Lend at your Own Risk Bank!

Yesterday the Federal Finance Minister announced changes to the mortgage rules and lending.  Shaun linked to an article that sums up some of the potential impacts of these changes.  Really, this is Canada's way of ensuring we don't end up in the Economic toilet like our friends to the south.  Canada managed to lessen its impact significantly through government banking controls and regulations.  I am all for free economy, but I don't like it when institutions like banks play both sides of the fence.

In the U.S., this is what they did.  Here is the scenario:

• U.S. Bank - lend first time homeowner waaay to much money to buy a house that they can barely afford.
• Insure the purchase with the U.S Government Insurance (similar to CMHC)
• Encourage the homeowner to take even more credit and use every ounce of equity (if the had any to start with) on trips and other extravagances.
• Economy turns, people loose jobs, everyone is overextended.
• Housing values drop significantly.
• Homeowner can't even begin to afford payments so walk away from their house.
• Bank forecloses on house - gets Insurance from Government.
• Bank says...muuuaaaaaahhh...and runs into their room of money to roll around in the profits!

A fellow I work with had his mortgage bought and sold four times.  Banks treat these mortgage portfolios like stock candy.

So in Canada now, the government says...OK bank..you want to lend a shit load of money to people using the equity on their house?  You absorb the risk.  We no longer will insure that load.

So how much you want to bet the banks will do a lot more due diligence making sure people can afford the money they are lending to them now?  I understand the need to borrow for your home or at times in our lives, but its a dangerous slope for many people.  Too many see it as free money and don't understand the long term impacts that loans can have.  I bought my first home for $55,000 and payed 11% interest on it because that is how it was then.  People don't know how lucky they are to have the interest rates we do and many will not make it if they go up even 1 percent.

So I think this is a good move by the government.  I am sure there will be those that don't love the changes, but sometimes people need to be saved from themselves.

Zen - On Hold

This past summer I blogged about building a new Trellis for the back yard.  I can't wait to finish the plantings at the base of the trellis and continue to add the "zen" to the yard.  After this weekends snow, I think it will be a little while longer before I will be doing that.

#$@!%&*

I come from fairly hardy stock.  I didn't grow up with a silver spoon in my mouth, just a good old hard working family.  My mom was a homemaker and did that job like nobody's business.  My dad went to work everyday with a smile on his face, happy to have a good job and come home to a great meal on the table.  Pretty Wonder Years kind of stuff.

I moved out when I was 18 and got a job with the federal government as a receptionist and got my first apartment.  I had some crappy hand me down furniture and an old car I bought (with my own money) when I was 16.  I worked extra hard and made opportunities for myself at work by being responsible, showing up when expected and always learning new things on my own.  I had little but it was all mine!  I was responsible for myself and I loved it.

Flash forward years (many years) later and I make a lot more money and can afford some much better stuff.  Having said that, I never forget what it takes to earn that.  I have a strong work ethic because that's what my parents instilled in me.  I have a strong work ethic because no one ever told me I should expect a free ride.  I am a grown up now and I own my decisions, mistakes and all.  

Today I struggled to stay positive and I hate that.  Sometimes I am greatly disappointed.  I work in an industry that pays its workers very well (at least I think so).  I work in an industry where people often get paid even more than they should.  I work with a lot of people who had that silver spoon in their mouths and don't appreciate how good and easy they have it. 

I think many people today are so spoiled and narcissistic, that they truly can't understand how their actions effect others.  O wait...there are others??? What is this "others" you speak of?  You mean there are actually people in the world with needs external to mine????  But I thought I am the only person with anything important going on and everyone is a simple by standard of my existence!?

Well I am here to tell those people that no, they are not special.  They are no more or less important than anyone else.  The world was in place long before they got here and will be long after they go.  So get over yourself!!!

I told you I was having a negative day ; (

Random News

Is this at all alarming to the people of Arkansas?
Arkansas has been experiencing some strange occurrences as of late. On New Year’s Eve, an estimated 4,000 to 5,000 birds fell from the sky in Beebe, Arkansas. One day before, 80,000 to 100,000 fished washed up dead on the banks of the Arkansas River. 
 

Not good Eh?

More than 60 per cent of adult Canadians are overweight and 24 per cent are clinically obese, according to a 2009 Statistics Canada report that directly measured heights and weights.

See, you really can't get fired from a Government Job!

A federal government employee who spent as much as five hours a day searching pornographic personal ads on his office computer and sending naked photos of himself from his work email has kept his job.

The Canadian Border Services Agency has conducted an investigation into allegations an employee in its national headquarters in Ottawa was reading and responding to sexually explicit ads on Craigslist, Kijiji and other sites while at work.
 

Dooooood!

Marijuana activist Dana Larsen is hoping his NDP leadership bid in B.C. gets a bit of a buzz from a smokin' endorsement by Canadian comedian Tommy Chong.

"I joined the B.C. NDP for one reason, and that is Dana Larsen," said Chong, best known as half of the comedy duo Cheech and Chong who starred in the potbuster movie, Up In Smoke.
Chong released a video Tuesday in which he appeared in a jovial, relaxed mood, with a Free Marc Emery poster shown prominently in the background. "Dana Larsen can change the face of this country but he needs your help," Chong says.