Time To Read Latest IMF Report On World Economy

October 4, 2007

Elaine Meinel Supkis

The latest IMF report about world banking systems is out and it sort of frets about the mess we are in but as usual, it mostly pays attention to 'emerging markets' rather than paying any attention to the biggest mess of them all: the US. It is full of charts and graphs which I amended and used here. There are a host of thes graphs so I hope everyone visits the IMF page where they parked this document. And Paulson says we should make more jobs! But then, Wall Street celebrates only job cuts, wage reductions and other destructive things. So we continue down this path that leads us off the cliff. More foreigners are buying up more American banking and economic machines and kiss our asses goodbye. And there are a lot of asses out there, aren't there, hee-haw!

Every quarter, the IMF issues global financial reports, here is the most recent report that came out this week:

This is the opening text to this big report. As a summary of what is going on, it has lots of good information. Anyone wishing to know what the future holds for all of us, this report gives some idea. It has many charts and graphs which I love. These can give a good idea of how things flow, relative values and trends. It should be painfully obvious to everyone that the world is entering a new cycle that is not going to make a bunch of wild speculators wildly rich.

The IMF won't say much about this vital matter but the world goes through various speculative cycles. Speculative cycles are not the same as investment cycles. Usually, speculative cycles are triggered by the creation, not just from new technologies but from new financial 'instruments' and changes in the speed at which financial houses can communicate information that allows them to anticipate market conditions. When we look back at the last 500 years of finance history, we see a strong correlation between new technology being used to gain early knowledge of market situations leading to wild over-guessing of all conditions causing a crash due to too much debt generated to bid up various market items.

Let's go back to the very first invention which literally spawned the term, 'Revolution': the telescope. When Galileo built the first telescope, he turned it to the heavens but other curious minds in Italy saw a quite different use for it: they could spot distant ships at sea and thus, know who was arriving in port and when they would come. All this, before anyone without a telescope could see the sails on the horizon. This 'insider knowledge' was very important because all Italian traders used various paper scripts for equivalent value for proposed cargo value. Sailing was a very dangerous operation back then and ships sometimes never came to port.

An astute merchant, knowing not only if his own ships were coming in, knowing if RIVAL ships with similar goods were coming in, could use this information for deciding when to buy or sell his own stocks and what the banking terms would be in a three day time frame, for example. This knowledge was so powerful, the first merchants and bankers who used telescopes kept this very secret.

Like all moneymaking secrets, this eventually came to be known and the towers in ports where ships came in had employees set up to log the coming and goings of ships. By the way, using spotters to track ships isn't gone at all. I used to do this for fun for Hellenic Lines when my ex-husband worked there. I would take the binoculars out to Grave's End and spot ships and then call him and he would inform his boss, Mr. K (Kallinopolis) that the ships were nearing NY harbor.

Back to speculative ventures thriving on new technology: the innovations brought about by merchants in Amsterdam hiring many optics grinders and spreading this skill and making money selling telescopes create a secondary technology skill very important to the art of number-crunching: eye glasses. The ability to see long lines of numbers easily shot up and was greatly appreciated by armies of accountants. This was as good as inventing computers.

Indeed, the invention of the number 'zero' was also revolutionary. Indeed, the use of 'zero' took off at the same time telescopes and eyeglasses were invented. So we had a classic 1-2-3 technological advance that amplified each other. Needless to say, the lands with the most liberal, humanistic philosophies were best able to exploit this triple header! And that was the end of Italy as a trading power for the Church joined the State in crushing humanism and they imprisoned poor Galileo. This is why Amsterdam ended up taking advantage of these advances!

And what happened next?

HAHAHA. The infamous Tulip Bulb Mania! I only realized this today while toiling through so many IMF documents. In the back of my brain, a part was saying, 'I have seen this before, what triggered this mess?'

Indeed, here is my theory: when one technological breakthrough creates a better system for using numbers or running up calculations like, say, the invention of the acabus in China, this is one step in creating a huge surge in financial activities. The second step is for this technology to be integrated with literature in some fashion like the invention of paper or cuniform mud tablets in Ur, then these have to be somehow moved forwards by improved transmission of this information via some sort of transportation revolution like the wheel or the stirrup or use of homing pigeons, etc. When these three things mesh, we see a sudden surge in trade and profits soar due to increased knowledge.

