Today’s Washington Post has an article about the resignation of Lawrence Small from his post as Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution. The following paragraph (on page 2 of the story) caught my eye: Small has also received $1.15 million in housing allowances over a six-year period in return for agreeing to use his 6,500-square-foot home […]
Last year marked the start of the housing downturn in several markets. The clearest indicator was the ballooning levels of existing home inventory for sale, and the fact that these homes largely stayed on the market until Thanksgiving without moving in an appreciable way. In some markets, at the sales flow rate at the time, […]
Tetrapod Zoology has become one of my favorite blogs. It’s written by Darren Naish, who describes himself thusly: Darren Naish – me – is, or was, a vertebrate palaeontologist, formerly based at the University of Portsmouth, UK. They still host my homepage, but have usefully deleted all the links to the pdfs I so lovingly […]
It should come as no surprise that divining and quantifying what is happening to the housing market and the connected financial systems is a topic of significant interest for me. While there is an excellent and growing suite of web sites and Blogs around that document elements of what is happening, one piece of information […]
Jules Crittenden — himself no stranger to war — talks with Vietnam vet John Eade about Thermopylae: John Eade hasn’t seen a war movie in more than 40 years, but he’s thinking about seeing “300.†I kind of get that. There is something about the Spartans’ simple illogical willingness to die at Thermopylae that I […]
From MarketWatch Alt-A mortgage losses accelerate, study says SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) – Losses on so-called Alt-A home loans are accelerating and could hit the value of lower-rated portions of some mortgage-backed securities, according to a study released on Tuesday. Delinquencies have jumped on Alt-A mortgages originated last year with adjustable interest rates that let borrowers […]
[Welcome to those coming over from Winds of Change! — additional comments at the end of this post] I haven’t seen 300 (the movie), though I own and have read Frank Miller’s graphic novel, as well as Gates of Fire by Steven Pressfield. More importantly, I also own and have read all of Herodotus’s The […]
[UPDATED 03/13/07 – 2005 MDT] Apparently, the stock ripples are worldwide: A steep sell-off swept through global stock markets on Tuesday as investor confidence was hit by the escalating woes of the US subprime mortgage market and weak US retail sales data. The S&P 500 ended the day down 2.04 per cent and the Dow Jones […]
Outstanding graphic from a report by Credit Suisse showing the break down of the size of the mortgage business by percentage and estimated absolute value. Of special note is that a majority of the money (51.4%) now comes from outside the Government Sponsored Entities (GSE), and through Wall Street and hedge funds. That means that […]
Tweeter Cuts Back – Video Fans Mourn
Tweeter Cuts Back – Video Fans Mourn Tweeter is a good store, they have an excellent selection of equipment, the sales staff tend to have a clue (at least at the local ones) and the prices are competitive. I purchased my current, highly prized Samsung DLP at Tweeter, and I was very happy with the […]
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