From Calculated Risk:

NY Times Norris on Pick-a-pay Loans

Note: World was part of Golden West which was bought by Wachovia, and is now owned by Wells Fargo.

  The amount owed on such loans at the end of March was $115 billion, which Wells estimates is 107 percent of the current value of the properties underlying the mortgages.
  ...
  Only $325 million of the loans — less than a third of 1 percent — will reset by the end of 2012.
  ...
  Wells Fargo has written the value of the pick-a-pay portfolio down by about 20 percent, and is offering to restructure some of the loans. But many of the owners may have no reason to seek such a restructuring. ... The result may be perverse: a prolonged foreclosure crisis ...

At least we don’t have to worry about many of these loans blowing up over the next few years!

Unless these Option ARM holders give up early—which many will—the foreclosure problem is going to be with us for quite a while.

Option ARMs are extremely difficult to model because the various payment options and interest rates make it difficult to tell when they will recast. Most will recast ahead of schedule when the cap is reached.

From Calculated Risk:

Zillow: High Percentage of Homeowners Waiting for a Market Turnaround

“As for selling activity, it’s clear a significant number of potential sellers are holding back due to the current market. When asked about future plans to sell, 31 percent of homeowners said they would be at least “somewhat likely” to put their homes on the market in the next 12 months if they saw signs of a real estate market turnaround.
...
“Also interesting is the information we have for the first time this quarter on the levels of ‘shadow inventory’ - homes that people would like to sell but that aren’t currently on the market, and thus aren’t captured in the official number of homes on the market. With almost a third of homeowners poised to jump into the market at the first sign of stabilization, this could create a steady stream of new inventory adding to already record-high inventory levels, thus keeping downward pressure on home prices.” [said Dr. Stan Humphries, Zillow’s vice president of data and analytics].”

When I talk about “market overhang,” this is what I mean. If prices start to rally, all these owners who want to get out but want better prices will list their homes and provide supply that will limit appreciation. Our current market rally—feeble as it is—is predicated on limited supply. It is characterized by low volumes and even lower supply. If prices tick up enough, discretionary supply will hit the market.

TRidge…. overpriced from day one.  This neighborhood, IMHO, will bottom BELOW what the house sold for new.

Why?  We used to tour the model homes up when we were choosing finishes for our reconstruction, and the KoolAid was toxic even then… The builder played tricks by releasing several phases in small batches and creating “pent up” demand.

This is the flip side of “financial value”... create artificial demand and then give cheap money. 

The builders in TRidge must have made multimillions of dollar, the owners who are still there are gonna get hosed.

Sad too because the area is really nice -but the homes will not age well because they are squeezed together and there are few 5 bedroom homes and almost no 3 car garages..

You gotta love Mish:

California’s Budget Deficit: What The Hell Is It?

That’s some strong Kool Aid there that they are drinking.  That’s overpriced by a least a half million, maybe by as much as a full million.  This is the type of property that should have a follow up post, six months from now, when it’s still on the market.

I agree.  I can’t believe that for $2,000,000 you don’t more than 5ft between you and your next door neighbor.

As for the view, from the map it looks like the house isn’t even on the higher streets and you’re overlooking the toll road.  Too bad the realtor didn’t provide any pictures.

Checking all of Turtle Ridge, and it looks like EVERYBODY there is drinking the same strong Kool Aid.  Days on the market for all of Turtle Ridge is an average of 137 days if you exclude short sales, 145 if you include them.  There’s one condo that has been on the market for 1075 days!!!!

http://www.redfin.com/CA/Irvine/145-Danbrook-92603/home/5944262

There’s 3 others that have been listed for over a year, and 6 more that have been listed over 250 days (10 total over 250 days).  There’s only 47 listings total!

For $2.2M I would go for this:
http://www.redfin.com/CA/Irvine/66-Summer-House-92603/home/5927789

Comps are at$1.5M you clearly picked the worst WTF house in the neighborhood.  Still think people are crazy, but not as bad as the featured property.

