C'mon over here and let me introduce you to my little friends, the Shun sisters. No matter how bad things get, people will always pay for a cook. That alone will see me through this economic situation. We'll see how many IT people, marketers, real estate gurus and overextended landlords will be able to say the same thing.

Sucker.

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market value is way way down from here. C'mon… a 2 bedrm concrete coffin for 1/2 mill in Coquitlam Bwahahahahahahahahahahahahah x 2. You'd really have to be stupid x 10

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I stand by my point: perma-bulls want everyone to believe that all the time is “a good time to buy real estate.” The perma-bears want everyone to believe “you’d be nuts to buy real estate right now.”

Hey Islander, do you ever use the preview button to look at your post before you submit it?

"Perma" stands for permanent which means "all the time". Not "right now". For everyone. Bulls and bears.

I couldn't make stuff like that up.

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I’m proving Dave’s point: “What is the purpose of correcting nominal dollars from the perspective of an individual homeowner?” He said: “Who cares?”

First off, apologies if this was covered in a previous post. A couple of hours off this blog and I am so far behind.

My answer to your post above is that the utility of converting to real dollars is to allow comparisons of values and profits made at different points in time in terms of purchasing power. For instance, you might like to know if the $1 profit you made in 1900 was good compared to the $1 profit you made yesterday. Or if you sold now versus in five years, you might like to know how much value the transaction produces in terms of purchasing power. That's all.

I'll have to read over the voluminous shell fire which went on … but on another note, anyone notice the mom from teranet from dec-jan declined as opposed to increased every so slightly using mls benchmark (overall it seems the two are within range of each other though).

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"A few blocks away, the condos are so thick they blot out the sun. But looking up into the maze there are scores of units staring blankly back without curtains or occupants. Everyone here is so aware of the collapse of the giant $500-million Ritz project, and now the desperation sales of unsold units in half-built buildings.

Turned out the floor manager in the hotel I spoke at was a Toronto refugee, here for more than a decade. The recession, he confides, is a monster. Hotel business has plunged all across the city. The complex across the road, in the heart of Van’s most fashionable shopping district – Louis Vitton, Hermes — has found it necessary to close off an entire tower as occupancy rates crash.

The group I spoke to was uniformly professional, serious money managers, investment bankers, specialty corporate lawyers and accountants, the kind of folks who regularly flit around the continent on business. The conversations inevitably turned to real estate, as they all do in the Lower Mainland. I don’t think anyone liked the words coming from my lips. The declines here, I said, have just begun. And don’t even think about the aftermath of the 2010 games…"

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Banks are far more interested in reinflating the price of $500,000 homes now fallen to $300,000 than taking care of urban blight. However, reinflating home prices cannot work because home prices needs to fall to levels that are affordable.

Homes in Flint and other such areas, have indeed fallen to their true value (less than zero). No one wants them at any price. Moreover there's little incentive for anyone to do anything about this. Thus the discussion involves "shutting down portions of Flint, officially abandoning them and cutting off police and fire service."

Our throw-away society has effectively reached a new level of efficiency: the throw-away city.

Did you just think 'Whalley' ? , so did I.

http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/2009/0…

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"Economic dirty bomb goes off in New York

By Tom Engelhardt

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Global_Economy/KC26D…

Theres a new catch phrase created here for BC – Before the Collapse. We'll see it soon enough.

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This will affect the workers ability to make mortgage paymnets and all other debt issues, not to mention food on the table.

At the same time it is estimated that a majority of forestry workers currently laid off are running out of EI benefits. There is nothing but forced sales and then welfare ahead for many as there has been no announcement from any level of government to provide further assistance.

I guess it's too early to tell these guys and girls that condo's are cheap and intrest rates are at record lows? If another 10,000 forestry wworkers go down how many more peripheral buisnesses and ancilliary jobs dissapear with them?

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If anything a modern depression will look like Japan in the 90s.

Well, Paul Krugman and I think you might be right.

Given what happened to the Japanese Real Estate market in the ’90s, I’m surprised to see you acknowledge that. But you are a wriggly fish, and love to flip and love to flop, don’t you?

(You don't mind if I snap at you twice, right )

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