[Grovenet] America's Trillion-Dollar Baby
Ron D'Eau Claire
rondec at easystreet.com
Sat Jan 27 15:15:05 PST 2007
That's rather old data. It's from the 2000 census.
Consider what a "housing unit" really is: it's any structure that is or has
recently been used for a dwelling. Here in Oregon take a drive in the
country and check out the old dilapidated cottages and "mobile" homes
sitting here and there. They are "housing units".
In the cities, look at the run-down slums. More housing units.
Another source for 'empties' are depressed areas. They don't help those in
other areas who need homes.
It doesn't take a Broker to understand the old mantra, "location, location,
location!" The home has to be where the willing and able buyer (or renter)
can live in it. Here in the USA that has been left up to the buyer to
decide, so people have opted for longer and longer commutes. Then they
demand support for those commutes: bigger highways, more affordable
gasoline, etc. In some other countries the government has stepped in and
drawn circle around a person's employer. You must live within that circle!
That's not acceptable here in the USA, but that doesn't mean a commuter will
go to any length to own a home too far from work. In the San Francisco Bay
area, that seems to be about 100 miles or w00 miles round trip *every day*
for a lot of people. That's 9 or 10 hours at work and perhaps 8 hours on the
road. One can squeeze in 5 or 6 hours of sleep if they do nothing else. One
couple who were interviewed in the 1990's drove a motor home and took turns
sleeping on the commute which took more than 8 hours every day.
Is that sustainable? I don't think so. So what happens to thousands and
thousands of homes in California's central valley of those workers go away,
as they might at any time if there's a stumble in employment around San
Francisco? You will have miles and miles of empty houses. That happened in
the 1970's in Houston when the oil bust struck there. Whole townships filled
by new, never-occupied homes were deserted.
This is where I start to sound like a "liberal" to my conservative friends,
but I think the answer is more regulations. Sure, we can always try to
educate our kids better, but the bottom line is that at some point it has to
become impossible for the citizen to choose certain options such as driving
100 miles each way to their jobs so they can have a 3 br 2 bth ranch home
instead of a city condo.
We currently have another serious problem in housing that is growing
rapidly: defaults. A lot of people grabbed "sub-prime" loans when interest
rates were very low and over-extended themselves buying more property than
they could afford. Now they can't keep up the payments. Not too many years
ago, less than 5% of the loans written were sub-prime because banks and
S&L's didn't like to write high-risk loans. But then investors fell in love
with the high interest rates those loans returned and demanded more
opportunities to invest in sub-primes, so the mortgage companies have
complied. Over the past couple of years, that number has jumped from 5% to
20% sub-prime loans.
In the last quarter of 2006, 12-1/2% of all sub-prime loans were in
foreclosure! That deterioration is expected to go on for several years.
Ron D'Eau Claire
P.S. There's another "daffy definition": sub-prime. "Below Prime?" Nope. It
means "above prime" interest rate. Usually about 3% above the prime interest
rate. So, since the interest rate is above the prime, it's called "sub"
prime. Go figure....
-----Original Message-----
From: grovenet-bounces at rdrop.com [mailto:grovenet-bounces at rdrop.com] On
Behalf Of Steven
Sent: Saturday, January 27, 2007 10:12 AM
To: Forest Grove local interests list
Subject: Re: [Grovenet] America's Trillion-Dollar Baby
Here is an interesting chart. http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0905152.html
It shows that there were about 10 million unoccupied homes in the US in
2000. I would expect that number to have grown with the construction
over the last 7 years. With that number, it could easily be that we have
current room for 30 million new residents. If the number were to have
gone up over the years to 15 million, that would be 45 million new
residents. If growth comes from immigrations and these immigrants have
larger families then the number could be even larger.
I could imagine that if your projection were accurate, we would not need
to expand our growth boundaries at all.
This could start to turn real estate prices. 100 years from now, empty
homes could be close to 30% of total homes.
Ron might know what would happen to real estate.
Carol Morgan wrote:
>
>
>
> Hi,
>
> Not to suggest that your numbers are wrong, but many growth
> projections are used by taking the current growth rate and multiplying
> it by number of years, and this ends up being incorrect. The rate of
> growth is itself slowing, and that rate of growth is accellerating at
> a rate that won't always be predictable, and many believe by 2030 the
> growth rate will actually be 0 and start declining. That is because
> we are only a few decades behind the trajectory of Europe's
> demographic trends, which have resulted in negative population growth
> (declines) in several of Europe's biggest countries: Russia (and
> Soviet block countries), Italy, Spain, and Germany among others are
> already shrinking. World population will start to shrink by 2050 at
> the latest.
>
> The US will slow because our indigenous birthrate is already
> negative--we only grow now because of immigration. And the countries
> that we get people from are themselves slowing down. Mexico's
> birthrate is about replacement and shrinking and so in a few decades
> they will need their own labor and not send it so us so readilly.
>
> As to the water prediction, who is to say that in 43 years, whatever
> the population, the scenario for obtaining drinking water will be
> significantly different? There are many technologies looming on the
> horizon, only waiting for economic feasibility created by a lack of
> cheap ground water that we now have. And one would bet that if Middle
> Eastern populations still have water by then, (they are growing faster
> and are in worse situations with respect to water supply), they would
> have made some contributions to that technology by the time we get to
> that situation.
