percent increase from a week ago.

The Right place would be a stable, walkable neighborhood, like Ferndale, Royal Oak, or even Hamtramak

I have started a New Thread, where I talk about Place-making and Walkscores: http://www.greenenergyinvestors.com/index.php?showtopic=15895 I thought Detroit's best way for recovering was to build a "walkable heart" around a new Light Rail system. This has been discussed for years, and had a real chance of moving forward, but was recently killed (again.) RIP Detroit

(POSTING HERE) Someone has recently emailed me, and asked how they can start posting here. It is FREE and easy, just follow these instructions (as posted on the New Members thread):

Hong Kong Homes Face 25% Drop in Year of the Dragon: Mortgages By Kelvin Wong - Jan 31, 2012 The Year of the Dragon, representing wealth and power in China, is shaping up to be the opposite for the world’s costliest housing market, Hong Kong. Mortgages (HKMGLEND) that need to be insured by the government because of risk experienced the steepest plunge in six years in 2011, a sign the biggest home price decline since the global credit crisis is accelerating. Property prices that have slid 6 percent since June may fall as much as 25 percent by 2013, estimates Andrew Lawrence of Barclays Capital, who predicted the initial slide in April. Asian real estate markets from Singapore to Beijing to Mumbai are stalling or have started declining as governments seek to curb the type of housing bubble that brought down the U.S. economy. In Hong Kong, rising borrowing costs, extra transaction taxes and higher down-payment requirements imposed by the government have fueled the slump. “We’re in for a very challenging first half,” said Wong Leung-sing, associate director of research at Centaline Property Agency Ltd., the city’s biggest closely held realtor. “The drop in secondary mortgages means buyers are having trouble borrowing from the banks the full amounts they need. The ones that are taking the biggest hits right now are the middle- to lower- priced housing segment.” Prices had surged 70 percent from 2009 to their 14-year high in June. Home deals in December fell for a sixth straight month to the lowest since November 2008, according to the Land Registry. Hong Kong will continue measures to maintain stable home prices, Financial Secretary John Tsang said at his annual budget speech today. 36 Percent Drop Loans covered by the Hong Kong Mortgage Corp.’s insurance program decreased 36 percent in 2011 from a year earlier to HK$26 billion ($3.4 billion), according to figures released Jan. 11. It was the biggest drop since 2006, said the body, which was set up in 1999 to provide government insurance for mortgages exceeding 70 percent of a property’s value -- also known as secondary mortgages -- in a bid to revive slumping home prices at that time. The HKMC in June 2011 reduced the maximum value of property that can be covered by its insurance program to HK$6 million from HK$6.8 million, the second reduction since late 2010. Hong Kong’s median home price of HK$3.15 million is a record 12.6 times the annual median household income of HK$249,000, according to a Jan. 23 report by Belleville, Illinois-based Demographia. Second-place Vancouver had a 10.6 multiple, followed by Sydney with 9.2. /more: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-01-31/hong-kong-homes-face-25-drop-as-loans-fall-in-year-of-dragon-mortgages.html

My parents, and one of my siblings still live in the Detroit area - in the suburbs. They have a nice living standard. Property prices are not expensive, but no where as cheap as Detroit. There's a very different "demographic" where they are, and it is much safer to live there. The big drawback is: they need a car to do absolutely everything. Living without a car in the Detroit area is next to impossible. That (and the cold weather, which my HK-born party "could not stand"), keep us from considering moving there. I have a brother there who works in a machine tool shop (he virtually runs it, I believe - he's very clever though he never wen to University.) His company is incredibly busy. Much business has moved back from Japan etc and the companies that survived have more business than they can handle. He lives in a beautiful house on a lake and owns two boats.

