Redneck Romance on Craigslist

A friend of mine posted about a twit about this post on Craigslist. I'm sure the post won't be up for too long, but you just have to read it. It was titled: "To the woman who crapped her pants in my car". I wonder if she was the one on Flava of Love....

Here is an excerpt:

At some point in life, everyone has gambled on a fart and lost. It just happened to be on a first date in the passenger seat of my car

Double click the link to read it (link opens up a screenshot I took).

image link

Other related posts:Redneck Spaceship House

Foreign Investment in Las Vegas

It seems that America is a giant yard sale for foreign investment. The flood started with our good neighbors to the north, buying up vacation and second homes in depressed markets like Scottsdale and Las Vegas. European also jumped on the bandwagon with similar purchases. Dubai had already started years ago, purchasing an interest in the massive MGM CityCenter project (which recently scaled back of its condos in the Harmon building) and the list continues. Of course, these investors are bringing some much needed capital to our economy so we shouldn't be too upset, should we?

I think we should be a little wary. After all, there is no such thing as a free ride. Then again, America businesses track record of late leaves a lot to be desired.

Another group of casinos may be bought up by overseas investors. This time its the Cannery Casino Resorts. The Cannery has two locations, a brand new casino resort on Boulder Highway on the site of the former Nevada Palace and another on Craig Road. Last week the state Gaming Control Board okayed the $1.8 billion acquisition of Cannery Casino Resorts by Crown Ltd, based in Melbourne, Australia. Of course, the deal still has to be approved by the state Gaming Commission but usually its just a formality.

Consumer Electronics Show

It's early January and that means that the giant Consumer Electronics Shows is back in town. Years ago I used to faithfully attend CES and the now defunct COMDEX. CES usually brings over 100,000 visitors to the Las Vegas valley. CES runs from Thurday through the weekend and will showcase the latest electronic gadgets and doodads.

Thankfully a massive influx of visitors is a welcome jolt to the local economy, especially the strip section. Tourism is down again last year and unemployment is at a historic high. On the plus side however, Encore opened and provided several thousand jobs, according to the latest study, the Las Vegas homes market is as much as 14% undervalued and interest rates have never been lower in recent history. Financial guru are advocating investing in real estate again, especially in our market. As the housing market recovers, we'll see improvement in other areas as well.

2009?

I suppose that we can continue to look at the line of descent that has occurred in employment, housing prices, and retail sales and project that line continuing on at the same steepness which leads to the end of the world. I suppose. Or we can look at the past massive economic calamities that purportedly foretold the end of the world economy except that most of us have long since forgotten about Long Term Capital Management, Enron, Drexel, etc. or even that the Panama Canal project was supposed to end France when it failed. Oh, these were all “end of the world” events. Funny thing is the world didn’t end, it adjusted and prospered. I find it interesting that for years we have been told that there was a housing bubble yet when it bursts everyone is surprised. For years we have been told that the U.S. is over-retailed yet when this shows up as lower same-store sales etc. we are devastated by the bad news. How about this is how it is supposed to work?

So where are the conservative long-term real apartment building investors in all of this? Still chugging along, maybe even better than last year due to fewer people rushing off to buy homes and condos. Maybe the world settles back down to realize that conservative investing is an attractive thing, almost the new thing to do. You wont likely get massive double or triple digit returns but apartment investors don’t expect them either. Slow, steady, not over-leveraged, plain and simple apartment investors of the old-school traditional type today are typically only losing sleep over their other investments performance, not their apartment holdings.

Perhaps we will see 2009 as the year that conservative apartments become the darling of the general market. I hope not as that rarely leads to a good long-term outcome. My clients are in for the long term. In any event, the big bad news fades away eventually and the water calms.

Happy New Year