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Tell us ‘Obama, good or bad for housing?’
August 28th, 2008, 3:30 pm · 51 Comments · posted by Jon Lansner
Forget all the pizazz and punditry. Speeches and spin. And the broad challenges that face America.
You’ve absorbed the Democratic convention. Register coverage IS HERE! Click on the photo at right to see a slideshow of the event!
So, let’s get down to what we care about in this space. Only one thing: How would a Barack Obama presidency impact our local housing? (Want read Obama’s real estate recovery plan? CLICK HERE!)
Obama's housing policies would be:
PS: Yes, we’ll do McCain. Next week!
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Jon - your link does not work.
YOUR BLOGGER: Fixed. Thanks.
I’m just curious here, are we talking about helping the owner struggling to make a payment, or the potential buyer waiting for prices to fall down some more to more affordable levels?
In the interest of equal access can we get the poll for Bob Barr as well? The OC Register is known as a libertarian rag after all.
It depends if he and the Gang of 3 (Pelosi, Reid and Hoyer) decide to take away the 250/500 capital gains exemption. Frank n Dodd already adjusted the exemption for 2nd homes which is why inventory went back up. But at the same time Biden and Dodd are trying to protect the Sovereign Funds from being taxed on real estate investments under IRS Sec 897
Pelosi is the single most worthless member of the senate. I wish Sheriff Joe would round her and Gavin Newsome up and show them what real leadership is.
notice how the realterds are always looking for
more and more government incentives for
real estate— WHY real estate isnt a true wealth
creator—- industrial manufacturing-
technological inventions and innovations
are the real wealth creation mechanisms–
we have become a consumer based economy founded
on asset inflation- and this is why were in the mess were in- but
the knucklehead realterds are so myopic they cant see
beyond their own selfish needs - what made our country
wealthy to begin with wasnt real estate- it was industry-
manufacturing- inventions- that created our wealth- not buying
a friggin house
Quick Jake, talk some sense into your right wing alter egos! Or maybe Jake is really the secondary character.
Don’t mean to get political here … I am not voting this election cycle because I feel like the party I was affiliated with abandon me. I cannot vote for the other party because I hate their ideas. So I will be staying home come election day. I suspect I’m not the only one that feels this way.
With that said:
Even though our current President is not respected, and most typical GOP voters I talk to are disgusted with his spending & immigration policies, there is NO chance for Obama to win the popular vote in Orange County, much less get a positive result from the question asked above.
Jennifer Haberkorn THE WASHINGTON TIMES Thursday, August 28, 2008
Pennsylvania’s former deputy attorney general and Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton supporter Philip J. Berg has filed a lawsuit in federal court in Pennsylvania accusing presumptive Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama of lying about his U.S. citizenship, which would make him ineligible to be president.
Mr. Berg is one of a faction of Clinton supporters who haven’t heeded the party’s call for unity, filing the suit just days before the opening of the Democratic National Convention, which will nominate Mr. Obama as the party’s presidential candidate.
The suit, filed in U.S. District Court in Philadelphia last week, also names the Democratic National Committee and the Federal Election Commission and says Mr. Obama´s mother went to Kenya late in her pregnancy and ended up giving birth there. It also claims that later in life, Mr. Obama declared himself a citizen of Indonesia.
The Obama campaign has firmly said the Illinois Democrat is a natural-born citizen. Last month, the campaign posted on Mr. Obama’s Web site a copy of his “certification of live birth.” It says he was born in Honolulu on Aug. 4, 1961, two years after Hawaii was named the 50th state.
Mr. Berg said he was contacted about filing the lawsuit by a member or associate of the group PUMA, which was formed to support Mrs. Clinton shortly after she withdrew from the race. Its mission includes denouncing the Democratic Party and Mr. Obama’s nomination.
“I really do not believe he is a natural-born citizen,” said Mr. Berg, adding that he is not connected with Mrs. Clinton or her campaign.
Lee…you have to vote. Men died for the right. At the very least, write in a candidate for that spot. There will be other offices on the ballot. You have to vote. You just have to…regardless of party preference.
There is Always Bob Barr the Libertarian Party candidate
SeekingAlfalfa Says:
August 28th, 2008 at 7:29 pm
“There is Always Bob Barr the Libertarian Party candidate”
Jake is right, Lee. The true conservative party are the Libertarians. There is no difference between the Demos and the Repubs. Less government involvement militarily, economically, and socially.
You’re not the only only Lee.
Mulli, people died for the RIGHT to vote, not the REQUIREMENT to vote.
I’ll be voting for everything short of the presidency. I can’t stand either candidate and refuse to vote for either one. That’s MY decision and nobody should tell you otherwise.