With such a high starting point relative to the market (is there really a market for these homes now?  The average DOM in this ‘hood indicates “no”), watching them chase the market down over the next six months to a year will yield a very long list of price reductions.  Is this really a strategy for success?

People’s opinions of what the stuff they own is worth is amazing - just go to a garage sale.  A few weeks I wanted to buy a box of beads at a sale and the guy didn’t like what I offered because in his words “that box will make a whole lot of earrings which I could sell for $$.  So, I told him to go ahead and make the earrings - he sold me the box for my price which says something for him because many would not have.

on another note - does anyone know what happened to Mr. Mortgage?

That’s hilarious. The description has the nerve to say the owner is “MOTIVATED”. Hahahahahahaha!

Mr. Mortgage, aka Mark Hansen, can be found here: Mark’s Blog - Mr Mortgage Live

From Mr, Mortgage’s most recent post:

“...It is proving painfully obvious that mortgage mods are more exotic than the actual loans that put the homeowner in default in the first place and their effectiveness even at the margin questionable at best.

The Obama-mod does the same as most other mods — it turns the homeowner into an underwater, over-levered renter for life unable to sell, re-buy or refi.  Modifications with combined loan to values of 150% to 200% are not uncommon. Many borrowers would be better off walking away today because their credit will be hurt for a shorter period of time than they will be underwater in their home.  As a note — I think the Obama 105% GSE refi is a good thing but doubt many will fit into the tight box especially in the regions that need the most help.

Wide scale mortgage modifications will ensure that housing remains a dead asset class for years — every time a homeowner gets a mod they are taken out of the mortgage and housing economic equation indefinitely.”

I wonder what’s gonna happen next week when all the propositions go down the toilet.

It seems to me that the politicians have (finally) pissed off voters, including many progressives.  The old argument of “the children” and “the teachers” ain’t gonna work this time.  Even the new argument of “California burning”, and “violent criminals being released from prison early” ain’t gonna work.

Who would-a thought.  Sorry unions, YOU LOSE!

“Motivated” to get that $2.2 million right away, I’ll bet he is! I wonder who is motivated to help him out with that.

I’ll be sure to give them all a $2m wave as go by, gunning it up the 73 hill tonight.  My dual exhaust sounds awesome.

Occasionally, this type of property, like jewelry, can be used for money laudry or bribing foreign government official.

The more expensive the better.

I think everyone knows that “2/3 of the U.S. economy is derived from consumer spending”. Think about that for a minute….Our entire economy is built on a house of cards that relies on the U.S. citizens to do what is NOT prudent, spend themselves into oblivion.

I guess that is why you will never hear a CEO, politician utter the term “people just need to learn to live with LESS”.

Since I can remember we, as a country, have farmed out our manufacturing to other parts of the world. First it was textiles, then plastics, toys, low end consumer electronics, motorcycles.

At the same time we stopped mining, drilling and using our natural resources to produce power, steal and other products that are needed for manufacturing and production. It is a dirty business, people have to work hard, it is dangerous, there are environmental issues…The lobby convinced the american public that we didn’t need this in our back yard. It was work better suited for some other third world country.

Lastly, we shut down virtually all manufacturing and gave it to Mexico, China and other asian countries. Nothing is produced here any more. I have been in the electronic manufacturing business for almost 20 years now and have seen it turn into a shell of it’s former self.

Now Chrystler is BK, I doubt it will recover. Jeep will but that will be about it. GM is shuttering plants and shipping manufacturing to China to build cars and export them back here. I have to buy American parts, in China and import them here, to sell to American companies to build prototype products so they can ship the production, you guessed it, back to China.

China is the most corrupt place to try and do business. I have been shipped counterfiet, used parts many times. There is nothing any one can do about it. No American company actually makes board level components in the U.S. anymore unless they are custom parts. Everything is done off shore and those people will not think twice about shipping inferior, dangerous and or fake products to make a buck. Once they have your money there is no way to get it back.

