Home Value Decline and Kids – Moon of Alabama

April 5, 2008

Home Value Decline and Kids

Calculated Risk and Atrios both post about this USA Today piece: Mortgage defaults force Denver exodus

For hundreds of homeowners in this mostly middle-class corner of Denver — and an estimated 1.2 million more nationwide — the wave of foreclosures battering U.S. financial markets is quickly unraveling the American dream. Those who have lost homes here describe seeing their lives crumble into anxiety and embarrassment. Many leave for cheap apartments or rooms with relatives, a trend that is tightening the market for affordable housing.

This small corner of the Mile High City represents an extreme example of how foreclosures are transforming lives and neighborhoods. On some blocks, as many as one-third of the residents have lost their homes, making this one of the worst hotspots in a city that was among the first to feel the pinch of the foreclosure crisis. Many houses here remain empty, bank lockboxes on the front doors.

The foreclosure epidemic has swept so quickly through this part of Denver that in less than two years, lenders took action on 919 of the roughly 8,000 properties here, according to city records. Their owners defaulted on more than $171 million in mortgages they had used to buy their way out of apartments and into cul-de-sacs.

CR says there is too much supply now with all these foreclosures and the price drop will therefore continue. Atrios points out that a lot of these locked up places will be devastated by lotters, sqatters and weekend parties.

Both are right. Both miss an important issue I’ll mention in the last graphs of this.

But first some general rant.

Having watched some of the building boom in West Virginia and around
Silicon Valley in the mid/late 1990s, these house constructions seemed
to this European engineeer to be worse than what my ancestors did 300
years ago. Some plywood and paper and they call that a house? Those are
mere huts with some unreasonable ‘upgrades’.

(Sorry that this sounds so arrogant. But the standard U.S. home
really wouldn’t get through any regulation here. A home, upgraded here
and there every 30 years, should be good for at least for 100 years or
so. What the USA Today picture shows deserves to, and will be,
caterpillared once its left without tenants for six month. The banks
should keep the people in those homes if only to avoid those buildings
to become damaged beyond repair.)

But the real damage will be done to the people who have to move and find another place to live.

There ain’t that many free apartments available for decent rents.
There were only few investments in these over the last years. The
recent years explosion of the ‘American Dream’, or should one say
‘American Illusion’, of everyone needing a self owned home was
irrational. U.S. people move a lot. It doesn’t make economic sense to
buy and sell a house every five years.

The UK is probably even worse with its ‘Home Sweet Home’ attitude.
But those folks move less so there is more economic reasoning to it.
Anyway – London is also in for some marvouless decline of ridiculously
priced self owned house and apartment prices.

Not being able to sell the house because one borrowed more than the
home is worth kills the mobility of people. Folks now find out that an
‘interest only’ adjusted rate mortgage isn’t just renting a place but
means taking on much more of an obligation than paying a defined fix
sum per month. They would have been better off renting an apartment (if
available) in the first place.

But the worst trouble induced by the housing bubble and its popping will be with the next generation.

Imagine those great eyes kids made when their family moved into that
big house – and now they have to move out to some much smaller place,
like the family car under that bridge. The parents may tell them what
happened and lose their hero status of being able to do that own big
room, own bath, home ownership magic for these kids. Or they may not
tell them what happened but will inevitably transfer the stress they
live through onto them.

There is a lot of sociological damage done through such a crisis.
The effect of that is more devastating and, as it hits kids, more
longterm than the economic downturn.

That issue is getting too little attention.

Posted by b on April 5, 2008 at 20:23 UTC | Permalink

Comments

Come on! I see this as a great opportunity. Take a look at those houses near the Denver airport. Just put some barbed wire around the whole thing and you have a pre-built detention center in a perfect location. Much cheaper than the ones that KBR is building.

Posted by: biklett | Apr 5 2008 21:11 utc | 1

I’ll take a US$250 rambler on 1/4-acre with a garden and attached garage in California
over a EU430 duplex-remodeled 3-story walkup with cat box back yard in Hamburg any day.

Posted by: Frank Lucenti | Apr 5 2008 22:07 utc | 2

Frank,
yunno, I got spoiled living here with German building code standards: door locks that click into place with the precision of a mauser bolt-action rifle, insulation that insulates and (double) windowpanes that don’t rattle upstairs when you slam a door downstairs.
I miss the big front lawns and even bigger backyards and driveways big enough to accomodate multiple SUV’s, though.

Posted by: ralphieboy | Apr 5 2008 22:28 utc | 3

Kids, fuck em. Demography is the problem. When the slump takes hold people will catch on and stop reproducing like the Russians did.

Posted by: …—… | Apr 5 2008 22:55 utc | 4

Add in:
High energy costs
(CNN) — Skybus Airlines announced Friday it is shutting down its passenger flights — becoming the third airline this week to cease operations.
The low-cost carrier couldn’t overcome “the combination of rising jet fuel costs and a slowing economic environment,” the company said Friday. “These two issues proved to be insurmountable for a new carrier.”
And high food costs
Escalating food costs could present a greater problem than soaring oil prices for the national economy because the average household spends three times as much for food as for gasoline.
…
For a long time, feeding her family of three used to cost around $125 a week. Suddenly this winter, her bill leaped to about $200.