My problems are very simple.
John McCain is not going to hold the line on spending, and though he will talk tough on immigration, he won’t do anything about it. He’s just like Bush. A lot of people like me, are sick and tired of this nonsense. And we’re not gonna vote.
Obama is an empty suit who will undoubtly blink during the first crisis in office. He has no real answers, other than typical BS from the left, “Big Oil”, “The Rich”, “Fair Share”, “Bush Lied”, “Change”, etc, etc, etc. I’m so sick and tired of this crap, but millions of Americans eat it up.
The good news is this, we got Reagan after Jimmy Carter screwed things up … who’s to say the same thing won’t happen again.
One more point.
The State of California is insolvent, and looking for ways to get into my pocket book. They need this money to pay for programs that mainly benefit slackers, illegals, and unions. Oh, did that offend someone? I’m sorry, NOW F.O.!
lee in irvine says:
“John McCain is not going to hold the line on spending, and though he will talk tough on immigration, he won’t do anything about it. He’s just like Bush….The good news is this, we got Reagan after Jimmy Carter screwed things up … who’s to say the same thing won’t happen again.”
Sorry Lee, but the Republican party started on the wrong path well before Bush Jr. took office. Bush’s policies are nothing but Reaganomics for the 2000’s. The budget deficit exploded in the 80’s because Reagan kept on spending while cutting taxes. You can’t have an expensive military without paying for it.
Both parties are solidly in the hands of the elite. Hoping for the next Democratic JFK or the next Republican Reagan is no hope at all.
Mulliganville Says:”Pelosi is the single most worthless member of the senate.”
Last time I checked she the speaker of the House, not the Senate and she is from the Bay Area so she can’t be bad. :-)
Welcome back Bubbs…and thank you for the correction. All of these senators are on my screen 24/7. Hope you had a nice vacation.
You are within your rights to vote or not to vote Greg. Obviously, I am passionate about it. We all know who CA electoral votes are going to. If you do not approve of either of these men for president…write in the candidate you do feel is right for the job! You are correct…men died for the RIGHT to vote. So do not let them die in vain.
Rants we all bow down to your wisdom. We should all call you Master Yoda Rants!
You are the first blogger on the OCR to touch the root of the problem. For 10 years the US has had a massive influx of cheap, cheap (Chinese) money. Huge capital available to develop our infrastructure, educational & health care system, technology like stem cell or fuel cell research, but instead we borrowed this money and spent it on, yes, real estate. The big money people just pushed this huge wad of capital into RE and created a bubble because no one knew what to do or how to profit from all this cheap money. Like a snake swallowing a chicken it will take time to pass and we will have gained nothing as a Nation. More on this later!
Master Yoda Rants speaks the truth when he says:
A. real estate isn’t a true wealth creator—- industrial manufacturing-technological inventions and innovations are the real wealth creation mechanisms–
B. we have become a consumer based economy founded on asset inflation- and this is why were in the mess were in- but the knucklehead realterds are so myopic they cant see beyond their own selfish needs.
Jon Lanser we need another poll. More important than who the next President should be is the question of which pejorative is more colorful?
A. realterds (Mean spirited perhaps?)
B. realtards (More accurate of true mental capacity?)
I am voting for Obama, for many reasons…not really necessary to get into on a real estate blog.
My opinion is that housing will benefit if we have an economy where more and more homeowners get into homes that they can actually afford. I believe there is a better chance of this happening under Obama than McCain, but thats my opinion.
I feel the more homeowners you have the better it is for any community. The less rental property you have the better people take care of the places they live and their neighborhoods.
In the long term the more homeowners you have the better it is for society as a whole. These people will have places to live that they can afford, therefore they should be less of a burden on the rest of us.
So the bottom line, I feel Obama will be better for the middle class and bring all those that where once middle class and are now poor under Bushy, back to the middle class. This should help increase home ownership a great deal. Increasing the number of haves vs. have nots is tantamount for the success of America as we know it.
I dont fully support all of the homeowner bailouts out there, but it appears to be a fairly bipartisan solution. An attempt to do something I guess, that I feel will do little help.
I do agree that there needs to be some serious regulation of the lending industry. Put burden on the lenders, Realtors and appraisers to be more certain that the people that they are helping get a home are getting one that they can afford to pay for.
