Friday Free For All!
Friday means the weekend is almost here, and that means it’s time for our end of the week news round-up and open topic discussion. Here are a few stories I’ve noticed this week:
-Work comes to a halt at Jameson House
-Construction halted on Victoria Hill Building
-Municipalities urged to increase residential property tax vs. business tax
-Vancouver west houses: 968 listings, 12 days, zero sales
-Builder Association: The Vancouver property market will bounce back
-Condo Wiki: ‘expert’ Quote-tracker
-BC #1 in job losses since September
-Vancouver fund’s cash reserves ‘tapped out’
-When politicians treat voters like bumpkins
-Entire city council agrees to lie-detector test on $100 olympic leak
-Ottawa boosts mortgage buy-out by $50 billion
-Canada to consider selling national assets
-US Foreclosures up 25% year over year
So what are you seeing out there? Post your news links, anecdotes and thoughts here and have an excellent weekend!
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November 13th, 2008 at 10:39 pm
November 13th, 2008 at 10:40 pm
This excellent Michael Lewis (of Liar’s Poker fame) article will scare the hide off the craggiest stock market bear. Did me. We ain’t seen nothing yet. One of the best things I’ve read all year in my near ADD-level of house and stock bubble article browsing.
http://www.portfolio.com/news-…..print=true
November 13th, 2008 at 10:46 pm
There’s a simple measure of sanity in housing prices: the ratio of median home price to income. Historically, it runs around 3 to 1; by late 2004, it had risen nationally to 4 to 1. “All these people were saying it was nearly as high in some other countries,” Zelman says. “But the problem wasn’t just that it was 4 to 1. In Los Angeles, it was 10 to 1, and in Miami, 8.5 to 1. And then you coupled that with the buyers. They weren’t real buyers. They were speculators.”
yeah yeah and I drink my chai tea yeah yeah nutslaps realtor
November 13th, 2008 at 10:47 pm
Reposting as it got lost on the end of the last post:
This excellent Michael Lewis (of Liar’s Poker fame) article will scare the hide off the craggiest stock market bear. Did me. We ain’t seen nothing yet. One of the best things I’ve read all year in my near ADD-level of house and stock bubble article browsing.
I think you meant this link:
http://www.portfolio.com/news-.....reets-Boom
November 13th, 2008 at 10:53 pm
Buh bye Vancouver West Specuvestors! What goes up, must come DOWN!
November 13th, 2008 at 11:14 pm
Thanks for the shout. Tis rose like no other. :>)
November 13th, 2008 at 11:30 pm
Welcome as Larry Yatkowsky.
November 13th, 2008 at 11:32 pm
The market rose and now its withered on the vine.
Perhaps too much fertilizer was used? Thanks for sharing the stats.
November 13th, 2008 at 11:37 pm
November 13th, 2008 at 11:44 pm
re⋅pug⋅nant
Synonyms of repugnant
abhorrent, abominable, antipathetic, contemptible, despicable, despisable, detestable, disgusting, foul, infamous, loathsome, lousy,”Entire council agrees to lie-detector test on city hall report leak”, despicable, despisable, detestable, disgusting.
Best regards
November 13th, 2008 at 11:51 pm
Don’t say someday you become a doer. Someday may never come.
Vote green = doer, red = loser!
November 13th, 2008 at 11:58 pm
November 13th, 2008 at 11:58 pm
It’s so obvious, it’s almost boring now. Wish I had one of those remote controls from Click, I’d hit fast forward about now.
November 14th, 2008 at 12:27 am
The link you gave is broken, can you repost it again, it sounds interesting. Can it beat the doom & gloom of Peter Schiff and his book Crash Proof predicting the US collapse?
November 14th, 2008 at 12:52 am
They should have sold the assets long time ago, before the bubble popped. Why does the government own the CN Tower anyway?
November 14th, 2008 at 2:32 am
It’s called courtesy.
By linking to my blog the owners of this blog showed courtesy - my comment was a thank you, nothing more nor less. Should opportunity arise I would do the same in return. To be clear, to my knowledge, this blog nor it’s owners have ever caused me harm.
What your reference to boot licking has got to do with my gesture of appreciation is beyond me.
Tom Vu
Speak of facts not hyperbole. Please, show me the reference for your statement falsely attributed to me: - “…someday you become a doer”.
