18 minutes ago, DiPros said:

I thought I was doing well by buying any sort of pasta and a good jar of sauce.  Just boil enough for me and wham-dinner.  It's true you are what you eat, as it shot my triglycerides reading up over 500.  Had to cut back on eating that too!  It's come down, still not normal but better.  Now, you can't find a decent sauce in a jar that hasn't gone up like $2.  F-That, I bought the canned tomatoes and made my own. 

My hands are already shaking heading out to the card store.  Have you seen the price of those lately?  It's paper with writing on it!!!!!  I would dig around for something, but they are special.  My good friend just lost her brother (59-cancer) and cousin having 1st baby.  Both events same day. 

My kids and I just booked a trip to FL for Thanksgiving.  Don't care, it's only money still have to live the best life I can.  Can't let being poor affect my mental health too much. I have back up money, I just try not to use it.

When I moved back down and back from NC, I spent close to a year living on my own away from my family. So I had to adjust to cooking for myself like this. I used to buy those individually wrapped chicken breasts so I could take them out to thaw one at a time as needed. They are a bit pricey but cuts down on waste. I used to always have a baked potato with them because I could buy those individually as well. Add a bag of frozen broccoli and that was dinner usually about 4-5 nights a week . I'd still make a pasta meal with home made sauce but I would freeze individual portions with the leftovers. Also I recommend shopping at Aldi for groceries if you have one close by. I am back to shopping for a family of 4 now. Aldi isn't as insanely cheap as it used to be (fruit and meat are about the same as anywhere else now) but everything else is much cheaper. We are currently buying meat from BJs and everything else from Aldi and its helping offset the rise in prices. 

16 hours ago, vikas83 said:

Don’t like it then don’t pay for it. If demand drops enough, then so do prices. 
 

Economics. It’s MAGIC. 

It’s almost as if when supply shrinks and demand remains elevated margins can increase…

4 minutes ago, TEW said:

It’s almost as if when supply shrinks and demand remains elevated margins can increase…

Nah man. That doesn't apply to "essentials" like housing, healthcare or education...

4 hours ago, JohnSnowsHair said:

Liz Truss out as PM

Brit Pound surges after resignation announcement.

Who says conservative policy is always good for the economy?

2 hours ago, vikas83 said:

OK. Let's educate with a real world example of liberal economic illiteracy.

For decades in Oakland, buildings built pre-1983 have been subject to rent control. This only allowed rents to be raised at a maximum of CPI. Landlords entered into this deal willingly and abided by it for decades as CPI generally was below 2%. This lead to massively below market rents, especially as Oakland gentrified and an influx of people crossed the bay from San Francisco. 

Now that CPI is over 8%, the City Council passed a bill limiting rent increases to the lower of 3% of 60% of CPI, because dammit -- people have a need to live. So now landlords in older buildings (who tend to be individuals, not corporations), have costs skyrocketing (labor, maintenance, borrowing costs) and can't recoup that from rents even though they agreed not to raise rents for decades.

The end conclusion? Landlords are now looking to file for bankruptcy. And what can they do in bankruptcy you ask? Why...REJECT THEIR TENANT LEASES, THROW THEM OUT AND RE-PRICE THE UNITS TO MARKET RATES. Which is exactly what is beginning to happen. 

Liberals -- the most economically illiterate clowns on the planet.

 

Sounds like cherry-picking, but at the end of the day, someone's hoarding.

7 minutes ago, EaglesRocker97 said:

 

Sounds like cherry-picking, but at the end of the day, someone's hoarding.

Are you just throwing together random words? Or did your brain malfunction?

8 minutes ago, vikas83 said:

Are you just throwing together random words? Or did your brain malfunction?

Your previous post was largely unintelligible, but if you're using rental properties in Oakland as an example to say that no one is doing anything untoward, then you're just cherry picking an extreme case and trying to use that as just another way to say rich people couldn't possibly be doing anything wrong.

Properties are being hoarded, particularly in the real estate market.

12 minutes ago, EaglesRocker97 said:

Your previous post was largely unintelligible, but if you're using rental properties in Oakland as an example to say that no one is doing anything untoward, then you're just cherry picking an extreme case and trying to use that as just another way to say rich people couldn't possibly be doing anything wrong.

Properties are being hoarded, particularly in the real estate market.

It was unintelligible because you don't have a basic understanding of economics. To everyone else it made perfect sense. 

And there isn't hoarding -- people sell to the highest bidder. If that is financial buyers, so be it. Most of the landlords in Oakland with rent control are individuals, not companies.

It's like everything you say is a ridiculous talking point written by morons.

12 minutes ago, vikas83 said:

It was unintelligible because you don't have a basic understanding of economics. To everyone else it made perfect sense. 

And there isn't hoarding -- people sell to the highest bidder. If that is financial buyers, so be it. Most of the landlords in Oakland with rent control are individuals, not companies.

It's like everything you say is a ridiculous talking point written by morons.

 

You are triggered so easily and its kinda funny to me when you go on one of your meltdowns and go right to personal attacks, simply because someone dared to charge the elites with malfeasance.

It was unintelligible because of the way you were writing out the numbers.

