Well, that's a record this month, just wait as we start going into the expensive pqrt of the year. :pity:
Obama has COMPLETELY screwed the economy, and I honestly think he and his merry band of croo...errr Czars are out of ideas.
We are a long long ways from where the bottom is eventually going to be folks.
I predict this record will be broken at least 3 more times in the next 6 Months.

 

Who would want to buy a house in this climate?

IMO is not Obama. Im not sure there's much more he can really do besides enact New Deal-like legislation to get people to work since the private sector still refuses to hire people despite the many bailouts to industry. He won't be able to do that anyways since the deficit hawks, many whom were silent in the Bush era, won't allow any more stimulus to pass. The Bush taxcuts ought to expire so we can get much needed tax dollars to help pay off some of the deficit and shore up Social Security and Medicare before the mass retirements begin. The only good thing about this major recession is that is held up retirements and maybe saved those entilements from going broke another few more years. Its really sickening to know that past administrations from both parties, more so the Republicans(since they don't believe in entitlement programs), have dipped into the SS trust fund and allowed the health care industry defraud Medicare and Medicaid, thus raiding our taxdollars to shore up corporate profit. The free market cannot provide essential services to everyone and the government must not privatize them. We're feeling the effects of 30 years of laizze faire/neoliberal policies and its time to change course.

 

That's nothing. Existing home sales dropped 27% the highest on record.

 

I am not being a smart *** here...and I am a small business owner.....it sounds like you are blaming SB for "REFUSING" to hire....

why would I hire when my taxes are going to go up compressing my gross to net income, if I get hit by a bus myt family has more headaches than security and get little of the benefits of my dealing with this **** every day, my share of employee expenses are going up, demand does not dictate hiring, I have increased regulatory costs, Off shore supplier credit lines are cut significantly because they do not trust our countries debt load, I will be losing R&D tax credits in 2011, government debt is sure to mean significant inflation at some point in time, I am dealing with potential deflation short term, I am financing most of my own reciecvables since banks wiull not lend and have lowered credit lines...and oh yeah credit insurance is non existant while I am carrying my own recievables, deductibles for loss prevention have skyrocketed....Please please tell me exactly why in the hell I am doing this..............cause I damn sure do not need to and would rather be fishing more often than not now days............why exactlky am i an ******* for not hiring?:up:

Those are just a few of the things I am dealing with...so please do tell me why you are seemingly assiging the blame to SB for not hiring...what are we missing that IS our great incentive to hire?....please do tell cause I would loive to make a few families happy as I once again carry the stress of all this while being called nasty names for wanting to make a profit and secure my families future......will be anxiously awaiting your response.............

 

It amazes me that my own money...unsecured by the way,,,and for the record this economy makes it very risky to do business and carry ANY AR........I am forced to carry more of my own AR, there are no credit lines available so I also carry more of AP, margins are compressed, my taxes are about to go through the roof...and I am the problem and the ******* that "refuses" to hire................AMAZING.............

 

m2c, isn't it amazing how one can always tell who has and hasn't been a BO'er!:yes::up:

BTW you and all the other BO'ers have my utmost respect, don't forget the BP pills.:wink2::up:

 

Sell me a good house for 125K and I'm down

 

I wasn't talking about small businesses. They are feeling the squeeze and the brunt of the recession. Im talking about the big boys, the banks we bailed out who aren't lending, the companies we bailed out who are laying off their workers anyway. The rich who've seen their lowest tax rate in history and yet aren't hiring anyone. Most corporations don't even pay any income tax at all! So why are we all upset about taxes, when clearly high taxes are NOT whats choking this economy?

 

"The Bush taxcuts ought to expire so we can get much needed tax dollars to help pay off some of the deficit and shore up Social Security and Medicare before the mass retirements begin"...and then " wasn't talking about small businesses. They are feeling the squeeze and the brunt of the recession."..makes no sense....those that benefit most from the Bush tax cuts are small business owners so why do you to punish them/us by saying "they ought to expire"...why since you were supposedly talking about big business?