Shout you may, loud as you can, I and others might listen, but in your “DOING” you haven’t earned the priviledge to castigate me by shouting nonsense.
November 14th, 2008 at 7:24 am
http://www.canada.com/vancouve.....66&p=2
it say vancouver special and:
“Metro Vancouver is well positioned to bounce back. According to leading demographers, we will need to accommodate another million people during the next 10 to 15 years. And during the 2010 Olympics, more than three billion pairs of eyes will be focused on us, creating interest from investors, tourists and families looking to live in one of the most livable regions on the planet.”
Better hurry call professional realtor this am before prices go up.
Other vely smart peoples like you read “Expert Simpson and understand that 3 billion pairs of eye balls see how sexy Vancouver, and they will come and set up business and more rich peoples comes.
Call Realtor today, do not delay.
November 14th, 2008 at 7:28 am
Hey Browntown — that’s a rather disgusting and disingenuous comment. But funny! You get points for laughs …
November 14th, 2008 at 7:45 am
Much more loser in thread than doer.
If you want to make money you have to be a doer. Lots of bargains right now. I see new bargain every day. Best time to buy is when market scared. Now is that time. Get out there!
November 14th, 2008 at 7:49 am
http://tinyurl.com/5lj35u
woulda been a neat tower….
November 14th, 2008 at 7:55 am
http://tinyurl.com/66px95
VANCOUVER — Stocks are plummeting, layoffs abound and a recession is on the way, but the desire to fork out big bucks to attend the 2010 Winter Olympics is as good as gold.
nobody ever tells me anything….
i’m so far out of the loop that i
don’t know the loop exists…..
November 14th, 2008 at 8:07 am
” Somehow that message failed to come across. Six months after Liar’s Poker was published, I was knee-deep in letters from students at Ohio State who wanted to know if I had any other secrets to share about Wall Street. They’d read my book as a how-to manual”.
Pretty much says it all.
Learning from History’s Mistakes is more like ” I’m all right Jack” and ” Me Too = Screw You “.
November 14th, 2008 at 8:26 am
A snippet:
There’s a long list of people who now say they saw it coming all along but a far shorter one of people who actually did. Of those, even fewer had the nerve to bet on their vision. It’s not easy to stand apart from mass hysteria—to believe that most of what’s in the financial news is wrong or distorted, to believe that most important financial people are either lying or deluded—without actually being insane. A handful of people had been inside the black box, understood how it worked, and bet on it blowing up.
Now scroll back up and give her a star!
Speaking of stars….. Does re-phrasing “This market is done, stick a fork in it!” really deserve a star? It seems to have become more of a poll. “Do you agree with the poster?”, rather than a reward for insight, new info, excellent link, good writing etc. Some of Dave’s posts deserve stars, not because he’s right, but because he articulates his points so well. Don’t worry, he will be refuted by multi-starred responses, but he deserves a click or two just for trying.
Mind you, verbal diarrhea is different. Nobody!!!! still gets an automatic down-click from me, and liberal use of the scroll wheel.
November 14th, 2008 at 8:28 am
November 14th, 2008 at 8:30 am
At least it’s never used Krissh/SATV,etc. I’d have to sanitize my keyboard!
November 14th, 2008 at 8:31 am
November 14th, 2008 at 8:37 am
well my down arrow is bigger than yours!
November 14th, 2008 at 8:50 am
I guess there’s a place for the “pity click”.
November 14th, 2008 at 8:58 am
“People will ALWAYS buy real estate, so don’t worry”
“Young people will always be looking for places to live”
“Don’t confuse falling sales with falling prices, prices have only fallen 6%. The sky is hardly falling”
My favourite one:
“On Monday’s program I will have GOOD NEWS for those who bought at the peak” I’m on tender hooks…
These aren’t word for word quotes, but they’re pretty close.
November 14th, 2008 at 9:18 am
A colleague at work told me she was renting and saving to buy an apartment since 2004 but now she lost her down payment on the stock market.
What can I say to her to calm her mind?
November 14th, 2008 at 9:20 am
“Hey, want to get laid?
Well that condo you bought is going to drop in value by 50% in the next 12 months.
There. NOW you’re f**ked!”
