Northern Virginia Weekend Bits Bucket 5/29-5/31, 2010

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Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 5/28/2010

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Funny of the Day

I wish I could have seen the look on CR's face as he wrote this:

"I thought this was from The Onion ... unfortunately it is not.

'From the NAHB: Legislation Addresses Housing Production Credit Crisis

Legislation introduced yesterday by Reps. Brad Miller (D-N.C.) and original co-sponsors Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.) and Joe Baca (D-Calif.) would help alleviate the severe lack of credit for acquisition, development and construction (AD&C) financing that threatens to end the budding housing recovery before it has time to take root, according to the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB).

'We applaud these lawmakers for taking the lead to address the housing production credit crisis that is jeopardizing the housing and economic recovery now under way,' said NAHB Chairman Bob Jones, a home builder from Bloomfield Hills, Mich.

H.R. 5409, the Residential Construction Lending Act, would create a new residential construction loan guarantee program within the Department of Treasury to provide loans to builders with viable construction projects. Designed to unfreeze credit for small home building firms, the measure would expand the flow of credit to residential builders on competitive terms'".

New houses for everybody.

Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 5/27/2010

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Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 5/26/2010

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MBA: Mortgage Purchase Applications at 13 Year Low

Free-Fall Thread

WSJ: Don't Rule Out a Double Dip Recession

"Also causing anxiety is the ominous rise in recent weeks in the three-month London interbank offered rate (Libor), the rate the most creditworthy banks charge each other for loans."

or . . . is this another one of those seasonal, temporary freak-outs . . .

"Ace said... Spider, thanks, the market has been in free fall (big dip) for several weeks now. Would Warren Buffett say now is a time to 'be greedy when others are fearful'?"

Certainly mortgage rates are astonishingly low. Is anyone looking forward to house-hunting this summer? Or are you going to Europe to shop?

Calculated Risk on house prices:

"Case Shiller is reporting on the NSA data (13 cities down), and I'm using the SA data. I'm not sure why Case-Shiller is saying prices are weakening because the tax incentive is ending. This is Q1 and March 2010 data - and the tax incentive pulled forward demand and probably supported prices. Just wait until later this year ... "

Warning: Crash dead ahead. Sell. Get liquid. Now. by Paul Elliott, Motley Fool Hidden Gems --Tuesday, May 25, 2010

"Warning, fans, the numbers on the game-clock are flashing wildly. America's ratio is now 92%, thanks to Obama's $1.7 trillion budget, future deficits, exploding debt. Soon, Ka-Booom! Another great nation bites the dust. Depression follows. Goodbye retirement. ... No, 'this time' it's never different. Get it? In the end, it doesn't matter what happens to the Dodd-Obama financial reforms. The endgame's never a Black Swan, it's a very White Swan well known to historians -- guaranteed, inevitable and inescapable. This time is never different. . . .The clock's flashing. Huge point spread. Think bear, think crash, think end of capitalism, think Great Depression II. . . . This is no buying opportunity, this game's in the refrigerator, call it".

You can't make this stuff up . . . "Consumer confidence rises for third straight month to 63.3 in May as job worries ease."

S&P/Case-Shiller® March Home-Price Index

The S&P/Case Shiller® composite index for the month of March was released today.

"'The housing market may be in better shape than this time last year; but, when you look at recent trends there are signs of some renewed weakening in home prices,' says David M. Blitzer, Chairman of the Index Committee at Standard & Poor’s. 'In the past several months we have seen some relatively weak reports across many of the markets we cover. Thirteen MSAs and the two Composites saw their prices drop in March over February. Boston was flat. The National Composite fell by 3.2% compared to the previous quarter and the two Composites are down for the sixth consecutive month. While year-over-year results for the National Composite, 18 of the 20 MSAs and the two Composites improved, the most recent monthly data are not as encouraging. It is especially disappointing that the improvement we saw in sales and starts in March did not find its way to home prices. Now that the tax incentive ended on April 30th, we don’t expect to see a boost in relative demand.'"

Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 5/25/2010

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Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 5/24/2010

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In case you missed it, fourteen busloads of SEIU protest bank greed at a private residence. The Montgomery County police did not arrest them for trespassing. There's a complete lack of local reporting -- did anyone see any Washington Post article on this? That's what I find particularly striking about this story.

A 3/2/1 rambler in Warrenton fetches $415K -- a tidy sum.

Northern Virginia Weekend Bits Bucket 5/22-5/23, 2010

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Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 5/21/2010

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Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 5/20/2010

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Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 5/19/2010

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Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 5/18/2010

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Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 5/17/2010

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Northern Virginia Weekend Bits Bucket 5/15-5/16, 2010

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Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 5/14/2010

PM edition . . .

Just wow: "Detroit Shrinks Itself, Historic Homes and All."

Maybe Detroit has a future as a rural farming community.

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Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 5/13/2010

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Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 5/12/2010

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Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 5/11/2010

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Northern Virginia April Housing Sales

Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 5/10/2010

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Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 5/7/2010

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Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 5/6/2010

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Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 5/5/2010

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Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 5/4/2010

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Northern Virginia Bits Bucket 5/3/2010

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Northern Virginia Weekend Bits Bucket 5/1-5/2, 2010

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