Banks paying money to tear down houses.

Canadian Government paying car company to build cars no one is buying.

Interesting times indeed.

Desert to Dust

Makes perfect sense to anyone with a degree in Obamanomics. If you understand it then you probably understand what they mean when the say the Carbon Tax will be "revenue neutral".

Why built in middle of desert island
I was wonder?

may be they are destroying for made new project or built new bank in desert instead

they can used some equipment of home used for poor people home

or put that as subsidize housing for USA to poor live there

or may have security attached to it

why in first place give tehm money to built then
tear it apart??

or may planed to destroy some evidence of corrption of bank moregagee in USA????!!!

or may be some of Volvo machineary used to tear apart building look for some job and seat doing nothing asked job to give them some job to get paid by bank to them

who knows what American are doing strange country never like to live in USA really!! never understood their system of logic to me

Victorville is a bedroom community and aspiring multimodal transport hub in the high desert an hour drive over the mountains from Los Angeles. What a dumb place to build a suburb. Surprisingly good restaurants though.

Funny thing is, when I first watched this video I was immediately reminded of the scene in THX 1138 where Duvall's character is disposing of the useless geometric solids that it was every citizen's patriotic duty to purchase.

Horrible movie, but as it turns out, eerily prophetic of the new Obamanation.

I don't know what is more stupid, tearing down brand new houses (that are of value) or the government of victorville for levying the fines. Someone pushing a pencil doesn't realize that once those houses are filled then their owners will be paying taxes, probably in excess of the fines collected.

For those who are wondering about building in the desert, I would like to point out that the Paliser Triangle is classified as desert, as is the Kamloops region.

Its Obamanomics insofar as he was supportive of the chain that led to easy credi and easy credi standards.

I take this as a good sign. Clear the inventory anyway possible.

Not a good sign as in it shouldnt have come to this, but given that we are here. This is worthwhile.

Posted by: Sean at May 1, 2009 12:56 PM

It's now your patriotic duty to buy a Chrysler Sean.

An eerie sign of the new Harpernation.

Love your pictures Sean and noted the disclaimer:
"Steal my stuff and I'll beat you like a Hitler piñata at a barmitzvah".
Bookmarked. Only.
:)

Are we sure it isn't Mike Holmes screaming...'bring it all down' after inspecting the work on the house?

The fellow who took that video has gone off to Mexico City with two others to find out what's really going on with the Swine Flu...

wish him luck...

"Please know this City Council is committed to securing a variety of new jobs, creating a business friendly environment and providing housing opportunities for all of our citizens."

Well, 1 out 3 ain't bad.

http://ci.victorville.ca.us/rudycabriales.aspx

There is actually some dumb logic to what they're doing. If the houses are left standing, unfinished, they scream out "This community is a failure!"
Forcing the banks to complete the homes makes way more sense. Seizing the homes from the banks, and completing them using local contractors, hopefully the ones that are no doubt going unpaid for the work they've already done and not been paid for, makes absolute sense.
Why the banks are being permitted to destroy the buildings without (an assumption here) paying out the trades and suppliers is bizarre.

DaninVan - the back story is that the homes were foreclosed, and the bank that holds them is being fined by the city daily until the homes are 'brought up to code'. The value of these homes has gone negative, and the bank is flipping the bird to the tax-grabbing local politicos.

This is just the start...

Demolishing a structure made sense in Vancouver. A local chain called White Spot had a restaurant on Prime Property in Downtown Vancouver (they'd been in business before Vancouver existed practically)

So Caimaw, an automotive Union strikes the restaurant. Goes on a few days, on the 4th they come back to picket and there is NO RESTAURANT.

Owners said fine. Called in a bulldozer at midnight and demolished the whole damn thing, and it was a recent build too. Didn't even take out the equipment. Smashed the works up and trucked it away.

Caimaw came to picket in the morning and there was only a concrete pad where the relatively new restaurant used to stand.

Best part of the story, as soon as Caimaw gave up their fight he build a new on in the same. Bang, up it came. Looked identical to. Hired all new staff.

My Hero

shows how well they were built. hundreds of thousands of dollars for shit. i sold my house last year and was going to buy a new one. not on your life. i now live in a bunker. i call it that because it is solid cement. a condo that it would require a large bomb to destroy.

Actually Victorville has a population of ~120,000. Victorville is at the base of the mountain that provides water to the high desert, SanBernardo, and LosAngles. There is an international logistics airport, route 66 and I15 pass through Victorville. It's not a dry empty desert it's fairly busy but most people aren't stupid enough to buy 1/6 acre lots since many houses are on half acre or multiacre lots. The funny thing is there are three condos that were recently built right near vast acreage. No one wants to buy those things. The core of this issue is morons pumping cash into the bubble. Then another set of morons got money during the bubble and invested it into pure stupidity. The resultant was pure retardation of the real estate business.

Galted

When you see banks doing things which are obviously insane because its -cheaper- that way, a large change in government is required to fix it.

Tax and regulation make it cheaper to spend considerable amounts of money tearing down 20 almost finished houses than to sell them for a dollar? I predict a lot of serious shlitz going to come down in California very soon.

Texas Canuck re: your comment on the Palliser Triangle....In the mid 1800's, shortly before Confederation, one Mr. John AlvinGore DavidSuzuki Palliser, surveying the vast open territoy between Manitoba and the Rocky Mountains made the astute observation that this harsh, barren, inhospitable wasteland was unfit for human settlement and had no economic value. Funny thing- this area was eventually settled, and except for the disaster that was the Great Depression and some minor setbacks since, it has proved to be a vital and integral part of the Western Canada Breadbasket, and in general has thrived.
Message to the Chicken Littles- short term myopic observations make ...Whoa!! Duck!! whew....

Shaken; as I said, there is some dumb logic to the teardown decision. There is after all, still some value to the banks in the land.
What I find indefensible is the banks writing off the potential finished value of the homes; if they don't make economic sense now then they certainly didn't when the banks lent the mortgage funds. In the final analysis, it's the bank's shareholders that have to carry the can. If I were one of them I'd be screaming for Executive heads to roll.

OOps, forgot to mention that I was wondering if all Mechanics' Liens against those homes expired when the buildings were demolished(?). Anyone know State Law on this?