Posted by: Sam | Apr 6 2008 0:00 utc | 5

Great post b.
Many of the new homes that comprise America’s suburban sprawl, where my parents bought in to “the dream” in the 90’s, degrade quickly, the same way they were built. After just ten years, as our house settled, doors didn’t shut right, and yes, the windows were crap.
I’m probably too young to be able to say they don’t build them like they use to, but I really can’t imagine a lot of these homes lasting a century. And they shouldn’t. The way I see it, the soulless sprawl of suburbia (like “the nothing” in THE NEVER ENDING STORY) is just another example of the general suppression of the American imagination, which is being actively dulled to keep us incapable of fathoming the degree to which we’re being manipulated.
Or maybe not. Just hours ago I experienced the presence of Obama, who blessed this gushing little mountain town I call home with his mesmerizing oratory chops, and I must say the phenomena of his presence-the magic effect of his charisma-can be spellbinding. He even managed to chide the audience for our nasty American habit of driving 8 mpg hogs, then whining when gas prices here start catching up to the greater global reality of increasing demand and diminishing supply.
Is it any wonder, amid the crumbling illusion of THE AMERICAN DREAM that HOPE is selling like snake-oil? Unfortunately the question no one wants to ask because they know the answer is: who else but ourselves can we blame?

Posted by: Lizard | Apr 6 2008 0:35 utc | 6

You are of course entirely right, b, but consider the Iraqi and Palestinian children, and the sociological and physical damage that is daily inflicted on them. Why should we waste our pity on the children of people who very likely voted for Bush, who do not need to fear bombs dropped on them and probably still have enough to eat, medicine when required, etc.?
Maybe this experience at an early age may even be good for some, cause them to question the myth that they live in the greatest country on earth, and be more prudent investors in their own time.

Posted by: Marian | Apr 6 2008 1:16 utc | 7

Well, so what? The lifespan of what you build is basically the sign of how long you hope your civilization and society to last.
Let the whole house of cards come crashing down and turn to dust once and for all this nasty smelling pile of horse manure that is the American way of life, let go down into the dustbin of history and a merciful oblivion that fake joke that was called American dream. The time of reckoning has come, it was doomed to happen sooner or later, after all.
Sure, all of this will have an effect on the kids. I hope at least it will convince them that buying crappy houses because “it’s what you do, and you have to be a home-owner” is one of the worst in the long list of very bad ideas.
Go back to the city, or live on the farm. Anything else just can’t work.

Posted by: CluelessJoe | Apr 6 2008 1:21 utc | 8

Let the whole house of cards come crashing down…
Sure, CluelessJoe, it probably will, but relegating the story of America’s rise and fall to “the dustbin of history and a merciful oblivion” isn’t going to help future generations understand how such a young nation with unprecedented potential allowed for the total corruption of its foundational concepts, like the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
And yes, the American Dream sold to returning GI’s during the post-WWII boom, as America enjoyed and exploited its starring role on the imperial stage, is an obscene aberration that directly threatens the well-being of billions of people, but at this point snide dismissals of the “fake joke” millions of America believed in seems petty and shortsighted.
but ultimately i understand the need to rant. I do it all the time, even at the cost of sounding like an arrogant hypocrite.

Posted by: Lizard | Apr 6 2008 2:15 utc | 9

Dmitry Orlov points out that the value of some empty houses in the US as scrap for stripping may start to exceed their market value as houses. In which case, expect the looters to arrive soon.
iirc it was in 2006 that the US mint first announced it was costing more than a cent to make a copper penny. I’m not sure of the exact order of events but didn’t they add more zinc? guess what, now the cost of zinc has gone up and a US penny is costing 1.7 cents to manufacture, which leads to a curious condition called “negative seignorage”, in which the cost (in some arbitrary standard currency) to a government of the currency it is issuing, is more than the face value of the currency issued.
seems to me I hear the chariots of delusion hitting the brick walls of reality, all over the place.
one other note: in post-war England very few people owned their own homes. OTOH most did not live in the precarity of monthly rentals. there were “leaseholds,” a binding agreement between owner and tenant such that it was hard for an owner to boot a person or family out of a leased property in the absence of genuine malfeasance. leases could be signed for numbers of years at a time, sometimes with guaranteed flat rates. it was not a market suitable for wildcat speculation or vast profits, but it was pretty stable for several decades. then the financial institutions — or that’s my cynical belief — stepped in with their “everyone should own their own home and pay us lots and lots of yummy interest,” and … well, here we are, with acres and acres of gimcrack housing “owned” by people in hock to their eyebrows.

Posted by: DeAnander | Apr 6 2008 3:14 utc | 10

Why aren’t these abandoned properties going on the market as rentals? I guess the mortgage industry either doesn’t want to ‘fess up to its loss or it is under the direction of too many incompetents.
If they got renters in there who were paying half of what the mortgage was at least they’d have some cash flow. Though renters don’t take care of property as well as owners, er buyers, the properties would still fare better with renters than they will if they are left abandoned.
So much for the magic of market solutions.

Posted by: CMike | Apr 6 2008 5:12 utc | 11

Good work b, you hit the nail on the head with this post.
I’ve seen the over-priced McMansions sprouting almost overnight; or so it seems. The walls of some are not even honest-to-God plywood, but dense particle board, a congealed slurry of adhesive and wood chips. Yuk. They would seem to be glorified barns, sold for hundreds of thousands of dollars.
“The rain falls on the just and the unjust.”
(whether we like it or not)
I’m still a bit agog over that Joe Bageant article, concerning the end of everything as we know it. Suffocating from the mendacity of our leaders, most Americans inwardly sense the fragility of the cheepo scaffolding that surrounds us.
Baby, it was bound to fall.

Posted by: Copeland | Apr 6 2008 7:23 utc | 12

Foreclosed properties aren’t going on the market as rentals because the lenders don’t want to take title. If the collateral reverts to the lender, they have to pay property tax. By not going through with the foreclosure, lenders keep the hopeless homeowner on the hook for the tax liability. When the jurisdiction evicts the suckers for back tax, lenders can negotiate for their pound of flesh with the encumbered title.

