Tim's Atlanta Real Estate Blog ~ Save Money. Avoid Rip Offs.

As Values Go Down, Property Taxes Stay High Around Atlanta

Tim Maitski "Video Agent Guy" (HomeAtlanta.com) — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 21:26:10 -0600

Many homeowners over the years have seen their property taxes go up, especially after the sale of a house. Once a home was sold, the new tax assessed value was always ratcheted up to very close to what it sold for.

Now many homes are going down in value. Now when a home sells for much less than it's tax assessed value, the reassessment doesn't change much. It's sometimes a ridiculous situation especially when buyers are approved for their mortgage but then find out that the high taxes make them unable to qualify anymore.

The Atlanta Journal Constitution did a great feature on this situation

Instead of sampling select data in a handful of areas, the AJC obtained every transaction in five counties for 2008 - all the data relevant to the 2009 tax year. The AJC grouped the data by ZIP code to create a first-ever look at not only what happened to individual properties but also to entire neighborhoods and beyond, both in tax appraisals and sales

Clayton County, south of the airport, has been the hardest hit as far as home values.

Rodney McDaniel, Clayton's chief appraiser, said this concern was impossible for him to ignore. In Clayton the median sale fell a stunning 43 percent. The county's median appraisal change? Five percent.

You can always try to appeal but it seems like they really aren't giving in much. Even armed with overwhelming data to back up your appeal, it's likely that you'll end up not getting a break.

A house Atkinson owns on St. Patrick Street in unincorporated DeKalb was valued for taxes at $170,000 in 2008, and the county maintained that number for 2009, even though Atkinson bought it last year for $85,000.

At appeal, Atkinson came in armed with five sales that averaged $69,000 from the same neighborhood. Still, he got no relief based on those sales.

The county lowered his value to $153,000 this year only because appraisers had overlooked a creek that bisected the backyard.

"I felt like I was banging my head against the wall," a frustrated Atkinson said. "You could argue I was the sap who overpaid."

The AJC has a really neat interactive map broken down in to zip codes showing changes in home values this past year. At a glance, you can see what areas have gone down the most. Then you just mouse over the zip code and on the right is all of the data. It's a great tool to get familiar with what has happened in various parts of Atlanta.

It All Depends on Who's Adjusting the Data and What The Agenda Is

Tim Maitski "Video Agent Guy" (HomeAtlanta.com) — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 07:26:23 -0600

When you look at a graph of temperature over a period of time, especially when it's in a big time scientific report like the IPCC climate change report, you just assume that the data is accurate and has been picked over by many fellow scientists.

Scientists don't lie. They have a code. They let the facts speak for themselves. That's what we all love about science. It's about the cold hard facts that leads to truth. To manipulate data in order to justify a preconceived conclusion is cause for banishment from the scientific community.

One would think that weather stations just report the temperature at their stations and this is then used directly in the graphs that are reported showing long range temperature trends. But over a long length of time, there are some technical details to consider. Some stations move, some equipment needs to be replaced etc. So the raw data has to be adjusted for these reasons.

The adjustments are where it gets interesting. A tweak here and a tweak there and before you know it you can make the raw data turn into whatever you want it to be. Maybe it's the truth. Maybe it's to further an agenda. With the revelations in the Climategate scandle, it makes you want to look into the numbers a little more closely.

This article shows a prime example of how this works. It takes the raw data that shows pretty much a flat or decreasing temperature over time and changes it to show a very frightening warming trend.

This is the raw data plotted out:

This is the data that has been adjusted. Wow! What a difference.

Read the article to see how you get from one graph to the other. Then remember this the next time you look at a temperature graph where someone is trying to use it to support their agenda.

Market Stats. What Are They Good For?

Tim Maitski "Video Agent Guy" (HomeAtlanta.com) — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 06:10:35 -0600

I had a fellow agent ask me if I had a number for what kind of price change we are seeing in our market. He wanted a simple "headline" number that he could tell his client. Something like house prices are down 10% over the past year.

Most people want a simple number and they don't want too many details. They just want a simple formula to figure out what their home is worth. I think many like Zillow because it just gives them a number and makes them happy.

My problem is that I think about the details too much. Usually the importance of the details that go into the market stats is realized when one begins to think about the price of homes in their particular neighborhood.

For example, I live in an older neighborhood with a variety of homes with a range of prices from $300,000 to $600.000.

You'll see agents who take the average price of homes that sold in 2009 and compare them with the average price of homes that sold in 2008 and come to some conclusion about which way prices are going. There might have been 10 homes that sold in both years and agents will confidently quote the averages and make statements about prices going up or down based on the average price or the median price. Many agents will try to overwhelm a homeowner with stats and charts hoping to make an impression that they know what's going on.

Sometimes extreme examples make it easy to understand potential problems with stats, especially for small sample sizes. What if 9 of the 10 sales last year in my neighborhood were the low priced homes and this year just about all of the sales were the high priced homes. Would that mean that prices are going up? No, it simply means that the nicer, more expensive homes are selling this year.

Can one follow price trends by following the sales for a particular home? Let's say that a home sold in 2000 and then again in 2009. Let's say it went up 20% in that period. If I bought my home in 2000, could I assume that my home is now 20% more valuable? Maybe, maybe not. Maybe they made a lot of improvement to their home while you did nothing. Maybe they let their home deteriorate over that period of time? Without that information it's really difficult to say much one way or another. I had a listing that I sold 5 years ago for $300,000 that was in pristine condition. I saw it listed the other week for $270,000. At first glance you might think that prices have gone down 10%. But when I went to look at the home, I saw that they had let the home fall into disrepair. The decrease in price had to do with condition and not general housing trend. Foreclosures are a prime example. How much of the decrease in value of a foreclosure is caused by the deterioration of the home?

So don't get blinded by pretty graphs and lots of numbers. Always know where the numbers are coming from and what factors might bring in some errors. Look at trends. Look for more than one item to support any conclusions about possible trends.

It usually comes down to having boots on the ground to see what's actually happening in the market instead of just relying on statistics that might be skewed by a variety of factors.

