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Strategies & Market Trends : MDA - Market Direction Analysis -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Les H who wrote (19425)	7/5/1999 5:29:00 PM
From: John Madarasz	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 99985

Thanks for the read Les, To be perfectly honest, I worked today, seriously considered working yesterday and have no intentions of quitting my "day job" anytime soon. I think I'm one of the lucky ones who absolutely love what I do, so sharing with others is part and parcel in my lifestyle. Way too much greed in this market, in this country and in this world. I never liked it before and I dislike it more with each passing day. I keep my contempt under wraps but when in doubt reach in and give it a little rub; a good reminder about the realities we must deal with to survive in this world. The main thing that attracts me to this thread is the realistic tone that can be found in the majority of posts. Perhaps a little more of the things Jim Hopkins so recently spoke about and we would all be truly richer for our efforts. Very Best Wishes, and thanks again. John PS. Since today seems to be book review day, here's my offering... amazon.com

To: Les H who wrote (19425)	7/5/1999 8:45:00 PM
From: Giordano Bruno	Respond to of 99985

Stock Profits Used for Buying Homes Filed at 1:42 p.m. EDT By The Associated Press LOS ANGELES (AP) -- It used to take decades of scrimping and saving to buy a dream house. In the midst of Wall Street's bull market, investors are shaving years off that waiting time and ditching their piggy banks. With stock prices climbing by double digits in each of the past four years, people in their 20s and 30s are using proceeds from profit-swollen stock portfolios for down payments for increasingly luxurious homes. ''Is there another way to do it?'' joked Dan Summers, a 35-year-old engineer at Silicon Valley-based laser maker Visx. He cashed in his company stock options for a four-bedroom home in Northern California. ''The stock went up, so I had the money to buy.'' The stock market's advance, underpinned by the booming economy and the growth of high-tech and Internet companies, has given more Americans the means to buy bigger and better homes. But financial experts and mortgage brokers warn that some homeowners might find they can't afford to keep those homes if the market heads south. An April spot survey by the California Association of Realtors showed about 15 percent of customers in the nation's most populous state bought their homes with money from stocks, stock options and 401(k) plans. No comparable figures exist for previous years. But census numbers show that a decade ago, only 4 percent of new home buyers nationwide used profits from investments or the sale of real estate to buy new homes. The trend may be most apparent in California, the home of many high-tech companies that have gone public and enriched their employees. But investors across the country who have poured money into stocks and mutual funds in recent years -- sending the overall value of the stock market to $13 trillion from $1 trillion in 1982 -- are also benefiting. Doug Anderson, president of Cornerstone Mortgage Corp. in Denver, and Pretam Fuqua, a real estate agent in Los Angeles' San Gabriel Valley, said they have seen doctors, nurses, attorneys, teachers, even a jockey cash in stocks from mutual funds and retirement plans to buy their houses. ''Everybody is looking at an increase in stock ownership,'' said Fred Flick, a vice president of economic research at the National Association of Realtors in Washington. Betsey Twigg, a Virginia real estate agent, said so many of her customers use stocks for seed money that it has become part of her company's standard contract. ''It's another store of wealth,'' she said. But some financial pros worry that these homebuyers, having seen the Dow Jones industrial average rise more than 7,000 points over the past five years despite several big downturns, may have a false sense of security. ''I think people may be overbuying,'' Anderson said. He said customers sometimes overstate income, counting on as-yet-unrealized stock profits to get big mortgages. ''Buyers see stocks as a source of quick cash if they need to act quickly in case interest rates go up,'' said Susan Ratliff, a real estate agent in Pasadena. But using stock market earnings to pay a mortgage can be a formula for disaster if Wall Street suffers a protracted decline. ''People assume it'll just keep going,'' said Mark Cowan, a Visx regional service manager who used stocks for a down payment but can handle the mortgage with his salary. ''The people that just got out of school are living in the million-dollar house and driving the Porsche around, these are people that could be broke at 30.'' The new money, a tight housing market and favorable interest rates have led to bidding wars for homes in some parts of the country, particularly where high-tech businesses are clustered. Glen Mendell, a San Francisco-area real estate agent with several clients in Silicon Valley, recently offered about $60,000 over the asking price for a $459,000 house. Six other offers beat his. In the 18 months since Summers bought his home for $298,000 -- having sold half his stock holdings for the down payment -- its value climbed $52,000 to $350,000. He gets letters from real estate agents every week asking him to consider selling.