And when this happens, we get speculative bubbles. We can't peer into the past too far to draw this correlation but if we start with modern history, it becomes very clear indeed. The invention of the cannon-bearing ships happened exactly when the telescope was invented and no captain went to see by 1650 without his telescope! For he could see other ships, see ports in the distance, he could use flags and other devices to send out information to agents watching for him. And this enabled these captains to wage long-distance water warfare!

All these revolutionary changes caused the Europeans to explode across the planet on a massive conquest that is finally ending with the disgraceful defeat of American arms in Vietnam and Iraq.

Let's look at a later explosion: the invention of paper money. Again, several forces came together and the instant bankers understood they could issue money based on DEBTS, this launched a series of, first, huge bubbles and then many lessor bubbles. Every time the harsh lesson that one can't issue infinite debt is learned, it is quickly forgotten until the next generation has to have the whipped into their skins. Within this Kondratieff Cycle is the larger Kondratieff cycle of every 60 years or so: there are revolutionary changes in the system that merge or coincide which cause a change in the speed of using numbers, gaining information and transmission of this information to distant viewers who then use this to anticipate economic events.

For example, in the 19th century, the invention of the train along with the invention of higher mathematics which used the discoveries of calculus, etc to apply them to the business ledger. There is always a timelag from the invention of some scientific device or system and it being exploited by merchants and manufacturers. The various scientific societies that sprang up in Britain starting in 1750 and onwards was the keystone to the Industrial Revolution. Scientists were directly communicating their discoveries to interested merchants and manufacturers like the Daltons who made pottery, for example. Instead of dry scholarship, everyone was discussing revolutionary discoveries and understandings of how things work. This push for sharing knowledge coincided with these same individuals creating better steel smelting and the use of steam. And the height of this movement was the work of Charles Darwin in biology and Adam Smith in economics. This gave Britain a broad intellectual/economic base for the Industrial Revolution.

Which created, right off the bat, a huge speculative bubble that burst in 1848 and thus, nearly destroyed the banking system and bankrupted many who were participating in this revolution, a number of the revolutionary industrialists were destroyed such as the creator of steam engines, for example.

It also gave birth to Marx and Engels and their revolutionary take on the value of labor in the capitalist matrix.

The invention of the telegraph ushered in yet another big change in how business was conducted and this caused another bubble/collapse in the late 1800's. When Einstein broke classic physics, the telephone was invented as well as the airplane and the radio. This would have created the world's biggest bubble yet except it all exploded quite literally, thanks to Alfred Nobel, into a very destructive war, WWI. The US managed to, by itself, create a good sized bubble out of all this despite Europe being cut out of the chance.

With the creation of computers, satellite communications and high-speed transportation of all sorts, we entered the second half of the 20th century and the bubble this has created is still growing! Despite the smaller ups and downs embedded within this latest revolutionary cycle, the main outlines of this bubble are quite obvious. The bubble may not be growing in the US anymore, it is now moving to Asia. But the US has made such a big DEBT bubble based on this technological revolution, it is already reaching the point that it can destroy this bubble everywhere all at once! For we are no longer 'growing' in the technological/travel sense. We are speculating. And this is the end phase of such bubbles.

The technology will survive this bursting bubble if we avoid a world war. And this is the tricky part: seldom do the people suffering such a burst take it lightly. They nearly always lash out.

The revolutionary news systems that have been cooked up by math geniuses and computer nerds have their uses but only if they are considered 'educational' and not 'automatic money machines.' In pre-revolutionary France, Mr. Law, who proposed the use of government-issued bonds backed by New Orleans bringing in gold and trade, told the Regent of France, he mustn't dilute the value by selling too many bonds, he must hold them. But the Regent loved to spend money and seeing that this was 'free' money and seeing that it grew in value as everyone wanted these Mississippi bonds, he merrily sold more and more of them until their value collapsed and there were riots in the streets.

So the problem here is, various sharp-minded geniuses come up with 'fool proof' systems which they explain to their bosses who then hear the words 'fool' and 'proof' and decide, they can fool everyone and thus, get very rich without much effort or skill beyond unleashing the systems set up by their underlings.

This irresponsiblity is endemic to humans. We can't help it. The temptation to gorge endlessly is part of our genes. So any system that is set up that lets cautious people anticipate events and exploit this knowledge end up trying to CREATE events via pushing these buttons, shoving these things forwards as fast and as hard as possible. This is why 'inflation' exists. There is a startling number of people out there who imagine that if they imagine something and wish for it to happen, it will happen.