The best example is showing how a 20% decline can be shown to have happened when in fact prices didn't change at all.

Atlanta Real Estate Market Statistics. Housing Stats for 28 Market Areas

Tim Maitski "Video Agent Guy" (HomeAtlanta.com) — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 21:54:25 -0600

I made some improvements to my Atlanta housing statistics. I wanted to smooth out the data somewhat in order to see the trends better.

Now along with the monthly data points going back to January 2002, I created graphs with a 12 month moving average which shows the trends better.

For those numbers people out there, I want to make note that I actually weighted each average price for the number of units sold in that month. (I took the number of units multiplied by the average price for that month, added those results going back 12 months and then divided by 12 in order to get the moving average point for a particular month). This should take the seasonality out of the original numbers and remove the noise giving a nice smooth line.

I show four values for single family detached homes around Atlanta. First a graph of the raw numbers and then the same graph using a 12 month moving average.

Average sales price
Number of units sold
Ratio for sales price/original list price
Total days on the market

My data is from the FMLS Smart Numbers report that Steve Palm puts out. Some of the data points that are way off are probably bad data but I kept it exactly as the data is reported. I really don't have any way to know what is the correct number for those points.

Below are the overall numbers for the entire Atlanta area. On my main site, I have graphs for 28 seperate market areas. You just click on the map and it pulls up the graphs for that area. It's really interesting to see how different areas have weatherd the storm so far. For example, Roswell vs. South Fulton.

A Good Heart and Always Does the Right Thing. That's My Boy.

Tim Maitski "Video Agent Guy" (HomeAtlanta.com) — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 08:56:21 -0600

Sometimes you wonder if your children are on the right track. As they get older, you see less and less of them in action with others.

My 10 year old son got his report card today. He had amazing grades, every subject was 96% and above. But the item that made me feel the best was the comment that the teacher wrote.

"I am pleased with his effort, both in school and with his friends. He has a good heart. He always does the right thing. He is an amazing student and an amazing person. I love teaching him."

I am so grateful that I was blessed with such a good kid. His sister is just as good and also brings so much joy into my life.

I always knew my kids were great but it's really nice when others confirm your feelings.

Are Deteriorating Houses Good for the Economy?

Tim Maitski "Video Agent Guy" (HomeAtlanta.com) — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 20:43:03 -0600

Will the economy get a nice boost when homeowners finally need to fix their houses?

At first glance, this sounds reasonable. When houses start to need repairs, people have to spend money to get them fixed. Roofers make money. Home Depot makes money and it all looks really good. It's almost so good that you begin to hope for hail storms and floods to help jump start the economy.

But then I think about my personal situation. I have a house that provides me shelter. It has a roof that needs replacing. Let's say I've been holding off on replacing the roof because I don't have the money. I want to buy a car instead. When I finally go ahead and replace the roof, the roofer will be happy that I spent the money but if I can't buy my car because I replaced the roof, is the economy any better off? Don't the car salesmen and the automobile workers lose out?

Whether I spend money on the roof or the car, the economy is boosted. But one way I have a car and shelter and the other way I only have shelter. Wouldn't it be great if you never had to replace a roof. You could use that money and stimulate the economy buy buying all kinds of other stuff.

So is it really a boost to the economy when houses deteriorate and need repairs?

It Just Doesn't Add Up.

Tim Maitski "Video Agent Guy" (HomeAtlanta.com) — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 07:32:30 -0600

Declaring "our security is at stake," President Barack Obama ordered an additional 30,000 U.S. troops into the long war in Afghanistan Tuesday night, nearly tripling the force...

...and will cost $30 billion for the first year alone.

That's one million dollars per soldier in the first year.

Obama said that we are going over there to get the al-Qaida and their terrorist leader Osama bin Laden.

So how many al-Qaeda are there in Afghanistan?

A senior U.S. intelligence official told ABCNews.com the approximate estimate of 100 al Qaeda members left in Afghanistan reflects the conclusion of American intelligence agencies and the Defense Department. The relatively small number was part of the intelligence passed on to the White House as President Obama conducted his deliberations.

So do the math. The additional money we are spending to get these 100 terrorists is $300 million/terrorist! We'll have 100,000 troops there chasing after 100 terrorists. That's 1000 solidiers equipped with the finest military equipment going after each terrorist. It just doesn't add up.

"It is from here that we were attacked on 9/11, and it is from here that new attacks are being plotted as I speak," the president said.

I thought I read about the 9/11 terrorists planning and training in places like Florida and Oklahoma.

I read somewhere that they had meetings in Germany.

I read somewhere that most of the attackers were from Saudie Arabia and Egypt

Maybe this strategy is Obama's way of bringing more Americans together. How else could you get a leftist like Michael Moore agreeing with a Christian Conservative like Pat Boone and a Libertarian like Ron Paul all saying the same thing: Bring the troops home.

I will admit, I was for the war initially. I thought it would be different. Maybe we could make a big difference and change the direction of that part of the world. But after eight years, you have to stand back and face reality. To me, the only thing that was positive about Obama becoming president was that it sounded like he would get us out of Iraq and Afghanistan. That was pretty much the only change I wanted from him. Now I see, along with many on the left, that that wasn't part of the change he was talking about.

Are Low Interest Rates Really Good for the Economy?

Tim Maitski "Video Agent Guy" (HomeAtlanta.com) — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 21:11:32 -0600

It seems like a given, if you want to improve the economy you should persue low interest rates. But in another chapter of Econmics in One Lesson, Henry Hazlitt takes a close look at this subject.

This whole subject has been so appallingly confused in recent years by complicated sophistries and disastrous governmental policies based upon them that one almost despairs of getting back to common sense and sanity about it. There is a psychopathic fear of "excessive" interest rates. It is argued that if interest rates are too high it will not be profitable for industry to borrow and invest in new plants and machines. This argument has been so effective that governments everywhere in recent decades have pursued artificial "cheap-money" policies.

Like many things in economics, if you only look at one side of the equation, you don't get a complete picture. Low interest rates do make it easier to borrow but what about the effect on savings? Who want's to save when they are getting almost nothing in interest?

