2000-2010 The Lost Decade for NYC Real Estate Valuations

wow.

and the banks are blameless. yep.

AR: Unbelievable!! My adorable Dimon exposed!! BTW, There was also a great NPR report a couple years ago about how bear stearns brokers et. al were putting so much pressure on mortgage brokers to get more product, that in CA they hired pizza delivery guys to go to neighborhoods to sign up loans.

The other big story that needs to be told is Wachovia. Ken Thompson should be strung up. And the govt should have let Wachovia go under because they deserved to go under. Most people blame the Sandlers as the poster scum for the subprime -- Sat Nite Live even did a skit with a chiron tag that said they should be shot. But all the years the Sandlers ran Golden West they had high retention rates and extremely low default rates. They were meticulous about credit ratings. They even made it through the S&L crisis unscathed. Then Ken Thompson -- at the very top of the market-- bought the company and way overpaid. Worse, Wahcovia discontinued all the practices and systems that kept all the Golden West loans viable -- a system that worked since 1963. It was essentially the equivalent of buying McDonalds and then deciding to discontinue serving hamburgers. There are so many horror stories out there that will never get told. And because it has all been glossed over, we are all probably doomed as a society to repeat those mistakes.