What a week!

Mortgage foreclosure White Knights targeted by the Florida Attorney General (no surprise there - just why did it take so long?!!!)

CNN special report on the Mortgage Meltdown and it being second only to the Great Depression.

Record foreclosures expected to continue to break records through 2008 and into 2009.

But heck - its Friday night and after working 5 - 19 hour days in a row I'm going to take Saturday off!

From the perch here in West Palm Beach things look like the stock market - volatility galore.  Usually this means that there is a big change on the horizon. The question of course is "what is the change"?  I cannot forecast if it is the Obama change, the Clinton change, the McCain change, or what the heck it is - just that from my 35 years of experience in South Florida, change it will be.

Now in my blogs I usually espouse some kind of educational line but I'm taking a rest and just espousing about kicking back and stepping back to take a look at the Forest instead of the trees.

Here are some changes I can see in my business over the past year:

1.  The number of residential closings is off by one-half.

2.  The number of commercial closings has picked up in the last quarter and is accelerating faster than I can remember in the past 10 years.

3.  The number of short sale calls I get (I do promote myself as a short sale experienced attorney) is through the roof, and some of the stories literally make me cry - sometimes in sorrow and sometimes in disgust from the blind greed exhibited by some investors.

4.  The number of wealthy investors that have lost huge sums in real estate is becoming astounding.  The past 2 years and probably the next two years have seen an incredible amount of transfer of wealth from buyers to sellers, and now those buyers are seeing the invested wealth evaporate more and more each day.

5.  We get involved in discounted mortgage packages. The blind greed of Wall Street and the crap paper they produced that was not properly disclosed to institutional and private purchasers of bond portfolios is astounding and in the end, some heads will roll down the criminal row for sure -- just because the government needs to target a scapegoat.  In reality, if they jailed all those involved, the number of jails in this country would need to double!  Can I ask, is there anyone out there (who solicited borrowers or packaged loans) in the past 4 years that can throw the first stone (and does not live in glass house)?  I doubt if there are many innocents - yet I can't blame everyone since if you wanted to be in business, you had to do business and giving loans to unqualified borrowers (who qualified under these stupid programs) was how business was done.

6.  Bankruptcies are so continually breaking records that the news does not even report it anymore.  Try to get an appointment to see a bankruptcy attorney -- you'd think you were trying to get an appointment with the Queen of England!

You get the picture - the present business climate is all over the place. Volatility, lack of definite direction, opportunists, family financial tragedies.  All the signs of Change.

So no education tonight, just some observations. 

How is your outlook this week?

Richard Zaretsky, Esq., RICHARD P. ZARETSKY P.A. ATTORNEYS AT LAW, 1655 PALM BEACH LAKES BLVD, SUITE 900, WEST PALM BEACH, FLORIDA 33401, PHONE 561 689 6660  RPZ99@FLORIDA-COUNSEL.COM - FLORIDA BAR BOARD CERTIFIED IN REAL ESTATE LAW - We assist Brokers and Sellers with Short Sales