I finally got my account open at Interactive Brokers. It was a lot easier than at Everbank and I didn’t have to provide them with blood samples or fingerprints!! [yeah thanks George W, this is what I get for being pro-Republican!]

My base currency is Aussie Dollars and I get paid a whopping 5.4% interest. And unlike Everbank, the money is liquid and isn’t tied up for 3 months.[plus I get a tad higher interest].

On top of that, the USD has been showing a little strength this week so I might get more bang for my buck in terms of appreciation too.

The only drawbacks are that you have to have atleast $15,000 AUD to get paid interest[thats about $11,250 USD] and the customer service isn’t as easy as picking up the phone, but they respond well to email. Also withdrawals cost $4 via check and $1 via ACH. [But its still liquid for a buck.]

Spain’s Housing Boom Faces a Test
Economists Worry About a Hard Landing
And a Resulting Ripple Effect
By KEITH JOHNSON
September 11, 2006; Page A6

MADRID — A decade of red-hot growth in the Spanish housing market fueled a jump in such things as jobs and consumer spending, turning Spain into one of the fastest-growing countries in the euro zone. But now, economists say the real-estate boom is coming unmoored from the economic fundamentals that once drove it, and they worry the market is headed for a hard landing that could have repercussions for the rest of the economy.

Incomes are no longer rising, but home prices continue to soar. Meanwhile, interest rates have started to head higher, making mortgages more expensive. Housing starts jumped 15% in the first half, while more than 3.5 million homes remain empty as owners wait for the value of the house to appreciate

“Spain is headed for a first-class beating, and the only question now is when it will come,” says Lorenzo Bernaldo de Quirós, an economist and head of Freemarket International Consulting in Madrid.

According to the WSJ,

Nomura Real Estate IPO
Could Raise $1.12 Billion
By KAZUHIRO SHIMAMURA
September 12, 2006

TOKYO — Nomura Real Estate Holdings Inc. set a tentative price range of 3,200 yen to 3,500 yen ($27.37 to $29.94) a share for its coming initial public offering of stock.

The real-estate arm of Nomura Holdings Inc. could raise at least 131.2 billion yen ($1.12 billion). The shares are scheduled to start trading on the Tokyo Stock Exchange Oct. 3.

Based on the tentative price range, the IPO of 41 million shares would be the largest by far in Japan this year, exceeding the 52 billion yen offering in March by Alpen Co. At that price range, the newly offered shares would trade at 19.9 to 21.8 times the company’s projected earnings for the fiscal year ending in March.

The company will take orders from institutional investors for a week starting tomorrow. The offering price will be announced Sept. 21.

Write to Kazuhiro Shimamura at kazuhiro.shimamura@dowjones.com

Sounds like a good play in the Japanese RE market which was flat for 15 years and has just started to rise. Also a good hedge against the US dollar. A lot of people think the Yen will also rise against the USD in the near future.

I got this email from someone. It was adapted from someone else’s article. I don’t know who, so I can’t provide a citation.

It is widely assumed that rising stock and house prices will keep American consumers both willing and able to spend, spend, spend their way to wealth – indefinitely. But the transfer of U.S. net worth to interests overseas is alarming, and it endangers U.S. economic and political health. Warren Buffett, who kept his vast fortune invested at home for more than 70 years, decided in 2002 to invest in foreign currencies for the first time. Buffett and management of Berkshire Hathaway believe the dollar is going to continue its decline. We should not need confirmation such as this to recognize the inevitable; but it bolsters the argument that the dollar is, in fact, in serious trouble, and that this trouble is likely to continue.

In addition to debt problems at home, Buffett made his decision based at least partially on the ever-growing trade deficit. He warned:

“We were taught in Economics 101 that countries could not for long sustain large, ever-growing trade deficits. At a point, so it was claimed, the spree of the consumption-happy nation would be braked by currency-rate adjustments and by the unwillingness of creditor countries to accept an endless flow of IOUs from the big spenders. And that’s the way it has indeed worked for the rest of the world, as we can see by the abrupt shutoffs of credit that many profligate nations have suffered in recent decades. The U.S., however, enjoys special status. In effect, we can behave today as we wish because our past financial behavior was so exemplary – and because we are so rich.

Buffett is especially concerned about the transfer of wealth to outside interests. He notes:

“Foreign ownership of our assets will grow at about $500 billion per year at the present trade-deficit level, which means that the deficit will be adding about one percentage point annually to foreigners’ net ownership of our national wealth. As that ownership grows, so will the annual net investment income flowing out of this country. That will leave us paying ever-increasing dividends and interest to the world rather than being a net receiver of them, as in the past. We have entered the world of negative compounding – goodbye pleasure, hello pain.”