This is an illusion. One can desire something and work towards it but it is a confluence of wanting, working and then not having something bad happen, that allows some people to gain their dreams. But the truth is, this happens rarely and usually, during revolutionary times when things are changing. But when things go bad, many of the people who thought their dreams were coming true due to their mental powers, that they are really helpless leaves in the gutter during a thunderstorm.

Many readers ask me for advice. And I wish I could give good advice but this is dishonest. The only good thing to do is the classic, 'Golden Rule': aside from 'He who has gold, rules.' If we live our lives correctly, we will at least be able to sail along safely but when things go haywire due to reckless people, we all pay the price, alas. This is why I opposed Bush Sr. and Jr. Both were talking tax cuts when we needed to stop our wild overspending. Enough Americans were tempted by this promise of a free lunch and free ride, the classic bubble mentality took over and thanks to computers and modern transport systems, the US created our massive debt/trade/housing bubble.

This IMF chart shows the huge negative flow from US housing CDOs crashing as more and more homeowners with recent, namely, new, mortgages go rapidly bankrupt. Seldom in our history have people bought such expensive things and then turned around nearly instantly and gone into bankruptcy. Usually there is a downturn due to overextending credit, then this happens. But the bankruptcies here started instantly right after the peak in housing values. Like, the very next day! These bad loans will peak after 2011 so this crash is guaranteed to last at least another 4 years.

Indeed, this is classic. The minute anyone figures out some new economic system that exploits new math/communications devices and systems, everyone rushes to do the same. If the systems they are rushing into using involve hedging which means the people who go against the grain win the spoils, everyone goes against the grain and the grain is spoiled. Everyone can't be a contrary force. Indeed, we are in an upside-down economic world. Good mortgages to people capable of paying the principal and interest were BAD investments while people with bad credit and risky futures were paying a higher interest rates so they were GOOD investments! Which is why so many bankers and fund managers fell for these stupid things.

When these risky contrary investments collapsed, there was this army of investors now heading out the doors all at the same time. This is a classic panic and is a classic feature of all bubbles. The modern computer systems and communications made this worse, not better.

Ergo: if there are improvments in communication speed and mathematical cacluations, this INCREASES the speed of balloon collapses. If everyone is on the same wavelength, the Kondratieff wave becomes a tsunami. The IMF notes a 'long period of stability' which is a lie. Russia and Argentina went bankrupt just 8 years ago. And has the IMF forgotten the Great Asian Currency Crisis already?

Someone has had 'stability': Japan. They dropped their interest rates to virtually 0% for the last 15 years now. This is a very low rate and for a very long time. And it is very ahistorical: never has this happened before. So the seeming stability was false. It continues because it is based on a conspiracy to keep Japanese rates below the rate of world inflation of all commodities. The Japanese even complain about the rise in commodity prices as they claim there is no inflation!

This chart shows how the US has wildly speculated in the ABX markets. I look at the ABX sales once and awhile. Back in June, it went off the cliff and is now grinding along. Losses in down markets are always greater than the best profits in up markets when bubbles burst. So if you spend $1,000 for your tulip bulb or Mississippi shares, it ends up worth $0 and if you borrowed money to buy them, you end up bankrupt and the bank loses money, etc.

Hedge funds set up to be a contrary investment scheme, ended up all buying this same thing and the banks weren't far behind, either. And note the chart on the right: the US is the holder of 75% of these stupid things, not Asians. Indeed, if we took Australia out of that chart and put it with the Europeans and Americans, the Asian exposure is virtually none. So we hold this tar baby mostly ourselves!

The IMF report loves to veer off into speculation about 'those people': the emerging markets, the oil pumping nations. The IMF is so worried about all these entities even as the IMF frets about the US, the focus is on saving the other nations that are growing from...themselves! Isn't that rich? So the chart above lists the world's biggest sovereign wealth funds. Note that all but two are oil pumping nations. And the two that aren't are Chinese cultures.

No surprise, the top nation doing this is the UAE operating out of Dubai. But the number two nation is...NORWAY! How interesting. They are investing their fund surplus. The standard of living in Norway is rather spartan compared to most of the other European nations and certainly, the US. But they are not going to go down in flames like all their neighbors and the US, either.

I included both of these charts to show how everything flew up into the air or blew up or whatever: classic bubbles popping. All the US charts whether it be for trade, debt accumulation or whatever, shows the exact same curve. This is a sign that we have created a mega-bubble, a historic event when it is the world's biggest empire.

From Bloomberg:

Walter Bagehot, an economist and author writing in the 19th century, had the answers to the current credit crunch.