I guess what I am trying to say is, we have fucked ourselves royally. We have created the worlds biggest economy on fake equity bubbles and now the only one left is for the governement to actually give a way FREE money, which, they are doing.

People keep waiting for the economy to recover, but please tell me how can it? How can it get anywere near it’s former glory if 2/3 of the economy is based on consumer spending and no one has any money, the MEW machine has been turned off, banks are cutting credit lines, 401K plans are in the shitter, and local, state and federal governements are facing the biggest deficits EVER?

Honestly I don’t know how we turn this thing around we just let everything fail and learn to do without.

I feel sorry for Manny, he is going to lose almost 9 million dollars for failing a drug test, what is this world comming to?

Sorry for the rant.

I would just love to hear how the listing agent and owner came up with this WTF price !!! 765 sq ft, what fundamental, rational, mathematic equation did they use. In their own minds they convinced themselves and will attempt to convince others with a straight face. What a waste of time and effort.

Can you imagine if this was 2007. It would be listed for 3 mill.

“Who would-a thought.  Sorry unions, YOU LOSE!”

So does anybody who uses schools, roads, or fire or police protection.  Layoffs ahoy!

Public school enrollment (k-12) in California has remained almost flat since y2k, yet the number of administrators has in the schools has increased significantly.

Most state workers don’t share any burden for their medical cost, that includes no premiums, no copays, no deductibles, no cost sharing.

I don’t see how anybody, outside of a state employee, can defend this massive debacle.

These people work for California, not the other way around.

Camsavem, you are singing my song.  I have been preaching this to anyone who will listen for years.  Most people just look at me like I’m crazy.  We have screwed ourselves royally.

For a very long time I tried as hard as I could to buy only things made in the USA.  It is difficult, but with the help of websites, and keeping track of what dept stores sell what stuff made in the US, I managed to get most of what I needed.  But it is more expensive (although honestly, the quality of the US-made products I have bought has ALWAYS been better) and much more time consuming than just strolling off to Target, Bed, Bath and Beyond, or wherever, and just picking up the goods without even looking at where it is made. 

But recently, I gave up.  I guess I was motivated by the thought that maybe I was helping to save somebody’s job somewhere in the US, if their employer just shipped a little bit more product.  But lately I feel like I was just being naive.  If American companies cared about their employees, they would do more to keep jobs here.  The CEO’s and managers only care about grabbing multi-million dollar salaries for themselves.  They are the new robber barons.  I remember reading somewhere that the ratio of the American CEO’s salary to the average worker in the same company is hundreds of times larger than the same ratio for any other country.  Why should I care?  I’m only helping the greedy upper management out.  I am really disillusioned about what the U.S. has become.  That recent thread about moving to Australia caught my attention.

Okay, I guess that was my rant.  My apologies too.

I just don’t get these houses.

Even at “only” $1M, you are looking at a pretty limited target buyer audience.  High level execs, lawyers, physicians, etc who work long and hard hours to pull in $300-$400k/yr.

Why the heck would you put the laundry upstairs?  Are these people really going to do their own laundry instead of having a maid come in a few days/week? 

More to the point, aren’t they likely to have live-in help?  Where is the maid’s (or nanny’s) room in this plan?

Definitely.  He’s a daily read for me (along with you of course!).

I do miss some aspects of California but the insanity from Sacramento is going to hurt for a long time.  Perhaps the can make a North California and a South California kinda like we have out here in the Carolina’s. 

I can’t believe you didn’t catch breakfast “knook”!!

Awesome!

Owner is agent. Several price reductions in a short period of time. Bought in 2005. Wanna bet there is an option-arm involved?

Treasury secy Geithner said yesterday that over 49,000 mortgages had been renogiated. Considering that over 12M mortgages are under water, the percentage renegotiated is less than 0.5%. The gov’t may need to rethink this approach.

Did you read Greenspan’s book?