There definitely is hoarding, it's been widely reported that most of the new home sales are being bought by individuals and management companies that already own many properties, to then turn into rental properties/Air BnBs and jack up rates well beyond inflation.

Everything you say is just another version or "rich people good, poor people bad" in an attempt to pull the wool over our eyes.

Poor little Vikas can't feel like a man unless he's calling someone else stupid and $hitting on poor people. How sad and pathetic.

1 minute ago, EaglesRocker97 said:

 

You are triggered so easily and its kinda funny to me when you go on one of your meltdowns and go right to personal attacks, simply because someone dared to charge the elites with malfeasance.

It was unintelligible because of the way you were writing out the numbers.

There definitely is hoarding, it's been widely reported that most of the new home sales are being bought by individuals and management companies that already own many properties, to then turn into rental properties/Air BnBs and jack up rates well beyond inflation.

Poor little Vikas can't feel like a man unless he's calling someone else stupid and $hitting on poor people. How sad and pathetic.

Nice and slow for the learning impaired...we were talking about RENT CONTROL PROPERTIES where the increases were limited to CPI for decades. Now that CPI spiked, they changed it to a max of 3% to further screw the individuals that all own older properties. These aren't investors, it's generational wealth. They've been forced to accept below market rents (average ~40% below) for decades and now are all going to bankrupt. Do you understand now?

And, no, you friggin moron, investing isn't hoarding. It's investing.

1 minute ago, vikas83 said:

Nice and slow for the learning impaired...we were talking about RENT CONTROL PROPERTIES where the increases were limited to CPI for decades. Now that CPI spiked, they changed it to a max of 3% to further screw the individuals that all own older properties. These aren't investors, it's generational wealth. They've been forced to accept below market rents (average ~40% below) for decades and now are all going to bankrupt. Do you understand now?

 

No, YOU were talking about rent control, because you wanted to cherry pick.

 

1 minute ago, vikas83 said:

And, no, you friggin moron, investing isn't hoarding. It's investing.

Semantics.

You are such a big baby.

2 minutes ago, EaglesRocker97 said:

 

You are triggered so easily and its kinda funny to me when you go on one of your meltdowns and go right to personal attacks, simply because someone dared to charge the elites with malfeasance.

It was unintelligible because of the way you were writing out the numbers.

There definitely is hoarding, it's been widely reported that most of the new home sales are being bought by individuals and management companies that already own many properties, to then turn into rental properties/Air BnBs and jack up rates well beyond inflation.

Poor little Vikas can't feel like a man unless he's calling someone else stupid and $hitting on poor people. How sad and pathetic.

 

single and double digit numbers are incomprehensible!

1 minute ago, EaglesRocker97 said:

 

No, YOU were talking about rent control, because you wanted to cherry pick.

 

Semantics.

You are such a big baby.

OK, genius. What's your suggestion? Saying people can't own multiple properties? Banning institutional buyers? Congrats, you just destroyed the housing market. But I'm sure you won't come crying for mortgage relief for all the people who go massively under water.

12 minutes ago, vikas83 said:

OK, genius. What's your suggestion? Saying people can't own multiple properties? Banning institutional buyers? Congrats, you just destroyed the housing market. But I'm sure you won't come crying for mortgage relief for all the people who go massively under water.

 

I don't know what the answer is, but I know that the first step to finding one is admitting that there's a problem.

 

Limiting the number of properties that people can hold in some of these areas doesn't sound all that crazy to me. It's just like anything, where you get to a point that the supply is so tightly controlled by the wealthy that they just keep swapping them amongst themselves, giving the illusion that the housing market is booming and raising the price of housing to the the breaking point.

Just now, vikas83 said:

OK, genius. What's your suggestion? Saying people can't own multiple properties? Banning institutional buyers? Congrats, you just destroyed the housing market. But I'm sure you won't come crying for mortgage relief for all the people who go massively under water.

Not for nothing, but the original post was an explanation that a huge percentage of price increases during this inflationary cycle was due to corporate profits.  It wasn't specifically about the housing market and it wasn't about any proposal for solving the issue.  It was just about informing people.  Unless for some reason you think the American people are smart enough to figure this out on their own, which I know you don't believe.

Just now, EaglesRocker97 said:

 

I don't know what the answer is, but I know that the first step to finding one is admitting that there's a problem.

 

Has it ever crossed your mind that you, and those like you, might be the problem?

Just now, EaglesRocker97 said:

 

I don't know what the answer is, but I know that the first step to finding one is admitting that there's a problem.

You're diagnosing the problem wrong. There isn't "hoarding" of real estate -- no one is buying up homes and then taking them off the market to sit empty. As a landlord (both personally and professionally), the last thing you want is an empty property earning no return. Occupancy rates are at all time highs, and people are paying the rents. 

The issue IS a lack of supply, but that's because overregulation and other factors make building affordable housing unattractive. The issue you need to combat is there needs to be a GREATER supply of low cost housing, which is pretty impossible to do in the current environment (regulations, inflation, borrowing costs). It could have been done over the last decade, but trying to build in ANY of these places is a nightmare. Just the EIR (environmental impact) studies alone take years and cost millions. We've done some of this for work in Southern CA, and it's just never worth it. 

1 minute ago, vikas83 said:

You're diagnosing the problem wrong. There isn't "hoarding" of real estate -- no one is buying up homes and then taking them off the market to sit empty. As a landlord (both personally and professionally), the last thing you want is an empty property earning no return. Occupancy rates are at all time highs, and people are paying the rents. 

The issue IS a lack of supply, but that's because overregulation and other factors make building affordable housing unattractive. The issue you need to combat is there needs to be a GREATER supply of low cost housing, which is pretty impossible to do in the current environment (regulations, inflation, borrowing costs). It could have been done over the last decade, but trying to build in ANY of these places is a nightmare. Just the EIR (environmental impact) studies alone take years and cost millions. We've done some of this for work in Southern CA, and it's just never worth it. 

My favorite part is how you are forced to build public spaces on private property, so that way your tenants are forced to live around homeless people and the landlord os forced to deal with the destruction of their property.

Just now, TEW said:

My favorite part is how you are forced to build public spaces on private property, so that way your tenants are forced to live around homeless people and the landlord os forced to deal with the destruction of their property.

Here's my favorite real world example. One of the things we did in the past was buying golf courses by acquiring the debt at a discount. Post the Tiger boom, this country built waaaaaaay too many courses, and most can't make money or support the debt. So we'd buy them and then begin the process of getting them re-zoned and re-entitled to build housing. And EVERYONE fought us. Nearby homeowners fight tooth and nail, because they don't want affordable housing near them. Each project we're going through multiple rounds of EIRs and CEQA submissions, trying to move it forward. Eventually, we end up either dealing with a city council, planning commission or in some cases a ballot initiative. All of this, and we commit to make 20-30% of the homes affordable housing for low income residents. 

Usually, it's like a 7 year process just to get to the point where we can bring in a homebuilder. Now, we can sit on that, invest millions more and work the process because we don't have LPs. But normal investors can't have dead money for a decade, no matter what the payoff. 

They need to make it easier to actually build housing.

15 minutes ago, EaglesRocker97 said:

 

I don't know what the answer is, but I know that the first step to finding one is admitting that there's a problem.

 

Limiting the number of properties that people can hold in some of these areas doesn't sound all that crazy to me. It's just like anything, where you get to a point that the supply is so tightly controlled by the wealthy that they just keep swapping them amongst themselves, giving the illusion that the housing market is booming and raising the price of housing to the the breaking point.

There is no possible way that is Constitutional. 

What you really want to do is limit 1031 exchanges to try and combat people re-investing with no tax. I don't support that, but it would be much more effective and legal.

3 hours ago, vikas83 said:

OK. Let's educate with a real world example of liberal economic illiteracy.

For decades in Oakland, buildings built pre-1983 have been subject to rent control. This only allowed rents to be raised at a maximum of CPI. Landlords entered into this deal willingly and abided by it for decades as CPI generally was below 2%. This lead to massively below market rents, especially as Oakland gentrified and an influx of people crossed the bay from San Francisco. 

Now that CPI is over 8%, the City Council passed a bill limiting rent increases to the lower of 3% of 60% of CPI, because dammit -- people have a need to live. So now landlords in older buildings (who tend to be individuals, not corporations), have costs skyrocketing (labor, maintenance, borrowing costs) and can't recoup that from rents even though they agreed not to raise rents for decades.

The end conclusion? Landlords are now looking to file for bankruptcy. And what can they do in bankruptcy you ask? Why...REJECT THEIR TENANT LEASES, THROW THEM OUT AND RE-PRICE THE UNITS TO MARKET RATES. Which is exactly what is beginning to happen. 

Liberals -- the most economically illiterate clowns on the planet.

maybe those landlords should learn to code. 

 

3 minutes ago, vikas83 said:

Here's my favorite real world example. One of the things we did in the past was buying golf courses by acquiring the debt at a discount. Post the Tiger boom, this country built waaaaaaay too many courses, and most can't make money or support the debt. So we'd buy them and then begin the process of getting them re-zoned and re-entitled to build housing. And EVERYONE fought us. Nearby homeowners fight tooth and nail, because they don't want affordable housing near them. Each project we're going through multiple rounds of EIRs and CEQA submissions, trying to move it forward. Eventually, we end up either dealing with a city council, planning commission or in some cases a ballot initiative. All of this, and we commit to make 20-30% of the homes affordable housing for low income residents. 

Usually, it's like a 7 year process just to get to the point where we can bring in a homebuilder. Now, we can sit on that, invest millions more and work the process because we don't have LPs. But normal investors can't have dead money for a decade, no matter what the payoff. 

They need to make it easier to actually build housing.

Can’t really blame them tbh…

1 minute ago, mr_hunt said:

maybe those landlords should learn to code. 

 

OK, that made me laugh.

I hope Vikas treats his tenants better than his secretaries...

1 minute ago, DEagle7 said:

I hope Vikas treats his tenants better than his secretaries...

Currently evicting one right now. Total PITA. 

It's a business in a mall we own, not a person. Before everyone has a stroke.