According to the RealtyTrac report, one in every 483 U.S. households received a foreclosure filing in May, the highest number since RealtyTrac started the report in 2005 and the second-straight monthly record.
Foreclosure filings increased from a year earlier in all but 10 states. Nevada, California, Arizona, Florida and Michigan had the highest statewide foreclosure rates.
Metropolitan areas in California and Florida accounted for nine of the top 10 areas with the highest rate of foreclosure. That list was led by Stockton, Calif. and the Cape Coral-Fort Myers area in Florida.
Irvine, Calif.-based RealtyTrac monitors default notices, auction sale notices and bank repossessions. Nearly 74,000 properties were repossessed by lenders nationwide in May, while more than 58,000 received default notices, the company said.
In Nevada, one in every 118 households received a foreclosure-related notice last month, more than four times the national rate. In California, one in every 183 households faced foreclosure.
Rick Sharga, RealtyTrac’s vice president of marketing, said foreclosures are unlikely to peak until sometime this fall, as more loans made to borrowers with poor credit records reset at higher levels. “I don’t think we’ve seen the high point,” he said.
About 50 to 60 percent of borrowers who receive foreclosure filings are likely to lose their homes, Sharga said. The rest are likely to be able to sell or refinance.
More on this story
Mortgage rates at highest level in 8 months
Pending home sales moved higher in April
Lenders slash prices to dump foreclosed homes
As foreclosed properties pile up, they add to the inventory of homes on the market and drag down home prices. The trend is most dramatic in many parts of California, Florida, Nevada and Arizona, where prices skyrocketed during the housing boom and are now falling precipitously.
Nationwide, one out of every four sales between January and March was a distressed sale, and that figure jumps to more than 50 percent in the hardest-hit areas like Las Vegas, Detroit and distant suburbs of Los Angeles, according to Moody’s Economy.com.
In some neighborhoods, lenders are slashing prices dramatically to rid themselves of an unprecedented number of foreclosed properties, sparking bidding wars and multiple offers. While that’s a positive for the real estate market, buyers in other parts of the country are still holding back.
“I think a lot of people are waiting to see if we really have hit the bottom,” Sharga said.
Lehman Brothers economist Michelle Meyer said in a report Thursday that U.S. home sales are likely to hit bottom at the end of this summer, but said a recovery in sales is likely to be “feeble.”
Wednesday, August 20, 2008
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
Real estate trends In MS are down 20.9 % YOY
Real Estate Market Trends in Miami Springs
According to the latest Zillow Real Estate Market Reports, home values in Miami Springs decreased 20.90% in the second quarter of 2008, compared to the second quarter of 2007. Nationally, home values have decreased 9.9% during this same period.
Home values have dropped almost 21 % in ONE year. If the home values have dropped that much how much do you think the taxes on those properties have dropped? 21% ?
That means the revenues from property taxes to the City are down the same amount. The City Council's answer to 21 % less revenues and a deficit for the whole year?
Add MILLIONS of dollars in new debt! We are projected to have at least a 1.5 million dollar deficit next year! They have already raided the Reserve Fund for 500k and will do it again and again until it is gone. Then they will raise our taxes to cover for their colossal stupidities. Adding MILLIONS more in debt for the residents to pay off when we cant even pay our bills NOW????
The USA is IN a recession. Times are tough and people are losing their jobs and their houses. Our City officials respond to this recession by taking on millions more in debt BUT giving us 3 more garage sales somehow evens it out??? Absurd. The couple hundred bucks that we may make on those garage sales may fill our gas tanks for a couple weeks or feed us, but probably not both. The crushing debts the Council has dropped on us will be a heavy burden for DECADES. The Council doesnt care, THAT much is clear. Their legacies are seemingly more important than the fiscal pain and suffering they are inflicting on us now, and for the next twenty years! We CANNOT allow that to happen!
According to the latest Zillow Real Estate Market Reports, home values in Miami Springs decreased 20.90% in the second quarter of 2008, compared to the second quarter of 2007. Nationally, home values have decreased 9.9% during this same period.
Home values have dropped almost 21 % in ONE year. If the home values have dropped that much how much do you think the taxes on those properties have dropped? 21% ?
That means the revenues from property taxes to the City are down the same amount. The City Council's answer to 21 % less revenues and a deficit for the whole year?
Add MILLIONS of dollars in new debt! We are projected to have at least a 1.5 million dollar deficit next year! They have already raided the Reserve Fund for 500k and will do it again and again until it is gone. Then they will raise our taxes to cover for their colossal stupidities. Adding MILLIONS more in debt for the residents to pay off when we cant even pay our bills NOW????