Posted by: …—… | Apr 6 2008 7:51 utc | 13

Lizard: Well, it’s quite possible if not highly probable that there was from the get-go a systemic incompatibility between the foundational principles and the people. Or to be more blunt that current humans are not suited, subtle, intelligent and evolved enough to have freedoms, human rights and the like, as we wished we would.
Though there’s one obvious factor to take into account when it comes to the USA, which is that the often quite noble “foundational principles” have nothing to do with the real reasons for the revolution and independance, and the next 130 years of American history are to some extent the consequences of this massive cognitive dissonance.
As for snide dismissal, this is exactly what the entire right-wing and even a sizable portion of the West self-claimed “Left” did with the tens of millions of people who believed in communist ideals and principles, which at the end of the day weren’t worse – though not necessarily better – than American principles.
DeAnander is perfectly right in pointing that there were housing systems that work quite well, as long as greed doesn’t touch it.

Posted by: CluelessJoe | Apr 6 2008 13:10 utc | 14

Clueless Joe: I think you may be right, maybe there is an incompatibility between the principles and the people. Don’t get me wrong, I am not starry-eyed about the motivations of America’s “founding fathers”, some who probably found the time (Jefferson) to rape their slaves between feverish quill-sessions scribbling THE BILL OF RIGHTS.
I don’t know if Americans are just inherently gullible when it comes to our brief history, but as a Nation we really are toddlers on the global stage. This makes it so much easier to manipulate us. Most citizens believe whole heartedly in the official myth of the noble democratic experiment.
That’s what is so frightening about this country: unquestioning belief, like any brand of fundamentalism, religious or secular, is dangerous, and we got it bad. So when reality catches up, as it will, America will probably redefine what it means to be an ugly american.
Anyway, I think the housing bubble, and the subsequent dollar free-fall, has been an engineered devaluing of a dominant currency to prepare the US for a Euro-styled unification of Canada, America, and Mexico, which may sound like conspiratorial paranoia, but these are tricky times, and it’s virtually impossible for any of us to stay ahead of what’s happening.
Basically i agree, Clueless Joe, there are systems-housing, political, social-“that work quite well, as long as greed doesn’t touch it” but those systems will never be allowed to thrive as long as the real power players behind the scenes aren’t totally flushed out and disposed of like the fecal waste they are.
And that is a global problem, not just an American one.

Posted by: Lizard | Apr 6 2008 14:28 utc | 15

My dad lost his job about the time I was born, in 1931, and I remember a succession of small apartments (parts of private houses in Oklahoma); that was just how we lived. During the Second World War, Dad was more prosperous and bought a house in the first new subdivision, still in walking distance of downtown, and I had my own room. Which I shortly lost so my folks could rent our bedrooms to personnel at Fort Sill. (I slept on a couch in the living room, my parents in a walled off corner of the garage.) After the war, the house was sold for capital so my father could start his own business; it failed, and it was back to rented houses. But in those days, our converted garage on the back of a vacant lot was around the corner from the brick mansion of a prominent banker (whose daughter was a friend until she went East to finishing school). Urban economic segregation had only begun. Point, if any, kids take life as it comes. Present-day kids may roll with the changes. Problems may result from loss of status amongst peers.

Posted by: mudduck | Apr 6 2008 14:46 utc | 16

What the US needs is a healthy dose of hurricanes, floods and earthquakes to reduce the supply of housing. That would jack the prices of houses back up and voila! people would no longer be upside down and be able to refi.
/satire

Posted by: IntelVet | Apr 6 2008 15:17 utc | 17

The US tax system is set up so that it is as cheap or cheaper to take out a mortgage on a house than it is to rent one.
Rentals are for folks who do not want to own property; they either don’t want to be burdened with maintenance, want to retain the flexibility to up and move without having to wait on a buyer, or have the sense not to invest their money in the housing market.

Posted by: ralphieboy | Apr 6 2008 16:11 utc | 18

the rain falleth…
The rain it raineth on the just
and also on the unjust fella,
but mainly on the just, because
the unjust stole the just’s umbrella!

Posted by: DeAnander | Apr 6 2008 16:20 utc | 19

DeA: Orlov is a reductio-ad-absurdum blog-artist, another drudge.
We are in a time of disconnect, with housing deflation and fuel
inflation reversing a now quarter-century of exuberant exurbia.
A lot of suffering will occur, but we’ve been there before, if
you remember 1973 or 1984. The real tragedy is being set up now
in the halls of power in NY:DC, not on the streets of suburbia.
[VFX: Hindenburg Disaster. VO, “Oh, the bailouts, the bailouts!”]
Besides, US are still much better off that the poor trolls in EU:
link

Posted by: Tip Orillo | Apr 6 2008 16:35 utc | 20

B is right about the quality of the homes. From a Swiss pov. The stickiest in the world. Say..
It is tempting to call it one more artificial bubble with baubles and bells offered to hopefuls. – Like that costume jewelry that suddenly tarnishes or breaks. Looks junky, cheap, to begin with.
The deeper issue is territorial management. The land belongs to all. Even if legislation doesn’t say so it is still true within wider implications and colonising the country with cheap MacHomes was a disaster to begin with – see e.g. Kunstler, etc. Trash and burn, burn, baby, burn…
The value and the means to raise credit, were suddenly tied to small plots of ground and ramshackle structures?
Why did that happen, beyond the obvious that a small band of criminals made out like bandits, and passed on the rotten paper worldwide? Counting on the suckers lining up?
Maybe because there was nothing else left to sell, hype?
It is fraud, and moreover it was well known, but ignored.
Agonising about a liquidity crisis, or a credit crunch, etc. is just a white-wash and concentration on the symptoms. Massive fraud, illegal dealings, shenanigans, fake paper, lies, etc. But Oh! Now it is just a ‘banking crisis’ etc. and the Fed has to do a bail out.
Giving up territorial management in this way is a symptom of collective suicide (imho.) See also, roads, rail, bridges, waterways, the electric grid, and Katrina… Do Americans really want to go on paying heavy taxes, being ripped off, and ending up in a tiny homestead defended with guns, killing their neighbors for a few beets and praying regularly to Jesus for the next harvest? (sorry for the fancy..)
What I haven’t seen, is how many of these homes were ‘investments’ that were flipped, as opposed to how many were/are family-owned-occupied?