The effect of keeping interest rates artificially low, in fact, is eventually the same as that of keeping any other price below the natural market. It increases demand and reduces supply. It increases the demand for capital and reduces the supply of real capital. It creates economic distortions. It is true, no doubt, that an artificial reduction in the interest rate encourages increased borrowing. It tends, in fact, to encourage highly speculative ventures that cannot continue except under the artificial conditions that gave them birth. On the supply side, the artificial reduction of interest rates discourages normal thrift, saving, and investment. It reduces the accumulation of capital. It slows down that increase in productivity, that "economic growth," that "progressives" profess to be so eager to promote.

Alan Greenspan and now Ben Bernanke are responsible for trying to set interest rates that create maximum employment and stable prices. This is a huge power to have and if not used wisely, can create much of what we are currently experiencing.

The money rate can, indeed, be kept artificially low only by continuous new injections of currency or bank credit in place of real savings. This can create the illusion of more capital just as the addition of water can create the illusion of more milk. But it is a policy of continuous inflation. It is obviously a process involving cumulative danger. The money rate will rise and a crisis will develop if the inflation is reversed, or merely brought to a halt, or even continued at a diminished rate.

Isn't that what we are seeing now? They say that we are getting some deflation and that is what has them really concerned. How long can rates be held at such artificially low levels? What are the consequenes?

It remains to be pointed out that while new injections of currency or bank credit can at first, and temporarily, bring about lower interest rates, persistence in this device must eventually raise interest rates. It does so because new injections of money tend to lower the purchasing power of money. Lenders then come to realize that the money they lend today will buy less a year from now, say, when they get it back. Therefore to the normal interest rate they add a premium to compensate them for this expected loss in their money s purchasing power. This premium can be high, depending on the extent of the expected inflation. Thus the annual interest rate on British treasury bills rose to 14 percent in 1976; Italian government bonds yielded 16 percent in ‘977; and the discount rate of the central bank of Chile soared to 75 percent in 1974. Cheap-money policies, in short, eventually bring about far more violent oscillations in business than those they are designed to remedy or prevent.

So what should be done about interest rates? It always seems like everyone expects something to be done. We just can't sit back and do nothing, can we? What would happen if we just let the free market set the price of money? Why does a commodity like money have to be manipulated by the government?

If no effort is made to tamper with money rates through inflationary governmental policies, increased savings create their own demand by lowering interest rates in a natural manner. The greater supply of savings seeking investment forces savers to accept lower rates. But lower rates also mean that more enterprises can afford to borrow because their prospective profit on the new machines or plants they buy with the proceeds seems likely to exceed what they have to pay for the borrowed funds.

Bernanke Gets a Tough Performance Review by a Couple of Senators

Tim Maitski "Video Agent Guy" (HomeAtlanta.com) — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 20:31:21 -0600

Today Ben Bernanke, the Federal Reserve Chairman, had his Senate confirmation hearing. I wasn't able to watch it live but I caught a couple of YouTube videos covering Senators DeMint and Bunning's questioning/grilling of Bernanke.

DeMint brought up three of the four duties that Bernanke said the Federal Reserve was responsible for during his confirmation hearing in 2005. You'd have to say that Bernanke was a miserable failure in fulfilling those duties.

Then Senator Jim Bunning really let him know how badly Bernanke has failed at his job. As opposed to DeMint who wasn't too confrontational in tone, Bunning seemed really mad about what Bernanke has done to the system.

I totally agree with both of these Senators and I hope that Bernanke is not reconfirmed for another term. I don't know if there is anyone who might be better though. I like Ron Paul's thinking which is the title of his new book, End the Fed.

Do We Want Jobs or Do We Want Production?

Tim Maitski "Video Agent Guy" (HomeAtlanta.com) — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 14:17:28 -0600

Jobs, jobs, jobs. That's the big buzz word today. Many are looking to Obama and Congress to do something about jobs.

But is employment an end to itself or should we be more concerned about what is actually being produced. Henry Hazlitt sets it out clearly in his Economics in One Lesson:

Primitive tribes are naked, and wretchedly fed and housed, but they do not suffer from unemployment. China and India are incomparably poorer than ourselves, but the main trouble from which they suffer is primitive production methods (which are both a cause and a consequence of a shortage of capital) and not unemployment. Nothing is easier to achieve than full employment, once it is divorced from the goal of full production and taken as an end in itself. Hitler provided full employment with a huge armament program. World War II provided full employment for every nation involved. The slave labor in Germany had full employment. Prisons and chain gangs have full employment. Coercion can always provide full employment.

Yet our legislators do not present Full Production bills in Congress but Full Employment bills. Even committees of businessmen recommend "a President's Commission on Full Employment," not on Full Production, or even on Full Employment and Full Production. Everywhere the means is erected into the end, and the end itself is forgotten.

So the question needs to be not about jobs, but about production. Jobs are just a natural result.

The real question is not how many millions of jobs there will be in America ten years from now, but how much shall we produce, and what, in consequence, will be our standard of living? ...We can clarify our thinking if we put our chief emphasis where it belongs-on policies that will maximize production

So the question is whether government or private enterprise is best at increasing production? Are politicians and special interests best at deciding how to spend money or are individuals smart enough to know what is best for themselves? If you believe that individuals can best decide for themselves what is most important to them, then policies that allow them the most money to make those buying decisions and policies that allow private enterprise to more easily produce those items would be the policies that we should be looking at.

The Housing Bubble Is Text Book Economics, at Least Austrian Economics

Tim Maitski "Video Agent Guy" (HomeAtlanta.com) — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 08:51:24 -0600

The housing bubble wasn't just some unforeseen accident that just happened all by itself. Alan Greenspan and Ben Bernacke seemed to be clueless. Maybe it is a testament to their type of economic thinking and their advisers are just plain wrong.

Here are a few clips from Economics in One Lesson written by Henry Hazlitt. This isn't some Monday quarterbacking. This is a book he wrote back in 1946 and revised in 1978.