The fellow believes that globalization means that the cost of labor (wages) should be the same everywhere, modified only by the risk to capital.

That means that american labor should only make just a bit more than the Chinese since the risk to capital is lower here (more lawyers in the US).

According to good old Alan, populism is wrong.  That is, thinking that your should protect the jobs in your own country is flat out wrong and not efficient.

This is what has driven the exodus of jobs out of this country.  Too many MBAs thinking that it’s OK to move manufacturing jobs out of this country.  After all, their idea is to make the US the financier to the world.

That is the stupidest idea I’ve ever heard.  They were teaching that crap in business school ever since the 70s.  I remember talking to my wife about this when she was getting her international business degree.  It’s plain stupid.

The politicians, of course, went along because they made lots of money.  And yes, it’s a deck of cards.  After all, just because WalMart sells cheap it don’t mean crap if its shoppers are being paid minimum wage and can’t afford it.

Obama sort of said some right things but he’s a complete sell out.  In fact, the Democrats in Congress are the worst enemy because they talk about protecting jobs while they blithely do the other thing.

I’m concerned that we are looking at a revolution.  As for me, I’m gonna vote a fat NO next week at our Propositions.  The politicians and the Public Unions have been at the trough for too long.  It’s time for some responsibility to creep back into our national consensus.

As far as Turtle Ridge… they’re are hosed.  I would not want to be there right.  Not even as a renter because I would not be safe that my landlord was walking away from the deal with me rent money.

My take?  This house will bottom at 1.1 MIL.  And even then, it’ll be expensive.  Think, your RE taxes will be like 20K a year…

I keep seeing people think that by not properly funding schools and the like, suddenly all the overpaid teachers (teachers are overpaid?) will have their salaries cut.  That’s absolutely not true.

In a unionized enviroment, job losses are much more likely than salary or benefit cuts.  That means cuts in services.

Keep in mind that approximately 50% of the state budget goes directly to education (K-12 and colleges/universities).

When this house was built, lots of people were able to pretend to be able to afford it when they really couldn’t, via stupid exotic loans.  If they could only afford the house via creative accounting, they couldn’t afford a maid or nanny via normal accounting.

Have you checked out the web estimates for this home?  Ay! 

BTW- the web estimates for my own home are -as usual- wrong.  They still have the original description of the house.  I wonder if the county ever updates their databases… I know the assessor did change our assessed value when they got copies of the work permits.

But the online tools still show the old 1750 sq foot home…. 

However, funny thing is that the assessed value per foot of my old house is almost as much as the assessed value of this TRidge home.

Perhaps it’s because my lot is 5500 sq feet?  Larger than most in TRidge, I guess.

Damn!  I gotta sell my house.  I got too much equity on it even at a fire sale price.

http://www.spb.ca.gov/jobs/benefits/index.htm#health

“The State of California provides a specific dollar amount to cover its share of the premium and the employee is required to pay any remaining balance.”

Sure if someone is single and choose the cheapest plan, they won’t have to pay premium.  But if they want to cover family or choose more expensive plan(i.e. PPO vs. HMO), they usually pay extra. The benefit is not better than any larger private sector employees.

I am not state employee, but my mother works for UC, and I was covered under her plan when I was younger, there were always a $15 copay for each visit for Kaiser HMO, which was what most others are paying, too.

You can take a look yourself.
https://mars.mcr-inc.com/04056/index.php

$2.2 million and only 1 picture?  Nice.

“Years ago, the brightest minds of a generation were attracted to math, science and engineering…”

An excellent commentary today.

Just think if just a fraction of the bailout money spent today was instead earmarked 10 years ago for scientific pursuits attracting the bright minds to those fields.  This huge misallocation of our nation’s (and the world’s) “human energy” resources is so depressing to ponder.

Disappointing.

It looks like we are officially going at this “Japan Style”. 

Settle in for a lost decade as the banks try to stretch out the losses with yearly bailout payments from the government.