The USA is IN a recession. Times are tough and people are losing their jobs and their houses. Our City officials respond to this recession by taking on millions more in debt BUT giving us 3 more garage sales somehow evens it out??? Absurd. The couple hundred bucks that we may make on those garage sales may fill our gas tanks for a couple weeks or feed us, but probably not both. The crushing debts the Council has dropped on us will be a heavy burden for DECADES. The Council doesnt care, THAT much is clear. Their legacies are seemingly more important than the fiscal pain and suffering they are inflicting on us now, and for the next twenty years! We CANNOT allow that to happen!
Monday, August 18, 2008
Rosetta@home
Every day 1500 Americans DIE from cancer. My Mother died of lung cancer. My college roommate died at 54 of throat cancer. My brother-in-law has prostate cancer now. Most of us are touched in one way or another by cancer. When I am sleeping I allow my Rosetta@home program to use my computer along with thousands of others to crunch the numbers in the search for a cure to cancer. It costs me little and could help a LOT!
tributes to themselves
Speaking in Open Forum is pretty much a waste of time and energy as The Council ignores the speakers and their requests like they never happened and the City Attorney says those requests for information or responses are not technically, Freedom of Information requests, and therefore they are not obligated to respond. It really doesnt matter because they really dont respond much to FOI requests either. Requests made over ten weeks ago have received little and no response. Excuses about how busy they are with the budget, etc are offerred, but not really acceptable under the law. There is ALWAYS an excuse to NOT fully hear or respond to the residents. They stopped listening LONG ago to the residents and are now only focused on making their own legacies happen, no matter what the cost to the residents. Its an pricy, painful, and pathetic tribute to their own oversized egos. They should be ashamed, or at least embarrassed, to sell out the majority of residents in tough, recessionary times to the few dozen who will benefit handsomely at the taxpayers expense.
electric cARS REDUX
Excellent article in this months WIRED magazine on the future of electric cars. An organization called Better Place figures that the typical American driver geta 20mpg and for 15,000 miles per year it cost $3,000 a year at $4 per gallon. He believes he can sell you enough clean wind and solar power to run your vehicles for $1050 a year. Shai Agassi is testing his cars now in Israel and Denmark. Denmarks largest utility DONG has signed a deal with Better Place as a way to rid themselves from its oil addiction, save its carbon e,issions, and use the car batteries to bank the power from their wind power farms. When the wind blows strong they have excess power that is now given away to Germany and Sweden.
The business model is similar to those of printers: give the printers away cheap and make the money on the refills. In this case discount the cars significantly and make your money back on the batteries and recharges. An onboard computer will track your mileage and calculate how much energy you will need, to get to work, for instance. At work you can plug your car in for recharging if necessary. The computer will tell you when the charge is low and when going longer disatances you could just switch out your battery for a fully-charged one at any service station.
The business model is similar to those of printers: give the printers away cheap and make the money on the refills. In this case discount the cars significantly and make your money back on the batteries and recharges. An onboard computer will track your mileage and calculate how much energy you will need, to get to work, for instance. At work you can plug your car in for recharging if necessary. The computer will tell you when the charge is low and when going longer disatances you could just switch out your battery for a fully-charged one at any service station.
numbers that dont make sense
Citizens must object
Dont most people object when money is taken from them? at least to the police? Why no audit so far? website cant be TOO transparent or the people will see whats really going on. What ARE they hiding? If the numbers were accurate and made sense they wouldnt have to hide them, would they? if, on the other hand, they demonstrated incompetency and inaccuracies it could, would, and should make the City Manager look bad, again.
Dont most people object when money is taken from them? at least to the police? Why no audit so far? website cant be TOO transparent or the people will see whats really going on. What ARE they hiding? If the numbers were accurate and made sense they wouldnt have to hide them, would they? if, on the other hand, they demonstrated incompetency and inaccuracies it could, would, and should make the City Manager look bad, again.
Citizens must object
Title: Citizens must object
The City of Miami Springs is projected to have a deficit next year of at least 1.5 MILLION dollars. You may wonder where will the City Council get the money to cover these debts? They will take it out of our Reserve Fund. They have already taken 500k out to help pay for the new gym project and our reserves are dangerously low. We are a bad hurricane or two from being insolvent, bankrupt.
