11% of the houses in the US are empty.

[uscitizen]

Hmmm.

 

[Terral]

Hi Citizen:

11% of the houses in the US are empty. Hmmm.

This is no way to start a topic.

Yahoo.com News Story

Nearly 11 Percent of US Houses Empty

On Monday January 31, 2011, 5:42 pm EST

I usually find the quarterly homeowner vacancy and homeownership report from Census pretty lackluster, but the latest one released this morning was anything but.

America's home ownership rate, after holding steady for a while, took a pretty big plunge in Q4, from 66.9 percent to 66.5 percent. That's down from the 2004 peak of 69.2 percent and the lowest level since 1998.

Homeownership is falling at an alarming pace, despite the fact that home prices have fallen, affordability is much improved and inventories of new and existing homes are still running quite high.

Bargains abound, but few are interested or eligible to take advantage.

More concerning than the home ownership rate is the vacancy rate. The Census tables don't tell the entire story, but they tell a lot of it. Of the nearly 131 million housing units in this country, 112.5 million are occupied. 74.8 million are owned, and that's only dropped by about 30 thousand in the past year. 38 million are rented, but that's up by over a million year over year. That means more new households are choosing to rent.

Now to vacancies. There were 18.4 million vacant homes in the U.S. in Q4 '10 (11 percent of all housing units vacant all year round), which is actually an improvement of 427,000 from a year ago, but not for the reasons you'd think.

The number of vacant homes for rent fell by 493 thousand, as rental demand rose. 471,000 homes are listed as "Held off Market" about half for temporary use, but the other half are likely foreclosures. And no, the shadow inventory isn't just 200,000, it's far higher than that.

Slideshow: 10 U.S. Cities Where Renting Beats Buying

[More]

I tried to Google News Stories to receive a big fat Zero (0), because this story is not covered by the major media outlets trying to fool you into believing the USA is in recovery (the lie). The only good deals allow the seller to lose everything and the new owner to pick up distressed property for next to nothing. The reason is that there is no bottom in the housing market that is on the way to ultimate collapse by design. That is why Goldman Sucks shorted the housing market at the same time that they shoveled bad loans to suckers.

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vj96ZkLpbVI]Keiser Report: Dope Economy! Fecal Finance![/ame]

GL,

Terral

 

[uscitizen]

Yaah, we see how that trying to convince everyone that it is ok is working out for Egypt.

 

[william the wie]

As Terral mentioned this is a downward movement in vacancies. The question for me is how long until the base downward trend in occupancy rates resumes? Downward pressure on rents will eventually cause another step down.

 

[sparky]

11%

wow...

them ninja buyers sure are sneaky ....

~S~

 

[rdean]

Number one cause of bankruptcies are "medical bills" and Republicans work to keep it that way.

Harvard study shows unpaid medical bills is the leading cause of bankruptcy in the U.S. - National Health Care | Examiner.com

 

[driveby]

eat a dick, faggot.....

 

[uscitizen]

eat a dick, faggot.....

Ahh a post worthy of your intelligence and integrity.

 

[driveby]

eat a dick, faggot.....

Ahh a post worthy of your intelligence and integrity.

very worthy follow up to any post from rdean......

 

[RadiomanATL]

11% of houses are empty, and 6% of scientists live in them?

 

[sparky]

medical bankrupcies?

now how in the world did we leap from a foreclosure issue all the way over to a health care issue?

~S~

 

[Mini 14]

The Harvard study seems to ignore the fact that almost all bankruptcies are structured to allow the filer to keep their existing home with the mortgage remaining unmodified. In other words, mortgages are typically not included in bankruptcies, and therefore would not be released as a debt, or forfeited as an asset in a bankruptcy.

It is quite a leap to ignore what is typically a person's largest debt (their home) and then lay the blame for bankruptcy at the feet of healthcare (or any other smaller debts one may incur).

The study itself cites the "range of healthcare debt" among filers (my words, not theirs) as between 13K and 35K.

Does the average person filing bankruptcy owe more, less, or the same on their mortgage as they do in healthcare debt?

I think I know the answer, and I think Harvard does too.

 

[Truthmatters]

The New Bankruptcy Law: Changes to Chapter 7 and 13 - Free Legal Information - Nolo

I love how the republicans made it harder to file just before they crahsed the economy

 

[Truthmatters]

funny that

 

[sparky]

maybe nobody ever gets sick @ Harvard?

~S~

 

[jillian]

eat a dick, faggot.....

Ahh a post worthy of your intelligence and integrity.

very worthy follow up to any post from rdean......

i guess that's a matter of opinion. *shrug*

the number one cause of bankruptcy IS unanticipated medical bills, constituting approximately 50% of all bankruptcies filed.

 

[asterism]

Ahh a post worthy of your intelligence and integrity.

very worthy follow up to any post from rdean......

i guess that's a matter of opinion. *shrug*

the number one cause of bankruptcy IS unanticipated medical bills, constituting approximately 50% of all bankruptcies filed.

What does that have to do with empty houses? How many bankruptcy filings result in vacancies?

 

[Truthmatters]

More than there used to be because of the Bush bankruptcy laws

 

[Mini 14]

This really is a great example of how you can define and manipulate data to produce your desired result.

What is the "cause" of a bankruptcy?

Is it the last debt incurred before the bankruptcy is filed?
Is it the largest debt you are carrying at the time of the filing?
Is it the oldest debt?
Is it the total amount of credit you are carrying?
Is it the pen you used to fill out the paperwork? (for without that pen, you couldn't file)
Is it the time of year? Or day of the week? Or geographic area where you live?
Is it the economy?

Its a compilation of many things, most often over-extending one's self, and economic shifts.

How many bankruptcies that "are the result of unanticipated healthcare costs" could have been avoided had the filer had no mortgage, or a smaller mortgage, or less credit card debt?

And how many could have been avoided had the filer ANTICIPATED those UNANTICIPATED costs that seem to be SO COMMON among bankruptcies, that they shouldn't be unanticipated at all?

 

[30x90]

More than there used to be because of the Bush bankruptcy laws

Why do you call it "Bush bankruptcy laws"?
Did he personally write them? Did he lobby for them? I don't get it?