Yes, you have to pay taxes and other costs on top (like re-wiring). You may need to find a tenant. and there's a real risk the house will get burned down. Don't bother with the $50 house. Go to a better neighborhood (like Hamtramak or Ferndale) where you can find a tenant and get fire insurance

Come on, London! You have some catching up to do: "There are some sections of Detroit where entire blocks of houses are being slowly dismantled by thieves and stripped of anything valuable." "This particular house is $50 right now." "Not too many people want to buy homes in Detroit now. At this point, the median price of a home in Detroit is just $6000." True enough. Detroit is so broke that they city cannot afford to turn the lights on at night, or collect garbage in parts of the city. Slowly, they are bulldozing whole blocks, and thinking about building farms in the City. Where should you be living? In a city like that, or on real farmland, with neighbors who share certain key values? (note: Moving to the suburbs may be worse than staying in the city. In the burbs you may be needed and forgotten. If you can feed yourself, that's not a big problem. But if not, it is a huge problem.)

Along the theme of: "F the F-ers", this headline is from the front page of the Asian WSJ "Hong Kong Braces for Job Cuts at Lenders" Specifically, they are concerned with how banking cutbacks may impact on HK's property market. If HK is worried about that, should London too? It seems like London's capital is even more exposed than HK

Yep. Ground rents. I met Tchenguiz before one of my ex-colleagues went to work for him. He's a savvy guy, but always liked to use leverage... the more the better.

People must be expecting a squeeze on earnings in 2012 and beyond

This story has legs, gentles - See the Folly of Money Printing thread... This sounds truly WACKO, doesn't it ??? That's what I would have thought without my strange "insider news source", but I was determined to follow the story on various threads here. NOW THIS has come out on BLOOMBERG of all places... A confusing story, but it does suggest the story is much more than pure invention, as some on GEI think it is: Chris Estrella, a Filipino social worker, says he led a troop of five porters out of a Mindanao jungle in January 2000 with a weather-beaten iron and leather box crammed with $25 billion of U.S. government bearer bonds. “The elders of the Umayamnon tribe told me an American plane crashed in their river in the 1930s,” Estrella, 47, says by mobile phone from a footpath between the tribal village and Davao, the largest city on the Philippine island. “The river dried up in the 1990s, and the natives went into the plane and found 12 boxes that contained $300 billion in bonds.” Each box, emblazoned with the Great Seal of the United States and the words “Federal Reserved Bond,” held five gold coins struck with a portrait of George Washington on one side, Estrella says. They rested atop stacks of certificates purporting to have been issued by the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta in 1934 and redeemable in gold bullion. The notes bore the signature of then Treasury Secretary Henry Morgenthau Jr. /more - this is Bloomberg (!) gentlemen, not Ben F's website: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-01-18/no-one-knows-truth-about-300b-bonds-from-alleged-plane-crash.html Why bother with such an elaborate counterfeit, and then just crash a plane with the bonds in them ??

kinross, as quoted in canada

Check the volume !

JAPAN did not get all the Chinese Gold (it got hidden "elsewhere"): EXCERPT Whatever the total value of gold acquired during the millennia of China’s dynastic rulers it is reasonable to believe that much of it was successfully hidden from Japan, and subsequently taken out of mainland China by the Kuomintang prior to the Communist takeover in 1949. According to Benjamin Fulford (the former Asia bureau chief for Forbes Magazine from 1998-2005 before he became a spokesperson for the Dragon Family in 2007) the gold transfer was secretly conducted by the U.S. Navy which in 1938 took possession of the gold via seven destroyers to the U.S. mainland. [6] These events occurred in conformity with the 1934 Gold Act and President Roosevelt’s 1933 Executive Order (6102) which prohibited private ownership of gold, and instructed private citizens to sell all their gold to the Federal Reserve Bank at a prescribed rate of $20.67. Here is how the lawsuit describes the actual transfer of the gold and roles played by the U.S. Federal Reserve and the U.S. Treasury in issuing the financial instruments that were eventually seized near Chiasso, Switzerland: … following the promulgation in 1934 of the Gold Reserve Act, the law required all bullion gold and gold coin to be surrendered to the Federal Reserve … Foreign Gold held by the Treasury was also surrendered to and thus leased to the Federal Reserve, which resulted in the issuance of the series of 1934 Notes by the Federal Reserve. These Dragon Family FRNs have never been redeemed and, upon information and belief, the accrued interest was met by the subsequent issue of certain 1968 series of Kennedy Bonds

Someone must be looking to escape from a headache, I reckon. Would a buyer really know the risk?