Posted by: Tangerine | Apr 6 2008 17:08 utc | 21

I was born after WWII, and I well remember 1973 and 1984.
Circa 1973, I was surviving on the occasional day-labor job and had some brief bouts of living on the street; but with the plucky resilience of youth, the palliative effect of mind-altering drugs, and a little help from my friends, it was possible to weather the storm. And there is no way to heal completely from the scars of those years: war, protest, incarceration, drug overdoses, paranoia, despair.
1984 was the beginning of the end of my livelihood as a machinist in the sheet metal trades. Four years later, after the crash of a relationship, I was a middle aged man. I did have my university education to fall back on; and I was yearning once more (as I had in my youth) to become a writer. But I never dreamt that my pursuit of a writer’s avocation would include what one MoA commenter calls, “the blogging the Apocalypse”.
Those who are not disposed to a profound contemplation of consciousness, who shun the possibility of spiritual or philosophical awakening, who will neither give nor allow solidarity the means to build a just society–these are exactly the people–most unprepared to survive the dislocation that is coming. 1973 and 1984 were indeed rough patches of road, but hard years would more resemble the 1930s.
From Bageant’s essay, I infer that perhaps, like some animals that become agitated prior to an earthquake, the great majority of my fellow Americans can sense, in some profound way, that the ground is about to shift, and shake their little world to pieces.

Posted by: Copeland | Apr 6 2008 18:52 utc | 22

Copeland,
I do not share your faith in humanity when you say that the vast majority of our fellow Americans sense change. rather it seems to me that we are acting like sheep running off a cliff, even those who hesitate when at the precipice will briefly glance down and then jump all the same.
I have never been down and out and have been comfortably employed since the age of 17 so my hat is off to you. I am now in a period of uncertainty as my present contract will soon expire and there is nothing immediately to take its place though the company I work for is good at finding new work. after nearly continuous employment (with very brief interruptions) for the last 35 years I am quite concerned for my future. fortunately my children are grown and the last one is in his first year of university. still I had hoped to be in a place where I could very soon quit working and simply be retired. I fear that the savings I have will disappear in the soon to come hyperinflation that is inevitable as far as I am concerned (there is no other way to get rid of the massive debt we have accumulated) and that sucks, big time.
I do not relish the thought of working selling apples or pencils in order to get a crust of bread when I am in my 80’s
it probably is a good time to buy ammo. things are going to get rough.

Posted by: dan of steele | Apr 6 2008 19:17 utc | 23

They were warned
Most amazing is all the little people that were defending the policies that led to the debt crisis. There is never a shortage of the clueless. Decades ago I picked up a young woman hitchiking. She was on welfare. It was election time and she told me who she was going to vote for. The guy ran on a platform of reducing welfare rates. Baffles me to this day.

Posted by: Sam | Apr 6 2008 19:32 utc | 24

Dan: I think there’s a difference between having the gut feeling that deep down something is terribly wrong and the party won’t last forever, but all will come down sooner or later, and knowing that there’ll be change, be ready for it, or even admit that there are good reasons for this change to come. So, I don’t think what Copeland said implied there’s any faith to have in the people – just the way animals don’t welcome the coming earthquake, they just know it is coming.
Lizard: I purposefully didn’t mean that only Americans are unfit to apply and live with such principles. Mankind as a whole isn’t read and I don’t think there’s any people or country that is mature enough to benefit from them without abusing them and totally perverting them beyond recognition, alas. And I don’t think all the problems are due to America being a young nation; partly, probably, but many are just due to wider and more general causes.
Now, to be brutally honest, of course I’d prefer that my current my life goes on, having my current standards – which are voluntarily a bit less than what I could really afford, and considerably less than what I’d get if I just wanted to run into debt and near-bankruptcy – for as long as possible, until somewhere in the future all will go away, in a way or another. But not only is this moderately leisury life paid by the blood and death of millions, which in itself would be reason enough to change the way things are, but even worse, I have no illusion about the final downfall of mankind if it goes on too long. I have no illusion that every year, heck, every month that passes without the end of the industrailised capitalist Western world as we know it, without the collapse the whole current global system and economy, means that fewer humans will be able to survive the coming catastrophe, and that fewer millions of people will be able to live in the future world – up to the point (probably still in the future, but I can’t be sure) where the damages we’ve done will mean that mankind will be entirely wiped out, along with a big share of mammals and other elaborate lifeforms. So, even though each passing month, I can quite enjoy my lifestyle, I am at the same time appalled that things still go on and saddened. Even if I benefit to some extent of the current situation, of the status quo, I can only wish for it to go away, fall, disappear as soon as possible – even if it would mean Hell for me and if I am massively unprepared for the shitstorm it would cause -, because I haven’t any choice, I can’t wish for mankind to die off and most of the planet to be utterly destroyed for thousands of years or more.

