Wednesday, July 26, 2023

(higher rates + higher standards = fewer buyers) / (full car lots + manufacturer's discounts) = LOWER ASKING PRICES

"Perhaps no one has felt the pain more than car buyers. It’s not just that sticker prices are way up. Or that lenders have tightened credit standards. On top of all that, steadily higher auto loan rates have elbowed many would-be buyers out of the market."  -A.P.





Tuesday, July 25, 2023

Powell's Heap Um Big Pow Wow


 It's that time again...big Summer meeting at Chief's Wigwam

I laddered out a bunch of certificates last year as rates came off of the floor (finally) and they are set to start maturing and earning about twice what they did last year starting in August.  Good times.  He who does not understand compounding interest pays it.  He who understands compounding interest collects it.

Inflation is not abating in any meaningful way.  There is more talk around the globe about the legitimacy of the dollar's world reserve currency status.  Foreigners are questioning whether or not our economy and our currency still deserves to be the end all and be all to the rest of humanity.

One sign that inflation will be cooling soon comes from a place many will not understand.  Denial rates for credit have spiked.  No more juice for "Great Americans" who buy shit on payments.

"Over the 12 months ending in June, 21.8% of people who applied for credit were rejected, according to data released this week by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. In other words, more than 1 in 5 people who submitted an application for a credit card, mortgage, auto loan or another type of credit were turned down."

Thursday, July 20, 2023

The Cure for High Prices is High Prices

 

"California cities where the median rental price decreased

  • Los Angeles metro by 2.6%,
  • San Bernardino metro by 5.9%,
  • Sacramento metro by 3.5%
  • San Diego metro by .6%
  • San Francisco metro by 4%

Overall, in the western metro area of the country, rent was 3% lower than where it was last year."

California Rental News 

Where the Western coastal cities and the North East lead, the rest of the country generally follows shortly thereafter.  

"Asking rental price" is the proverbial fly in the ointment where it comes to grossly inflated "asking sale price" for real estate.  For many people, if renting makes more financial sense than owning, they will rent a home instead of buying a home.




Wednesday, July 19, 2023

All Signs Point To a Long and Slow Death

Sometimes, the only way to win at a game is to not play.  Active participants in today's housing market game will live to regret their actions.

Read about housing starts at Zero Hedge here.



Potential sellers find themselves shackled with the "golden handcuffs" of a 3% mortgage that will be replaced with a mortgage at 7% if they sell and move.

The pool of potential buyers will dry up as the summer buying season ends and the industry will be scraping the bottom of the barrel to come up with buyers.  The only sellers who will win right now are those who purchased their homes a long time ago and who have no debt or very little debt.

Buyers will be the patsies.  Best quote/comment from the Zero Hedge article comes from someone who says they are a mortgage underwriter:

"I'm a mortgage underwriter.  Its just the opposite.  Guidelines are easing up to get lesser qualified borrowers in the door sadly.  The FHA, VA and USDA loans are basically subprime at this point.  With down payment assistance programs, people with no money down can buy a house with so so credit or basically no credit as long as they meet a certain credit score."

Sound familiar?  Speaking of subprime home buyers, Angelo Mozilo (founder of Countrywide Mortgage) passed away this week.


The "Original Orange Man" - Godspeed Angelo

Saturday, July 15, 2023

Just Believe

 

Contrary to our desires, we can't really "believe" Santa Claus into existence.

Apple's current stock price to earnings is presently sitting at 32.35.  The company's implied value is no more believable than the legends of Santa Claus or the Tooth Fairy.  Will that P/E go higher?  Maybe.  The nation is full of people desperate to believe in Apple, in something, in anything...

How has the stock market maintained "the levitation trick" over the past several months?

Read about what realists "believe" over at The Daily Reckoning - here's a hint/snippet from the article:

"Taken in a broader context, over 100% of all the gains this year in the S&P index have been driven by seven stocks. Three of those seven stocks account for 68% of the S&P’s entire yearly gains."


I recall first seeing one of these ridiculous signs in the home of a former girlfriend some 20 odd years ago.

Friday, July 14, 2023

Costco Possibly Quitting Queer Beer

 



The asterisk in the upper right corner normally indicates that Costco will no longer stock the item after existing items are sold.  Get woke and go broke.  

Not so long ago (2020), Beyond Meat company stock traded at a price of nearly $200 per share.  It is now trading at under $18.  It's price to earnings ratio (P/E) remains in the negative.  That means that it has still not turned a profit as a company and is a purely speculative stock.  

It is a Hoola Hoop or a Pet Rock.  A fad.  A trendy and shiny item that your teenage daughter thinks is cool.

Anheuser Busch searched high and low and found a woke, female, white millennial ass hat with an ivy league degree under her belt and they made her the Veep of one of their more successful products.  The horse faced girl on the left (go figure) is her.  40 years of being on top of the light beer heap and they threw it all away.  

And for what?  Virtue signaling inclusive bullshit.  No different than white suburban kids sending in their lunch money and car wash earnings to the local BLM chapter so that Patrice Cullors could go out and buy a multi-million dollar mansion in a predominately white neighborhood in southern California.  Whitey America that resides in the burbs has some of the most stupid fucking offspring in the country.  Truly dumb.



Real women of genius

Friday, July 7, 2023

Democrat Party - A Coalition of Morons, Hustlers, Gullible Young People and the "Perpetually Aggrieved"

"Grace Meng (D-NY) announced today that she reintroduced her legislation that would lower the voting age in the United States to 16-years-old. The Congresswoman's measure seeks to replace the 26th amendment of the U.S. Constitution with a new amendment that would allow 16- and 17-year-olds the right to vote."

Go figure that this asinine idea came from a woman with a "D" behind her name.


The image is for those of you astute enough to put two plus two together and consistently come up with a sum of four.

Just think of some of the complete morons you went to high school with and wonder if you would want them expressing their opinions as "Great Americans" on the direction of the country.  I remember myself as a teenager and would have had no business what so ever casting a vote.


Thursday, July 6, 2023

Artificial Intelligence - Collection and Repossession Assistant

When your deadbeat tenant or debtor is having trouble remembering when the payment is due:



Harley-Davidson's credit division has seen a noticeable increase in delinquent contracts secured with Hogs but there is a serious shortage of repossession agents who are willing to repo motorcycles for the small fee that H.D. credit pays for bringing in motorcycles that secured delinquent loans.  

Assistance from some artificial intelligence device might remind "Mr. Ride to Live and Live to Ride Biker Dude" that once a month he is your bitch and to cough up the payment or else.

Perception when making the purchase: Easy Rider.  
Reality: Don't miss a payment or the Hog gets repo'd and you have shitty credit.

Ford has not implemented its patented invention (described below) but I suspect it will be coming soon.  To my thinking, they could make a few bucks by licensing their invention to other manufacturers.

"And instead of flying us to work, collapsing into briefcases (or backpacks), and hanging under desks while we work, our cars can now refuse to let us in.

Wait. What?!

Yup. A Ford repossession patent would make it so autonomous and semi-autonomous cars could disable air-conditioning or even drive themselves to the repo lot if they think you’re ignoring delinquency notices."

Sunday, July 2, 2023

France's "Saint George Floyd Moment"

Some kid from Africa who migrated to France tried pulling away from a legitimate traffic stop and the cop waxed him right on the spot.  Overkill?  Probably.  The price paid in kind by the French is to have whole sections of cities burned to the ground, looting, out of control chaos, etc.  The mainstream news sources are not talking a whole lot about it but you can read all about it right here.

Why are so many Africans in France in the first place?  Because the French are too lazy to build their own buildings and do the manual labor needed to keep their country going.  Too busy drinking and eating and collecting very generous social welfare benefits that are financed by the working class which is increasingly made up of migrating Africans with far different ideas about social norms than the native French.  Sound familiar yet?  Any patterns forming for you yet, Skippy?



They had their chances to avoid all this bullshit when Le Pen family members were running for office (both the father and the daughter) but they blew it.

I'm not a white supremacist (my shit stinks just like the next man or woman) but I might accurately be called a white separatist.  Associate with those who are like you and "pick your own fucking cotton" and you'll live a life that has a lot less drama and bullshit.  All that "We Are The World, kumbaya my Lord" bullshit is just that - bullshit.