The advocates of government-guaranteed mortgages also forget that what is being lent is ultimately real capital, which is limited in supply, and that they are helping identified B at the expense of some unidentified A. Government-guaranteed home mortgages, especially when a negligible down payment or no down payment whatever is required, inevitably mean more bad loans than otherwise. They force the general taxpayer to subsidize the bad risks and to defray the losses. They encourage people to "buy" houses that they cannot really afford. They tend eventually to bring about an oversupply of houses as compared with other things. They temporarily overstimulate building, raise the cost of building for everybody (including the buyers of the homes with the guaranteed mortgages),and may mislead the building industry into an eventually costly over-expansion. In brief in the long run they do not increase overall national production but encourage malinvestment.

Does this sound familiar? You can blame all of the other things that built on this but the crux of the problem was the government guarantee. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac had the implied guarantee of the federal government which enabled many bad loans to be made than otherwise.

Here is another example we hear many make for getting government to lend money to those who don't qualify under normal banking standards.

Here is a poor family, it will be said, with no means of livelihood. It is cruel and wasteful to put them on relief. Buy a farm for them; set them up in business; make productive and self-respecting citizens of them; let them add to the total national product and pay the loan off out of what they produce. Or here is a farmer struggling along with primitive methods of production because he has not the capital to buy himself a tractor. Lend him the money for one; let him increase productivity; he can repay the loan out of the proceeds of his increased crops. In that way you not only enrich him and put him on his feet; you enrich the whole community by that much added output. And the loan, concludes the argument, costs the government and the taxpayers less than nothing, because it is "self-liquidating."

...apologists will freely acknowledge that the percentage of losses will be higher on these government loans than on private loans. But they contend that this will be more than offset by the added production brought into existence by the borrowers who pay back, and even by most of the borrowers who do not pay back.

...There is a strange idea abroad, held by all monetary cranks, that credit is something a banker gives to a man. Credit on the contrary, is something a man already has

You can go to the online chapter for the details as to why giving out credit to non-creditworthy people isn't a good idea, but the bottom line is:

..the net result of government credit has not been to increase the amount of wealth produced by the community but to reduce it, because the available real capital (consisting of actual farms, tractors, etc.) has been placed in the hands of the less efficient borrowers rather than in the hands of the more efficient and trustworthy.

If you always thought economics was too complicated and confusing, please take the time to read Economics in One Lesson. It explains things very well in a way it is easy to understand. Whether it is right or not, can be evaluated much by what we are seeing happen right now. From what I've seen, it has been pretty much right on the money at predicting what eventually happens when the popular but wrong economic policies are implemented.

I might do a series on several of the chapters that I find relevant to what's happening today.

We Can Send a Man to the Moon but We Can't Count the Vote?

Tim Maitski "Video Agent Guy" (HomeAtlanta.com) — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 06:52:19 -0600

Phantom votes appeared in the special election in District 23 in New York. There were more total votes than there were ballots cast.

The problem is that these numbers add up to 179 votes counted for the candidates, and there were only 148 ballots cast; St. Lawrence County certified these numbers to the state as accurate with the number of 'blank' ballots reported as -31

Isn't that great. When the numbers don't add up, let's just create negative ballots. What in tarnation is a negative ballot?

If we want to have a chance to actually clean up politics and get the right people elected, we have to make sure that there isn't any monkey business going on with the voting process.

...how can we have a democracy if we cannot know if the vote count is accurate? If election officials cannot know, and if the candidates cannot know, and if the voters cannot know that the official results are true and correct, why even have an election? Why go through the motions?

I never liked those computerized voting machines. I never understood how those machines were supposed to make sure that the vote is accurate. To me, it seems like it just opens up the possibility of a massive fraud that can be done without anyone ever knowing about it.

The fault lies with computerized vote counting and our willingness to trust it.

It has already been reported that zero votes were incorrectly reported in numerous precincts in Jefferson, Madison, and Oswego Counties for one of the Congressional candidates, and that voting machine failures occurred in dozens of polling places in at least three different counties.

In St. Lawrence County, ballots from eight polling places had to be hand counted due to voting machine failure. Machines in Louisville, Waddington, Clare, and Rossie "broke" early in the voting process on Election Day. Republican Commissioner Deborah Pahler said that the machines kept "freezing up... like Windows does all the time". Machines in Hermon, Lawrence, Colton's 2nd district, and Massena's 1st and 2nd districts failed to print the results. Frank Hoar, an attorney for the Democratic Party, initially ordered the impoundment of malfunctioning machines but released the order on November 5th so that Bill Owens could be sworn in to Congress in time to vote on the House health bill on November 7th.

Electronic vote counting is much too vulnerable to failure and/or manipulation. If a mechanical (lever-style) machine breaks down, the failure is visible, and only the one machine is affected. With electronic vote counting, one person can change the outcome of an election and not leave a trace. This has been shown over and over again in scientific studies, including those commissioned by the Secretaries of State in California and Ohio

There has to be a better way.

Climategate. Watts Up With That?

Tim Maitski "Video Agent Guy" (HomeAtlanta.com) — Sun, 29 Nov 2009 09:04:13 -0600

About 10 days ago, someone hacked into a server at a big climate research institute and downloaded a large number of files and archived emails. They then made them available for the world to see.

This institute and the people who sent the emails are the big time climate change players who the politicians are relying on for their policy decisions. This is a good description:

Although Prof Jones is not what you could call a household name (though he soon might be) he is, without doubt, one of the world's most influential proponents of the theory of man-made global warming.

The CRU has the largest archive of global temperature data in the world, and its research formed the basis of the United Nations' key document on global warming, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report of 2007.

You hear a lot that the science is solid and that there is consensus in the scientific community that man is responsible for global warming. Many politicians make it sound that the scientists and their scientific results are unbiased facts and can be relied on without any doubts. Scientists, unlike politicians, aren't supposed spin and manipulate. They say the system of peer review eliminates all of that stuff.

In a perfect world, that is usually true. But in a world with big money and big power at stake, it looks like the pristine world of scientific research ain't so pristine any more. The scientists are people with personal biases and personal career goals. These emails give you a glimpse of the scheming and manipulating that goes on.