November 14th, 2008 at 9:23 am
The “British Columbia Real Estate Association” says residential sales volume on the mulitple listing service fell 54 per-cent in October, compared to the same month a year ago. Residential unit sales were down 51 per-cent and the average price fell 6.5 per-cent.
6.5% year over, how about since April 2008, ‘the peak’.
Love the Olympic crap, even J-Pod made reference to it yesterday. Why dont we survey Beijing, Turin, Salt Lake, Athens, etc and see how they are doing. Did everyone feel compelled to buy into these markets when watching them on TV? Remember Beijing with all its rain and delayed events, that looked really appealling. Does anyone know how much it rains in February here? Will look equally inviting on TV to the billions watching. They will wonder where the mountains are! The herd cannot be conned anymore, they are in panic and values are in free fall! I LOVE IT!
November 14th, 2008 at 9:26 am
Those are your criteria, not THE criteria. People will vote as they see fit, often just in agreement, and there’s nothing wrong with that. You are not the Decider….
November 14th, 2008 at 9:59 am
November 14th, 2008 at 10:05 am
What can I say to her to calm her mind?”
Tell her she has plenty of time to buy and plenty of time to collect a downpayment. Housing will plummet and stay low for many years. This will not be a V-shaped drop with a rapid recovery. No it will moderately rapid fall followed by stagnation.
Funny how the bulls were fond of saying we might enter a market with stagnant prices. Yes, stagnant prices could happen, but first we need the big drop
November 14th, 2008 at 10:10 am
November 14th, 2008 at 10:11 am
A colleague at work told me she was renting and saving to buy an apartment since 2004 but now she lost her down payment on the stock market.
What can I say to her to calm her mind?
Tell her that down payment money goes into safe investments like GICs or savings accounts. She was foolish to gamble it away.
On a positive note, tell her that in a few years, real estate will be at least 50% off, so she’ll need a smaller down payment.
November 14th, 2008 at 10:15 am
That about sums up many of the most fervent bear posters on this site. Tell her the truth. What’s the truth? Well she’s just wasted at least 4 years of her life.
November 14th, 2008 at 10:16 am
I feel badly for her, but there is not a lot I can do but what you said.
Thanks.
November 14th, 2008 at 10:18 am
November 14th, 2008 at 10:19 am
As Alexcanuck says, he gets points for trying.
November 14th, 2008 at 10:19 am
November 14th, 2008 at 10:24 am
I guess the only thing is to “pack your own shute” as they say and do the homework like we all have done so we don’t waste our money.
Have a good day, everyone!
November 14th, 2008 at 10:48 am
you make it sound like it was accidental.
November 14th, 2008 at 11:01 am
http://blog.mint.com/blog/fina.....al-crisis/
November 14th, 2008 at 12:01 pm
Far be it from me to offer advice to a depressed Boomer but you might offer the following:
1) Assume the losses she suffered are 50%. Assume she invested 25, 000. She’s therefore lost 12,500.
2) Now assume prices are going to drop 50% from the peak, which seems pretty likely to me. Assume she’d bought at the peak. Assume she spent $450,000 on the condo Her losses would have been $225,00, and that wouldn’t have been savings, she would have lost that on money she BORROWED, which meant she’d have lost that amount of the value of the property AND she would have paid interest on the lost equity!
In terms of “It could be worse” , that’s a situation where it could be a lot worse.
If some sort of misfortune strike (and tell her for me honey you wouldn’t believe how fast your life can go in the crapper), she still have an asset (stocks) that can be liquefied in an emergency. Trust me on this one, that’s a big ol’ bonus.
Assuming she hasn’t sold the stocks yet, the loss is only paper. As long as she hangs on to the stock it will recover eventually, even if that’s a year or two.
Speaking as someone who got divorced, fired and evicted in June, tell her to count wht blessings she can. We make our own heaven and hell based on our thoughts and feelings.
John, I used to laugh at your posts but your shit is extremely stale these days. Who are you to pronounce four years of a human life “wasted” because someone lost a little money (and i the end, it’s only a little money)? Did she wake up most mornings glad to be alive? I hope so. Were those days “wasted” because she made a choice that set her back a little? Did she enjoy a meal, fall in love, kiss her family in those four years, and were those experiences “wasted”?
You’re starting to remind me of Pandora and her stinky box full of pestilence and disease. It’s local bulls with that kind of attitude (which incidentally I find most prevalent among Boomers) that I fervently hope get hit the hardest.
