June 19, 2007

FLASH: Nicholas Retsinas, HP hater and discredited head of the corrupted Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies, comes clean. Kinda.

HP'ers are familiar with the laughable and discredited Retsinas, and his list of REIC puppetmasters.

You may also remember being called "pollyannas" and "chicken littles" as Retsinas belittled HP'ers and anyone who challenged his REIC masters and their housing cheerleading during the bubble. From September 2006, this direct attack on HP'ers (remember we had called for his firing) from Retsinas:

The headline hints of catastrophe: a dot-com repeat, a bubble bursting, an economic apocalypse. Cassandra, though, can stop wailing: the expected price corrections mark a slowing in the rate of increase - not a precipitous decline.

This will not spark a chain reaction that will devastate homeowners, builders and communities. Contradicting another gloomy seer, Chicken Little, the sky is not falling.

Well, even a discredited REIC hack has to come clean at one point, after the data shout "you're a fool". So here's Retsinas now:

"The air went out of the inflated housing market as higher home prices and interest rates finally tempered demand," center Director Nicolas Retsinas said. "Many buyers are now waiting on the sidelines hoping prices will fall."

"We're going to be in for a prolonged slump," said Nicolas Retsinas, director of the center.

Hmmm... I guess Chicken Little was right. Or maybe Retsinas' over-extended REIC masters didn't pay their annual dues this year... Whatever the case, Retsinas and his bogus JCHS are a stain on the good reputation of Harvard. The REIC has bought our Congress, it's a real shame when they can buy our higher learning institutions.

HP renews it's call for Harvard to fire Retsinas immediately, and to no longer accept REIC bribes.

Retsinas - you can leave your apology to HP'ers here. It's too late to apologize to America though. They're screwed.

27 comments:

Anonymous said...

Retsinas gets the big bucks to drive by the rearview mirror.

Can you imagine the lines he uses to get gals in the sack?

Anonymous said...

Check out his mugshot.

One might imagine he'd need some smoother lines than Indiana Jones AND a Ferrari...dealership....to "get gals in the sack".

PS: no PhD, he can't be an actual Hahvahd faculty.

Anonymous said...

Retsinas deserves a Gallows.Duping people into traps.Sickening.If we ever get this country "righted" again I would like to be the executioner.

Anonymous said...

But first I would like to be in charge of his stay at Gitmo.

Anonymous said...

Retsinas did say that housing would be fine if companies doubled the pay of their employees.

Anonymous said...

It all is really so simple - housing in most parts of the country is out of reach of 70% of the working population without the cheap money the Fed was providing. . .now that 30 year is back to 6.75 and climbing, and 100% financing is history, and liar loans are history, housing prices will fall, or stay flat for 10 years (at 3% inflation for 10 years, fall 30%) . . .which ever scenerio, 30% fall in most areas (50% in Phoenix, LV, and SD is in the bag). . .it is all about the numbers - I have almost always made money in stocks by looking at basics, revenue, PE, and growth rate. . .nothing fancy. . .housing is the same. Why can't these paid shills at Harvard and other places understand this?

Anonymous said...

Doubling wages? Isn't that tantamount to lowering house prices by 50%, only without the tax increase?
My god, aren't one of us tricky enough to get him to say it?

Anonymous said...

wow...seeing that this guy served as "Assistant Secretary for Housing-Federal Housing Commissioner at the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development and as Director of the Office of Thrift Supervision"...why are there even more homeless people today than when he started?

Good job Retsinas! Way to go! Thanks for everything!

Anonymous said...

Retsinas an his cronies (Lereah, Leslie-Appleton Young) were like a greek chorus last fall, singing the tune "housing has bottomed, all is well" to all who would listen, including their media shills at Bloomberg, CNBC, etc. This bought some time for Bob Toll and other crooks to prop up their stock prices and dump some more toxic waste on the suckers.

Now that we know the truth, they want to change their tune, to try and save whatever shred of credibility they have left? Shakser I agree, hang 'em high ...

Anonymous said...

Send Harvard a note

Interim President
Derek Bok

Office of the President
Harvard University
Massachusetts Hall
Cambridge, MA 02138 USA
Tel: (617) 495-1502
Fax: (617) 495-8550
derek_bok@harvard.edu

Anonymous said...

hey Retsinas..........the sky is falling.........whatcha goin to do about it asshole????

Anonymous said...

Sent an email to Harvard

Anonymous said...

CNBC VIDEOS today: housing numbers/reports !!!

Realty Check: Builder Sentiment
Not since the first Gulf War have home builders felt so glum about their business, with CNBC's Diana Olick & Bill Griffeth

http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=383508900

Realty Check: Housing Snapshot
Housing starts finally took the hit so many have been expecting. Insight with CNBC's Erin Burnett & Diana Olick

http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=384822693

Anonymous said...

I wont apologize.

I WONT I WONT I WONT!!!!

Anonymous said...

Harvard Shmarmard. OK I had to get that in as a Dartmouth alum.

Carry on.

Adam said...

Retsinas? What a hilarious name: retsina is a alcoholic beverage produced in Greece that's noted for having a calming effect on those who drink it! Why not just appoint a guy with the name Nicholas Koolaid as chief economist of NAR? LOL!