The shoe will drop when the people stuck in these mortgages lose faith in the rebound and start defaulting.  You know there are a lot of people with these loans who want out and are waiting to sell once the market “comes back”.  It’s going to take a little longer to break their spirit.

LOL I posted my comment to the above article before reading this.  Diddo.

MOTIVATED is a codeword for DESPERATE.  Anyone sensing blood in the water?

You have to love how they totally over-price the thing so they can act like they are taking it in the shorts when they settle for some buyer’s “low” bid.

Figures.

I liked the phrasing too.

It all comes back to gambling.  We all like to go over to the casino and play a hand of blackjack every now and again - why not turn your love of blackjack into a career in Finance salted with a pinch of peer-competition?

Notice how during this same period of time, we were being pummeled with reality TV shows where business wannabees claw, cheat, and steal their way to “win” money?

I watched Obama’s ASU graduation speech and he said “Did any of you study engineering?” to a very light cheer/applause.  He then said “Did any of you study business?” which was met with a huge cheer and roar of applause. 

Sucks to be those kids; a little late to the party with worthless business degrees!  Finance and business is going back to being being boring, mundane, and actual work.  No more of these big business loans to start up your fake dog vomit manufacturing business.

The government knows that a broad mortgage modification plan would create such a moral hazard that the whole system would collapse.  So, they intentionally made it so that only people truly borderline qualify.

IMHO, the government’s approach is the right one.  If it’s close, then help out the home owner.  If the home owner really is too far gone, or he’s just messing with the system to get a lower payment (but could pay the old one easily), they shouldn’t be helped.

It reminds me of those crafty car salesmen who try to convince you that you are pulling the shirt off their back and taking food from their children’s mouths.  They get a car for 3K, ask 15K and find a schmuck who will walk in and act all hard and not pay a penny over 10K.

Same thing applies here.  They are fishing for a gullible “negotiator”.

Might as well consolidate all the garbage into one pile.

“If prices start to rally, all these owners who want to get out but want better prices will list their homes and provide supply that will limit appreciation.”

I tend to take the opposite viewpoint.  “All these owners” will more or less wait for prices to turn around, but behaviorally, they will actually list and sell their homes when prices have fallen completely, and they will sell at the bottom.  They will define the bottom; giving up, acquiescence, throwing in the towel, CAPITULATION.

Yup.  Many of the positions in my field have gone off to India so I will eventually be joining the ranks of the “Well…now what?” crowd.  I actually can’t wait until the dollar is utterly worthless and it becomes economically viable to hire Americans again.

Once this gig ends though, I will be more than qualified to man the fryer at KFC.  I’ll just buy myself a nice cozy little tent and camp out at the park Valley Forge style and bathe in the pond before heading off to work on my bicycle.  Maybe I will even move into one of those nice parks in Irvine and work at Charo’s Chicken; I hear the weather is great all year round!  And safe!

Jedi Mind Trick.

They are just casting a line; trying to pre-empt the lowball offer. 

You walk in and say “HAH! I won’t give you a penny more than 1.5!” and the seller will have a huge cry and sob as they “agree” to your “demands” and get for it what they had originally hoped for.

I don’t know why everybody’s so worried. Take a look at *this* report from UCLA’s Anderson Report regarding San Diego.

“...The Anderson Forecast, one of the state’s most followed teams of economic analysts, predicted that housing prices will start rising steadily by the second quarter of the year, starting with a rebound in the price of existing single-family homes.
 
“When it is generally perceived that selling values have reached a bottom, sideline buyers will enter the market and conventional home sales will dominate the real estate recovery,” UCLA economist Mark Schniepp said. “Reported selling values for homes will reverse, slowly at first, and then rise more convincingly.”

The median price, which is projected to average $325,374 this year, will rebound to $490,966 by 2013, according to the forecast. That would return the median price to its levels of early last year, but would be well below the inflation-adjusted 2005 peak average of $602,327.”

