Developers Ask U.S. for Bailout as Massive Debt Looms

Wall Street Journal ^ | December 22, 2008 | WSJ

[do the dhue]

With a record amount of commercial real-estate debt coming due, some of the country's biggest property developers have become the latest to go hat-in-hand to the government for assistance.

They're warning policymakers that thousands of office complexes, hotels, shopping centers and other commercial buildings are headed into defaults, foreclosures and bankruptcies. The reason: according to research firm Foresight Analytics LCC, $530 billion of commercial mortgages will be coming due for refinancing in the next three years -- with about $160 billion maturing in the next year. Credit, meanwhile, is practically nonexistent and cash flows from commercial property are siphoning off.

[LibLieSlayer]

The US will be beyond bankrupt in 2 years. We will not be able to afford an election in 2010. The US is NOT too big to go broke... and it ceases to exist when it has no treasure. hussein announced this morning, a new 1 TRILLION dollar stimulus... on top of those already in place or planned. Someone please stop this madness... of course... no one can.

LLS

[Don Stadt]

You would think someone would fix the hole in the boat. No they wouldn't. Financiers couldn't care less if a product succeeds or fails so long as they get their cut. And they will happily let a boat sink if they'll profit from its sinking. What else do you think downsizing and asset-stripping is all about? Make a thousand people redundant, collect a six figure bonus. Financiers make their money when the going is good and make reckless (and heartless) decisions to maximise that return. They're not doing this for anyone's benefit but their own. As soon as a ship starts to sink as a consequence of those decisions, the financiers bail out at the first opportunity they get. The people who had to implement or live with their reckless decisions end up paying the price. J. Bruce Ismay, the M.D. of the White Star Line, escaped in a lifeboat (in defiance of the protocol of the time) while his own workforce (including Thomas Andrews who actually built it) did whatever they could to save the passengers first, and most of them went down with the ship. It was ever thus. The thing is, if financiers can't be trusted to police themselves then the Left says you have to use regulation. Regulation disrupts the free market so the Right are (rightly) wary of it. But, we didn't have any problem "regulating" consumption of alcohol by minors, jaywalking, or anything else that on the face of it should be left well alone. It strikes me as peculiar that we're OK with intervention when it's targeted at someone doing something we don't like and he's hurting a small number of people in doing it. We like intervention on organised crime even. But when it comes to entire institutions that operate in ways that hurt hundreds of thousands of Americans at a time, we let them carry on because the free market is sacrosanct. If the free market was REALLY sacrosanct we'd have no rules against loan sharking, slum landlords, car maintenance, recreational drugs, and we'd do away with rules that say you have to be of a certain age before you can drink or smoke. The crooks would have the whip hand but hey, it's a free market.

[M-cubed]

BINGO!!!!!....We have a winner...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_MGT_cSi7Rs

This should be sent to every E-mail address in America....Let the MSM refute Congress....

[dennisw]

bttt

[M-cubed]

....and the dirty little secret is ?..

http://www.321gold.com/fed/greenspan/1966.html

Think Greenspan knew what he was doing???

[HighlyOpinionated]

UNDERSTAND THIS. THERE IS NO DEBT IF THE BANKS HAVE LOANED CREDIT. They’re NOT allowed to do so.

The United States Supreme Court has ruled time and again against the legal authority for banking institutions to lend credit. Both Federal and state laws allow banks to lend money, but banks do NOT have the authority to loan credit.

When you use your credit card, the bank is loaning you credit, NOT money. They can’t lend you something they don’t have, and they can’t charge you interest when they did NOT lend you money in the first place.

Banks do not lend money. They lend promises to supply money that they do not possess. So, if we can have no money without debt then if there is no debt then there is no money?

The “Federal Reserve” is not a government institution but a private central bank owned by a handful of major banks and bond dealers. As such, it is a cartel owned, controlled, and essentially for-profit driven, not by the people of the United States but, instead, by the banking industry’s ruling elite. This oligarchic setup generates the most costly, debt-based, money system and greatest conflicts of interest in the history of the world. It is a system clearly at odds with the intent of the founders of the United States of America.

“…I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around [the banks] will deprive the people of all property until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered. The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs. “

Thomas Jefferson (1743 - 1826),
Letter to the Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin (1802)

Check my third post at http://auntiecoosa.blogspot.com for information on getting your own bail out of unsecured debt. It’s legal, Patriotic, and ethical.

[Peter W. Kessler]

Our family lives fairly modestly, pays its debts on time, and has a nest egg stashed away for college and retirement.

Where did we fail?

[Durus]

The current economic problems were not caused by “Laissez Faire” capitalism but was directly caused by government “managing” the economy. You have fallen prey to the current liberal meme which removes the government from all blame for the current crisis and then further claims that the only way to fix it is to give government more power. To quote the best president of my lifetime “government is the problem, not the solution”

[Just mythoughts]

Where do I apply for this bling? Do I need a God Father in the Treasury Department?

Did you *PAY* to *PLAY*? If you did not get to the back of the line. I think these *earmarks* come under campaign finance reform, in the fine print.

[RipSawyer]

As with every good thing in life, when taken to an absolute position “Laissez Faire Laissez Passer” can lead to some absurd outcomes. Like this one.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Only those afflicted with terminal economic ignorance are so foolish as to believe the current situation is the result of “Laissez Faire” capitalism. What we are seeing is the result of government interference.
It is classic big government, first trumpet the existence of a problem where there really is none, then set up a government program to deal with it, the new program creates an actual problem where there was none, then call for more government action which makes the problem worse, then blame the problem on capitalism and call for yet more government interference. When will we ever learn? The more we demand university education for everyone the dumber people become.

[Fury]

When will this bailout madness end? Is there anyone left we have yet to bail out?

Homeowners. Wait until that starts. More than a few people will intentionally game the system to get bailout $.

[DieHard the Hunter]

Prescient. And 42 years later, right.

[Jackanapes]

We go back to the future!

[central_va]

Can you say, Greater Depression Civil War II?

[wolfcreek]

Again, just because they complete the product/project, doesn’t mean someone will buy/lease.

Let the market run it’s course.

[ErnBatavia]

[reformedliberal]

That’s something with which I console myself: NZ voted Conservative after 9 years of the Reds. There’s hope for the US.

How long do you think this will last? How bad is the overhanging damage from Helengrad?

[Boiling Pots]

and the same people who create them claim they are the ones who can fix it.

See: US Federal Government.

[hunter112]

I figure that the commercial developers are asking now rather than waiting for Zero is because they've figured that he would turn them down. From their perspective, since Hank is tossing bailout money like a drunken sailor, why not ask for it now?

But someone's going to point out to the Obamanation that commercial real estate failure just creates nests for crime and drugs in the big cities. Further, those buildings won't have viable firms with jobs in them, either. I expect him to come up with their bailout anyway.

[wtc911]

I’d have to guess that GWB and the Conservatives must have had a “Scorched Earth Policy” in place and waiting to greet His Excellency.

_____________________________________________________

Except for the use of GWB and Conservatives as one unit, I agree. W kicked the Detroit can down the road knowing that this first round won't change anything and that bambi will have to either pour good billions after bad or else turn his back on the UAW.