Anyway, Retsinas is just another mouthpiece, talking head with an agenda (AKA job protection, namely his own), another nerd who's not above using his position to try and 'calm the markets' by spieling platitudes instead of truth.

He's a Greenspan wanna-be, thinking that he's one day he'd be able to move markets with a single word: a lot of economists DREAM of wielding such power, and respect that kind of influence.

Economists and expert analysts are generally weinies, book-nerds, and being so highly respected and listened to is the ultimate ego trip for them. They love it when their words are disected, with listeners hanging on their every word.

While their platitudes might work for 95% of market participants, there's others in the crowd who are willing to do their thinking and research for themselves, thank you very much...

But unfortunately, it's more insidious than that: any talking head who DARES to speak unflattering truth about our current status is likely to be hunted down and skewered by the powers that are responsible for this mess; dare speak unflattering truths, and you'll be out on your cans and discredited. Not going along with the crowd is dangerous, even nowadays, and this isn't even 1950's Moscow with banishment to gulags, etc.

Remember the story of "The Emperors's New Clothes"?

http://deoxy.org/emperors.htm

We never hear what happened to the little boy who dared to publicly state that the King wasn't wearing any clothes. I can assure you, even if he wasn't executed on the spot, the kid certainly wasn't appointed to any government panels or HUD groups.

Anyway, the problems with industry groups talking about markets is institutional, systemic, and the 'patient' is terminally ill.

Retsinas is now trying to over his tracks (or his ass?), as the problems he poo-poohed are far more persistant, far worse than he admitted/realized; they're not easily explained away when they've only worsened 9 months later. His credibility is nil, IMO.

Anonymous said...

shush you!! If it comes from an Ivy League school is must never be questioned. The liberal professors know all. They vote 90%+ for Democrats therefore they can never be wrong.

LONG LIVE DEMOCRATS!!

LONG LIVE HARVARD!!

Anonymous said...

Great article on the shoddy build quality of all the McHouses that sprang up:

http://tinyurl.com/2vvw28

say hello to rotting ghost towns. say hello to suburban crack houses. welcome to hell, exurb owners.

Anonymous said...

LOL!

http://biz.yahoo.com/seekingalpha/070607/37566_id.html?.v=1


Seeking Alpha
NAR Revises Home Prices, Sales Forecast Down Again
Thursday June 7, 5:02 am ET


The National Association of Realtors says annual median single family home prices should decline 1.3% to $219,800 in 2007, and not 1% as projected in May, which was a revision of January's predicted 1.2% gain. Despite earlier flat forecasts, the NAR expects a 2.3% decline in new home prices to $240,800 from May's $246,400 projection. Home sales are expected to decline 4.6% from 6.48 million units to 6.18 million, almost double May's -2.7% forecast. New home sales are likely to fall 18.2% to 860,000, revised from -17.8%, and another 18% y/y decline from 2005-2006. Only 1.43 million housing starts are expected, 370,000 less than 2006. Pending sales are down 3.2% in April, and 10% y/y. NAR chief economist Lawrence Yun calls the declines a "temporary distortion" and predicts a 3.7% rise in 2008 sales to 6.41 million units, with existing home sales bottoming in Q2 2007, and new home sales in Q4. Yun thinks existing home prices will rise 1.7% in 2008, preferably with "traditional mortgages" -- a reference to the subprime crisis that's intensifying the housing slump. Online brokerage ZipRealty says inventory is up 29% y/y, with a 6.5 month supply of new homes and an 8.4 month supply of existing homes -- the highest since 1992.

Anonymous said...

Hey AL-QWAFFER soare you saying that someone at Harvard can't be trusted just because he's at Harvard? Think of that next time you swallow the garbage spewed from Princeton's Paul Krugman.

The Thinker said...

Hey Mark in San Diego,
3% inflation for 10 years does not equal 30% change, it would be a 26% change.

Anonymous said...

They ought to haul that mf'er out of his office by his tie and reassign it to Keith.

Incompetence has it's price, or not.


smn

Anonymous said...

Toll's not bad, they're just built that way.

Paul E. Math said...

Bijon frise. The photo is of a bijon frise. Retsinas is the REICs bijon frise.

What? Oh, sorry, wrong thread.

Anonymous said...

YEAH!!!

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=akV2sasSGUY8&refer=home

Anonymous said...

2 Bear Stearns funds face shutdown - report
Rescue plan is falling apart for the hedge funds heavily invested in securities backed by subprime mortgages, WSJ says.
June 20 2007: 4:30 AM EDT

LONDON (CNNMoney.com) -- Two Bear Stearns hedge funds face shutdown as a plan to rescue the funds is falling apart, according to a report in the Wall Street Journal.

The two hedge funds at Bear Stearns (Charts, Fortune 500) are heavily invested in securities made up of bonds backed by subprime mortgages, the newspaper said. The subprime market, which gives home loans to borrowers with weak credit, has been roiled by rising defaults.

Chuck Ponzi said...

The Thinker said...
Hey Mark in San Diego, 3% inflation for 10 years does not equal 30% change, it would be a 26% change.


Technically, 3% compounded per year would be 34.4%.

I have no clue where you get your 26% figure from.