In 2005, Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle, bid $1.65 million for a house on the south side of Chicago. According to newspaper reports, the owner was also trying to sell an undeveloped parcel of land adjacent to the property Obama was buying, and he wanted the sales of the two to close on the same day. Obama has said that he mentioned he was buying the house to a longtime political patron, Antoin (Tony) Rezko, a developer. Rezko’s wife wound up buying the lot adjacent to Obama’s. At the request of the Obamas, who were seeking a bit more space for their yard, she later sold them a 10-foot wide strip, or about one-sixth, of her land. The Obamas paid $104,500 for it, or about one-sixth of what Mrs. Rezko had paid for the entire property.
Melody,
And the beat goes on A=B=C=etc
Notice the twin postings of Alph and mul. First 10 minutes apart then
3 minutes apart. Wow that happens a lot. And I am sure they sit watching the blog continously and just happen to see each others work and in three minutes post again.
Did the register allow you into nerve center?
SeekingAlfalfa Says:
August 28th, 2008 at 4:22 pm
It depends if he and the Gang of 3 (Pelosi, Reid and Hoyer) decide to take away the 250/500 capital gains exemption. Frank n Dodd already adjusted the exemption for 2nd homes which is why inventory went back up. But at the same time Biden and Dodd are trying to protect the Sovereign Funds from being taxed on real estate investments under IRS Sec 897
Mulliganville Says:
August 28th, 2008 at 4:30 pm
Mulliganville Says:
August 28th, 2008 at 7:26 pm
Lee…you have to vote. Men died for the right. At the very least, write in a candidate for that spot. There will be other offices on the ballot. You have to vote. You just have to…regardless of party preference.
SeekingAlfalfa Says:
August 28th, 2008 at 7:29 pm
There is Always Bob Barr the Libertarian Party candidate
Even with Mul hanging on this blog it takes him 36 minutes and then an hour and 20 minutes to respond to someone real.
The usual time between his fake characters is 0,3 , or 10 minutes with 3 being the favorite.
To quote from lead zepplin
“He thinks we need coolin,
So he is foolin,
A whole lot of lulz, a whole lot of lulz”
lee in irvine Says:
August 28th, 2008 at 6:50 pm
Don’t mean to get political here … I am not voting this election cycle because I feel like the party I was affiliated with abandon me. I cannot vote for the other party because I hate their ideas. So I will be staying home come election day. I suspect I’m not the only one that feels this way.
With that said:
Even though our current President is not respected, and most typical GOP voters I talk to are disgusted with his spending & immigration policies, there is NO chance for Obama to win the popular vote in Orange County, much less get a positive result from the question asked above.
Mulliganville Says:
August 28th, 2008 at 7:26 pm
Lee…you have to vote. Men died for the right. At the very least, write in a candidate for that spot. There will be other offices on the ballot. You have to vote. You just have to…regardless of party preference.
NationalBubble.com Says:
August 28th, 2008 at 9:18 pm
Mulliganville Says:”Pelosi is the single most worthless member of the senate.”
Last time I checked she the speaker of the House, not the Senate and she is from the Bay Area so she can’t be bad.
Mulliganville Says:
August 28th, 2008 at 10:38 pm
Welcome back Bubbs…and thank you for the correction. All of these senators are on my screen 24/7. Hope you had a nice vacation.
Even though our current President is not respected, and most typical GOP voters I talk to are disgusted with his spending & immigration policies, there is NO chance for Obama to win the popular vote in Orange County, much less get a positive result from the question asked above.
Mulliganville Says:
August 28th, 2008 at 7:26 pm
Lee…you have to vote. Men died for the right. At the very least, write in a candidate for that spot. There will be other offices on the ballot. You have to vote. You just have to…regardless of party preference.
Jake -
I printed the other thread - 31 pages. I’m going to highlight the names in question and the abuse towards me. I’m getting ready in a moment to go to the ocregister. I will keep you posted on what happens.
Jake is a member of the schizophrenic party. No he isn’t. Yes, he is. Who said that?
# Mulliganville Says:”Welcome back Bubbs…and thank you for the correction. All of these senators are on my screen 24/7. Hope you had a nice vacation.”
Thank you Mulli.
Yes, I was on vacation for a week. I’m well rested and ready to continue the debate with you guys. :-)
I see you guys have been busy while I was gone
MELODY CALL THE FBI, CIA, NSA……………………
YOUR BLOGGER: Folks, I’ve gone in a started to delete some of the stupidity. Let’s debate real estate, not each other! And since, nobody’s got a perfect crystal ball … so respect the opinions of others!
And, what I’d like to see/read … is when you post a link to a story … give us a 2 to 3 key paragraph summary (not the full piece) as a extra fodder for the debate.
