Ummmmm?
Michael
Just a bit ago?
Michael
Stuart Rogers
>
> Did someone call my name?
>
> Just a bit ago?
No no! We were calling you names.
Stuart
Michael
That's very comforting.
Makes me very much at home.
Michael
Michael
now...@spamless.co.zz wrote:
>
>
> ____
> Chimaera
That's a curious name; "names".
Michael
kdse...@no-spamsc.rr.com
wrote:
>Did someone call my name?
>
>
>Just a bit ago?
>
>Michael
Actually it was last spring. In the multiple listings service about
that time several homes were for sale in Campo, I thought maybe one
was yours. I knew you had wanted to retire up north. I was looking at
the MLS because we had to get a bigger place because my mom has to
live with us. We are still in SC, in the same city, in fact, just a
few miles away. Love the house, but alot of stress going on with
moving two households. AGAIN. Except, the first one was across the
country. .How are you?
KS
kdse...@no-spamsc.rr.com
>On 14 Oct 2006 22:12:53 -0700, "Michael" <spooner...@hotmail.com>
>wrote:
>
>>Did someone call my name?
>>
>>
>>Just a bit ago?
>>
>>Michael
>
>
Oh, I should add, the reason why I was looking in the CA MLS was out
of curiosity; I was aghast at how prices have gone up since we left.
Eegads! The house my mom sold to come here is in the $600,000 range
now. She sold it for $250,000 in '99. Our little one bedroom condo in
Fullerton that we bought for $78,000 is now $300,000. I don't look at
it as a good thing- how can it be? How can young couples start out
paying $3,000-$6,000 a month? We could turn into a nation of
millionaires, none the better for it with no place to go. Scary- well,
then I started searching farther away from LA and I saw Campo.
KS
Michael
Hi Karen,
Yes, we always did want to retire somewhere else in the
West.........But.....when we really got to seriously considering a move
we realized that we didn't really want to move far away from our son.
I can sure appreciate the situation with your mother cuz we're going
through something similar with my dad, now almost 90., although we're
not quite at the point of having him live with us. We promised my dad
years ago that we would never put him in a home of any kind unless he
was at the point of not having all of his marbles. I do have the help
of my sister who takes my father to his numerous doctor's appointments
and my wife and I spend lots of time over at his apartment caring for
his needs.
Hey, stop that stress stuff!
Michael
Michael
Yup, CA real estate is nuts indeed I too feel it's a pretty lousy deal
for young people starting out who are doomed to renting because of the
high cost of owning property. Of course back country property is
generally cheaper, but still no bargain and the cost of fuel being what
it is that's a tough go as well.
Michael
joseph....@virgin.net
The UK press has run several reports about how the US real estate
business is crashing and burning, house prices plummeting etc.
Presumably this is just newspaper hype?
Such a house price crash in the UK would certainly the only way my
children would be able to afford to buy property!
kdse...@no-spamsc.rr.com
wrote:
>
>Hi Karen,
>
>Yes, we always did want to retire somewhere else in the
>West.........But.....when we really got to seriously considering a move
>we realized that we didn't really want to move far away from our son.
I understand. The one whose decor is Early Frat-boy?
>I can sure appreciate the situation with your mother cuz we're going
>through something similar with my dad, now almost 90., although we're
>not quite at the point of having him live with us. We promised my dad
>years ago that we would never put him in a home of any kind unless he
>was at the point of not having all of his marbles. I do have the help
>of my sister who takes my father to his numerous doctor's appointments
>and my wife and I spend lots of time over at his apartment caring for
>his needs.
I don't have any siblings- so I'm trying to juggle her checkbook, Dr.
appt's, etc. She doesn't have Alzheimer's, but her attention span
isn't what it used to be, and she gets mixed up easily. What's scary
is that she was mega stressed out in her 50's taking care of *her*
mother, and I saw it, and was determined not to let anyone do that to
me. Ha! I'm kind of taken aback, because she is the last person I
thought would need help. The shock of having "lost my mother" was hard
to go through, now it's just hard keeping up on her stuff and Larry's
and mine.
How is Sherry doing? I'm doing well with the meds I'm on. Anxiety is
under control; depression is harder to deal with.
>Hey, stop that stress stuff!