Banks are not lending because we were stupid enough support a PONZI scheme...ahhh I mean accounting rule that allowed banks to go off balance sheet for the toxic mortgages...and BTW...we ain't seen the tail end of that dog yet.....they have to have cash on hand to pay balance those losses due to having to pass "stress tests" and why lend money when you do not know what whacko law or rule is next, you have higher taxes coming, and higher employee costs, and business failing all over the place due to lack of demand...I do not blame them for not lending in these conditions, but I sure will not rail on small business owners that take their own money to market.....only to get taxed to death and the families taxed beyond their death.......

 

I could show you 3-6 in my neighborhood that are about 135k (3BR, 2Bath and 5yrs old or less).

 

Thanks Ron. I certainly handle it better this time. There is not as much pressure this time since it is not the end all if something goes bad....not that there are not pressures........

At the end of the day as long as you know what you are dealing with you can adjust your business to maxamize your netbacks whether that is in the manner of time, lifestyle, revenue, profits, or philanthropy ........ just with these clowns who knows what crazy idea is next.

 

The Bush tax cuts benefits those who makes above $250,000. Most small business owners do not make that much money. All Obama is going to do is allow that portion of the tax cut to expire and return to Clinton-era levels during which the economy was healthy. Tax cuts do not pay for themselves you know, theyre actually adding to the deficit.


You want to cry about the deficit but your keep the tax cut that youre really not getting. Doesn't make much sense.

 

I can see this from a business owners perspective. As a business owner you want to have the least amount of expenses as possible. Of course you're going to hate taxes. But just as I can see this from your perspective, what about a non-business owner? Dont our opinions count as well? As workers we are the usually the first casualties of business "restructuring" in bad times and even in good times. We don't look at small business owners as greedy, cheap, tax avoiding bullies. Its the bigger guys who are conspiring against us workers and you small business owners by unfairly competing against momandpop operations and by lowering standards for everyone in terms of doing business: poor customer service, low pay little or no benefits for workers, pushing deregulation for themselves but pushing regulation for their smaller competitors, avoiding paying taxes(many large multinational corporations don't oay any corporate taxes at all! That is a fact.) amongst other things. Why are you guys defending these crooks who don't give a crap about you or I?

 

Anybody and everybody if you have any sort of a stable job...this is actually the most ideal time to buy a house, I did. I bought a house assessed by the Town I live in for $273,000, for $209,000, at 4.85% interest, and it was a convential sale, not a short/foreclosed. It is in a very nice neighborhood surrounded by 300-550K houses, in a great school district....My house will never be under water, and if it does, then hey we are looking at third world climate....The deals like this are ALL over the place, my buddy bought a $650K house for $405,000...at a flat 5.00%...crazy deals....

You will not see deals like this for a very long time, once the market rights itself....

I can only thank the fools taking out 400K mortgages, on a 35K income for my opportunity, without them the crisis would have never happen....

 

not to mention the mandated healthcare you will be required to offer to your employees soon....:up:

 

thats what I am talking about, the deals out there are insane right now....

I hope you took advantage of that Stitch, and by your avatar you did!!!! :up:

 

foreclosure.com

 

By no means am I defending them! I love having them around because having them around and all the go to market problems they have allows us small businesses to fill gaps........for instance we compete rather well (actually kicking the crap out of them in many instances) against the Dow's, BASF, Albemarle's of the world because there are gaps in their service.......we import products (chemicals in essence) from Asia, Eastern Europe, India and various parts of the world that are low cost models of production from smaller and mid size manufactuers...because we have the largest consumption economy and they have low cost manufacturing base, consumption is primarily in the USA......so as their production grows in size they try to do the same things we have been doing for years...i.e....manufactuer molecules off shore...many times they have to spend gazillions of dollars building ground up because these small manufactuers they have targeted will not sell their business to them and we have most tied up on contract anyway...or these small-mid level manufactuers are completely pleased we have sold their plant out , and tell Dow to piss up a rope................the big guys hate us because we sell exactly what we are......a lower priced alternative that picks up 50% type supply positions, with a long pipeline and allows customers to leverage our price to the big guys keeping their margins (AND YOUR RETAIL PRICE DOWN!) down and for this......