Posted by: CluelessJoe | Apr 6 2008 22:41 utc | 25

Article on IFC funding a new 8GW ultra-mega coal-fired plant in N. India.
Tata is the integrator, using super-critical B.A.T so meets green goals,
tariffed power selling for INR2.26 per kWh, such a deal. They will
need to bring another such “ultra-mega” online EVERY . THREE . MONTHS for
TEN . YEARS. Ready? China brings a new “ultra-mega” online EVERY . MONTH!
http://www.ifc.org/ifcext/spiwebsite1.nsf/0/1584ea74da3979ab852573a0006847bb?OpenDocument
Copeland, same back story! Stood in gas lines in 1973 while people shopped,
night shift as machinist. 1984 double-whammy up in Alaska, oil crunch on top
of economic recession, people just locked their houses and mailed the keys
to their bank. We left with our clothes and a 1970’s bomber, after years of
slaving in the G.W.N, sent the wife home to her folks and lived in that car
half a year, until we had FL&D for a liveable 1BR on edge of the Tenderloin.
If you’re gonna retire, learn to speak Tagalog/Bahasa/Malay. Live like a king.

Posted by: Sugar Bear | Apr 7 2008 0:11 utc | 26

@cluelessjoe #25 — yes, exactly.
it is almost intolerable to me to watch the parade of motor vehicles on the streets and highways, knowing that each litre of fuel burned is irreplaceable.
I said the other day to a fellow member of the waterfront riffraff that watching the industrial West today is like watching a beheaded chicken that is still running around. this lifestyle — the AWOL as I now call it, with all that this implies about dereliction of responsibility — is over, finito, busted, history… we just don’t really know it yet.
and at the same time, pragmatically, I hope to be able to fill the tanks on my boat with diesel before the real crash comes. are we crazy primates or what?

Posted by: DeAnander | Apr 7 2008 0:14 utc | 27

Understood, CluelessJoe.
And thank you for the verse, DeAnander

Posted by: Lizard | Apr 7 2008 0:27 utc | 28

Its a little like this story a friend recounted:
We got caught up in an unexpected traffic jam, and turned on the radio to see if anything was up. The announcer was talking about a visit to our town by Ronald Reagan, and sure enough the traffic jam had been created because we had happened upon the motorcade route from the airport. Just as we figured out this a motorcycle cop stopped us at an intersection, we figured out that our car was first in line and it was probable that Reagan’s limo might actually pass directly in front of our car. It was a golden opportunity, fueled in part because the better part of the day had already been spent bar hopping and trash talking, particularly about Reagan’s policies – so the fix was in. We figured and worked ourselves into a little hate frenzy about how when we saw his limo coming our way we would jump out of the car and give him directly and shamelessly the finger while shouting the same expletive, just in case he didn’t get the message. It wasn’t to long before a bunch of motorclcyle cops went by with their lights flashing and sure enough a big limo with little american flags fluttering on the bumper came into view. Moving a lot slower than we expected, with the window rolled down Reagan’s face appeared looking out. As his eyes met ours, in a very surreal moment, he lifted his hand up as if in slow motion, and with a smile waved directly at us. And without even looking at each other we both got a big grin on our faces and yes, we waved back. As he motored on down the road.

Posted by: anna missed | Apr 7 2008 1:25 utc | 29

I’ve seen a few of these pressboard-and-vinyl structures go up in my neighborhood. If they start showing problems after a mere ten years as Lizard has indicated, they will likely be only barely habitable in twenty-five, and that’s a generous estimate. Does anyone know for sure during which decade residential construction standards took such a complete and total nosedive? I want to say the 90’s, but I’m not sure.

Posted by: Loveandlight | Apr 7 2008 3:21 utc | 30

I don’t know…everything we do have an impact on kids. We as parents are not aware of it while we are young…or we don’t care. Sometimes we believe it’s for the better while in reality it’s not. Sometimes we are powerless and actually not in control of what is happening. I always thought I am protecting my kids while very often I just made them dependant on me. Life is what it is. Don’t ask me what I think it is because I don’t want to be rude, ha-ha. We all have to endure it.
And about houses in USA, Australia etc. They really are pile of shit comparing to European standards. But it’s also incredible how expensive actually land is here, having in mind space and number of citizens. It all has been projected to make a profit for certain people and middle class is just a “fuel” in that engine…

Posted by: vbo | Apr 7 2008 4:11 utc | 31

I forgot to tell you that here in Australia home value is not in decline (yet) and interest rates are going up, not down, but still more and more people can not afford to service mortgage any more. Not to mention how more and more people actually can not afford to buy real estate at all. So one way or another we are doomed…

Posted by: vbo | Apr 7 2008 4:24 utc | 32

I often work in the construction trades, and have seen various evolutions in those trades over the years. In most locations construction codes have actually become (a lot) more stringent, especially with regards to seismic and energy considerations – that most often translate also in structural integrity. For example, 2×4 exterior wall construction have been replaced by 2×6, as most rafter schemes use 2×10’s instead of anything smaller, down to 2×4 (in the old days). These changes are to accommodate greater insulation space, but contribute to better structure. Foundation to structure have also improved markedly, with every manner of rebar configuration, bolts, and straps. Inspectors insist (on site inspections) that these requirements be met, having already passed through rigorous structural
hoops at the building dept.
That said, other things have changed as well – in the other direction. There has been a steady increase in the use of chip products, aka particalboard, for sub-flooring, exterior sheathing, siding, and more recently, structural members. The use of vinyl (and other plastic products), for siding, windows, doors, plumbing, and even trim has also found wide usage. Most of these products pass minimum building (structural) standards easily, and offer some advantages, usually in price advantage, some “green” advantage, or ease of installation. The downside to the widespread use of many of these materials is that they often wear very badly to the elements. Chip products in particular, because they are mostly glue, expand and delaminate when they contact moisture and lose their structural integrity. Couple that (un)quality with “high production”/ maximum profit (shoddy) design and construction techniques and its easy to see why a lot of newer construction is already falling apart, before its even finished. *For some reason duration never seems to concern the engineering maestros at the building dept.
Personally though, its probably a good thing much of the new construction uses these poor materials, because those who like that sort of cheap shit wwill also have about zero preference for design, so at least it wont last very long. And even if it did last longer than it should, there would be no one interested in restoring it – the design being as wretched and soulless as the developers and bankers that conceived and gave birth to it.