Who is responsible for putting us in this precarious predicament? The City Manager and his $400-600+ a square foot construction fiascos deserves a LOT of the blame. With the exception of Councilman Dotson, who is making the good effort toward fiscal common sense, the rest of the Council should also shoulder considerable responsibility for not providing any significant oversight, accountability, or common sense on those projects and basically rubber-stamping whatever the City Manager says it costs.
How will they pay for their latest debacle? Once they have drained the Reserve Fund they will raise our taxes to cover their butts. At a time where residents are tightening their belts and struggling to put gas in their car, food on the table, and make their mortgage payments, the Council will raise our taxes to cover for the 3.5 million in additional debt for the new, and unnecessary, gym project.
It is yet another demonstration of the unbelievable ongoing lack of economic awareness, fiscal irresponsibility, and rational management by City officials with respect to each and every significant construction project in recent memory. Instead of tax relief or tightening their municipal belt buckles, the Council offers an ordinance that will give us more chances to sell off our possessions at garage sales, as if that will put food on our tables or gas in our cars for more than a couple weeks, or stave off foreclosures on some of our houses. THAT is all the Council has to offer to help us avoid personal bankruptcy.
Their idea to avoid municipal bankruptcy is to raise our debt by millions and increase our taxes. That is, of course, contrary to any known sound and credible economic theory and policy known to Man. They are so focused on their legacies that it doesnt faze them that they have no common sense or logical rationale to explain their actions. When you are in a hole the FIRST thing you do is stop digging. They stopped listening to the residents long ago.
They really aren't concerned with the plight of the residents because, as those HUNDREDS of THOUSANDS of dollars keep disappearing, they can, and will, just keep raising our taxes to cover it! To them (again, with one exception) we are a deep-pocketed and never-ending ATM that just keeps on giving and giving, no matter HOW horribly mismanaged and/or corrupt (take your pick) the City is.
Without voicing your objection, this ongoing and unacceptable pattern of incompetence, waste, and/or corruption (your choice) will simply continue until we are broke. Silence and apathy are as much the enemies of democracy as dictators. Stay tuned.
The City of Miami Springs is projected to have a deficit next year of at least 1.5 MILLION dollars. You may wonder where will the City Council get the money to cover these debts? They will take it out of our Reserve Fund. They have already taken 500k out to help pay for the new gym project and our reserves are dangerously low. We are a bad hurricane or two from being insolvent, bankrupt.
Who is responsible for putting us in this precarious predicament? The City Manager and his $400-600+ a square foot construction fiascos deserves a LOT of the blame. With the exception of Councilman Dotson, who is making the good effort toward fiscal common sense, the rest of the Council should also shoulder considerable responsibility for not providing any significant oversight, accountability, or common sense on those projects and basically rubber-stamping whatever the City Manager says it costs.
How will they pay for their latest debacle? Once they have drained the Reserve Fund they will raise our taxes to cover their butts. At a time where residents are tightening their belts and struggling to put gas in their car, food on the table, and make their mortgage payments, the Council will raise our taxes to cover for the 3.5 million in additional debt for the new, and unnecessary, gym project.
It is yet another demonstration of the unbelievable ongoing lack of economic awareness, fiscal irresponsibility, and rational management by City officials with respect to each and every significant construction project in recent memory. Instead of tax relief or tightening their municipal belt buckles, the Council offers an ordinance that will give us more chances to sell off our possessions at garage sales, as if that will put food on our tables or gas in our cars for more than a couple weeks, or stave off foreclosures on some of our houses. THAT is all the Council has to offer to help us avoid personal bankruptcy.
Their idea to avoid municipal bankruptcy is to raise our debt by millions and increase our taxes. That is, of course, contrary to any known sound and credible economic theory and policy known to Man. They are so focused on their legacies that it doesnt faze them that they have no common sense or logical rationale to explain their actions. When you are in a hole the FIRST thing you do is stop digging. They stopped listening to the residents long ago.
They really aren't concerned with the plight of the residents because, as those HUNDREDS of THOUSANDS of dollars keep disappearing, they can, and will, just keep raising our taxes to cover it! To them (again, with one exception) we are a deep-pocketed and never-ending ATM that just keeps on giving and giving, no matter HOW horribly mismanaged and/or corrupt (take your pick) the City is.
Without voicing your objection, this ongoing and unacceptable pattern of incompetence, waste, and/or corruption (your choice) will simply continue until we are broke. Silence and apathy are as much the enemies of democracy as dictators. Stay tuned.
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