Michael Podanoffsky's Discussions
Discussions are sorted newest to oldest.
- Discussions (134)
- Helpful (116)
Changing agents may not be so easy...
You need to separate in your mind the sale of your property from the purchase of the other. What did he promise or say when you spoke with him 2-3 weeks ago?
Make sure you are not asking for the impossible: feedback is not always given or available. Even when feedback is given it is often wrong, incorrect, and not valuable. Some agents refuse to even ask for feedback because often it is worthless.
When you are trying to sell your home there is a great deal of anticipation and anxiety. In this market there are a lot of tire kickers and few buyers. It is going to drive you crazy. However you should really be placing your emphasis on where and how your home is being marketed: where is it advertised, what is the market like, and is your home priced aggressively.
If you still want out, simply ask for a release of the contract to list your home for sale. There is no reason why the listing contract is related to the buying contract.
Who is responsible for remediating radon problem?
If you are buying the property you have the responsibility for setting the price and terms. Your only leverage is to walk away. Since I doubt they have many other offers, their stubbornness may cost them the sale.
A couple of negotiating points:
-- You have already made an offer at $999,000 and there has been an acceptance. However, you have tremendous leverage because you can cancel the contract over the radon. [ check with your lawyer on this one ] You also have a specific deadline and must respond within that date - so don't waste time.
-- You can ask for an extension on the radon issue. Say you want to discuss what your response will be be and want another 7 days. This is an extension to the inspection contingency. Use a lawyer or your agent (not their agent).
-- After the extension - if you need one -- indicate that you are unwilling to fix this issue and may walk on the contract.
-- Your "may walk on the contract" talk only works if you really can walk legally out of it over this issue.
-- If you do walk, you can make another offer at $975,000 on the same day. It may, or may not be accepted.
-- be prepared to not move into this home if everything falls apart.
-- be prepared to accept that you will pay for remediation if they refuse and you really want this house
-- demand and walk a tough line on their repairing this or you may walk
-- make sure you get a date by which the remidiation will be fixed, say within 21 days
Could be a better web site. Don't need to refresh page to jump from one pic to another. Pics should be resized top minimze scrolling.
There is really no data that would suggest SEVERE or HYPER inflation. There is data that suggests raising prices for many basic goods - certaily petroleum products, utilities and food. That data does not show severe inflation.
Even if oil doubles (100% growth), the prices of other products will not double. Transportation is a percentage of overall cost.
So why is there a fear of severr of hyper inflation?
jal74,
I think your post more than illustrates my point. A barter economy does not negate inflation, it merely allows people without money of any worth to exchange things they can get a hold off. Try barter for food to see how much fun that is!
Your post roughly translates to "these economies came to a standstill as far as money are concerned." I doubt we want to see the USA there.
FYI, wage income in the US has been negative in terms of real value for a couple of decades now. In other words, your salary's purchase power is less today than it was a couple of decades ago.
Alpine,
Which is worse: 20% prime or out of control inflation?
Long term no country survives out of control inflation. Interest rates are meant as a brake and are meant to cool the economy. The US has had 20% prime in the past and we didn't miss a beat. At those shock interest rates the economy cools really fast.
Tha last time this occurred, in 1979, it set the stage for a long and prolonged 30-year economic growth. I'd take the medicine instead of suffering from the condition.
Any kind of double digit inflation doesn't fix anything. On paper, the US debt would become a smaller percentage of its GDP (currently, almost 66% of GDP). Here are the ills with inflation:
1) You cannot save any money for retirement
2) You cannot save for a down-payment (savings rate is lower than inflation rate)
3) You cannot make money in the stock market (Dow barely keeps up with inflation)
4) Your grandparents run out of money since their savings are now a fraction of what they were
5) You taxes have to go higher since Social Security has to pay much higher cost-of-living increases
Good point. It's a cycle. As everything goes up, companies charge more for what they sell. In turn they can lose valuable employees to companies that will pay more, so they in turn pass some of that new income to employees so they can in turn pay higher rents and therefore are more willing to consider a higher priced homes.
There is a time lag between higher food prices and higher homes. Eventually homes in Europe shot up. Even Europe can't stop supply and demand.
The Fed will stop hyperinflation. They can set interest rates at 20% or higher until they wring inflation out -- and they will do it.
President Barack Obama to Kill House Flipping?
Alpine,
There is no effect on flipping from the cap gains tax. Captial gains are already at your tax rate for any asset held for less than 2 years (see note below). Flipping is obviously buy and sell within six months or less. So anyone flipping is already paying teh higher rate.
Capital gains taxes do not in any way affect money you may have invested in 401k or other tax deferred investments. Those are taxed on withdrawl as ordinary income.
LTCG (long term capital gains) supports people who buy and hold stocks, those that have significant portfolios in long term stocks or other assets such as boats, commercial real estate, and rental property. The lower LTCG tax is a tool for encouraging long term investment.
(My bet is that the capital gains tax stays where it is Obama or anyone else).
Home Sweet Home - Socialist countries have the lowest home ownership rates
I don't think the countries you mentioned are socialist, unless you have a deeply warped view of the world. All of the countries in the article are Western European countries, except US, Canada, Japan and Russia. The European countries mentioned, such as Spain, Germany, France, UK, etc... may provide a better safety net for their citizens (than does the US), but they are hardly Socialist. They all have extremely competetive free-market economies. Examples would be Volvo, VW, Fiat, Krupt, and well over 2,000,000 small businesses.
It is in fact these business and the payroll they generate that allows these countries to have a strong safety net.
As for several of these countries, they have a private sector medical insurance. This includes France -- called a model of free market health care, Germany and Japan.
The UK and Canada have single payer National health care. This does not make them Socialist unless you want to mix free market with who pays your medical bill.
July 22
See this discussion