>
> Hate to spoil the doomsday predictions, for some reason many find them
> fun, but the points I have made are consistent with what usually
> happens to these types of predictions. Many have predicted that we
> would run out of food, using the assumptions of many more people and
> less food. But technology has resulted in a situation where right
> now, nearly every country in the globe is a net food exporter. This
> country could feed the entire world if its crop capacity were
> reached. Obesity is becoming a much more common food problem than
> starvation, even in poor countries, and especially in poor populations
> within rich countries.
>
> I imagine that since the assumptions underpinning the lack of energy
> and water are themselves so Malthusian, they won't materialize, just
> like mass starvation didn't.
>
>
> On an alternate path. The USA is projected to be over 400 million by
> 2050. We don't have enough water for that many.
>
> Ron D'Eau Claire wrote:
> > Neither the anti Prop-37 activists or those who are trying to make a
> > windfall from Prop-37 are in charge. They're both noisy, but it's
> > only noise. The legislative and legal systems are now in charge.
> > Claims
> are being
> > filed, and the legislative branch of the government will make a
> > determination on each one.
> >
> > We have a system that works. Don't get distracted by the people on
> > the street corners (of Grovenet or the streets) waving signs. The
> > best
> they can
> > hope for is to change the rules some day in the future, if enough
> people
> > agree with them.
> >
> > Where did you get this figure?
> >
> > "To answer your question, Ron. We will need 20% less than what we
> > now consume to be competitive in the future. What will the future be
> like to
> > achieve that? Who decides the best path?"
> >
> > I think you're saying we need 20% more energy, not less. If it were
> less
> > we'd already have a surplus. So we need 20% more? If so, then we
> know what
> > we need to do.
> >
> > Who will decide how to achieve that number? In the USA it will be
> > the scariest body of them all. It will be the same group who elected
> > James Carter, Bill Clinton and both Bushes to the Presidency: the
> > American
> voter.
> >
> > And that's why I campaign for a better informed, better educated
> > voter!
> >
> > But, please, before we rush to the polls, where did you find that
> number?
> >
> > Ron D'Eau Claire
> >
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: grovenet-bounces at rdrop.com [mailto:grovenet-bounces at rdrop.com]
> > On Behalf Of Steven
> > Sent: Wednesday, January 24, 2007 8:13 PM
> > To: Forest Grove local interests list
> > Subject: Re: [Grovenet] America's Trillion-Dollar Baby
> >
> >
> > I was thinking of the prop 37 landowners vs county and FG's Morelli
> > vs Metro stuff. We can't seem to get the 'who is in charge' thing
> straight. I
> > notice that we seem to be focused on commuting to work. Live close
> > to work. Stuff us all closer to work. Is that the largest
> > consumption of energy? Is the goal to have a bazillion employees
> > making widgets? Who would be the consumer ins
> such a
> > world?
> > Is the goal to stuff us in close to a job?
> > We could easily live in 300sqft per person units. A building 320' x
> 320'
> > would have about 100,000sqft of living space. Enough for over 340
> > people. Multiply that by 30 floors and you have enough room for
> > 10,000 people. If it costs too much to have this in the cold north
> > of
> Oregon or
> > North Dakota, we could decided to move all living to temperate
> climates.
> > The entire population of Oregon and Washington could live in less
> > than 1000 of these buildings in eureka, CA. We could move all
> > manufacturing from the northwest to there, too. Food transportation?
> > Convert all organic mater to hydrocarbons. We can recreate the
> > perfect food, EcoFu. It would have all the nourishment the body
> > needs.This could be manufactured local to the residences so that
> > transport would be minimal. Manufacturing needs would be minimal,
> > there isn't a lot that will
> fit in
> > my studio apartment.
> >
> > Now, on the other hand. I remember a book about how to be self
> > sustaining on 40 acres of land. Maybe it is more or maybe it is
> > less. What if the answer is for each person/family unit to have a
> > certain amount of land that they are in charge of. Oxygen production
> > from
> plants
> > might be a bonus. Or maybe we could each have a garden, like a
> > Victory Garden. Maybe we don't commute to work, but use technology
> > to work from home.
> >
> > Metro has set us in motion for one of these viable options. Which
> > one?
> >
> > To answer your question, Ron. We will need 20% less than what we now
> > consume to be competitive in the future. What will the future be
> like to
> > achieve that? Who decides the best path?
> >
> > Ron D'Eau Claire wrote:
> >
> >> Man, Steven, you become absolutely paralyzed at the idea that
> >> anyone might tell you what to do!
> >>
> >> How do you survive a day knowing there are laws that you must obey
> >> or you'll be arrested, or work you must do or you'll lose our job,
> >> or that the choices of where you live, what you wear and where you
> >> go on your 'own time' are in large measure limited by the choices
> >> of other people?
> >>
> >> And what do such phobias have to do with wanting to know how much
> >> energy the USA will need to regain a competitive position in the
> >> world for our children while protecting the qualities that make
> >> life here
> >>
> > attractive for us?
> >
> >> Ron D'Eau Claire
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> > _______________________________________________
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> >
> >
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> >
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