That’s what is wrong with America. Major recession/depression, nearly no one can get financed, those that can are simply waiting it out anyway just in case…and STILL sh**ty service trying to buy something. I swear, some of these sales people act as if they don’t work on commission or something. Hello STUPID, no one is gonna buy a car…if someone IS gonna buy a car you need to KISS THEIR BACKSIDE!
OK. Now to tie this into REI. A few weeks ago we closed on a 3/2 from a guy who owns numerous properties in town. This one and a couple other properties of his had been on the market for well over a year. We offered a low number and he immediately came down to close to our price (well down from his asking price). At closing, we asked him if he’d be interested in owner financing - at least long enough to weather the economic storm and we could re-fi w/ a bank later. With no hesitation, he answered yes. So after that we went and looked at his other two houses on the market and decided to put an offer in on one of them. We had shopped some banks and was able to find a bank to still do a NOO loan for us. We figured this would give us better bargaining position on the price rather than doing the owner financing. We started a couple thousand higher on this one as it was a little better house than the one we just got from him. Our first offer was rejected w/ no counter. The day we placed our offer, the owner (who has all these properties listed w/ an agent) called our Realtor directly and told him that we’d “better hurry up and put in an offer because Obama is fixing to raise the capital gains tax and that’s gonna make the price go up.” We raised our offer to what we were willing to pay and still have cash flow. His response was that he was holding firm on his asking price on his house that had been on this house for well over a year because he thought he could get it.
So in an environment of almost no buyers and very slim lending options, he thinks the house is magically going to sell for his asking price and probably more if the capital gains tax goes up…
When he should be thankful for even getting a qualified offer, he’s trying to play hardball like it’s a seller’s market… Stupid.
Today is a good example of what I was talking about in regard to Ford stock (stocks near bankruptcy). GM’s auditor said that they may not have enough money to be ‘a going concern’, which is causing them to trade down. Ford will be trading down in sympathy (on the news). If you were putting $3,000 into Ford stock at $2.00/share a couple of days ago, then you could buy 1,500 shares. Currently, you could buy 1,800 shares with the stock trading at $1.65. I have my order in at $1.25, which would allow me to buy 2,400 shares with the same $3,000!
Mike
I don't consider this playing....to me it's called income.
more steep income this morning:
http://www.google.com/finance?q=skf
-Mike