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Chinese Investors Snap Up Property in Bankrupt Detroit
NBC News ^ | 11/22/2014 | ERIC BACULINAO

Posted on 11/22/2014 6:01:32 PM PST by SeekAndFind

Bankrupt Detroit’s thousands of empty buildings are being flogged at rock-bottom prices — and Chinese investors are answering the siren call of unbeatable deals.

With family homes regularly selling for around $10,000, the beleaguered Motor City is now the number-four destination for Chinese housing investors in the U.S. Bigger spenders have already snapped up some of Detroit’s most iconic commercial buildings.

“There are factories, commercial real estate and upscale areas around Detroit with proximity to good schools that are worth investing in,” said Wang Ning, deputy manager in charge of international business at China online real estate agency SouFun.

The firm, which lists hundreds of photos of abandoned Detroit homes on its website, says it received more than 1,000 telephone inquiries the week after the city claimed the dubious distinction of having filed the country's largest municipal bankruptcy in July 2013.

Chinese interest picked up steam after a TV report claimed that homes in Detroit could be bought for the price of a pair of shoes.

After the program one user posted on Twitter-like Weibo: “700,000 people, quiet, clean air, no pollution, democracy — what are you waiting for?” The comment generated millions of responses.

The influx of cash is welcome in Detroit. Earlier this month, a bankruptcy court ruling approved a complex restructuring of the city's $18 billion in accumulated debt to end a costly and contentious chapter of the city's long-running financial decline. Once among the greatest manufacturing cities in the world with the highest per capita income in the United States, many of its homes and office buildings now sit empty and derelict. Its officials are looking to China help salvage the gutted city.

Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder on Wednesday embarked on a week-long trip to the country, his fourth visit since 2011.

(Excerpt) Read more at nbcnews.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Culture/Society; News/Current Events; US: Michigan
KEYWORDS: china; detroit; michigan; property; realestate
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To: faithhopecharity

For a couple million dollars, someone could buy an area large enough for their own city.


61 posted on 11/22/2014 7:39:58 PM PST by tbw2
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To: SeekAndFind

Wait a minute!! Does that mean the Chinese are going to STOP buying the $1.5 million fixer-uppers in Palo Alto? Or are the poor Chinese headed to Detroit?


62 posted on 11/22/2014 7:40:25 PM PST by ProtectOurFreedom
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To: MeshugeMikey

Same 1950 $10k rancher in Palo Alto now goes for $1.5 million.

Location, location, location.


63 posted on 11/22/2014 7:43:21 PM PST by ProtectOurFreedom
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To: cripplecreek

Is there a business base there to justify all that investment?


64 posted on 11/22/2014 7:44:33 PM PST by ProtectOurFreedom
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To: HiTech RedNeck

More civilized, perhaps, but lookout for the DWAs!


65 posted on 11/22/2014 7:45:53 PM PST by ProtectOurFreedom
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To: Celtic Conservative
It reminds me of a story told by L. Brooks Patterson, head of Oakland County, the prosperous county north of Detroit.

He said he had to drive into Detroit one day for a meeting, and had to park pretty far from where the meeting was. He asked a cop who happened to be where he parked, how long it would take to walk to where the meeting was, and the cop said, "I don't know, no one's ever made it."

66 posted on 11/22/2014 7:48:02 PM PST by MUDDOG
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To: tbw2

The Chinese have already bought a big piece of countryside outside Detroit. But that will require new infrastructure. Detroit has infrastructure but maybe it needs to be largely rebuilt. And Detroit has other super- sized problems the Chinese probably can’t overcome — ? It will be interesting to see what happens ——


67 posted on 11/22/2014 7:49:52 PM PST by faithhopecharity ((Brilliant, Profound Tag Line Goes Here, just as soon as I can think of one..))
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To: HiTech RedNeck
Interesting factoid about the use of Lollapalooza in WW II. Never heard that before and have sure never seen it in all the WW II movies I've seen. Wikipedia under "Shibboleth":
During World War II, some United States soldiers in the Pacific theater used the word lollapalooza as a shibboleth to challenge unidentified persons, on the premise that Japanese people often pronounce the letter L as R or confuse Rs with Ls; the word is also an American colloquialism that even a foreign person fairly well-versed in American English would probably mispronounce or be unfamiliar with. In George Stimpson's A Book about a Thousand Things, the author notes that, in the war, Japanese spies would often approach checkpoints posing as American or Filipino military personnel. A shibboleth such as "lollapalooza" would be used by the sentry, who, if the first two syllables come back as rorra, would "open fire without waiting to hear the remainder".

I like those ROE.

68 posted on 11/22/2014 7:50:36 PM PST by ProtectOurFreedom
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To: SeekAndFind

I can’t type hanzi on my phone; I knew that the second one meant “special” and the third one meant “rule”; the first must be simplified, I have a scroll with “foundation” kanji and it is much more complex.