In 1866, the U.K. money markets were in turmoil. The collapse of a private bank called Overend & Co. threatened to destroy the fragile trust underpinning the credit system.

The parallels with today are powerful, as ripples from the crash in the U.S. subprime mortgage market threaten to swamp parts of the financial markets. Central banks are losing control of monetary policy, as short-term money-market rates jump and long-term bond yields develop immunity to policy changes. Their sovereignty is under fire, as the crisis forces them to be reactive rather than proactive.

An amusing read. But of course, since all speculative bubbles follow the same psychological and economic trajectory, the proposed cures are always, sobriety and careful lending by bankers. And this always fails.

From Bloomberg:

Bear Stearns Cos., the securities firm hit hardest by the collapse of the subprime mortgage market, said it will ``weather the storm'' and a recovery in the debt markets is under way.

``Things are getting better'' since policy makers lowered the Federal Reserve's benchmark interest rate on Sept. 18, Bear Stearns President Alan Schwartz said in a presentation to investors in New York today. ``Liquidity has improved.''

All the charts and graphs show clearly that the debt crisis is beginning and will worsen. Bears Stearns hopes the Fed bandaid will fix the amputated credit sources. Wishful thinking is the next step for all wizards waving wands. Bears Stearns now claims they are avoiding Risky and hanging out with Safety. But the money returns with Safety are slender and if interest rates are low, very slender when the inflation devil eats it all up. So they will be forced to court Risky again.

From the Nikkei:

BOJ Survey Shows Many More Consumers See Economy Declining

TOKYO (Nikkei)--The percentage of consumers who said economic conditions had worsened from a year earlier jumped 10.5 percentage points from the June poll to 34.1%, according to the results of a September survey released Thursday by the Bank of Japan.
**************************************
ANALYSIS: China Boqi Sees Growing Demand, Stiffer Competition

SHANGHAI (Nikkei)--China Boqi Environmental Solutions Technology (Holding) Co. (1412) became the first mainland Chinese firm to debut on the first section of the Tokyo Stock Exchange two months ago. The company will likely enjoy robust demand for its desulfurization equipment as electric power production expands in China, but its profit outlook is unclear as are the prospects for new businesses it plans to enter.

How can the American system make money if Japan is going down the tubes as the government-imposed depression now sets up there in ernest? Japan has to crush inflation and has done so via the brutal method of cutting wages. This kills commerce, of course. So they hope the US will buy while they refuse to buy, a bad trade situation our government should be howling about, not assisting. And China is slowly penetrating the Japanese Fortress. The Japanese, like the Koreans, are being reeled in by Beijing.

From Bloomberg:

Orders placed with U.S. factories fell by the most in seven months in August as the turmoil in credit markets eroded business confidence.

Weaker demand for furniture, home appliances and construction machinery helped push orders down 3.3 percent from July, the Commerce Department said today in Washington. The decline was greater than forecast and followed a revised 3.4 percent gain in the previous month. Excluding transportation products such as cars and airplanes, orders dropped 1.7 percent.

Stocks surged on news that workers lost more benefits and pay and more lay offs, etc. These cause consuming to collapse but in the upside-down world of contrarian speculations, the financiers all loved this news. This is beyond stupid. But then, this is typical of collapsing bubbles. Everyone hopes to save their money by firing all the workers or reducing wages or passing on inflation while not allowing wages to keep up. And then all commerce collapses and they can't understand how they made this happen. Today, Treasury Secretary for Goldman Sachs said we should 'create more jobs!' Wow. What a genius.

From the Telegraph:

Vietnam is planning to cut its purchases of US Treasuries and other dollar bonds, raising fears that Asian central banks with control over two thirds of the world's foreign reserves may soon join the flight from US assets.
*snip*
Separately, the gas-rich Gulf state of Qatar announced that it had cut the dollar holdings of its $50bn sovereign wealth fund from 99pc to 40pc, switching into investments in China, Japan, and emerging Asia.

I believe that the 'jumping ship' began around the beginning of March this year. Remember when the world's markets had that little jigger? This was when many people suddenly decided it was time to change gears. Now that the data is in, it is obvious: they are all moving away from the dollar. This is why the euro is rising rapidly. The dollar's reserve status is already dead. I would strongly suggest the IMF and the G7 dwarves hold a very big meeting about this. Call it 'Bretton Woods Forest Fire Sale!' We will be forced to reset our currency against all others: down!