According to the Salt Lake Tribune Utah housing is still doing well.

Utah’s home price appreciation, the worst in the country just three years ago, is now the 10th best nationwide.
Home prices statewide rose 15.2 percent in the year that ended in June, according to a report released Tuesday by the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight, a government agency that tracks housing values nationally. Utah moved into the top 10 from No. 15 in the agency’s last report three months ago.
Nationally, home prices rose only 10.1 percent in the year that ended in June, reflecting a downturn seen in markets throughout the country that experienced a rapid run-up in prices in the past several years.
Salt Lake City economist Jeff Thredgold, a Zions Bank consultant, believes Utah may be ranked sixth or seventh in home price appreciation by the end of the year.
He attributes that rosy outlook to Utah’s strong economy, which continues to outperform much of the rest of the country.
In addition, “Home prices are still reasonably cheap here, compared with neighboring states,” he said, which tends to fuel investment in the area.
That said, he expects appreciation along the Wasatch Front to kick down into the 8 percent to 12 percent range next year.

According to the Desert Times, Salt Lake City housing is likely to keep booming!

Plunging housing sales and sagging values may mean the end to one of the nation’s biggest housing booms, but Salt Lake City’s hot housing market will likely continue to show double-digit price gains for at least another year, according to industry experts.
The Commerce Department reported that U.S. home sales in July fell 22 percent compared to July 2005. And new-home prices decreased 1.7 percent in July compared to June.
“We’re going the other direction,” said James Wood, director of the University of Utah’s Bureau of Economic and Business Research. “We’ve had one year of really strong price increases. I think we have a ways to go. I think we have another year of double-digit growth.”
At 14.68 percent in the first quarter, Utah ranked 15th among all states in highest house-price appreciation rates, according to the U.S. Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight. Second-quarter rankings are set to be released Tuesday.
However, while home values and sales in nearly all Wasatch Front communities are soaring, Utah’s real estate market is not immune from a national slowdown.
New construction in the state in the first seven months of 2006 is down about 1 percent compared to the same period in 2005. And in the greater Salt Lake region, finished unsold vacant home inventory, which includes single-family and multifamily units, rose to 1,492 units in the second quarter, a 29 percent increase from 1,156 units in the first quarter, according to Metrostudy, a Houston-based real estate research firm with offices in West Jordan.
A June report by National City Corp. revealed that 71 of 317 metro areas across the country were considered “extremely overvalued” in this year’s first quarter, having appreciation rates in excess of 34 percent.
St. George ranked among those areas considered extremely overvalued. The Salt Lake metro region, while considered overvalued by the report, only carried an 8 percent housing premium. Just 18 months ago, Salt Lake was considered one of the most undervalued real estate markets in the country.

Finally closed on my St George house. Its really quite nice. Unfortunately, the market has gotten a bit saturated [despite the tremendous influx of people]. Seeing as I have too many things going on, I’ve decided to sell it and take my cash out of it. I’m heavily invested in Salt Lake City and I don’t think it makes sense to spread myself thin in different geographic areas.

Here’s the virtual tour. Let me know if you’re interested!

There’s a very interesting documentary on Google Video – The Money Masters.

It traces the history of money in America and how the Fed is screwing the American people. Incredibly interesting. Its 2 hours long but worth it.

It explains how the standard of living has decreased in the past 25 years and how rampant inflation is caused by the fact that the US Government doesn’t own the money, but rather borrows it from the Feds, who charge interest for this.

The Fed is not a government entity but a group of private banks whose sole motivation is to make the highest return on their money.

Also the banks are able to lend money using “Fractional Reserve Banking”. Basically the same dollar is lent out 10 times at 8% giving them a total return of 80%. Essentially, they use our money to push us deeper into debt. And since good old Bush passed a law making it almost impossible to file bankrupcy, we’re destined to a life of slavery!

Yet another reason to invest in foreign currencies and gold!

To hear a great conspiracy theory by well-known director Aaron Russo listen to his interview about his new movie, Freedom to Facism.

I tried to open an account with an online bank called Everbank. Apparently they want color photos of my passport, a notarized letter from my bank and a filled out W-8 form. This is too much work!!! All I wanted to do was open a CD which invests in foriegn currencies like the Canadian, Australian and New Zealand Dollar.

Instead I decided to open an account with Interactive Brokers. They even have better interest rates and the money is much more liquid.

check out this site. http://www.forsakencraft.com/proof.htm.

The condo I sold last year is already down 15%. I’m renting it back from the buyer. She bought it as an investment on a 3/1 ARM with 10% down. I glad I got out. Some one of my friends weren’t so lucky.
Check out this cry for help.