The two climate blogs that are trying to figure out what it all means are Watt's Up With That and Climate Audit. It's been very interesting following their stories as they dig into the data that has been revealed.

While reading through a lot of the posts at these sites, I came across a post that summarizes what has been found so far. It breaks it down to easy to understand language. You don't have to be a climate insider to understand it.

1. The scientists colluded in efforts to thwart Freedom of Information Act requests(across continents no less). They reference deleting data, hiding source code from requests, manipulating data to make it more annoying to use, and attempting to deny requests from people recognized as contributors to specific internet sites. Big brother really is watching you. He's just not very good at securing his web site.

2. These scientists publicly diminished opposing arguments for lack of being published in peer-reviewed scientific journals. In the background they discussed black-balling journals that did publish opposing views, and preventing opposing views from being published in journals they controlled. They even mention changing the rules midstream in arenas they control to ensure opposing views would not see the light of day. They discuss amongst themselves which scientists can be trusted and who should be excluded from having data because they may not be "predictable".

3. The scientists expressed concern privately over a lack of increase in global temperatures in the last decade, and the fact that they could not explain this. Publicly they discounted it as simple natural variations. In one instance, data was manipulated to hide a decline in temperatures when graphed. Other discussions included ways to discount historic warming trends that inconveniently did not occur during increases in atmospheric CO2.

4. The emails show examples of top scientists working to create public relations messaging with favorable news outlets. It shows them identifying and cataloging, by name and association, people with opposing views. These people are then disparaged in a coordinated fashion via favorable online communities.

Here's a video that brings up some of the stuff that was found.

I think this should burst the bubble for all of those who believe that the science of global warming is complete and there is consensus.

Brandford's Diary, America's First "Blogger"

Tim Maitski "Video Agent Guy" (HomeAtlanta.com) — Thu, 26 Nov 2009 07:54:00 -0600

William Bradford, who came over on the Mayflower and became the Governor of Massachusetts, took many notes in a diary and then later put them altogether in a book covering the history of Plimouth Plantation.

After discovering this book a few years back, I've been making it a personal Thankgiving tradition to take time to read parts of it. I find it fascinating to read history from the point of view of an eyewitness.

It's interesting to see how the English language has changed over the years. The old spellings of words makes it difficult at times to understand what is being written. So much for spelling being set in stone.

Below are the passages that I find most intriguing.

It describes how the Pilgrims' experiment with "socialism" was a huge failure. They regrouped and came up with a plan that rewarded individual effort. They split up the land and gave each individual control over their own piece of land. Each individual decided what and how much to plant and how hard they wanted to work. They got to keep the fruits of their labor. The colony produced much more than before without all the problems of having to compel them to work harder.

Google Books is a pretty neat setup. They took the original transcribed edition of this book and made it available online. It is available as images and pdf form. You can "clip" portions and embed them into posts like I did. When you click on the image below it will take you to the Google book itself.

Myth: Google Only Reads the Post Content and not Your Sidebar Content

Tim Maitski "Video Agent Guy" (HomeAtlanta.com) — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 08:58:12 -0600

This morning there was a feature post about the length of the signatures some attach at the the bottom of each one of their blog posts.

Some said that it was for SEO purposes.

One person said that the search engine spiders crawl blog posts individually and not with the side bar information.

I never used signatures for SEO purposes because I figured that it would just be easier and also better looking to just use my sidebar for that sort of stuff.

So when I saw that comment, I began to rethink this strategy.

But I always like to experiment for myself. Does Google actually ignore the sidebar content and only indexes the actual blog post content?

I went ahead and put a "nonsense word" into my sidebar content. I used "bvcxz hills homes". I then wrote a post and posted it this morning.

In about an hour, I did a Google search for the term and lo and behold, my post that I just wrote came up as the first result. The term was bolded in the result's snippet which kind of proves that Google actually reads the entire page, sidebar and all.

I guess the next experiment is to see if the different placement of words might be weighted differently in algorythm. I used the nonsense term once in the content of the post here. Before I submit this post, I'll erase the nonsense term in the side bar. Then I'll do a search in an hour or so and see which post comes up higher in the Google search.

I'll post the results of that experiment later.

Update:

After 45 minutes of posting this after removing the nonsense word in the sidebar, I got both posts showing up. The new post, the one with the nonsense word in the post content, is the first result. The post where the nonsense word in only in the sidebar is an indented second result.

I'll keep track over some period of time if this order changes.

Update: 4 days later

I went to do the same search as before and now the only page coming up is my front blog page. It's now the second post on my main page.

The interesting thing is that I can't get Google to find the actual post by itself. Even by searching the entire title and tacking on bvcxz gives me ony one result, my main blog page. I would have expected at least an indented result like I had previously. I'll keep monitoring this to see if it might somehow shed some light on the dynamics of a blog post in Google.

The Foreclosure Crisis Hits My Backyard

Tim Maitski "Video Agent Guy" (HomeAtlanta.com) — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 07:39:47 -0600

I think the saying goes, "When your neighbor loses his job, it's a recession. When you lose your job, it's a depression."

The recession has hit my neck of the woods. My neighbor, a fellow Realtor, recently lost his home to foreclosure and it is now a newly listed REO home on the market.

What I thought should be worth over $400.000 just went on the market at $339,900. It was listed by someone who isn't very familiar with the area.

My neighbor had refinanced in 2004 for $485,000 and the county tax assessment is $389,000. To me, it looks like a great deal. It needs a little updating but seems to be in really good shape. My neighbor took pride in ownership and is a really great guy who unfortunately fell on a dry spell.

It's also a reality check for me. My neighbor seemed to be a very good real estate agent. He sold several homes in the neighborhood and seemed to be well connected. He was hard working. I think once he held a home open for about ten weeks in a row. Everytime I called to ask him about a listing and we got talking, it seemed to me that he really knew his stuff. He'd be able to talk in detail about many homes currently on the market and how much others had sold for.

I hate to see him have to get out of the business.

If you are looking for a good deal on a foreclosure in Sandy Springs, give me a call and I'd be glad to show it to you.

