QUESTION: ANYBODY HURTING OUT THERE IN THIS ECONOMY???

[NP_Gresham]

Odd side effect. Big hiring freeze where I work, so while fewer are working, those that are rarely take days off. Fortunatly for me, OT is never mandatory. But when co-workers are working 50-60 days in a row, does it not mean time to hire?

One person I work with last took a day off in July 09!

I turn down OT more than I work. To the corporate honchos: For gods sake give the unemployed work and stop calling me.

 

[shadroch]

When a person or family has to put a big down payment down on their house, they have a vested interest in it and will do everything they can to keep it.

Give somebody a house for no money down and why wouldn't they walk away when the house is under water? You might as well rent in those conditions.

[Icculus308win]

i love that homes are not the investment people thought they were. This whole stupid "home depot mentality" really gets on my nerves - "must go improve my home at all costs!!!" The banks were saying this - and behind your back they were unraveling the entire system.

 

i am glad im young and dont own a home. like a comic book its only worth what someone is willing to pay.

 

Uh... the benefits of owning a home are TREMENDOUS. Buying a home you cannot afford is not.

What else that happened was people bought houses and took out $500,000 thousand dollar loans only to find out those houses are now only worth $185,000!

So it wasn`t just taking out a loan they couldn`t afford but buying something of overpriced value(sound familar?), I always took this advice from my now dear departed 93 year old grandfather, he told me when I was a kid "If it looks too good to be true, then it probably is."

There are people who pray on dreams and would love to get rich off of people. Yes even credit card companies/banks, they really want people to fail so they can collect debt/interest fees. buyers beware!

 

Your Grandfather sounds like a smart man. (thumbs u

[dupont2005]

When a person or family has to put a big down payment down on their house, they have a vested interest in it and will do everything they can to keep it.

Give somebody a house for no money down and why wouldn't they walk away when the house is under water? You might as well rent in those conditions.

Totally. I would never buy a home I couldn't lay 20% cash on. I'm extremely paranoid about job security though so even financing a nice car is too much for me.

[snitzer]

The Mrs and I have both been lucky over the course of the downturn. Her in a state government position and myself in a well-performing private company. Locally, housing prices continue their traditional slow increase, while the state is still in the black. Recently, oil/mineral/gas lease rights, in our county alone, generated an additional $80 million for the state budget (sans any private leases that occurred). Now it's a waiting game to see what impact those leases will have - across the board.

 

On a related note...my parents are downsizing and sold their house in six days. We noticed that 30% of the visitors were from outside of our state. They consistently cited lower taxes as the primary motivation for leaving their current situation. No state income tax