THEY get taxed at a rate 3% lower than a small business owner, THEY get the benefit of reciprocal tax rates with countries like China and India, they guarantee credit lines with big multinational banks that freeze us smaller guys out and force us to carry our own AR and AP, ...so yeah I love being a pain in their ***.

I AM NOT "DEFENDING THESE CROOKS"!!!!! I love it when they exist because every scenario you just pointed out you are looking at as a problem....I see an opportunity to fill a void in the market and sell that benefit...I AM DEFENDING THE FREE MARKET!!!!!.....it is when the government gets involved in "fixing" everything that those voids and opportunities "we" small business guys have in front of us, become obstacles that protect the big business.........and on top of that........I do not blame ANYONE including big business, small business or anyone for not hiring right now.....it is like hitting a moving target as to what stupid goofy idea or new accounting principal is next with the bozo's.....hell as a business owner I do not even KNOW what my tax rate will be next year....what the F is off balance sheet accounting in the biggest market sector in our country...how F'd up is that!

do you realize that most small businesses operate on 6-10% EBITAD...and now with the tax cuts expiring it you may have an increase in tax rate that takes 3-4% of that away because tax rate is bottom line......so now these guys (us) will be earning 3-6% (max) after taxes while exposing in many cases 100% of their own money to risk (since credit insurance is non existant now days)...and that actually makes sense to people? Do you realize that if you have a 25% GP and a 5% net then you have to increase revenue $20 to off set any $1 loss in earnings.....IN A DOWN MARKET!!!!.

It is sheer and utter stupidity to allow the tax cuts to expire FOR ANY OF US! As far as planning and hiring....NO FN WAY.....not when their should be a tent over this circus in Washington and these bozos throwing darts to see what cockamamie idea they can puke up next...........

 

Yes and Im glad youre smart enough to start your own business and take advantage of free enterprise. God bless you. But not all of us, like me, are cut out to start our own businesses. We do need some social safety nets in this country because we're starting to have third world like conditions in alot of our cities and this being America, that is unacceptable. Not everyone who is unemployed is a lazy welfare recipient either, especially in these times. Jobs that used to be considered a dime a dozen in this country are becoming rarer and rarer due to the globalization. Now Im not opposed to globalization as an ideal, but the execution of it is hurting workers here and Im inclined to think alot of this was planned. That said, when it comes to big business, I cant think any of them that are anywhere close to ethical. Not to mention big business does not like free trade(in some scenarios), open competition, unregulated markets. They want restricted trade measures, less competition and regulated markets, because they can use the law to rig the game in their favor. For example, Reagan was the biggest protectionist President of all time, as import duties for steel were never higher than under his term, and it was done to protect the American steel industry. Is that free trade? No, its an example of protectionist measures used to stifle out competition, in this case foreign. Walmart is a good example, of course, of big business squashing out the little guy and it has nothing to do with convince, price, what have you. They bribe cities and municipalities to change zoning laws so Walmart can come in and claim eminent domain.

 

I am amazed that people just don't "GET" what you are talking about. Lets take the Food Service industry as an example. It operates on a 4-6 % profit margin (very labor intensive and many over the $250,000 size) yet most are of the small business types and will not survive this coming "Perfect Storm" the Federal government has cooked up for the coming year and the years to follow. You will see alot of local businesses close, some of which you and your family visit quite often. Unless of course you are talking about the Giants of this industry, Ronald will always be out there for your kids, Joe's Bar and grill, well not so much cause he's already operating at that 4% that Obama's gonna wipe out come 01/01/11.

The Days of diversity are just about over and the small to mid level business is going to be a thing of the past and the real killer is that it is going to hurt the very people that scream about business as the "Bad Guy" in all of this!

BTW this includes Banks, too. Another part of the reason there is no money to be loaned out! And just who allowed this to happen, tada, the good old Federal government!:pity: