California Cities To Seize Mortgages?

[3rdnlng]

http://news.yahoo.com/calif-cities-eye-plan-seize-mortgages-190416716--finance.html

 

 

"The idea was broached by a group of West Coast financiers who suggest using the power of eminent domain, which lets the government seize private property for public use. In this case, they would condemn troubled mortgages so they could seize them from the investors who own them. Then the mortgages would be rewritten so the borrowers would have significantly lower monthly payments.

 

Steven Gluckstern, chairman of the newly formed San Francisco-based Mortgage Resolution Partners, says his main concern is to help the economy, which is being held back by the mortgage crisis.

 

"This is not a bunch of Wall Street guys sitting around saying, 'How do we make money?'" he said. "This was a bunch of Wall Street guys sitting around saying, 'How do you solve this problem?'"

 

Typically, eminent domain has been used to clear property for infrastructure projects like highways, schools and sewage plants. But supporters say that giving help to struggling borrowers is also a legitimate use of eminent domain, because it's in the public interest.

 

Under the proposal, a city or county would sign on as a client of Mortgage Resolution Partners, then condemn certain mortgages. The mortgages are typically owned by private investors like hedge funds and pension funds."

[/dev/null]

And eventually somebody will figure out that once the city/county takes the mortgage, they don't necessarily have to lower your payments and can use the interest as a revenue stream.

 

Then when some developer wants to build something they'll grease the right palms. Munincipality then forecloses on a few strategic properties, saving the cost, headache, and bad PR of eminent domain

[IDBillzFan]

And eventually somebody will figure out that once the city/county takes the mortgage, they don't necessarily have to lower your payments and can use the interest as a revenue stream.

This is how we're going to pay for the bullet train that no one needs.

[B-Man]

http://news.yahoo.com/calif-cities-eye-plan-seize-mortgages-190416716--finance.html

 

 

Typically, eminent domain has been used to clear property for infrastructure projects like highways, schools and sewage plants. But supporters say that giving help to struggling borrowers is also a legitimate use of eminent domain, because it's in the public interest.

 

Under the proposal, a city or county would sign on as a client of Mortgage Resolution Partners, then condemn certain mortgages. The mortgages are typically owned by private investors like hedge funds and pension funds."

 

So they say................

 

 

Thanks Justice Souter.

 

.

[DC Tom]

http://news.yahoo.com/calif-cities-eye-plan-seize-mortgages-190416716--finance.html

 

 

"The idea was broached by a group of West Coast financiers who suggest using the power of eminent domain, which lets the government seize private property for public use. In this case, they would condemn troubled mortgages so they could seize them from the investors who own them. Then the mortgages would be rewritten so the borrowers would have significantly lower monthly payments.

 

Steven Gluckstern, chairman of the newly formed San Francisco-based Mortgage Resolution Partners, says his main concern is to help the economy, which is being held back by the mortgage crisis.

 

"This is not a bunch of Wall Street guys sitting around saying, 'How do we make money?'" he said. "This was a bunch of Wall Street guys sitting around saying, 'How do you solve this problem?'"

 

Typically, eminent domain has been used to clear property for infrastructure projects like highways, schools and sewage plants. But supporters say that giving help to struggling borrowers is also a legitimate use of eminent domain, because it's in the public interest.

 

Under the proposal, a city or county would sign on as a client of Mortgage Resolution Partners, then condemn certain mortgages. The mortgages are typically owned by private investors like hedge funds and pension funds."

 

 

Rhetorical question, that B-Man already answered:

 

When did "public use" become "public interest"?

 

We are truly governed by idiots.

[3rdnlng]

Rhetorical question, that B-Man already answered:

 

When did "public use" become "public interest"?

 

We are truly governed by idiots.

 

Those communities are just placing themselves on a no lend list for all lenders and insuring that real estate values and prices stay depressed there.

[DC Tom]

Those communities are just placing themselves on a no lend list for all lenders and insuring that real estate values and prices stay depressed there.

 

Better than that: they're tanking their own finances. How are they going to pay for modifying the mortgages? Are they going to tank the mortgage bonds that are pinned to these mortgages? Or are they going to pay them off and refi them...and if so, with what? It would actually be easier, if they're going to appropriate mortgages under eminent domain, to just forgive the mortgage: the party with interest in the mortgage has already been !@#$ed over when you've expropriated the damn mortgage, and modification of the mortgage is something the cities simply cannot do, since they don't have anywhere near the capital.

 

Stupid, !@#$ed-up plan. The kind of plan you get when you've got all the goodwill in the world completely untempered by any knowledge of how the world actually works.

[IDBillzFan]

Stupid, !@#$ed-up plan. The kind of plan you get when you've got all the goodwill in the world completely untempered by any knowledge of how the world actually works.

Nice article today breaking down California: America Without Republicans.

 

With all of this unfunded government spending, Keynesian-Democratic thinking would predict that California's economy should be booming.

 

It isn't.

 

At 10.8 percent, California has the third-highest unemployment rate in the country. There are fewer private-sector jobs in the state today, 11.9 million, then there were in 2000, 12.2 million.

