Foreclosure helps homeowners and the economy

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123336541474235541.html

by quoderat • 17 years ago

14 13 17 years ago

online.wsj.com

indiejade3• 17 years ago

From the article: Mr. Su is a real-estate consultant and a former REO broker.

Maybe whomever submitted this article should have titled it: "Foreclosure helps real-estate consultants and brokers"

Basically what it boils down to is that there needs to be a smaller gap between cost of ownership and rents in an area. Diminishing this gap will reduce the "power" that 99.9999999999999 percent of real-estate people have leveraged during the last eight years.

The only way to reduce this gap is by paying people in the real estate profession less: get them to divulge their pay in dollars, not percents. Unfortunately, with the current "mortgage meltdown," people in real estate are the first ones getting paid! Whether a home is getting foreclosed upon or simply just "sold," Realtors always get paid. I studied their games. I know how they play it.

zzzmarcus5• 17 years ago

You start off with an implied ad-hominem attack; just because he's a broker doesn't mean he's only looking out for himself or that doesn't know the industry works in every day.

Then you summarize the article by basically stating the exact opposite of the premise of the article which is actually closer to: "foreclosure helps home owners who are in trouble while at the same time helping the finance industry recover."

Then you state that there should be a smaller gap between the cost of ownership and renting. Fine, this is probably easy enough for everyone to agree with. But you, unlike the author of the article who talks about supply and demand equalizing the market through the foreclosure process, say that the solution is somehow for real estate professionals to "divulge their pay in dollars, not percents."

First of all realtors, by divulging the percentage they are paid of a transaction, are already divulging their pay in dollars since everyone who is a party to the transaction knows the amount of the transaction. It's simple math.

Second, someone is paying real estate professionals for a service that apparently worth what realtors and brokers charge. The market is sustaining their fees, if the service they provided wasn't valuable, someone would step in and do it cheaper.

Third, even if real estate professionals didn't make a cent off transactions, even if there were no realtors or brokers, it doesn't change the core problem or anything suggested the article's solution. They aren't the ones who control market values or financing.

michaelneale2• 17 years ago

>You start off with an implied ad-hominem attack

As a side point - if in a discussion someone brings up someone elses professional background/employer/affiliation (the implication being that it undermines their authority) is that really an ad-hominem attack?

indiejade3• 17 years ago

Watch: http://kcet.org/socal/2008/09/foreclosure-alley.html

Which party is hurrying the transaction such that the owners of the belongings in the home don't even have time to move out or to coordinate efforts with an ecologically-friendly recycling charity?

The Realtors.

Everything into a landfill? Seriously? Realtors make $ by flipping properties like flipping burgers. They are the only ones who are "thriving" from such a mortgage mess. It should, for all practical purposes, be illegal.

P.S. The video starts off slow; watch until where Lisa Ling starts reporting. Take note of who is paying the dude to "paint the grass green".

zzzmarcus5• 17 years ago

That is just flat out wrong. Even the story states repeatedly that a foreclosure doesn't just sneak up on you. Why those people left behind all their belongings is beyond me, but it wasn't because it happened all of a sudden. Like the story mentions, they know months in advance. Everything in the story about why the stuff is left is speculation.

Even if realtors did cause foreclosures to somehow sneak up on people, it has nothing to do with what causes people to end up in foreclosure in the first place.

You're going after the wrong target.

Cunard2• 17 years ago

When I see the words "clean" and "capable" to describe markets and new buyers of forclosed properties, and the word "evil" used to describe loan modification, I think that: 1) clean is the opposite of dirty. The unfettered market is clean, he says. 2) capable. Who doesn't want to be in that category? Capable! Yes. I am capable. And THAT is the reason (sigh of relief) that I am not being forclosed upon. This article says: "loan modification is not only ineffective, it is evil." So. If you're incapable...don't come crying to me. because it would be evil to offer help..... "Get a job.", then. Thanks Rupert.

Foreclosure helps homeowners and the economy

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