Not to mention that since jake goaded her into it, his credibility is shot as well but that was pretty much already a given
It’s the first time under a half-million bucks since December 1993 2003. (My bad! Corrected 8-28 8 PM) - Lansner
My bad. Although my teacher was a bit pudgy, it was her veracity I questioned not her voracity. - SeekingAlfalfa
Notice the use of the term My Bad in both sentences, it can mean only one thing. I am he and he is me and we are all together, coo coo, ka, choo.
Yeeyaaa Hoooo! We have a gun toten, hockey playin, salmon fishin, marathon runnin, Drill in Anwar, SUV drivin Mom for VP
Wow Jake…prior to 6am and the first thing you go to is your multiple handle conspiracy. You my friend, truly need help. When Melody returns from the internal affairs division of the register, and once Mulliganville is exonerated of all charges, and since you were chicken sheet about my $1000 wager, your apology will be all that is required. That is, if you have one shred of character in your being.
YOUR BLOGGER: Folks, I’ve gone in a started to delete some of the stupidity. Let’s debate real estate, not each other! And since, nobody’s got a perfect crystal ball … so respect the opinions of others!
And, what I’d like to see/read … is when you post a link to a story … give us a 2 to 3 key paragraph summary (not the full piece) as a extra fodder for the debate.
Ah, that would be heaven. Kudos.
Has anybody seen where Jake or Melody’s remarks have been censured?
I believe we’ve all been censured. Lansner’s kicking butt and taking names. Good to get back to housing.
Well thats what we were trying to do, discuss housing until, She who shall remain nameless had her conniption fit. I’d be glad to keep it to housing but about the 3rd time I get called moron or idiot for posting a legitimate article, I take the gloves off. Well anyway I’m off to find more bits of news
PUMA is here and will prevail!!!! hussein obama strike him down with a fury.
Palin is a dooer. She get’s the job done and will take on sellouts like your typical liberal.
http://www.ObamaCrimes.com
Jennifer Haberkorn THE WASHINGTON TIMES Thursday, August 28, 2008
Pennsylvania’s former deputy attorney general and Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton supporter Philip J. Berg has filed a lawsuit in federal court in Pennsylvania accusing presumptive Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama of lying about his U.S. citizenship, which would make him ineligible to be president.
Mr. Berg is one of a faction of Clinton supporters who haven’t heeded the party’s call for unity, filing the suit just days before the opening of the Democratic National Convention, which will nominate Mr. Obama as the party’s presidential candidate.
The suit, filed in U.S. District Court in Philadelphia last week, also names the Democratic National Committee and the Federal Election Commission and says Mr. Obama´s mother went to Kenya late in her pregnancy and ended up giving birth there. It also claims that later in life, Mr. Obama declared himself a citizen of Indonesia.
The Obama campaign has firmly said the Illinois Democrat is a natural-born citizen. Last month, the campaign posted on Mr. Obama’s Web site a copy of his “certification of live birth.” It says he was born in Honolulu on Aug. 4, 1961, two years after Hawaii was named the 50th state.
Mr. Berg said he was contacted about filing the lawsuit by a member or associate of the group PUMA, which was formed to support Mrs. Clinton shortly after she withdrew from the race. Its mission includes denouncing the Democratic Party and Mr. Obama’s nomination.
“I really do not believe he is a natural-born citizen,” said Mr. Berg, adding that he is not connected with Mrs. Clinton or her campaign
You’re right seeking…except for all those caveats about the economy, jobs, tightening credit and rising interest rates…is sure looks like a great time to buy except not here in the OC.
The Government Did It
The financial peril of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac–the government-sponsored, government-regulated mortgage giants regarded as instrumental in solving the nation’s mortgage market problems–has one benefit. It should help expose the lie that today’s financial problems are the result of an insufficiently regulated market.
For too long, the refrain has gone, Congress and the administration have been asleep at the wheel when they should have been steering the economy by expanding government control over the housing and financial markets. Economist Paul Krugman slams the administration’s “free-market ideology”; he urges Bush to “reverse course now” and “seek expanded regulation.”
All this overlooks a crucial fact: There has been no free market in housing or finance. Government has long exercised massive control over the housing and financial markets–including its creation of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac (which have now amassed $5 trillion in liabilities)–leading to many of the problems being blamed on the free market today.
Consider the low lending standards that were a significant component of the mortgage crisis. Lenders made millions of loans to borrowers who, under normal market conditions, weren’t able to pay them off. These decisions have cost lenders, especially leading financial institutions, tens of billions of dollars.
It is popular to take low lending standards as proof that the free market has failed, that the system that is supposed to reward productive behavior and punish unproductive behavior has failed to do so. Yet this claim ignores that for years irrational lending standards have been forced on lenders by the federal Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) and rewarded (at taxpayers’ expense) by multiple government bodies.