And this is a disaster. The discipline of the currency FOREX markets were supposed to inhibit us from doing stupid things but since our main traders all held dollars, this didn't work. So we have to take other measures and one of them is to cut our military spending by 75% and close all our bases in Korea, for example. Why are we protecting rich Japan? Eh? Order them to give us a trillion dollars for our services!

Well...Korea, under the wing of China, is slowly reuniting. And we have troops there for what? And the Middle East: pure hell. The longer we stay, the more money we lose and the more we are hated and attacked here at home. So why are we doing this? This, alone will save us $200 billion a year, minimum.

From Blacklisted News:

European, Asian and Canadian companies are taking advantage of the weaker dollar to buy their U.S. counterparts at a record pace, increasing investment in the United States but also raising fears about a potential loss of jobs and autonomy.

"We could be looking at the world's largest tag sale if we continue to see declines in the dollar," said Donald Klepper-Smith, chief economist at DataCore Partners.

In the latest large deal aided by a weak dollar, Commerce Bancorp, which is based in Cherry Hill, New Jersey, agreed Tuesday to be acquired by Toronto-Dominion Bank of Canada in a cash-and-shares deal valued at $8.5 billion.

Do we have anything left to sell? When we are selling off our children, will we stop? Will any stories about the loss of control of our own economy, our own money, our lives, waken the American people? Or will we continue? This is the result of a 90% service economy buying 90% of its manufactured goods and energy from outside!

Click here to see a funny Saturday Night Live skit from reader Elsie. A mock-up TV ad to Not Buy Anything You Can't Afford!

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Comments

[BoBerTo]

Bible & Koran: INTEREST BAD!!! Fed Reserve: INTEREST GOOD!! Idealism revved up: what if the greedmongers had worked all this time for the good of all instead of the few? Tech evolution tainted to the positive side of the "force". Perhaps homo sapiens are always gonna be ruled by those prominent canine teeth.

[Greg]

http://bp2.blogger.com/_kQmcDGJ6WuI/RwVTvYhWn_I/AAAAAAAAAF0/7TZeqtamHho/s1600-h/Moodys+2000-2007+subprime+vintages.bmp

judging by this chart, you dont normally get the full amount or effect of subprime delinquencies till about 15 months after issuance, anyone agree????

[Greg]

http://bp2.blogger.com/_kQmcDGJ6WuI/RwVTvYhWn_I/AAAAAAAAAF0/7TZeqtamHho/s1600-h/Moodys+2000-2007+subprime+vintages.bmp

judging by this chart, you dont normally get the full amount or effect of subprime delinquencies till about 15 months after issuance, anyone agree????

[Elaine Meinel Supkis]

The IMF had the Credit Suisse graph you refer to. I should republish it. Yes, without the slightest doubt, the real crunch will be from 2009 to 2011. There is no evading this mess.

[Greg]

TAIWAN : Industrial Bank's Hsueh said accelerating inflation may prompt Taiwan's central bank to raise its benchmark interest rate again in December. Governor Perng Fai-nan raised the rate for a 13th consecutive quarter to 3.25 percent on Sept. 20.

``The risk of potential inflation is rising,'' Perng said this week. An interest-rate increase ``will help market rates gradually approach a neutral level to prevent inflation.''

INDONESIA : Oct. 5 (Bloomberg) -- Indonesia's central bank will probably keep its benchmark interest rate unchanged for a third month on concern inflation is climbing towards the higher end of this year's 5 percent to 7 percent target range.

and just for a laugh at the taser wielding criminals ........The U.S. will appeal directly to Myanmar's military government tomorrow to end attacks on peaceful protesters and move toward democracy

[Callihan]

Good evening, Elaine.

Just as financial activity has an internal logic so does Empire. Just as human nature in crowds follows strict patterns, and must do so because humans are what they are and act as they do, empires follow an iron logic, unavoidably, uncontrollably except marginally, and generally tragically for most individuals. To talk of restraining Empire behavior is foolish. The question is, instead, what can, in fact, in practice, be accomplished.

The time for "Ron Paul" government is not yet, and when it comes the standard of living will be shockingly low by most standards.

The Empire will collapse, of course, empires invariably do, but not yet. People will push the "empire" bubble until it pops. Until then, group think increases, the "manufacture of (political) consent" increases, the the middle class decreases, savings and investment deteriorate in quantity and quality, and waste and foolishness generally become even more ridiculously extravagant.

Unfortunately we are, will not, be able to "bell the cat" before concrete reality intrudes into human dreamworlds.