Posted by: anna missed | Apr 7 2008 4:44 utc | 33

anna missed: yes, and thank you for making me feel a little bit better about not being able to maintain my cynicism in the captivating presence of hope incarnate, Obama. I don’t know what exactly it exposes in regard to the effect celebrity has on us plebeian hordes, but your friend’s story is honest.

Posted by: Lizard | Apr 7 2008 4:59 utc | 34

@Lizard the verse is not mine, but an old traditional bit of doggerel which is reprinted with many variations… (TIA)

Posted by: DeAnander | Apr 7 2008 5:00 utc | 35

anna missed: just to be clear, my 34 was responding to your 29, but i just read your 33, and thank you for bringing some “concrete” information to the discussion.

Posted by: Lizard | Apr 7 2008 5:07 utc | 36

It is not just the quality of US houses (10 year life on a 30 year mortgage!) but the whole premise behind their design, which was unlimited, inexpensive energy. They are too far apart, too far from the city, without public transport, too hard to heat… The whole US housing stock ($20trn) is facing a write-down as it was created on false assumptions.

I’ll take a US$250 rambler on 1/4-acre with a garden and attached garage in California over a EU430 duplex-remodeled 3-story walkup with cat box back yard in Hamburg any day.

Funnily enough, I have the opposite view. The latter would probably be very inexpensive to live in and work from with all the resources of a world-class city at hand; and it would last.
Having said that, I live in the country for lifestyle reasons. Our timber home is almost 130 years old, and doing really well, which proves that things were built to last in that era. We are 30 miles from a shop, but only need to go to town every couple of weeks for groceries and grow much of our own meat, vegetables and fruit. Perhaps we’ll be using a horse or sailboat (again) for shopping trips in a few years…

The parents may tell them what happened and lose their hero status of being able to do that own big room, own bath, home ownership magic for these kids. Or they may not tell them what happened but will inevitably transfer the stress they live through onto them.

Somehow I think that not a few of them are going to look to blame somebody. Dirty hippies, Wall-street bankers, liberals, Arabs, etc. etc.

Posted by: PeeDee | Apr 7 2008 5:23 utc | 37

DeAnander, can’t keep up, thank you for that old traditional bit of doggerel.
Here’s a quick stanza from Stanley Kunitz in protest of the wars that never stop:
When they shall paint our sockets gray
And light us like a stinking fuse,
Remember that we once could say,
Yesterday we had a world to lose.

Posted by: Lizard | Apr 7 2008 5:25 utc | 38

— @13,
There is no advantage to the mortgage holder to allow the property to remain empty, not producing income and accumulating a back tax burden. The problem is not that the mortgage holders are adopting some sort of “pound of flesh” strategy, whatever that might mean. The problem is the mortgage holder does not understand…he’s the mortgage holder of a not performing mortgage. These tranches have created new meaning to the term “absentee owner.”

Posted by: CMike | Apr 7 2008 6:22 utc | 39

cmike, are mortgage holders (pension finds, 403k’s, sub prime (highrisk) loans ) the same as mortgage brokers (banks)? i agree there is no advantage to keeping properties emoty but was the holder even aware ? who dumps it for them? the broker? somebody makes money on both ends, the holder suffers as the ex homeowner does. the broker becomes absent when the chips fall. socialized debt and privatized profit. we bail out the banks w/our taxes and are still left holding the debt. the broker survives. no?

Posted by: annie | Apr 7 2008 8:16 utc | 40

i meant 401 k’s

Posted by: annie | Apr 7 2008 8:17 utc | 41

jesus! pension funds! late night, better find my glasses. economics, i will never comprehend.
great thread, i have my own personal story, but it will be more interesting in a few months, and could go either way depending on whether my house sells.

Posted by: annie | Apr 7 2008 8:20 utc | 42

As the saying goes, mankind is doomed since the first time a human drove a stake in the ground, claiming that this land is now his, and everybody else believing him.
Add to that a banking system which in principle is designed to create money from thin air and thus allowing its owners, the Rothchilds, Morgans, Rockefellers of this world, to pump the nations economies into any shape they want to, bubbles being preferred, and you have the recipe for Banking giants as powerful as any army one would want to buy. The combined profits of Australia’s five major banks in FY 06 was about twice the Australian defense budget that year.
The whole scheme, with all its facets, from the political party system, to the structure of the courts, right down to the truths kids are being taught from kindergarten onwards, is designed to be a self perpetuating mechanism allowing the few to commit highway robbery on peoples journey through their lives. Lucky are those who get away with only being stole from, many end up as virtual slaves to the robbers for the rest of their days.

Posted by: Juan Moment | Apr 7 2008 9:09 utc | 43

Psychological damage to kids? Maybe: Americans are nothing if not persistent in our delusions. But what an opportunity for them to learn that the pursuit of glitzy plastic trash and invidious, ephemeral status symbols is an unworthy human endeavor!