 

And thanks to liberal welfare requirements, a third of all the nation's welfare recipients live in California despite the state only containing one-eighth of the national population.

 

Brutal.

[TakeYouToTasker]

The scariest part about this is that perverse incentive seems to have been packaged into pill form and ingested by everyone involved in the discussion. Since when have investments been guaranteed to be profitable? Also, I can't see any way that doing this sort of thing won't scare away future private investment.

[DC Tom]

The scariest part about this is that perverse incentive seems to have been packaged into pill form and ingested by everyone involved in the discussion. Since when have investments been guaranteed to be profitable? Also, I can't see any way that doing this sort of thing won't scare away future private investment.

 

I want to say 2008 or 2009.

 

(Through no fault of Obama's, I hasten to add.)

[IDBillzFan]

Sad story about the people of Stockton, CA.

 

We talk about the government, but the people are in dire straits.

 

While Stockton’s bankruptcy troubles can be traced in part to the collapse of the housing market and the subsequent erosion of the city’s tax base, for years city leaders also mismanaged and overspent funds, pushing the city into financial peril, analysts and current city officials say. Stockton cannot afford the $417 million it owes for retiree health benefits, city officials say, and this year a bank repossessed city-owned parking garages and a $40 million building the city had bought with plans for an upgraded City Hall.

 

Since 2009, the city has cut 25 percent of its police officers, 30 percent of its Fire Department and over 40 percent of all other city employees. And while the Police Department has started hiring again, much ground has already been lost. Last year, there were 58 homicides here, a record. Halfway through 2012, there have already been 35. Other cities across the state are also teetering. On Wednesday night, city leaders in San Bernardino, Calif., voted to declare a fiscal emergency, which would allow the city to file for bankruptcy within 30 days.

 

After the three burglaries, Ms. Hinson and her husband, John Hinson, 68, a retired city finance director, installed an alarm system, video cameras and a locking gate at their home. But when the alarm goes off, which it has on several occasions, they say the police do not come. “They used to serve and protect, but now they can’t protect us anymore,” said Ms. Hinson, who works for a company that manages homeowner associations. “We have to protect ourselves.”

[Dante]

Nice article today breaking down California: America Without Republicans.

 

 

 

Brutal.

Keep those borders open. We need more using Cali's services.

[TakeYouToTasker]

Keep those borders open. We need more using Cali's services.

See, this is where I always begin to get a good chuckle at the faux divide between Democrats and Republicans. Those "services" you speak of all function as nothing more than subsidies for big business. Welfare nutrition programs? Subsidies for Big Agro. Prescription drug programs and now the ACA? Subsidies for Big Pharma and the Insurance industry. Free cell phones? Subsidies for Big Telecom. The list is nearly endless. The players all understand exactly what they're doing and enrich themselves as they go along by investing with the highest levels of insider knowledge, and exclusive access to IPO's as political payoffs. The theater we see on the stage doesn't matter a whit, because it isn't real. Our system, when critically examined, is a vampiristic neo-mercantist sham designed to confiscate and consolidate the wealth of the world by a few, and is protected by the political theater of a one party system acting as well payed gate keepers.

[DC Tom]

See, this is where I always begin to get a good chuckle at the faux divide between Democrats and Republicans. Those "services" you speak of all function as nothing more than subsidies for big business. Welfare nutrition programs? Subsidies for Big Agro. Prescription drug programs and now the ACA? Subsidies for Big Pharma and the Insurance industry. Free cell phones? Subsidies for Big Telecom. The list is nearly endless. The players all understand exactly what they're doing and enrich themselves as they go along by investing with the highest levels of insider knowledge, and exclusive access to IPO's as political payoffs. The theater we see on the stage doesn't matter a whit, because it isn't real. Our system, when critically examined, is a vampiristic neo-mercantist sham designed to confiscate and consolidate the wealth of the world by a few, and is protected by the political theater of a one party system acting as well payed gate keepers.

 

"Vampiristic neo-mercantilist" is great, but I prefer to think of it as "laissez-faire free market chupacabraism."

[TakeYouToTasker]

"Vampiristic neo-mercantilist" is great, but I prefer to think of it as "laissez-faire free market chupacabraism."

Vampires > Chupacabras

 

In all seriousness though, our system has never been laissez-faire. Alexander Hamilton saw to that. Capitalism is alot like pregnancy. Either you are, or you aren't.

Edited July 20, 2012 by TakeYouToTasker

[DC Tom]

Vampires > Chupacabras

 

In all seriousness though, our system has never been laissez-faire. Alexander Hamilton saw to that. Capitalism is alot like pregnancy. Either you are, or you aren't.

 

And even if it were, "laissez-faire chupacabraism" is a pretty damned obvious oxymoron.

[TakeYouToTasker]

And even if it were, "laissez-faire chupacabraism" is a pretty damned obvious oxymoron.

Consider our current venue, and ask yourself if the large majority of the posters here would have posted what you did oxymoronically, or out of ignorance.