I'm looking for another good neighbor.

How Can Sarah Palin be so Popular Even After the Media Thinks They Have Proven That She Is an Idiot?

Tim Maitski "Video Agent Guy" (HomeAtlanta.com) — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 22:11:02 -0600

The popularity of Sarah Palin is really amazing. People are standing outside in line for 36 hours in the freezing cold just to get the opportunity to meet her and get a book signed. I haven't seen lines like this since I camped out as a student at Penn State in order to get a dorm room.

I thought that the media had proven without a doubt that she was really stupid and only a fool would think otherwise. I really have to give this woman credit. She weathered that media attack and now seems to be more popular than ever before.

I had to laugh when some pundits had said that Palin was a negative for the McCain campaign and it was a big mistake for him to pick her as his running mate. I don't think that there were such lines when McCain came out with his book. I think Palin was the only thing that kept McCain from being humilated worse than he was.

So who are all of these Palin fans? Cspan covered a book signing on Friday and talked with many people who showed up. Many reminded me of my Mom. Older women who see a young, hard working, down to earth lady who sticks to her principles and still seems to beleive in the Constitution. They don't seem to be angry wackos. They seem to be concerned cititzens who are afraid that this county is going down the wrong path.

I'm still undecided about her. She sounds good but I don't trust her yet to know if she is really ready to do battle against the entrenched Washington politicians. Did she really support all those things that John McCain was saying or did she just have to do that as her role as vice predidential candidate? I'm waiting to see her views on the issues. Is she really going rogue? I really hope so.

Congress and Obama, Stop Using My Credit Card. Sooner or Later I'll Have to Pay the Bill, with Interest.

Tim Maitski "Video Agent Guy" (HomeAtlanta.com) — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 13:28:50 -0600

This little blurb in an article by Janet Tavakoli makes all this stimulus spending and bailout stuff so simple and clear. She's responding to a silly remark that Warren Buffet recently made:

Imagine this scenario: Warren grabs my credit card and charges twelve suits. When I object that I don't want to bail out his wardrobe, he chuckles and says, don't worry, you haven't paid anything yet. The bank that issued the credit card bailed out my wardrobe, and it hasn't even had time to charge you interest on my purchase.

When I protest that I'll have to eventually pay off both the balance and accrued interest, he tries flattery. You are so productive that by the time you have to pay this off, you'll have so much more wealth that you won't even notice these charges. You've always been good for it before, and you'll figure out how to pay!

Don't fall for it.

Government debt, like your credit card, is a type of money. It must be paid off with our future taxes generated from our production (unless you wish to destroy the economy by printing excess money). The fruits of your labors should be used in the way you see fit.

Slowly but surely, more people are starting to realize this fact. All of this deficit spending is just setting us up for a huge loss in future living standards.

Let's stop the insane spending before the whole system self destructs.

The New Crime in REO's: The Shocking Truth on Who's Behind It.

Tim Maitski "Video Agent Guy" (HomeAtlanta.com) — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 07:10:01 -0600

Unfortunately, I'm seeing more foreclosures being trashed by their former occupants. Many times the appliances and light fixtures are being torn out. I guess they try to sell them on Ebay or something.

How much of the decrease in value for a foreclosure is due to this?

I thank God that I haven't been involved in one of the scenarios that is described below.

I really think there should be jail time for people who intentionally destroy property before they lose it to foreclosure. It's one thing if you don't have money to fix the roof but when you clog the drains or wreck the plumbing, that is just plain wrong and you should have to pay a price.

Via Jerry Bronstrup (Bristol Builders, Inc):

Scott was a husband and proud father of three. Nothing was more fulfilling than the day he was approved for a home loan. His dream of providing a home for his family was finally a reality. He would soon be a proud homeowner, inviting his friends and family over at every opportunity he could to show off his pride and joy. One day Scott's perfect world came crumbling down. Scott developed a destructive plan to counter his unforeseen fate. Who would have thought this law-abiding citizen would mastermind such a heinous crime…

The new crime in REO: Deliberate and catastrophic acts of vandalism bringing destruction and disaster throughout America. Who is committing these vindictive acts? You probably would be shocked to find out. They are the baseball coach, the schoolteacher, the doctor, the accountant, the computer tech, the neighbor who proudly displays the American flag on the front porch. They are homeowners who feel they are the victims of greedy and gluttonous banks preying on the dreams of the American family. They feel they have been “suckered”and deceived by the slick talking snake who magically found their dream home and negotiated a deal of a lifetime. They want their voice to be heard. They have been cleverly deceived only to find their dreams snatched away. They are leading a silent revolution against the system that destroyed their future by, in return, destroying the very thing that represents what was taken from them… their homes.

Yes, American homeowners are sabotaging their foreclosed homes with destructive acts of vandalism… the consequences of this could be far worse than imagined.

One of the most common acts of vandalism we are seeing involves water lines. A disgruntled occupant manipulates a water line to explode upon instant water pressure. Once the water is turned on, the house is flooded within hours. The cost to repair: thousands, and that’s just in repairing the obvious drywall and flooring damage. There will also be health issues associated with mold growth. Run your HVAC system, then the mold spores could contaminate the entire house, unbeknownst to the innocent family buying the house, they get to breath the spores until they figure out why they are taking their children in for respiratory issues every 2 months. That my friends, leads us to an entirely different issue concerning agent disclosures, liabilities, etc.

A worse scenario…. imagine an ill-tempered and impassioned occupant rigging a gas pipe to leak gas and when triggered by an “electrical defect” (also rigged) an explosive charge ignites the house. With the close proximity of homes to each other mixed with the dry landscape, we have recipe for disaster. One house fire could potentially endanger an entire city.

We have all seen the regurgitated debris coming from the foreclosure virus spread throughout our nation. It’s tangible, visible, stinks, and is pretty much a straightforward issue dealt with hard working clean out crews, dump trucks, lots of trash bags.

Unfortunately, the visible is not our worst enemy. The problems caused by the ploys and vindictive tactics of occupant vandalism are serious and could cause immediate health and safety issues. Realtors need to be educated on these tactics and deal with them head on.