We'll try!
KS
kdse...@no-spamsc.rr.com
wrote:
>
>Yup, CA real estate is nuts indeed I too feel it's a pretty lousy deal
>for young people starting out who are doomed to renting because of the
>high cost of owning property. Of course back country property is
>generally cheaper, but still no bargain and the cost of fuel being what
>it is that's a tough go as well.
>
>Michael
What is fuel there now? It's dropped off here from $3 a gallon to
about $2.11.
KS
Michael
I think it's more correct to say that at least in SoCal the market has
flattened out and and making a gentle downward correction. Since many
continue to want to come to where the sun shines most of the time, I
don't look for the market to really make any hard landings. In fact, a
slight drop in mortgage interest rates caused housing starts to
increase modestly last month.
>
> Such a house price crash in the UK would certainly the only way my
> children would be able to afford to buy property!
Right, that's a sad truth. Although my son has a very good job, the
best he can manage ATM is a rather large mobile home/carvan. Of course
a really sharp crash would have negative consequences for the economy
since real estate is such a major market component. How about all
those folks left holding the bag who bought high and financed with
negative amortization loans who'll just walk away and default on these
contracts? Crash of 29 revisited? Some of the real doomsayers paint a
similarly dire picture, but I don't feel that's really in the cards,
IMHO.
Michael
Michael
kdse...@no-spamsc.rr.com wrote:
> On 18 Oct 2006 16:30:28 -0700, "Michael" <spooner...@hotmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>
> >
> >Hi Karen,
> >
> >Yes, we always did want to retire somewhere else in the
> >West.........But.....when we really got to seriously considering a move
> >we realized that we didn't really want to move far away from our son.
>
>
> I understand. The one whose decor is Early Frat-boy?
Ah yes, he's an only child of course. Joel has one room in his house
dedicated to his guitar and whatever else hobbies and the rest of the
house is pretty well ordered.
>
>
>
> >I can sure appreciate the situation with your mother cuz we're going
> >through something similar with my dad, now almost 90., although we're
> >not quite at the point of having him live with us. We promised my dad
> >years ago that we would never put him in a home of any kind unless he
> >was at the point of not having all of his marbles. I do have the help
> >of my sister who takes my father to his numerous doctor's appointments
> >and my wife and I spend lots of time over at his apartment caring for
> >his needs.
>
> I don't have any siblings- so I'm trying to juggle her checkbook, Dr.
> appt's, etc. She doesn't have Alzheimer's, but her attention span
> isn't what it used to be, and she gets mixed up easily. What's scary
> is that she was mega stressed out in her 50's taking care of *her*
> mother, and I saw it, and was determined not to let anyone do that to
> me. Ha! I'm kind of taken aback, because she is the last person I
> thought would need help. The shock of having "lost my mother" was hard
> to go through, now it's just hard keeping up on her stuff and Larry's
> and mine.
It does sound like your mother is demanding a bunch more time than is
my dad, although he may not be far behind. My dad's problem is
although he's still pretty sharp in the brain department he can't see
very well at all and his walking ability leaves a lot to be desired.
OTOH my dad has a great heart and wish I had his blood pressure.
Imagine a 90 year old with a BP of 105/65 and a 59 resting pulse rate?
>
> How is Sherry doing? I'm doing well with the meds I'm on. Anxiety is
> under control; depression is harder to deal with.
Sherry has moved backwards unfortunately and is back on the meds. I've
tried to convince her that taking her tranquilizer every other day is
what brings on her irregular heartbeat on the off meds days. I think I
now have her convinced that she can cut the pills in half and take a
50% dose every day rather than going through a pattern of
dose/withdrawal, dose/withdrawal.
>
>
> >Hey, stop that stress stuff!
>
> We'll try!
Yes we will!
Michael
Michael
As you know fuel prices are always higher here. ARCO and the
independents are at a low of around $2.32. I buy my gas at Shell
because the cheap stuff tends to make my "SERVICE ENGINE SOON" light
come on peridically. I'm currently paying around $2.41 at my fave
Shell station. Of course taking a world view & comparing other
industralized nation's fuel prices, we're still very spoiled.
