Jul 17 2008
It’s about time!
After 20 years of investing, 14 of being married, 11 of being a mom, and 46 of being just me, I thought it was time to put my financial/business sense into a blog. Hence the name Wearmanyhats. Hopefully, others will find it worthwhile to spend some time here.
Today the hat I am wearing is the listener on the street, taking a pulse of the locals. Real estate is the hot topic here in the upper midwest, just as it has in the much of the nation. I am reminded of a deer who has heard a distant shot; that’s the attitude of others in the area. Their heads are up and they are looking all around. People who want to buy a new home wonder if they can sell their current home. Investors have either jumped into the fire by buying last year, or they are waiting to see if there will be further corrections. Sellers are lamenting that their home or business wasn’t sold when the market was high. The realtors are grumbling about the lack of financing available, saying that the banks are supertight with money.
The second topic of concern is banks. There are raised eyebrows from these docile small town folk about a nearby bank that suddenly was in taken over by the Feds, and quickly sold out. It looks like some bank officers are in deep trouble for some questionable business dealings in Florida. However, when I mentioned Indymac’s financial bust yesterday at a local church meeting, one woman reminded me tersely that each bank patron was insured up to $100,000. Great. I wonder how comforting that is for the folks who are out a half of a million dollars or so.
The restaurants that weren’t serving very good food have now gone out of business. The other restaurant owners tell me they are busy. It is a marvel that they are; tourism is down a bit. Businesses that don’t quite have enough to stay afloat have owners racing to new jobs in the evening. There’s an optimism, though, that is hard to describe. People are talking about how good everything will be once a new President takes over, or when wages begin to go up to compensate for the gasoline hikes. Other folks talk about how speculation has led to the crazy spike in oil prices and once that’s over, the price will drop.
That’s the pulse on small town American today. Feel free to post and let me know how your towns (and cities) are doing.