You read that right—a 34 percent price INCREASE in the next 5 years.

But wait…there’s MORE.

“...Only 5,200 new housing units were authorized in San Diego County last year, the lowest number since record keeping began in 1968. The forecast predicted that the number will be even lower this year: 2,300.

But the economists predicted a rebound starting with a sharp recovery in 2010, driven by increasing demand from a growing population. The forecast predicted that by 2013, housing construction will hit 17,000 a year – close to the average of the peak years between 1999 and 2005…”

Ummm….I guess somebody forgot to tell him that the population has been flat to declining in San Diego for several years now…

Oh well…

here’s a link to the full Kool-Aid laden text.

http://www3.signonsandiego.com/stories/2009/may/15/1b15sdecon201510-home-price-fall-nears-bottom-repo/

Yes, you can also see it illustrated in the redfin chart showing the space between ‘list’ and ‘sold’ prices in that zip code.  Much father apart than a lot of the recent profiled properties.

MMmmm, Charo Chicken!  If I have to be homeless, at least it will be delicious.

Huh? I thought we already had a lost decade.

Ooops….I thought you were talking about DJIA/SP500

“Huh? I thought we already had a lost decade.”

I agree - we already have had a lost decade.  Housing has been more expensive than it should because of the exotic lending that was around for almost ten years.

Shameful.

“According to good old Alan, populism is wrong.  That is, thinking that your should protect the jobs in your own country is flat out wrong and not efficient.”

I’m all for globalization:  Let those who are best at what they do, do it!  However, I want that metric applied everywhere and not just where I work (in the private sector). 

Let’s scrap the teachers’ unions and hand out school vouchers.  I’ll pay an Indian who was educated in the US to teach my kids math via satellite instead of some less motivated person who is counting the days to their 55th birthday so they can retire with a pension.

Scrap the unions, scrap Davis Bacon, and outsource government jobs.  Make everyone else compete the way I have to compete.  What’s unfair about this?

“Finance and business is going back to being being boring, mundane, and actual work.”

Like it was when my grandpa was a banker in the early 60’s in Chippewa Falls, WI.  He did not have a college degree, but took classes to get a certificate to run the bank.  Hard, boring work keeping all those ledgers in balance.  My dad said he used to remember when the bank auditors were in town because my grandpa was always anxious around that time.  If you were missing so much as a penny from the required reserves, you were toast!

My grandpa lived the rest of his life in Chippewa.  He didn’t have to worry about angry mobs claiming to be bamboozled with exotic loans coming after him.

You could always squat in style in the vacant-for-close-to-a-year monstrosity at 2 Angell (profiled numerous times on the IHB) and simply walk across the street to work!

http://www.redfin.com/CA/Irvine/2-Angell-St-92612/home/4697876

No kidding. These people must be smoking crack. The fool aid isn’t strong enough.

I’m fine with loan mods as long as they come with a fraud investigation. esp if the loan being modded was stated income.

and if they’re found to be guilty of federal loan fraud, then prosecute to the fullest extent. make this widely known before anyone starts loan mod talks, and I bet loan mod applications drop 50% or more.

Davis-Bacon was passed as a frankly racist law to keep black contractors/workers from undercutting (white) unions on labor price. It was a disgrace then and remains so to this day.

Guess what, a neighbor who is employed by the Orange County Sanitation Department gets weekly massages from her chiropractor free as it is billed as “chiropractic care” under her insurance policy. Her husband gets them free too. Do you really think they are the only ones? There are so many excessive benefits for government workers it sickens me. Oh yeah, don’t forget about Orange County court employess getting a two hour lunch everday. I have worked in the private sector for 25 years and have never got any of those benefits!

“That is adding value. If you take that finished house and inflate its value through some innovative loan program, the house is not changed. Where is the value added? The cheerleaders of financial innovation overlooked this obvious fact. Moving money around never adds value.”