Michael
Stuart Rogers
>
> Of course
> a really sharp crash would have negative consequences for the economy
> since real estate is such a major market component. How about all
> those folks left holding the bag who bought high and financed with
> negative amortization loans who'll just walk away and default on these
> contracts?
Serve the buggers right for contributing to this madness. My savings
and I are ready to pounce.
Stuart
The Odd Stray
wrote:
>
>joseph....@virgin.net wrote:
>> The UK press has run several reports about how the US real estate
>> business is crashing and burning, house prices plummeting etc.
>> Presumably this is just newspaper hype?
>
>I think it's more correct to say that at least in SoCal the market has
>flattened out and and making a gentle downward correction. Since many
>continue to want to come to where the sun shines most of the time, I
>don't look for the market to really make any hard landings. In fact, a
>slight drop in mortgage interest rates caused housing starts to
>increase modestly last month.
>>
>> Such a house price crash in the UK would certainly the only way my
>> children would be able to afford to buy property!
>
>Right, that's a sad truth. Although my son has a very good job, the
>best he can manage ATM is a rather large mobile home/carvan. Of course
>a really sharp crash would have negative consequences for the economy
>since real estate is such a major market component. How about all
>those folks left holding the bag who bought high and financed with
>negative amortization loans who'll just walk away and default on these
>contracts? Crash of 29 revisited? Some of the real doomsayers paint a
>similarly dire picture, but I don't feel that's really in the cards,
>IMHO.
Unfortunately, I have anecdotal contradiction.
SimonP and I have recently thought that having a Piece 'O Land of our
own, for weekend camping purposes, would be both fun and a good
investment. So we talked to a realtor in the northeast outskirts of
Sandy Eggo (Ramona, to be specific).
She gave us good advice for our Land search. But, relevant to this
discussion, she said that this year she has dealt with 2 (two) sales.
And last year it was 40,000 (forty thousand).
In SoCal, it's crashin' and burning' The homeowners just haven't yet
found out :-(
Odd
Michael
Frankly I don't believe current sales in the SD backcountry are
terribly relevant to the SD real estate picture in the main and
represent only a fraction of total sales anyway.. Skyrocketing oil
prices have sparked a dramatic downturn in sales of homes where
prospective homeowners face having a long and therefore very expensive
commute. OTOH with the current glut of oil worldwide and corresponding
falling fuel prices it is possible that the market may recover somewhat
in the sticks, depending on how low fuel prices remain relatively low.
Typically country property is the last to recover from even a minor
funk in the housing market. So what I'm saying is that with the current
gentle drop-off in the SD urban housing prices, since it's much worse
in the backcountry, now is FS the time to buy so go for it!
Or, is this person you talked to referring to two vs. 40 K sales in the
market in general? If so these sales figures sound a bit, or should I
say massively overstated. Two people in my rather small office alone
have sold their homes in the past month or so, soooooooooo I dunno?
Guess I need to do my own research. Could a single person really deal
with 40K real estate transactions even in a year? Hmmmm?
Michael
Michael
Right. Financial disaster for some constitutes opportunity for others.
Michael
The Odd Stray
wrote:
>The Odd Stray wrote:
The numbers were for her office, with 30 employees.
I agree that the real estate market in the SoCal backcountry has
suffered somewhat from the rise in commute prices. But if there was
no reasonably-priced available real estate "inside" the backcountry
(as there hadn't been for some time previous) then the fuel prices
wouldn't have been able to affect the real estate market for the
backcountry.
An additional anecdotal evidence ... just last evening we heard the
tail end of an ad for condos in La Jolla starting at $2 Grand. If
anyone had asked me two minutes earlier, I'd have guessed that the
meanest, poorest condo in La Jolla would have been going for $6 Grand.
And La Jolla is in the midst ... not the backcountry.
Odd - "glad our investment is small enough that no amount of c'in or
b'in will ruin us" girl
Sarah Eggleston
> joseph....@virgin.net wrote:
>
>>Michael wrote:
>>
>>>kdse...@no-spamsc.rr.com wrote:
>>>
>>>Yup, CA real estate is nuts indeed I too feel it's a pretty lousy deal
>>>for young people starting out who are doomed to renting because of the
>>>high cost of owning property. Of course back country property is
>>>generally cheaper, but still no bargain and the cost of fuel being what
>>>it is that's a tough go as well.