One thing that seems pretty likely would be "speedbumps" in the near future

Wonderful ! Anymore like that ? Apparently, there are - see below. (Add a booth where you can surf the web, and you've a great Head Office for GEI.) Comment: How can you buy a bridge when people pay road tax so who own the road before the bridge and after who looks after the maintenance this country never stop to surprise me - nico siano, cheshire, 19/1/2012 11:40 Nico, the road leading up to the bridge on either side is maintained by the Highways agency using taxpayers money. The bridge is in private ownership, privately maintained and therefore the owners have a right to charge people for using the bridge. No public money is used to maintain the bridge, it is maintained from money received in the tolls. The bridge was constructed back in the 18th century using private money. There are dozens of similar bridges dotted around the country. This is not a unique situation - Sarah, London, 19/1/2012 13:05 === Not a HUGE amount of time for surfing tough: Some simple maths: 200 cars a day produces income of £160 which equates to £58560 in 2012 To reach £100,000 needs nearly 350 cars a day, which could be 240 in daylight (12 hours) and 110 at night (12 hours From which you can see that 20 cars an hour would be required during the day - one every three minutes. And this is the average rate. Will they get cars at that rate - well I'll leave it to you. - John Wood, Hull UK, 19/1/2012 11:38 get a life you loser. Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2088693/Couple-sell-home-buy-tax-free-toll-bridge-400-000-earn-100-000-year-fares.html#ixzz1jucjpY3f

Prices are moving back in time, wiping out gains

DISCOUNTS Offered to HK-based investors 20% off the Normal price, if we can close the property purchases before March fiscal year-end Example: Units 15.03 (15th floor, 3 bed, 1647 NET sq foot) Asking price - 975,000 will accept 20% off asking price (WILL ACCEPT 780,000) and will furnish the apartment fully. Agent's comment: "That takes these 2 units to below 500 a foot in a project that is worth 700 + a foot. Very rare an opportunity comes around like this." The builders may be a bit "desperate" now. And they want to keep the transaction away from London, it seems (?)

DownCaster? What an expressive name

MORE Bad News ! (I am out of KGC now - Thank Goodness) But I did not like the look of this new - Nor did the stock market ! / KGC-chart Kinross shares off after Mauritania-mine delay Kinross Gold Corp. KGC -16.68% said it will require an additional six to nine months of analysis and planning to develop its Tasiast gold mine in Mauritania, and expects to record a "material" non-cash impairment charge in connection with the project. The Toronto-based gold company's stock was recently off almost 19% to C$10.73 on the Toronto Stock Exchange, on heavy volume of about 9.6 million shares. In New York trading, the stock is off 16% to $10.57 on 1.7 million shares. The charge relates primarily to the goodwill recorded for Tasiast in connection with the 2010 acquisition of Red Back Mining Inc., through which Kinross acquired the mine. Kinross said that, at Sept. 30, 2011, the book value of total assets of Tasiast was $7.1 billion, of which $4.6 billion was goodwill. It said it hasn't finalized the Tasiast feasibility study or mine plan, and drilling results continue to demonstrate "significant exploration potential supporting a world class mine." In a research note, TD Securities analyst Greg Barnes said company management hasn't been clear on why its plans for developing the project have changed, though it appears capital and operating costs are facing significant upward pressure. In a statement, Kinross said its three major growth projects - Tasiast, Fruta del Norte and Lobo-Marte - will require significant capital expenditures over the next several years and that, in light of increasing industry-wide costs, it will conduct a comprehensive capital and project-optimization process. Fruta del Norte is in Ecuador and Lobo-Marte is in Chile

Wait until the money flow reverses (as it did in HK in 2008.) Then London will quickly become "ground zero" for a property slide.

The (ex) bankers and lawyers may riot, when they find their jobs are gone