I agree! But the prime movers of this false currency in housing were real estate agents. The current rate of 6% would provide the agent with a $132,000 payday on the featured home. This is the same reason CEOs destroyed their companies for short term gains in stock prices.

It appears real estate agents prop up ridiculous prices and extort unrealistic prices from unsuspecting buyers. As a result they destroy communities.

Can anyone tell me why the agent should be paid such a ridiculous sum. Since the house is worth less, isn’t this fraud? Couldn’t someone sue the real estate agent?

I don’t think anyone said it’s unfair.  What’s wrong with spending your money to keep it at home and your economy actually grounded in reality?  Do we all really need houses full of junk, anyhow?

As for outsourcing government jobs, how are you going to have restaurants inspected from India, so you don’t get food poisoning, or have prisons manned from Africa?  And I don’t want my kids taught via satellite.  I don’t a a bunch of think 8 year olds are really going to sit still in their seats and listen while the TV or computer monitor drones on about math.  I have three children with a combined 20 years’ worth of teachers between them.  I can think of one teacher in that time that fit your description.  Don’t get me wrong, I get irritated at teacher salaries for 9-month (with two weeks off in the winter and a week in the spring), 7-hour a day jobs too.  But give them credit.  Most of them truly do want to teach kids and put a lot of time and energy into the job.

Hey Irvine Realtard.  What has happened to this site?  Riddled with ads and the amount of new user comments are dropping as fast as your “book” ranking on Amazon.

Now block this IP so you never get any negative comments.  Dbag.

I’m in a simlar situation.  I closed on my Riverside house today (ya!).  The tax folks say it’s less than 1,100 square feet, when it’s really 1,900 square feet or so, due to a (permitted) addition built thirty years ago-one of the reasons I was able to get a great deal on it.  Unless you ask them about it, it looks like they will never update their files.  If/when I ever sell it, I probably will ask them to fix it, since it will be easier to sell and will sell for more if the listing shows the actual square footage.

http://www.ocsd.com/jobs/benefits.asp

They use either Blue Cross(HMO/PPO) and Kaiser HMO just like about everybody else.  Plus looks like there significant cost sharing on the employees part, notwithstanding misinformed statement to the contrary above.

Do people abuse their health insurance? Yes. But why single out public sector employees.  Can you say people who get BlueCross/Kaiser coverage from their private sector employers don’t abuse it?

Way to be a troll, competing realtor-

Actually, I partially disagree on this.

Unlike stocks and mutual funds, a primary home is an abode. For those that have equity, sure, they might capitulate if they need to move out of the area. If not (and they wanna stay there until they die), how are they gonna capitulate?

For those that have no equity whatsoever, they don’t need to capitulate since it’s not theirs in the first place

Our laundry is upstairs because that is where most of the clothes and towels end up anyway. Dragging loads of laundry downstairs to wash it then dragging it upstairs to put it away is just plain dumb. I can wear the dirty stuff upstairs and shove it right into the washer.
We have tons of laundry as we live on a working farm, think 2 pairs of jeans a day plus shirts, socks, underwear, etc. As a 50 something year old person, I LOVE my upstairs laundry and if I ever built another house again, I would be sure to put it upstairs.

Job losses + benefit cuts + salary cuts = happy taxpayer. No on props 1A - 1F.

Geotpf, how many investor homes are you planning on buying?

Ihave been wondering about that “PRIVATE FULL bathroom”. Maybe the breakfast knooks [ who ever they are ] are just hung like racehorses.

“For a very long time I tried as hard as I could to buy only things made in the USA.  It is difficult, but with the help of websites, and keeping track of what dept stores sell what stuff made in the US, I managed to get most of what I needed.  But it is more expensive (although honestly, the quality of the US-made products I have bought has ALWAYS been better) and much more time consuming than just strolling off to Target, Bed, Bath and Beyond, or wherever, and just picking up the goods without even looking at where it is made.”

Can you share what some of these websites are?

Zero.  I bought this one to live in.