>>
>>The UK press has run several reports about how the US real estate
>>business is crashing and burning, house prices plummeting etc.
>>Presumably this is just newspaper hype?
>
>
> I think it's more correct to say that at least in SoCal the market has
> flattened out and and making a gentle downward correction. Since many
> continue to want to come to where the sun shines most of the time, I
> don't look for the market to really make any hard landings. In fact, a
> slight drop in mortgage interest rates caused housing starts to
> increase modestly last month.
>
The way I heard it, the Florida house market is crashing and burning -
that's the part of the US that UK buyers are most exposed to. I could
believe that some UK journalists extrapolated Florida -> US. It's the
same thing, no? [1]
>>Such a house price crash in the UK would certainly the only way my
>>children would be able to afford to buy property!
>
> Right, that's a sad truth. Although my son has a very good job, the
> best he can manage ATM is a rather large mobile home/carvan. Of course
> a really sharp crash would have negative consequences for the economy
> since real estate is such a major market component. How about all
> those folks left holding the bag who bought high and financed with
> negative amortization loans who'll just walk away and default on these
> contracts? Crash of 29 revisited? Some of the real doomsayers paint a
> similarly dire picture, but I don't feel that's really in the cards,
> IMHO.
I agree, it doesn't look like another big crash in my crystal ball at
the moment. After a couple of years of going sideways, I hear rumours
that the UK market is picking up again. Possibly the latest banking
initiatives (mortgages that can be shared between up to 4 individuals)
have contributed to this phenomenon.
Although of course, I'm not a qualified soothsayer, and some pundits
predict a 50-60 year cycle between big crashes (just long enough that
everyone's forgotten), so YMMV.
-Sazz
[1] Ooo, an opportunity for revenge on the Sweden/Switzerland
Vienna/Venice sagas.
Stuart Rogers
> Sarah Eggleston <sar...@broque.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>
>> I agree, it doesn't look like another big crash in my crystal ball at
>> the moment. After a couple of years of going sideways, I hear rumours
>> that the UK market is picking up again.
> I've been really fortunate to live in Bournemouth
Now that's a phrase I never thought I'd ever hear.
>> Possibly the latest banking initiatives (mortgages that can be shared
>> between up to 4 individuals) have contributed to this phenomenon.
>
> Very likely. There are so many people who couldn't possibly buy a
> place on their own. The new rules come in and everybody jumps.
One of the main reasons I want to buy a place of my own is that
no one else is involved - it would be my house to do with how I
pleased. For me, mixing my finances with those of others is little
different to the renting situation I'm in at the moment.
Stuart
Calum
> My region of Bournemouth used to be really depressed, but they started
> investing in it a few years ago.
> The've just finalised plans to do up the pier and seafront buildings
> and install an artificial reef to improve the surfing. Immediately
> that was announced, local house prices jumped by about 10%
Where's that, Boscombe? Used to doss round there myself when I was
working at Hurn, until I settled in leafy Hampshire instead.
lardychap
now...@spamless.co.zz wrote:
> I've been really fortunate to live in Bournemouth, where the market
> didn't really stop going up. It's a high-demand place.
... if you smell of wee?
> We get the
> highest recorded hours of sunshine pretty well every year. It's only
> 100 miles from London, and it's dual-carriageway and motorway all the
> way. There's also a fast train service. And of course, it's on the
> coast and has very clean beaches.
... and Kwik Save is zimmer friendly?
> While the rest of the UK market went to sleep, our house prices were
> still playing catch-up.
Most of Bournmouth went to sleep. At least in the afternoon. Before
that nice man comes round with Meals On Wheels.
> The've just finalised plans to do up the pier and seafront buildings
> and install an artificial reef to improve the surfing. Immediately
> that was announced, local house prices jumped by about 10%.
Is that Silver Surfers?
>
> >Possibly the latest banking initiatives (mortgages that can be shared
> >between up to 4 individuals) have contributed to this phenomenon.
>
> Very likely. There are so many people who couldn't possibly buy a
> place on their own. The new rules come in and everybody jumps.
>
I suppose why rent with mates if you can buy. That is, if anyone's
prepared to sell now....