Agents should rely on licensed contractors who are trained to properly inspect all service lines prior to turning on the main power switch and water valve.

Those involved in the REO business, or any real estate for that matter, need to place high priority on the health and safety of community. The REO landscape has changed the world we live in. We can no longer avoid the giant purple elephant in the room.

TRUE STORY THAT HAPPENED TO US YESTERDAY:

We were called by an agent this week with a cry for help. He was checking on one of his REO's just in time to spot the beginnings of what would be a destructive flood caused by a manipulated water line, obviously sabotaged by the previous occupants. If we had not caught this in the time we did, we would be replacing dry wall and the flooring... for starters.

The agent actually blogged about it.. read it here.

The Chinese President "Bowing" in Front of Obama. SNL Skit Is Really Funny

Tim Maitski "Video Agent Guy" (HomeAtlanta.com) — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 20:16:55 -0600

I love YouTube. I always fall asleep trying to stay up to watch Saturday Night Live.

Last night was a good one. It had Obama and the Chinese President making their remarks at a press conference.

It made me laugh more because of all of the uproar over Obama recently bowing in front of the Japanese Premier. Jon Zolsky had a few posts about this. I said I thought it might be more appropriate if Obama bowed while having a tin cup in his hand.

This is along the same lines but with the bowing suggesting something else. The Chinese President asks Obama, "Will you kiss me? Why? Because I like to be kissed when someone in doing sex to me!!

The Chinese President then asks Obama, "Are you going to at least treat me to dinner and a movie? Why? Because I think it's the polite thing to do before doing sex to me!!"

The Chinese President then bows over in front of Obama presenting his butt to him.

Do you remember the scene in "Bugsy" where Warren Beatty goes into a rage when he confronts his associate after finding out he's been skimming the books. Bugsy gets the guy to get down on all fours and bark like the dog that he'll never be good enough to be. I envision that our Presidents will soon be in that awkward position of having to do whatever our "partners" tell us to do. Who knows, we might already be there.

The Global Pool of Money That Got Sucked Into the Housing Bubble Due to Alan Greenspan

Tim Maitski "Video Agent Guy" (HomeAtlanta.com) — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 19:38:02 -0600

Some of the best information is left in comments.

Today I was reading a feature post, Did Mortgage Brokers Cause The Economic Collapse? . It gave an anecdote about a slimy mortgage broker and asked whether mortgage brokers caused the economic collapse. Many people have picked out targets and blamed certain players for the mess we are in.

In comment #21, Melissa Brown, shared a link to a podcast she listened to which made me want to go and listen to it asap. Her comment:

Oh my gosh, when I read your post, it immediately made me think of this incredible podcast on This American Life called the "Giant Pool of Money." It was one of the best descriptions of the subprime mortgage crisis and its causes than anything I have ever heard. I can't believe there are still mortgage lenders out there bending the rules to make more money.

This is a long story, but very informative, and I would encourage everyone to listen to it. It's quite revealing...

This American Life, "The Giant Pool of Money"

After listening to it, I totally agree with her. It is worth listening to the entire 59 minutes. It puts a lot of the pieces together. Once it got started, the housing bubble fed on itself. But there were some key things that made it all possible.

The Federal Reserve saying that they were going to keep interest rates down for a length of time.
The invention of CDOs
The bad data that the rating agencies used to come up with high ratings for CDOs even though they were full of "toxic assets".

They said that the major event that allowed it all to start was when Alan Greenspan gave a speech in 2003 saying:

...the FOMC stands ready to maintain a highly accommodative stance of policy for as long as it takes to achieve a return to satisfactory economic performance.

They translate that as saying: "Hey Global pool of money, Screw you! We will keep the Fed Funds Rate at the absurdly low rate of 1%" This is what made the "global pool of money" go out looking for a place where they could get a higher rate of return.

In the financial world it seems that when there is money looking for a place to go, there are companies all too ready to create products that seem to meet that need. These products that eventually caused the economy to collapse, needed the whole system working together in order to pull off such a fraud that it turned out to be. The rating agencies and the government regulators were either clueless or corrupt. I think it was a combination.

After the stage was set, the rest of the system was already there to get the party rolling. The mortgage brokers, real estate agents, real estate speculators all jumped on the bandwagon and just started blowing the bubble bigger and bigger.

There were a lot of people motivated by greed who added to the housing bubble.

But the one guy who started it all was Alan Greenspan. One of my favorite blog sites is none other than, The Mess that Greenspan Made. Listening to that podcast made it much clearer to me and made me understand better about how the Federal Reserve's interference in the makets usually result in many unintended consequences much larger than the problem they were trying to solve.

Audit the Fed Bill Moves Forward After Attempted Gutting

Tim Maitski "Video Agent Guy" (HomeAtlanta.com) — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 08:57:52 -0600

I think everyone is for more transperancy. Some like the sound of that word but are afraid to actually have some real transperancy in action. Some are afraid that if we actually knew what was going on it would cause panic in the streets and the whole system would come tumbling down.

One of the big things that President Obama promised was transperancy in government.

Ron Paul has a bill that would audit the Federal Reserve and bring to light what the Federal Reserve is doing with trillions of dollars.

He got 309 out of 434 members of Congress to cosponser the bill. Of course, a bill has to go through a long process and might come out being something much different than what the actual title of the bill might lead you to believe.

This almost happened to Ron Paul's bill. Finance committee member, Mel Watt, gutted the bill and turned it into a bill that would actually make the Federal Reserve more secretive and more powerful. I'm sure it wouldn't surprise you that Mel Watt represents the Charlotte area where Bank of America's headquarters are. And I guess it wouldn't surprise you that most of his campaign money came from banks and financial institutions.

Fortunately, an amendment, the Paul/Grayson Amendment, was passed that will bring back most of Ron Paul's original bill.

This morning on CNBC they are already trying to make auditing the Fed sound like it will be a really bad thing for the economy and the market.

I'll defer to Karl Denninger in explaining the Fed's track record and why the Paul/Grayson Amendment is needed.