It’s only fucking money.
I’ve known people who survived murder attempted. I’ve know people who barely survived cancer. I’ve known people living with HIV. I know a guy who survived the murder of his father and grandfather, three earthquakes, two car crashes, a gas explosion and a kidnap attempt (viva Colombia! :). I don’t think any of us appreciates the country we live in, imperfect as it is.
Oh, John…. one more thing. If bears lost some savings in the stocks market and therefore “wasted” four years, how many years will bulls who bought at the top have “wasted” when prices come crashing down to earth?
Dude? Seriously. Get a new schtick…. even I’m bored with your shit.
November 14th, 2008 at 2:06 pm
Prices will drop by 60% without even a blink. You can bank on that.
November 14th, 2008 at 2:08 pm
Alexcanuck, in an ideal world the star system would work differently, but I can’t control the way people use it, and I understand why people use it as an ‘agree/disagree’ vote.
I do like the way that some useful info gets voted up and highlighted, and its either the voting system in its imperfect state, or nothing at all.
Everyone, if you’d prefer to see the voting system disabled vote this comment down, if you want to keep it, vote up.
November 14th, 2008 at 3:03 pm
Here is a looming crunch in corporates. Check out the spreads at Markit and you can see that linking to CDS spreads will really hurt corporations. It will also blind side investors who think LIBOR or the TED spread are the only spreads that matter. LIBOR and TED spreads are starting to come under the control of the FED and the banks must try to keep them low to keep in the FED’s good books. This is the reason for linking lines of credit to CDS spreads as the banks nor the FED has any control of that yet.
November 14th, 2008 at 3:36 pm
Jhon,
Thanks for sharing that bearish insight,what a interior design without any living room,aha fuckkkkk that in next step she is going to loose(lose)her job as well and lots of bears within next six month.
They did not buy on peak of their income obviously they can not buy on the bottom of their net on the top of that a great fear of job loss opps congratulation Idiots STICK A FORK IN YOUR A#S#OLE.
November 14th, 2008 at 3:37 pm
WOW!
I know the developers, the Pappajohn family.
However, while I knew they had various holdings, I didn’t realize they were into the Hi-Rise condo development market.
Like I had posted a while back,as a builder once told me, when Firemen, BC Tel employees and Housewives start getting into the development scene, time to bail.
This appears to be the same phenomenon as Toronto, with a land shortage, everyone and their dog gets into the Hi- Rise market, and especially those that shouldn’t be in there in the first place.
Nice folks, but work within one’s limits/expertise, and not get caught up in the gold rush euphoria.
November 14th, 2008 at 3:44 pm
November 14th, 2008 at 3:49 pm
http://www.theglobeandmail.com.....gary+mason
November 14th, 2008 at 4:05 pm
There is a chace Nobody is just a troll who pretends to be the stupidest person alive but after this long he/she would have to be pretty crazy to take so much abuse and keep coming back for more. It obviously can’t comprehend or doesn’t read any of the links and it’s source of information is unclear.
November 14th, 2008 at 4:10 pm
Check out Evelyn (currently on hold)in West Van they are taking 57 houses and making it into 176 units!
Obviously you owe me for finding out about this!
Maybe one day they’ll start using this land making machine on all the surface parking lots downtown and put infill buildings on parking lots in the west end!
November 14th, 2008 at 4:22 pm
Browntown is too busy trying to dump his property because he is upside down now
Poor, poor, browntown; he’s caught with a property that won’t sell in this market, and he is losing gobs of his equity everyday.
November 14th, 2008 at 4:39 pm
November 14th, 2008 at 4:53 pm
Some links can be read through it’s headline if the reader got brain in his head,Developers are not different than any other investors that’s why they like to bring their rental cranes to fork in the roots but that was good for bears because if those developers decide not to follow their investment plan this city will get dry from new supply.
Remember that $2000 per sq.ft.starting from the bottom part of Vancouver,Aren’t you the one who trolled through archives hmmm yep! yep!! that!!! one ok now you should say thanks to developer for coming out to help the bears but the way projects are going down that will bring the same light out of lost Anecdotal in the archive,did some one say vrngd?.
November 14th, 2008 at 5:00 pm
November 14th, 2008 at 5:01 pm