69 posted on 11/22/2014 7:59:33 PM PST by chajin ("There is no other name under heaven given among people by which we must be saved." Acts 4:12)
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To: SeekAndFind
click the pic...

70 posted on 11/22/2014 8:02:48 PM PST by Chode (Stand UP and Be Counted, or line up and be numbered - *DTOM* -w- NO Pity for the LAZY - 86-44)
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To: MUDDOG
Good luck Detroit blacks.

Rotsa ruck Detloit bracks.

71 posted on 11/22/2014 8:05:18 PM PST by ROCKLOBSTER (Celebrate "Republicans Freed the Slaves" Month.)
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To: SeekAndFind

Perhaps the Chinese will send in a few triads and put all the homies on their asses, then get them one way tickets out of Detroit. That would be a good thing for the city.

Then send the triads to Flint.


72 posted on 11/22/2014 8:06:29 PM PST by Rembrandt (Part of the 51% who pay Federal taxes)
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To: ProtectOurFreedom

There is a growing Tech sector in Michigan. Its also right next to the heart of the Canadian manufacturing region. Also, Detroit is the second busiest freight crossing on the north American continent. Quicken HQ is there, JP Morgan has a regional HQ there, Ernst & Young has a regional HQ there. Compuware HQ is there.

Take a look at downtown Detroit with Google Street view sometime. The city is looking good. Forbes recently named the Detroit riverfront the best in the USA.

As far as residential is concerned, some neighborhoods are very bad still but others aren’t bad at all. Mexicantown is looking better all the time, Corktown is looking pretty good as well.


73 posted on 11/22/2014 8:25:21 PM PST by cripplecreek (You can't half ass conservatism.)
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To: cripplecreek
And the homegrown "talent" is the only group that has not really been part of the equation in this comeback. If anything, they have been fighting it, particularly the city council, but you don't really hear much of their braying anymore and their craziness seems to have all but been stopped. They've lost some control over some previously exclusive domains, which they were running into the ground such as the water department, who's control is partially being shared by the suburbs in an authority board. The state took over Belle Isle and made it into a state park and is undergoing renovations and is heavily patrolled.

And now the Chinese are the latest to step onto the stage with their investments, this time in the neighborhoods, the last frontier of Detroit that has always been the toughest nut to crack. Until they clean up the crime, drugs, gangs, mindset of the people, and their dependency on government for their subsistence, that part of the equation of the comeback of Detroit will be a failure. Personally, I don't see it happening. But if it is to happen, the good people of Detroit have to step up and clean up the human debris in their own neighborhoods. Work with the police, work with the schools, raise intact families and stop encouraging their sons and daughters to procreate outside of marriage. And the sooner, the better because the generation that has any values at all are aging and being eliminated through attrition.

74 posted on 11/22/2014 8:25:24 PM PST by FrdmLvr ("WE ARE ALL OSAMA, 0BAMA!" al-Qaeda terrorists who breached the American compound in Benghazi)
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To: ROCKLOBSTER
That's the way Chinese used to speak in the Stratemeyer syndicate books (Hardy Boys, Nancy Drew, Dana Girls, etc.) until the 1950s.

Then they rewrote the books to remove the stereotypes, and dumbed them down as well, making them a lot less entertaining.

75 posted on 11/22/2014 8:26:31 PM PST by MUDDOG
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To: ImJustAnotherOkie

“gos se” (see http://fireflychinese.kevinsullivansite.net/title/shindig.html)


76 posted on 11/22/2014 8:33:17 PM PST by No.6
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To: Sivad

Correct...I worked with an associate who actually adopted one of the girls to get her out of the country...was a long and wild ride but she got here after all. Cute kid.

Still their population has grown....even prior to that and was one of the reason’s they had the “one child” rule ...to get the population under control...too many to feed etc. Girls were seen as baby producers so elimination of them inured by many of the parents because having a girl was senn as “the problem”.


77 posted on 11/22/2014 8:37:41 PM PST by caww
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To: MediaMole

Even with the one child law...and the girls being knocked off...they still are having children...and prior to that law their population grew mightily...they had their kids they didn’t abort them....we’ve been doing that since the 70’s til now it’s simply a means of birth control period...


78 posted on 11/22/2014 8:40:09 PM PST by caww
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To: MUDDOG

First, they are absolutely NOT dumb....but they do talk that way.

Knew a Chinese national, I had a friend named Laura. He tried and tried to say her name, Rolla...Roara...finally....Larry.

He was so proud.


79 posted on 11/22/2014 8:42:37 PM PST by ROCKLOBSTER (Celebrate "Republicans Freed the Slaves" Month.)
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To: HiTech RedNeck

Verwee interwesting.


80 posted on 11/22/2014 8:49:24 PM PST by Sivad (NorCal red turf ;-))
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