Guess what Obama thinks he did wrong

This is Obama’s record as POTUS:

This is what the POS thinks he did wrong:

“I didn’t tell a good enough story”

Asked by CBS’ news anchor Charlie Rose to reflect on the past 3½ years as POTUS, this is what the POS said:

“When I think about what we’ve done well and what we haven’t done well, the mistake of my first term – couple of years – was thinking that this job was just about getting the policy right. And that’s important. But the nature of this office is also to tell a story to the American people that gives them a sense of unity and purpose and optimism, especially during tough times.”

That’s how clueless the POS is.

H/t Patriot Action Network

~Eowyn

Americans Turn to Apartments, Government Counts it as Growth in Housing

Pop the champagne, folks! Fresh data from the Commerce Department says home construction is on the rise.

There are only two teensy little problems.

First, a surge in construction for January – the most trumpeted facet of this report – is being cast as great news that people are buying new homes. If an 80 percent rise in apartment buildings counts as buying a new home, then there you go. Pay no attention to the fact that construction for free-standing houses actually fell.

While this is great news for the suffering construction industry, it has nothing to do with home sales. In fact, this is bad news for banks. More and more Americans are giving up on home ownership and settling for apartment space. And while some of these new buildings will accommodate population growth, a jump to the tune of 80 percent means something else.

A large chunk of these new apartment dwellers will likely be folks who just abandoned an underwater mortgage. This means even more saturation in the existing home market and less chance for new home construction in the near future.

Speaking of home construction, we turn to the second major problem with the government’s figuring. Just a few weeks ago the Commerce Department flooded the media with good news about building permits. Take it away, CNN Money:

Permits for housing construction soared in December, while initial construction of homes declined, the government reported Wednesday.

“Last month didn’t look so hot for construction, but the future looks a lot better,” said Mike Larson, a housing industry analyst for Weiss Research…

“We’re seeing confidence creeping back into the market — and while we’re not ready to go nuts building yet, with jobs starting to improve I think that’s going to be a catalyst to get construction going,” said Larson.

The surge in apartment construction did in fact occur, but the decline in home construction continued. What was the difference? Three weeks later (when they hope you’ve forgotten all that) we get the truth:

“We had strong increases in December as builders pulled permits to avoid some onerous regulations being imposed at the first of the year,” Crowe said. “In January, we had an adjustment to that.”

And there it is. Scrambling to secure permits before new regulation counted as economic confidence. High demand for apartment space counts as home construction. And that troubling report published yesterday about a surge in evictions due to foreclosure? All part of the plan.

Welcome to the new normal where apartment leases are as good as home ownership.

-Candance

11% of U.S. Houses Sit Empty

Sure doesn’t look at an economic recovery to me!

But then I don’t work for the Fraud’s administration. 

~Eowyn

Nearly 11 Percent of US Houses Empty

By Diana Olick – CNBC – Jan 31, 2011

America’s home ownership rate, after holding steady for a while, took a pretty big plunge in Q4, from 66.9 percent to 66.5 percent. That’s down from the 2004 peak of 69.2 percent and the lowest level since 1998.

Homeownership is falling at an alarming pace, despite the fact that home prices have fallen, affordability is much improved and inventories of new and existing homes are still running quite high.

Bargains abound, but few are interested or eligible to take advantage.

More concerning than the home ownership rate is the vacancy rate. The Census tables don’t tell the entire story, but they tell a lot of it. Of the nearly 131 million housing units in this country, 112.5 million are occupied. 74.8 million are owned, and that’s only dropped by about 30 thousand in the past year. 38 million are rented, but that’s up by over a million year over year. That means more new households are choosing to rent.

Now to vacancies. There were 18.4 million vacant homes in the U.S. in Q4 ’10 (11 percent of all housing units vacant all year round), which is actually an improvement of 427,000 from a year ago, but not for the reasons you’d think.

The number of vacant homes for rent fell by 493 thousand, as rental demand rose. 471,000 homes are listed as “Held off Market” about half for temporary use, but the other half are likely foreclosures. And no, the shadow inventory isn’t just 200,000, it’s far higher than that.

So think about it. Eleven percent of the houses in America are empty. This as builders start to get more bullish, and renting apartments becomes ever more popular. Vacancies in the apartment sector have been falling steadily and dramatically, why? Because we’re still recovering emotionally from the toll of the housing crash.

Younger Americans have seen what home ownership has done to their friends and families, and many want no part of it. Credit has become very nearly elitist. Home prices, whatever your particular data provider preference might be, are still falling.