[Greg]

Subprime Delinquencies Accelerating, Moody's Says (Update3)

By Shannon D. Harrington and Mark Pittman

Oct. 4 (Bloomberg) -- Subprime mortgage bonds created in the first half of 2007 contain loans that are going delinquent at the fastest rate ever, according to Moody's Investors Service.

The average rate of ``serious loan delinquencies'' in the securities has been higher than 2006 bonds, New York-based Moody's analysts Ariel Weil and Amita Shrivastava wrote in a report today. Serious loan delinquencies are those 60 days or more past due, including properties in foreclosure or already foreclosed upon.

``It is shocking what you see,'' said Kyle Bass of Hayman Advisors LP, a Dallas-based hedge fund that reported a 400 percent return on its bet the U.S. housing market would fall. ``Anything securitized in 2007 has got to have the worst collateral performance of any trust I've seen in my life.''

Moody's, Standard & Poor's and Fitch Ratings have been downgrading subprime securities issued in 2006 as defaults on the underlying loans rise to record highs. Fitch said yesterday it's now reviewing ratings on bonds created in 2007.

Moody's has cut ratings or placed on review 496 bonds backed by first mortgages issued last year, or 3 percent of such bonds created in 2006. Through Sept. 21, S&P had cut ratings on 433 securities from last year and backed by subprime loans, or 9.1 percent of the total. Fitch yesterday cut ratings on $18.4 billion of bonds backed by subprime loans.

Moody's said 6.6 percent of the loans in bonds issued in the first half were seriously delinquent four months after their securitization. The rate was 4.2 percent after four months for bonds created last year, and was 4.5 percent for 2001 bonds.

``We see this as a continuation of the trend we had in 2006,'' David Teicher, a Moody's managing director, said in a telephone interview. ``We're studying it, looking at the vintage carefully, as we are with all of the other vintages.''

Worst Year Ever

The Moody's report today compares with research from S&P in March that said 2006 bonds may be the worst-performing ever.

For bonds older than six months, 2006 was the worst year for serious delinquencies since at least 2000, Moody's said in the report. Data in the Moody's report suggests that accelerating delinquencies from 2007 bonds are likely to eclipse 2006.

Many of the loans that investors shunned in 2006 were able to be successfully securitized in 2007 because of the limited availability of new loans to purchase, according to Andrew Chow, who manages about $7 billion in asset-backed bonds and mortgage securities at SCM Advisors LLC in San Francisco.

``It's not surprising that the performance of that type of loan is in fact even worse than the average of 2006 because these are the loans that were rejected from those deals,'' Chow said.

ABX Indexes

Subprime mortgages are given to borrowers with poor credit or high debt. The rise in loan defaults and foreclosure followed a period of lax lending standards by the banks making the loans and little due diligence by investors buying the repackaged debt.

The perceived risk of owning subprime mortgage bonds created in the first half of 2007 rose today, according to traders of ABX indexes of credit-default swaps.

The ABX index linked to 20 securities from the first half and given the lowest rating of BBB- fell 2.5 percent to 36.67, the lowest since the index began trading in July, according to, Markit Group Inc., the index administrator. The index rated AA, the second-highest rating, fell 0.93 percent to 87, London-based Markit's composite prices show.

ABX contracts allow investors to speculate on or hedge against the risk the underlying securities aren't repaid as expected.

[anonymous]

I have only been looking at this blog for a couple of days now, but I am very very impressed. It's truly unique and informative. Please continue the good work!

[Elaine Meinel Supkis]

Oh yes, the default rate of new mortgages is incredible. Never saw this in my long property owning life. I have seen people go bankrupt after owning a place too big for their purses...after 5-10 years!

But the flood of failures after 5-10 months?? Unheard of! And this is final proof that all those desperate mortgages were false. I once foolishly bought a mansion I could afford to buy...paid CASH...but couldn't afford to RUN. It required a huge staff to run. Not me. Full time job, keeping it polished and groomed.

So, after waiting 3 years, I sold it. Many people have bought McMansions little knowing that running these giants is hard, hard work and quite expensive. One person I knew was overjoyed at the size of his estate and the groomed hedges and lawns, etc. After one summer trying to keep it in order, he called me and said, 'I have to spend every weekend working as a yardkeeper!' I said, 'Sell.'

We have a madcap market out there where everyone's eyes are bigger than their purses. I know, I did this to myself in the past. What a mistake that was.

[supra vaider]

Those are super cute. I like you on Facebook.

[supra shoes]

Christmas is probably the most special day of the year for children. One thing that makes it special is the popular tradition of Santa Claus.