Posted by: Gaianne | Apr 7 2008 21:10 utc | 44

Good to see ya PeeDee, order your poison on me…
On second though, I may not be able to pay my tab here at the moon, times are gettin ruff…guess and smile and a nod will have to do…
Somehow I think that not a few of them are going to look to blame somebody. Dirty hippies, Wall-street bankers, liberals, Arabs, etc. etc.
That’s pretty well exactly what former US secretary of labor Robert Reich says in my post on the OT.
Also, While some are worried about their homes, others are worried about eating…
Price of rice has doubled in the last two weeks

A global rice shortage that has seen prices of one of the world’s most important staple foods increase by 50 per cent in the past two weeks alone is triggering an international crisis, with countries banning export and threatening serious punishment for hoarders.
A global rice shortage that has seen prices of one of the world’s most important staple foods increase by 50 per cent in the past two weeks alone is triggering an international crisis, with countries banning export and threatening serious punishment for hoarders.

There were “tortilla riots” in Mexico, corn riots in Indonesia, and bread riots in Morocco and elsewhere last year.
Wonder how long before these shortages start showing up in good ol’ Amorica? While we haven’t had these shortages, yet, many things have doubled in price in the last year or so..

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Apr 8 2008 3:09 utc | 45

anna missed @ 33
I agree that current construction is structurally and energy wise an improvement over the past. The back slide is the interior finishing: cheap wall to wall carpet, poorly finished drywall, skimpy trims, cheap fittings. Except for the requisite granite countertops which may not even be granite.
But these “developments” of 50, 100, 200 units gain their cost efficiency thru cookie cutter repetition, slapped onto a meandering spagetti of cul-de-sacs. There are no mature trees to be seen. People who buy into these aren’t expecting to stay forever – they don’t expect to raise children and grand-children in these places, but to move up and away in a few years. So there is no neighborhood sense, no community sense. There is no there, there.
And that’s the real dread in the heart of America – that there just might not be any there, there.

Posted by: Allen/Vancouver | Apr 8 2008 3:53 utc | 46

Posted by: Allen/Vancouver | Apr 8 2008 4:49 utc | 47

i have this eversion wrt buying new lumber or remodeling materials. i think it runs in my blood. maybe it comes from creating valentines out of discarded wallpaper as a child, or reusing wrapping paper and ribbons. more likely loving architectural features from my grandfathers homes recycled from old schools ‘n likekind. in 1978 or thereabouts when he died i grabbed some old banisters in his garage left over from a building he shredded circa i don’t know when (he had already made many tables over the years using them for legs) and they are near me now, a few feet away on my stairs. he built a rather renown adobe subdivision in albuquerque during the 40’s called the chacon addition that still stands. marvelous little homes incorporating many recycled materials from old structures he would voluntarily dismantle for the materials. here’s one.
when i grew up, a weekend trip to the dump was a real treat. we scavenged. not because we were poor, but because lots of cool stuff is there, and back in the old days they let you rummage thru it.
i remember the first housing development they built in mill valley where i grew up, in the alto district. all these cookie cutter homes. i ask my mom if that was where the poor people lived. she said, ‘the poor people w/no taste’, meaning they weren’t cheap they were just poorly constructed and ugly. of course those houses now cost a million bucks.
this was in the 50’s/early 60’s before marin was ‘marin’.
the beauty of old stuff. what can i say. nothing they make today compares unless you have a friggin fortune. my life is somewhat defined by my remodeling projects (and as a child by my mother’s). creating something out of nothing is fun. free stuff is massively cool and rewarding. i can’t even begin to tell you. recently i have considered scrounging an old wrought spiral iron staircase (i originally scrounged in 88 or thereabouts, free of course, from a dump heap and placed into a loft) from one old minor’s house (i purchase for 3 grand down) and dragging it out to cali. its hard to find those old jewels now. anyway.. i am getting distracted . memories of stumbling across those jewels could fill a few books.
when i moved into my seattle house it was covered on the outside w/some truly gruesome fake brick siding that sort of resembled tar shingle roofing material. naturally it had to go. after tearing it off (beautiful old cedar siding underneath) the old window trim outline was apparent from the absence of paint. i was able to find all the original type molding for pennies at 2nd use , a massive wearhouse of used building material. i got excellent kitchen cabinets there, light fixtures, sinks.. i lived there. when they dismantled the tile section they called me and said ‘you want it”? i’m like.. hell yes (2 truckloads of free tile!). i tiled my entire basement, floors, shower stalls, door trims. the cool thing about free stuff is you can keep working when you’re broke. they opened up the restore in ballard a few years ago. i got all the wood for my arbor for 20 bucks. an old redwood deck someone didn’t want anymore. recently during my last ‘fix up’ phase, i was there every day. what a waste to buy cheap crap at home depot when you can buy gorgeous stuff people throw away for pennies or less.
once i moved into a house that was so dark and claustrophobic. i got a sawzall and cut out the region i knew one day when i found them i would install french doors. i lived w/that hole in the wall for 6 or 7 months. and then i found them. hey, holes can be very rewarding.
yeah, just like everyone i buy new stuff. but not if i can help it.
ok, back to my movie. i am at the ‘snap back or snap break’ part of uncle’s film (it’s good!) waiting for it to upload…

Posted by: annie | Apr 8 2008 5:30 utc | 48

I suppose the degeneration in American residential architecture into the proverbial cracker box began post WWII with the Levittown subdivision. Even then (1950) the template was fully incorporated that replaced the evolution from architecture as an expression of integrated style (or cultural idea) into a strictly business proposition. From that beginning, the use of precut delivered lumber, standardized cookie cutter replication, non-union workforce, and no/little money down – generally, set the parameter not only for cheapening down aesthetic expectations to the level of speculative entrepeneurship, but managed to justify it culturally, as modernity. Indeed, my small home town, chock full of fine 19th and early 20th century century houses has seen virtually every victorian, neo-gothic, or craftsman stripped of intricate detail, windows, and gingerbread and covered over with aluminum siding, acoustic ceilings, and vinyl windows – done for the most part because it looked “old fashioned”, or “out of date”. As a consequence, I think (post WWII) people have become culturally conditioned to not only expect, but to actually demand that their habitats (along with all other domestic artifacts) be generic, and exhibit no particular style. Mostly I think, because there is a fear that if it has style, it could go out of style, so they settle for no style instead.

