Ignorance At It's Best

Just when you think government can't come up with any more ignorant ideas comes this.

Another suicidal idea from the Great State of California, specifically San Bernadino County.

I'm becoming more and more convinced we should be requiring IQ tests before running for office. ANY office.

So the geniuses holding county offices in San Stupiderino County have decided it would be a good idea to use eminent domain on property whose owners are under water in their mortgages to "save" the property values.

WTF?

So we have local governments across the nation cutting back on police and fire services because of critical budget shortfalls but we have counties in California of all places thinking they should now bail out homeowners whose houses are worth probably half of what the mortgage is.

Were these idiots dropped on their heads when they were young?

Ignoring the obvious problem of the county finding funding to buy the property in the first place, they believe they would then give the homeowner a reduced mortgage. Yes, the local government thinks they will now be in the mortgage business. Assuming the homeowner would suddenly begin paying the new mortgage (and that's a big ASSumption) these county gubmint pinheads apparently do not understand the words, cash flow. Their money is now tied up in long term investments. Extremely low interest rate long term investments. Let's imagine five years from now when rates are tripled what they are today and the county needs to borrow funds at the high rate while the mortgages might be returning 4%.

They also do not understand what will happen to the real estate market by their "solution" to the looming foreclosures.

Just what do they think will happen to very single mortgage lender in the country?

I could give them a one minute lesson in what happened when parts of Chicago passed a ruling that every mortgage applicant had to receive mandatory counciling within 7 days after applying for a mortgage.

Lenders have to process loans FAST. Delaying an application for at least a week is an eternity for a lender. As soon as that was announced the mortgage company I worked for took the zip codes involved and red-lined the area.

No mortgage would even be considered for houses within the affected areas. And every other mortgage company did the same.

If these knuckleheads in California get this done, they have just killed the real estate industry there.

There will be no bank, no mortgage company, no investor that will ever lend there again. People and companies have this quirky aversion to lending money only to have some local government use their powers to return half their investment.

If it wasn't for my friend Z I'd think the entire state is nothing but crazed whackos.

Add that to the real estate sales tax that was buried in the Affordable Care Act. If you make more than $250k a year (which would not be rich if you lived in the Golden State) there is now a 3.8% sales tax on the full sales price on the property paid by the seller. What does that have to do with health care? Not a damned thing.

No way the housing market will recover anytime soon.