G - stereotype girl (has mortgage, wife, children etc)
lardychap
called Horrible... horrible... horrible from 2005 it would appear that
I quoted (for absolutely no reason I can see) a huge tract of the
Bible. Alan it would appear, amongst others, did exactly the same. I'm
sure they're contiguous passages but why we got all ecclesiastical is
beyond me.
Or am I just seeing it writ large and it's time for my Damascene
conversion? Unlikely whilst listening to Blind Lemon Jefferson. Wonder
if it were chosen for me what my Blues Name would be, in the form
<Adjective> <Noun> <Surname>
There might be a thread in that somewhere....
G - Lardy Toast Evans girl
Michael
Well okay, but the numbers for the SD market in general don't support
her results.
>
> I agree that the real estate market in the SoCal backcountry has
> suffered somewhat from the rise in commute prices. But if there was
> no reasonably-priced available real estate "inside" the backcountry
> (as there hadn't been for some time previous) then the fuel prices
> wouldn't have been able to affect the real estate market for the
> backcountry.
I wasn't or should I say I didn't take the time to look at all regions
in the county, but was interested in the overall picture. Some
zip/postal codes are up, Golden Hill and the area around SD State
University are up 10% for instance. The hardest hit area I found was
Del Mar which experienced a drop in the price of a median house price
from 1.7 to 1.2 million USDs in the period June 2005 - June 2006. Poor
babies!! One area of real weakness is the condo market because the
inventory of such properties is flooded with condo conversions. Also
the million dollar + condo high rise units sales are very soft and
you'll notice that for the first time in a while the number of cranes
on the downtown skyline has fallen below the dozen or so that have been
visible at any given moment for several years. Still all in all the
market has only fallen about 7% in a year and this figure is skewed
somewhat by all of the standing vacant condos. Some experts in the
field feel the market has bottomed, while others think that a gentle
downward trend will continue for the rest of the year and right through
2007.
The real reason that the real estate market isn't about to take a
serious crash is:
1. People keep flooding into California and I don't know where they
get the money to buy, but they do.
2. the FED raised the federal fund interest rate for a whole bunch of
sessions and this put the brakes on the market.......but......the FED
has held the line on these hikes recently and did so again today for
the third straight session.
3. The DOW and the other markets keep going up and the DOW set a new
record today of 12,134.68.
Real estate crashes are generally accompanied by recession with high
unemployment. That just ain't happening.
>
> An additional anecdotal evidence ... just last evening we heard the
> tail end of an ad for condos in La Jolla starting at $2 Grand. If
> anyone had asked me two minutes earlier, I'd have guessed that the
> meanest, poorest condo in La Jolla would have been going for $6 Grand.
> And La Jolla is in the midst ... not the backcountry.
Well there you go.
>
>
> Odd - "glad our investment is small enough that no amount of c'in or
> b'in will ruin us" girl
Not to worry. Property ownership is this area is pretty safe long
term.
Michael
Michael
> > Right, that's a sad truth. Although my son has a very good job, the
> > best he can manage ATM is a rather large mobile home/carvan. Of course
> > a really sharp crash would have negative consequences for the economy
> > since real estate is such a major market component. How about all
> > those folks left holding the bag who bought high and financed with
> > negative amortization loans who'll just walk away and default on these
> > contracts? Crash of 29 revisited? Some of the real doomsayers paint a
> > similarly dire picture, but I don't feel that's really in the cards,
> > IMHO.
>
> I agree, it doesn't look like another big crash in my crystal ball at
> the moment. After a couple of years of going sideways, I hear rumours
> that the UK market is picking up again. Possibly the latest banking
> initiatives (mortgages that can be shared between up to 4 individuals)
> have contributed to this phenomenon.
Right, my tea leaves gave me similar optimistic results. I dunno know
that the UK housing market has much to do with what's going on here in
SoCal but who knows? Maybe we really are beginning to experience a one
world economy?
>
> Although of course, I'm not a qualified soothsayer, and some pundits
> predict a 50-60 year cycle between big crashes (just long enough that
> everyone's forgotten), so YMMV.
I'm not going to say a crash can't happen cuz my positive prediction
will probably just bring it on.
>
> -Sazz
>
> [1] Ooo, an opportunity for revenge on the Sweden/Switzerland
> Vienna/Venice sagas.
