Charleston Real Estate Blog

A couple of big stories out there in the Financial World have my attention and it's only my opinion but I can't help but give a BIG FAT F on my report card. Unlike almost everybody from surprisingly on both the left and the right, I don't blame Fannie and Freddie for causing the housing mess. I think it was reckless lending and ...

Payback is sometimes a b*tch. The NY Times reports that an investigation into S&P began before the ratings agency cut the United States credit rating earlier this month. But that action isn't likely to make life very comfortable for S&P. “The Justice Department is investigating whether the nation’s largest credit ratings ...

Fortune contributing editor Duff McDonald just trashed Zillow in what I think is the silliest financial analysis of a firm I've ever read. The background, Zillow has just filed the necessary paperwork for a proposed initial public offering of stock. McDonald says, "I'm not buying Zillow". Now you have to understand ...

Barry Ritholtz at the Big Picture reminds us this week marks not one but two major Wall Street anniversaries. One year ago this week, the market made a 12 year low and back in 2000, the tech bubble popped. Barry called the March bottom last year. Here's more.    

One of my favorite columnists at MarketWatch is Todd Harrison and I eagerly followed his 18 chapter e book, Memoirs of a Minyan. Marketwatch published a chapter every Wednesday chronicling his career from Wall Street trader to founding the award winning online media business, Minyanville. Today was the final chapter and Todd ...

The big news today is that the credit card act passed by Congress and signed into law by President Obama takes effect today. Highly touted as offering relief to the American consumer, it falls short on most counts.  The bill does very little to actually help the consumer addressing only minor reforms like late billing and advanced notice of ...

Hank, I hope you don't mind this informal note requesting bailout funds but as a Charleston real estate agent, I would like to convert my business into a bank holding company and become eligible for an injection of capital from the bailout fund that you control. After all, just about every other business in the country has their hand out so ...

  ... and he's probably very smart so what does he have to say about a solution to the financial crisis. Mr. Krugman thinks that British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and Chancellor of the Exchequer Alistair Darling did the right thing by injecting capital into banks in return for a share of ownership."But the Brown government ...

The stock market effectively crashed yesterday on October 9th exactly one year after setting a record high and how did we get here. To quote the Grateful Dead, "what a long strange trip it's been". Back in February of last year I wrote about the tip of the iceberg."HSBC (Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation) was the first ...

Charlotte's banking landscape changed dramatically this morning when Citibank took over Wachovia in a deal brokered by the FDIC and the Treasury. Wachovia's downfall can be traced to the ill timed purchase of Golden West Financial and the Option ARM. An Option ARM allows borrowers to skip part of their payment and add that sum ...