Here is Ron Paul explaining his amendment.

Here is Alan Grayson explaining why the Watt amendment is a step back and then Mel Watt pleads his case that if the Paul/Grayson Amendment is passed it will wreak havoc in the markets. Who to believe? My trust is in Ron Paul.

My Stellar Predictions from Last Year and a Look Ahead to 2010

Tim Maitski "Video Agent Guy" (HomeAtlanta.com) — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 21:15:18 -0600

Before I give you my predictions for 2010, let me show you just how good I was back in October 2008 when I made predictions on a slew of economics statistics for the second quarter of 2009. I know, predicting what the unemployment rate will be just 9 months ahead shouldn't be that tough. It's not like you have to be a highly trained and highly paid economist or something.

So the official numbers are in for the second quarter of 2009. Let's see how well I was able to predict some things. I know I must be good at this stuff because thousands of people came to hear me talk about what I see coming up for the next year.

I'm a housing specialist and I predicted prices to go up by 2.6% but they actually went down by 12.8%. I guess no one could have seen that one coming.

I guess it might have been because I was predicting unemployment to only be 6.6% and then it went all the way up to 9.3%.

Interest rates went down much more than I expected. 30 year fixed rate ended up at 5% instead of 6.5% as I predicted.

For some reason thousands of people still came to listen to my predictions for 2010. I guess they think I'm pretty good at this stuff. Maybe people like the way I sound or the way I present my numbers. Here's some good advice. If you sound like you know what you are talking about, people usually don't bother to check out your past performance, especially if you have a PhD or other smart sounding credentials.

I guess if you are a Realtor you like when someone like me says that the housing recovery has begun and good times are right around the corner. Someone has to give them hope.

Who am I to tell them differently? Who am I to think that I can predict what's going to happen to the housing market in the next 3-18 months?

I'll tell you who I am.

I'm Lawrence Yun, chief economist for the National Association of Realtors. I get paid the big bucks to come up with these fancy schmancy predictions. I find that if I use big words, a lot of numbers and some fancy charts, people really take me seriously.

If you don't believe my numbers, go check them out yourself, October 2008 and October 2009.

Democracy to Dictatorship

Tim Maitski "Video Agent Guy" (HomeAtlanta.com) — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 07:49:29 -0600

Yes, another post about government and free markets. But dictatorship? I know most feel that "it can't happen here" but I read a great article that shows why most democracies usually end up going down the path to dictatorship. I love this country and I hate seeing the signs of it's demise.

James Madison, the father of our Constitution, knew the dangers of democracy:

A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship

Some seem to think that free market capitalism creates winners and losers and thus a big income gap which then creates social tension and divisiveness. As if only if everyone had the same amount of stuff, we would all live happily ever after.

Very rarely do you hear that free markets provide peaceful, social harmony. But think it through a little bit.

A free market, as competitive as it is, is based on peaceful, voluntary cooperation. When commerce is free and unfettered by government interference, both sides to a transaction normally gain, thereby promoting social harmony.

Democracy, by contrast, engenders social conflict. Money changes hands by force of the taxman and the threat of imprisonment, not voluntarily. Democracy pits citizens against each other in a sordid squabble whereby many strive to have the state confer benefits seized from their fellow citizens.

Here's another great quote that paints an easy to understand picture:

As the late, great economist Hans Sennholz described it, the democratic "transfer society" resembles the absurd spectacle of a circle of people, each trying to pick his neighbor's pocket. How can there be social harmony when everyone is trying to rip off someone else?

The government doesn't have a bottomless pot of gold to keep giving people all sorts of benefits. Government doesn't create any wealth at all. Any money it gives out eventually comes from the citizens: Either through taxation, borrowing(which is taxation in the future), or printing money out of thin air which is a stealth tax on everyone.

Have you seen what the national debt is. Our debt and obligations to social security and medicare are over $60 trillion! Do the math. That's $200,000 for each man, woman and child in America. Is it really possible to actually ever pay it off? Have we dug a hole so deep that it is impossible to climb out of? Is there an orderly way out of this mess?

We are starting to see two groups of people getting agitated and restless. Some people are demanding more government benefits to help them get through this recession. Others are getting angry about higher taxes and want to stop this crazy government spending.

When a financial crackup occurs, those who have been taught to depend on government will demand continued government benefits. If government fails to provide them, those demands could turn violent. On the other hand, if government moves to confiscate a significant chunk of whatever wealth remains in the hands of an already-hurting middle class, then millions of peaceful, law-abiding, hard-working Americans may finally reach the breaking point and rebel, as our forebears did in the 1770s, against a government viewed as abusive and oppressive.

How bad could it get? If the social order breaks down, civil unrest could disrupt markets and shortages of essential goods could occur. The resulting chaos could trigger martial law. A strong leader-a Caesar-could institute some sort of command order. Millions would resent it, but it would be accepted, because the alternative-civil conflict, chronic disorder, and impending starvation-would be intolerable. In such a calamity, Caesar would be the lesser of two evils. The American Republic and Constitution would join earlier democracies in the ashbin of history.

This is why I am so against all of these government programs. It's not that I don't want everyone to have healthcare. It's because I see where it will eventually lead.

I don't want to debate about details about which plan is better. I want to debate about why government should be involved in healthcare in the first place.

I don't want to fight for tidbits of benefits while I watch the greatest country in the world go down the tubes and destroy my right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

China's Stimulus Package Spurs GDP by 8% but the City It Built Is Empty

Tim Maitski "Video Agent Guy" (HomeAtlanta.com) — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 11:28:42 -0600

In order to stimulate the economy, China built an entire city in Inner Mongolia. It was an incredible project and is a shining example of what government spending can do. With this scale of government spending, China is keeping their GDP growing by at least 8% per year.

Before you begin thinking that maybe the US should follow China's example, you might want to watch the following video.

You'll see that this brand new, complete city is pretty much empty. There it sits in Inner Mongolia just waiting for the people to come. I'm sure it created a lot of jobs for the Chinese but somehow I think that it might have been a waste of good resources.