I'm so ignorant of such things I'm igneeant.
Michael
Sarah Eggleston
Dunno, but I did hear that a recent Amazon pre-Christmas best-seller is
a Dawkins book on ... atheism... "The God delusion".[1]
I did manage to get through 600 marginally less controversial pages of
"The Ancestor's tale" on my recent travels (mostly in planes, airports,
and buses).
-Sazz, heavy reading girl
[1] Modern lyric writers please note, that's a real example of irony
lardychap
Sarah Eggleston wrote:
> >
>
> Dunno, but I did hear that a recent Amazon pre-Christmas best-seller is
> a Dawkins book on ... atheism... "The God delusion".[1]
It won't be long before we get "HolidayTime" rather than Christmas.
Having said that I did see an advert which had holly in it at the end
of August. Makes me want to hurt people in marketing even more than I
already do. Oxygen theives. Did a course on it once. In the practical
we had to market alcopops. So I took it really seriously and decided
the target market was segmented into
a) teenage girls
b) gay men
I got into trouble for not taking it seriously enough. What's wrong
with injecting truth into the scenario.
>
> I did manage to get through 600 marginally less controversial pages of
> "The Ancestor's tale" on my recent travels (mostly in planes, airports,
> and buses).
I am ember-arsed to say I have no book on the go at the moment, despite
working less than a mile from the library. I did read Fanboys and
OverDogs by the woman who does countdown's dictionary corner (no, I
didn't know either who she was) but that doesn't count. I probably
should try to score one of the few Graham Greene's I've not read
G - pleb girl
lardychap
now...@spamless.co.zz wrote:
> I've taken to downloading texts of classic books from
> www.gutenberg.org, and loading them onto my PDA, so I can read them
> anywhere.
wow. That's pretty impressive! Thanks. Foiled only by my lack of a PDA
or desire to get one and my inability to stare at small LCD screens for
any length of time without wishing to go mental.
>
> They currently have about 19,000 books, all in the public domain.
> Worth a look.
If only there was a way of reading some of the Sherlock Holmes that
I've only seen as episodes on telly. Library. That's the boy. Papery
things. Apparently Starbucks are planning "pod books" (printed [and
bound] on demand). ie you go in, you pay exhorbitantly for mucky shit
tasting hot water that is as close to coffee as is the grit in my
garden. I don't think that shit's even been in a bag NEXT to coffee.
Sure, it's 15 gallons in a carton but there's not a grain of coffee
been near it. Get a Gaggia. Barista my arse. Makes you sound like a
Cuban freedom fighter.
But anyway, I digress.
I shall have a smurf over there and maybe download some fun!
cheers
G - worm girl
Ken Butler
wrote:
>wow. That's pretty impressive! Thanks. Foiled only by my lack of a PDA
>or desire to get one and my inability to stare at small LCD screens for
>any length of time without wishing to go mental.
I have a Palm, which, when I do remember to take it with me, mostly gets
used for playing backgammon on.
>If only there was a way of reading some of the Sherlock Holmes that
>I've only seen as episodes on telly. Library. That's the boy. Papery
>things.
That's the chap. I've been averaging about eight books a time out of my
local library (taking advantage of the fact that you get books for three
weeks and can renew them twice).
They also do videos. Amy put one of the Lord of the Rings movies on hold,
which just came our way. After *three years*.
>Apparently Starbucks are planning "pod books" (printed [and
>bound] on demand). ie you go in, you pay exhorbitantly for mucky shit
>tasting hot water that is as close to coffee as is the grit in my
>garden. I don't think that shit's even been in a bag NEXT to coffee.
>Sure, it's 15 gallons in a carton but there's not a grain of coffee
>been near it. Get a Gaggia. Barista my arse. Makes you sound like a
>Cuban freedom fighter.
> But anyway, I digress.
A fine rant, nonetheless.
To my mind, "barista" is female; "baristo" would be male.
<pause>
After consulting my room full of papery things, it appears that the Italian
word "barista" can mean "bar owner" or "barman" or "barmaid" male or
female. Nothing to do with coffee, though. Bit like Starbucks really.
Cheers,
Ken.
--
Ken Butler
Brampton, Ontario, Canada