Posted by: anna missed | Apr 8 2008 5:55 utc | 49

Theres also a lot to be said about the rise of suburban architecture in relation to the unquestioning obedience to new technology, cheap energy, the enhanced mobility of 2 cars in every driveway, endless blacktop,throw away consumerism, and of course the ugly immediate universal demand created by a nationwide “white flight”.

Posted by: anna missed | Apr 8 2008 6:08 utc | 50

annie – you should post the link to your house in Seattle. [What she did with the tile!]
Not a week goes by that S.O. doesn’t come from work with something salvaged in the back of his truck. What people throw away!
A next door neighbor tore up the heart pine flooring in his kitchen and was going to toss it. It repaired my front porch. Heart pine.

Posted by: beq | Apr 8 2008 11:43 utc | 51

except that style-less-ness is also a recognisable style.
Kunstler talks about “freeway architecture”– buildings like giant cartoons, designed to be perceived as a stylistic gesture out of the corner of an eye while flashing by at 65 mph.
recently a friend and I were driving through the outback of inland BC on our way to Quesnel and frothing a little at the hideous trophy homes springing in in random places along the highway. we mulled over for many miles just what it was that was so depressing about this buildings. first, we decided, there’s the deliberate clearcutting of every tree and shrub on the lot to make it “more efficient” to build a big house (i.e the builders can be as stupid and brutal as they wish with vehicles, as the acreage around the house has been reduced to bare dirt or gravel). but there was something more than that, something more disturbing than just an absence of trees.
finally it clicked for me. these trophy homes look commercial — that is, they look like commercial architecture. they look like steak houses, they look like Borders bookstores, they look like an upscale Starbucks in a resort community, they look like the central atrium of a ski lodge, like a yuppie Western-wear emporium, like some kind of fakey “Mom’s cookin'” restaurant in an upmarket mall. these homes look like shopping mall architecture. they are designed in mimicry of the “freeway style”… slightly smaller in scale, but the style is faithfully copied.
and this in turn made me think how the architecture of rich people’s houses always mimics their concept of power. when knights in armour ruled the land in recent memory, great houses of the wealthy were designed to imitate castles, which were originally armed fortifications. when the power of the Church ruled the land, rich people’s houses had stained glass windows, dark soothing wood work and vaulted ceilings. when industrial artificers were the dominant class, rich people’s houses became “art deco industrial” with a lot of brushed stainless, plain “functional” decor like an idealised locomotive, “rationalised” design. and now, corporate franchise barons rule the world and rich people’s houses look like franchise outlets.
or so it seemed to me, as the truck rolled on into twilight and the thinning edge of the great boreal forest, ravaged by pine beetle and trophy home developers (mange on two different scales, reflections of the same Wetiko culture).
and speaking of which
Taiga, taiga, turning brown,
beetle-eaten, burning down:
no jet flight or SUV
is worth this slo-mo tragedy.

Posted by: DeAnander | Apr 9 2008 2:08 utc | 52

On the positive side, probably the high point in U.S. residential architecture was in the Arts and Crafts / Craftsman era, 1900-1920. One of the first styles designed specifically for the emerging middle class, and ranging from the rather large down to the tiny, it in most cases captured the arts and crafts anti-industrial mantra of form follows function, beauty lies in proportions and craft, and a general distaste for pointless or excessive ornament. Its interesting that if there ever was an indigenous, or at least unique, American architecture, this would have to be it. With now many over 100 years old, most are still are intact and as beautiful as ever, and judging from what I see, the least remodeled, altered, or “modernized” of any style, bar none.

Posted by: anna missed | Apr 9 2008 4:08 utc | 53

buildings like giant cartoons
that says it all

Posted by: annie | Apr 9 2008 5:46 utc | 54

I’ve been in my little arts & crafts bungalow for 30 years this month. The day I moved in I knew I was home forever. [They were so not cool back then]

Posted by: beq | Apr 9 2008 11:09 utc | 55

Yeah, its amazing. You go to a place like British Columbia which is about 2 1/2 times the size of Califoria but with only 10% the population but they still strip-mall. The railroad didn’t even arrive here until 1886, then the Klondike gold rush of ’97 put both Vancouver and Seattle on the map. First housing was for loggers and railway men – the word “skidrow” survives. Then the mills started to produce Catalog houses – still surviving in parts of our cities.
Then a War, then a Depression, then a War, then the Levitt suburbs, then the creativity – Disney Studios, Beatles, NASA, Man on the Moon: then the pain – JKL, MLK, RFK, Vietnam. Then the lack of thougth, or avoidance of… or loss of faith.
When we don’t care anymore, we just leave the garbage out on the back porch. We pile shit upon shit. None of us wants to believe that we’re on a non-reservible downward course, but I’m not seeing any signs of God’s forgiveness.

Posted by: Allen/Vancouver | Apr 10 2008 4:03 utc | 56

Back to Main