Disposablity of Humans

I'm not here to talk about the disposability of human lives, but another type of disposability. It's one that I am currently witnessing in the real estate arena, so I have first hand knowledge of the subject.

Let me tell you how this works in the real estate market. First, a person of unknown origins decides to buy a piece of property for future gains. He knows at the moment, the property value is lower than it could be, or is in distress for some reason or another and decides to take advantage of said property. In our case it was someone from Europe who purchased our small complex with the intent of making money off of it in the future as land values in our area continued to rise dramatically. He bought the 8 unit property, collect rents which paid the mortgage, property taxes, insurance, etc. All the while, no repairs were done after major storm damage happened due to a hurricane, although he did collect checks from the insurance company. So people were paying rent for a place to sleep safely and soundly, and yet the owner did nothing to fix any needed items including termites.

Next comes the sale of the property because the city has hounded this owner with one Code Violation after the next, and he's been cruising by with one excuse after another for some time. It's boiling down to fix it, or pay! What's his option if he doesn't want to pay to have repairs done? Sell it to the next guy who's wanting to make a buck off the property. So now the first guy makes a profit on his money, the second guy buys to tear down all the buildings and wait until the value of the property goes back up. Some folks just have enough money in the bank to do that. Besides, with the buildings gone, the taxable value is almost nill, there's no insurance to pay for, and life goes on while the waiting game is played out.

But wait!!! What about those poor folks, living from paycheck to paycheck that have been paying the mortgage for guy #1 all this time? They got 15 day eviction notices. Fifteen days to move out, or have the sherriff come knock on their doors and put their belongings in the street.

Amazing this 'American Capitalism Society', isn't it? Turning living beings into disposable trash to be thrown to the curb when no longer needed to pay someone else's mortgage, taxes, insurance, etc.

Life never ceases to amaze me. Nor some of the 'human beings' I get to share this 'journey' with.

Something to think about.

Waking up to Reality

I'm sure this is going to make some folks mad, especially people in certain 'industries', however I just can't seem to contain myself.

How many times have you seen that hogwash on TV about this bank, or that bank, doing you some 'great service'? Did you fall for it 'hook, line, and sinker'? That's a shame if you did. Really a shame. Let me explain why I feel that way.

First off, I use direct deposit to have my salary sent to X Institution. For all accounts and purposes, I am making a loan to X until I'm ready to use those funds. What has X provided me? A safe place to keep my money, a debit card and checks so I can withdraw it to pay my bills or purchase something.

What I have done for them was loan them my entire paycheck to use, until I need it. So during the course of the year I have loaned them, say $30,000 (fictional sum used). What have they done with that money while they had use of it? Made more money by loaning it to someone else. What portion of the interest that they collect is given back to me? Zilch, zip, nada.

Now lets take a nice round figure to represent the number of 'customers' the bank has who are doing the same as me. Say 100,000 (it's just a small bank, okay?) So these 100,000 customers donate on average (just for simplicity's sake) $1,500 a month in X Institution. That is a whopping $150 million dollars each month, or $1.8 billion a year. If I had that kind of money coming in yearly, I'm sure I could make some money on that, take a trip, buy a new home or two, several new cars, etc...and that's just on the interest, not on the principal.

So who's getting the most benefit out of the money we are working for?

Just something else to think about.

Have a spiffy week!

You Tube Videos

I guess You Tube has a way of keeping us on our toes. Seems like a few vids I posted here within the last few months were no longer available, which keeps me coming back if only to make sure content is still available. Then on the other hand, it gives me an excuse to write something like this.... Thanks You Tube!!

Writing, Handwriting Specifically..

I have the awesome duty and responsibility to register voters for the county I live in. I work in the Supervisor of Elections office and do data entry. That means I have to read voter registration applications from all types of people. The ones that get to me the most are the ones from the High School drives we have. This brings me to the main point of this topic.

Handwriting is a form of communication between two or more people. I'm not talking about notes you might take to help jog your own memory, but the things you write with the intention of communicating information to another person. If I were to speak English to a non-English speaking person, there would be no communication between us. Same goes for the person who writes in such a sloppy fashion that you can't make out heads or tails of what he/she is writing.

What ever happened to the class in school where children actually learned to write, be it in block letters or script? Why are our children not being educated in handwriting any more? Why don't the teachers enforce some type of standard, so that children learn the importance of communicating via the written word?

Just my thoughts and opinions, but well worth thinking about.

Have a Jiffy Father's day all you dads out there..