The CRA forces banks to make loans in poor communities, loans that banks may otherwise reject as financially unsound. Under the CRA, banks must convince a set of bureaucracies that they are not engaging in discrimination, a charge that the act encourages any CRA-recognized community group to bring forward. Otherwise, any merger or expansion the banks attempt will likely be denied. But what counts as discrimination?
According to one enforcement agency, “discrimination exists when a lender’s underwriting policies contain arbitrary or outdated criteria that effectively disqualify many urban or lower-income minority applicants.” Note that these “arbitrary or outdated criteria” include most of the essentials of responsible lending: income level, income verification, credit history and savings history–the very factors lenders are now being criticized for ignoring.
The government has promoted bad loans not just through the stick of the CRA but through the carrot of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which purchase, securitize and guarantee loans made by lenders and whose debt is itself implicitly guaranteed by the federal government. This setup created an easy, artificial profit opportunity for lenders to wrap up bundles of subprime loans and sell them to a government-backed buyer whose primary mandate was to “promote homeownership,” not to apply sound lending standards.
Of course, lenders not only sold billions of dollars in suspect loans to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, contributing to their present debacle, they also retained some subprime loans themselves and sold others to Wall Street–leading to the huge banking losses we have been witnessing for months. Is this, then, a free market failure? Again, no.
In a free market, lending large amounts of money to low-income, low-credit borrowers with no down payment would quickly prove disastrous. But the Federal Reserve Board’s inflationary policy of artificially low interest rates made investing in subprime loans extraordinarily profitable. Subprime borrowers who would normally not be able to pay off their expensive houses could do so, thanks to payments that plummeted along with Fed rates. And the inflationary housing boom meant homeowners rarely defaulted; so long as housing prices went up, even the worst-credit borrowers could always sell or refinance.
Thus, Fed policy turned dubious investments into fabulous successes. Bankers who made the deals lured investors and were showered with bonuses. Concerns about the possibility of mass defaults and foreclosures were assuaged by an administration whose president declared: “We want everybody in America to own their own home.”
Further promoting a sense of security, every major financial institution in America–both commercial banks and investment banks–was implicitly protected by the quasi-official policy of “too big to fail.” The “too big to fail” doctrine holds that, when they risk insolvency, large financial institutions (like Countrywide or Bear Stearns) must be bailed out through a network of government bodies including the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, the Federal Home Loan Banks and the Federal Reserve.
All of these government factors contributed to creating a situation in which millions of people were buying homes they could not afford, in which the participants experienced the illusion of prosperity, in which billions upon billions of dollars were going into bad investments. Eventually the bubble burst; the rest is history.
Given that our government was behind the wheel, influencing every aspect of the mortgage crisis, it is absurd to call today’s situation the result of insufficient regulation.
We do not need more regulation or economic “steering”–laws or bureaucrats dictating to financiers and investors the kind of innovation they may or may not engage in. If that were the solution to economic problems, then Hugo Chavez would preside over the world’s healthiest economy in Venezuela. What we need to do is remove the government’s power to coerce, bribe, reward and bail out irrational decisions. The unfree market has failed. It’s time for a truly free market.
The CRA was passed into law by the U.S. Congress in 1977 under the Carter administration for affordable housing, despite considerable opposition from the mainstream banking community.
The CRA mandates that each banking institution be evaluated to determine if it has met the credit needs of its entire community. That record is taken into account when the federal government considers an institution’s application for deposit facilities, including mergers and acquisitions. The CRA is enforced by the financial regulators (FDIC), (OCC), OTS, and (FRB). In 1995, as a result of interest from President Clinton’s administration, the implementing regulations for the CRA were strengthened by focusing the financial regulators’ attention on institutions’ performance in helping to meet community credit needs. These changes were very controversial
The 1995 revisions were credited with helping to substantially increase the amount of loans to small businesses and to low- and moderate-income borrowers for home loans. Part of the increase in the latter type of lending was no doubt due to increased efficiency in the secondary market for mortgage loans. The revisions allowed the securitization of CRA loans containing subprime mortgages. The first public securitization of CRA loans started in 1997.
Mulli,
“men died for the RIGHT to vote. So do not let them die in vain.”
Men also died fighting for independence and a free country (read Constitution). Now am I right that you will neither vote for Obama nor McCain on the grounds that both of them have not exactly a constitutional record and do absolutely nothing about the various anti-constitutional, anti-liberty programs?
In my opinion, neither of those two candidates are good for the US Economy and the Real Estate market in the long term.
I will vote for somebody. As of now, I am leaning towards McCain.
McCain is essentially republican light…Obama is too liberal in his ideals.