Estimados Foreros:

Y, especialmente, estimados Foreros Madmaxistas: el por otra parte excelente diario (progre, je je) británico "The Guardian" obsequia hoy con un ESCALOFRIANTE reportaje sobre la "Zona Cero" donde empezó la crisis del Ladrillazo mundial: Stockton, USA-California, el sitio del mundo con más embargos hipotecarios.
Y digo que es IMPRESCINDIBLE la lectura del articulito de marras porque nos pone bien a las claras lo que pasará aquí, tetes.
Me permito traduciros el párrafo mas JUGOSO:
"El mayor de los peligros es que estos vecindarios embargados van a ser arrollados por drogas y bandas criminales", afirma Sheil, quien afirma que los precios en caida están atrayendo a caseros especializados en viviendas de suburbios que se hacen con casas por cuatro duros. "Compran las propiedades embargadas, pasan de darles mantenimiento y las ponen en alquiler" Así el cáncer se extiende y extiende."

EL GLORIOSO REPORTAJE que os he pescado, os lo pasteo aqui en su integridad:

Mortgage crisis: Welcome to sub-prime capital, USA
Slum landlords are moving into once-pristine suburbs in the foreclosure 'ground zero'
Andrew Clark in Stockton, California The Guardian, Monday July 28 2008 Article history

It is easy to spot a repossessed home in Stockton, the sub-prime mortgage capital of the United States and, indeed, of the world. You just need to look at the colour of the grass.

"Whenever you see a brown lawn, it's a foreclosure," says Fred Sheil, a local housing activist, as he drives along a suburban street, gesturing at neglected properties. "Look, three in a row."

A city of 260,000 people in California's Central Valley, Stockton was once famous for its agriculture - it hosts an annual asparagus festival to celebrate its most prestigious crop and its orchards produce top-class cherries.

The city is now renowned for a less fragrant reason: it is "ground zero" in an economic crisis that has spread from Stockton's working-class suburbs across the US and beyond. Stockton has suffered a higher rate of foreclosures than any other US city. In the three months to June, banks filed repossession papers on 9,066 Stockton homes - one in 25 residences, according to the property experts RealtyTrac. The number of filings has leapt 170% from its already elevated level a year ago.

Abandoned

In the southern suburb of Creekside, the damage is plain. Almost every other house has an estate agent's board. White notices in the windows bear stark messages: "This is a bank-owned property", "Bank-owned - no trespassing", "Bank-owned - protected by electronic security".

One of many developments thrown up as people moved east from San Francisco in search of cheaper housing, Creekside consists of endless streets of identical whitewashed bungalows with two-vehicle garages. A typical three-bedroom house here cost about $375,000 (£200,000) two years ago but can now be bought for $125,000.

Outside one abandoned house, the former owners have dumped a sofa, a mattress and a table on the lawn after giving up their struggle with an unaffordable mortgage. A few doors down is a well-kept home, where some rainbow-coloured miniature windmills spin with incongruous cheer.

"The biggest danger is that these neighbourhoods will get overrun by drugs and gangs," says Sheil, who says falling prices are attracting slum landlords who snap up houses for a song. "They buy properties, they don't maintain them and they rent them out. The cancer just spreads and spreads."

The anger is palpable in a city where black and Hispanic residents have suffered disproportionately. Bobby Bivens, president of the local chapter of the NAACP civil rights group, puts the blame squarely on Wall Street banks.

"Somebody sitting in a room somewhere says 'here's a new hustle we can do'," says Bivens, moving cups on a table to demonstrate a classic pavement con trick. "Where's the nut? Which shell is it under? They move it around and you've just been hustled."

Those hit by foreclosure were mostly on variable-rate mortgages with a cut-price "teaser" rate for the first year or two, which lapsed, causing a surge in repayments. When they bought, they were typically assured that prices would keep rising, making it easy to remortgage when this discount expired.

"This is not a rich community - we don't have a lot," says Bivens, who says few people read or understood the dense small print in mortgage documentation. "A lot of people, because they were experiencing the hope and joy of buying their first home, really misread where they were going to be and because of that they've suffered great loss - and the losses are not temporary."

Bargain

In downtown Stockton, the skyline is dominated by institutions such as Washington Mutual, Bank of the West and Pacific State Bank. The shops are hardly a picture of prosperity - several large wig emporiums line the main street. Boards cover up the door of the Treasure House, which boasts housewares, antiques, toys and trains. On the pavement outside Drivers Soul Food Barbeque, two men tend a makeshift midday grill.

It isn't just the owners of sub-prime properties who are in trouble. Rental tenants are increasingly being turned out on to the streets at minimal notice because, unbeknown to them, their landlords are facing foreclosure.

"Tenants may be completely up to date with their rent but they're not entitled to any notice of foreclosure," explains Kevin Stein, from the California Reinvestment Coalition, an advocacy group. "They may only find out when somebody turns up to kick them out of their house."

Those wanting to snap up a bargain on the back of others' misery, or simply curious bystanders, can even go on a weekly bus trip around Stockton called the Repo Home Tour, set up by a wily entrepreneur, Cesar Dias. "We have one or two tour buses full every week," says Dias. "It becomes a friendly field trip."

More than a year has passed since the sub-prime crisis began to bite and in parts of the US even celebrities are being snared. Evander Holyfield, former world heavyweight boxing champion, is facing foreclosure on his $10m mansion in Atlanta, which has 109 rooms, a bowling alley and 17 bathrooms.

The market is in such a sorry state that a San Diego housebuilder, Michael Crews Development, is offering a "buy one, get one free" deal on new homes. Anyone purchasing a $1.6m luxury detached home in Escondido gets a $400,000 townhouse thrown in. Marketing director Dawn Berry says: "Everybody's talking about such terrible things. We did this to create a buzz."

In California's worst-hit cities, nobody seems hopeful of an upturn. If the slump continues, it won't be long before Stockton's worst-hit streets have more brown lawns than green ones

Beobachter, gracias por las noticias que mandas, pero please anyade siempre el link tambien .

__________________

Pocerogrado, año 2011:




"Cada uno se gana la vida como puede."