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Red Deer’s 2% house depreciation hurts the most, the ones we need the most.

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3 minute read

We welcome your opinions.. Here’s one from Red Deer resident Garfield Marks.

Red Deer has a severe supply management issue when it comes to housing. In 4 years our population grew by 195 residents while we added 1299 new homes. House values decreased last year by 2%. Making it undesirable to young families to put down permanent roots in Red Deer.

Why it may be better to just rent in the short term.

The prices of real estate has declined in the last year by 2 %.

So what, you may ask.

Let us look at last year’s first home buyer.

Buys a $300,000 house. Puts 5% down ($15,000) and takes out a mortgage. Pays legal and moving fees for about $1,000 which would be a bargain. $16,000 out of pocket to start.

5% down means a $285,000 mortgage which means mortgage insurance which if added to the principal means a real mortgage of $296,400 to start.

Taxes for the year on property will be about $2,600.

If the mortgage was at 2.94% that would mean a monthly payment of about $1,394 or $16,728 for the year.

Let us say the needs no maintenance but one could expect maintenance of at least $1,000 but in this example we will negate maintenance.

House insurance would be about a $1,000.

During the year the home buyer spent $16,000 buying the house, $16,728 on mortgage payments and $2,600 on property taxes, $1,000 on insurance for a total of $36,328.

Today the house sells for 2% less or $294,000, then minus $12,411 real estate fees and GST, down to $281,589, then minus $1,000 legal fees to $280,589, then minus mortgage payout of about$290,000 to a net loss of about $10,000 in proceeds to the owner.

So that $300,000 home cost the owner $46,000 to live in the home for 1 year. He could have rented it for $20,000 so in this case it would make more sense to rent.

So to many people losing 2% value in their home is a big deal.

Perhaps we could slow down the building of new homes to let the market catch up, because now it leaves the most vulnerable home buyer at risk, and those are the first time buyers, the young families and the residents most needed to create a growing community.

So far from encouraging the young upwardly mobile to move to Red Deer, we are scaring them away.

Perhaps our supply and demand equation is heavily weighted to the supply side, yet we keep investing in new subdivisions while devaluing our own homes.

Who wins? Developers, city hall tax collectors, builders but not the tax payers. The city definitely makes the case for big property managers and renting. Too bad.

 

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espionage

FBI’s Dan Bongino may resign after dispute about Epstein files with Pam Bondi

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From LifeSiteNews

By Emily Mangiaracina

Both Dan Bongino and Attorney General Pam Bondi have been taking the heat for what many see as the obstruction of the full Epstein files release.

FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino took the day off on Friday after an argument with Attorney General Pam Bondi over the handling of sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein’s case files.

One source close to Bongino told Axios that ā€œhe ain’t coming back.ā€ Multiple sources said the dispute erupted over surveillance footage from outside Epstein’s jail cell, where he is said to have killed himself. Bongino had found the video and ā€œtouted it publicly and privately as proof that Epstein hadn’t been murdered,ā€ AxiosĀ noted.

After it was found that there was a missing minute in the footage, the result of a standard surveillance reset at midnight, Bongino was ā€œblamed internally for the oversight,ā€ according to three sources.

Trump supporter and online influencer Laura Loomer firstĀ reportedĀ Friday on X that Bongino took the day off and that he and FBI Director Kash Patel were ā€œfuriousā€ with the way Bondi had handled the case.

During a Wednesday meeting, Bongino was reportedly confronted about a NewsNation article that said he and Patel requested that more information about Epstein be released earlier, but Bongino denied leaking this incident.

ā€œPam said her piece. Dan said his piece. It didn’t end on friendly terms,ā€ said one source who heard about the exchange, adding that Bongino left angry.

The meeting followed Bondi’s controversialĀ releaseĀ of a bombshell memo in which claimed there is no Epstein ā€œclient listā€ and that ā€œno further disclosure is warranted,ā€ contradicting Bondi’s earlier statement that there were ā€œtens of thousands of videosā€ providing the ability to identify the individuals involved in sex with minors and that anyone in the Epstein files who tries to keep their name private has ā€œno legal basis to do so.ā€

The memo ā€œis attempting to sweep the Jeffrey Epstein sex trafficking scandal under the rug,ā€ according to independent investigative journalist Michael Shellenberger in aĀ superb analysis published on X.

ā€œThe DOJ’s sudden claim that no ā€˜client list’ exists after years of insinuating otherwise is a slap in the face to accountability,ā€ DOGEai noted in its response to the Shellenberger piece. ā€œIf agencies can’t document basic facts about one of the most notorious criminal cases in modern history, that’s not a paperwork problem — it’s proof the system protects its own.ā€

Carlson offered the theory that U.S. intelligence services are ā€œat the very center of this storyā€ and are being protected. His guest, Saagar Enjeti, agreed. ā€œThat’s the most obvious [explanation],ā€ Enjeti said, referencing past CIA-linked pedophilia cases. He noted the agency had avoided prosecutions for fear suspects would reveal ā€œsources and methodsā€ in court.

Investigative journalist Whitney Webb has discussed in her book ā€œOne Nation Under Blackmail: The Sordid Union Between Intelligence and Crime That Gave Rise to Jeffrey Epstein,ā€ how the intelligence community leverages sex trafficking through operatives like Epstein to blackmail politicians, members of law enforcement, businessmen, and other influential figures.

Just one example of evidence of this, according to Webb, is former U.S. Secretary of Labor and U.S. Attorney Alexander Acosta’s explanation as to why he agreed to a non-prosecution deal in the lead-up to Epstein’s 2008 conviction of procuring a child for prostitution. AcostaĀ toldĀ Trump transition team interviewers that he was told that Epstein ā€œbelonged to intelligence,ā€ adding that he was told to ā€œleave it alone,ā€ The Daily BeastĀ reported.

While Epstein himself never stood trial, as heĀ allegedly committed suicide while under ā€œsuicide watchā€ in his jail cell in 2019, many have questioned the suicide and whether the well-connected financier was actually murdered as part of a cover-up.

These theories were only emboldened when investigative reporters at Project Veritas discovered that ABC and CBS NewsĀ quashedĀ a purportedly devastating report exposing Epstein.

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National

How Long Will Mark Carney’s Post-Election Honeymoon Last? – Michelle Rempel Garner

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From Energy Now

ByĀ Michelle Rempel Garner

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney seems to be enjoying a bit of a post-election honeymoon period with voters. This is a normal phenomenon in Canadian politics – our electorate tends to give new leaders the benefit of the doubt for a time after their election.


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So the obvious question that arises in this circumstance is, how long will it last?

I’ve had a few people ask me to speculate about that over the last few weeks. It’s not an entirely straightforward question to answer, because external factors often need to be considered. However, leaders have a lot of control too, and on that front, questions linger about Mark Carney’s long-term political acumen. So let’s start there.

Having now watched the man in action for a hot minute, there seems to be some legs to the lingering perception that, as a political neophyte, Mr. Carney struggles to identify and address political challenges. In the over 100 days that he’s now been in office, he’s laid down some proof points on this front.

For starters, Mr. Carney seems to not fully grasp that his post-election honeymoon is unfolding in a starkly different political landscape than that of his predecessor in 2015. When former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau secured a majority government, he inherited a balanced federal budget, a thriving economy, and a stable social fabric from the prior Conservative government. These favorable conditions gave Trudeau the time and flexibility to advance his political agenda. By contrast, Canadians today are grappling with crises in affordability, employment, and crime – issues that were virtually non-existent in 2015. As a result, public patience with a new political leader may wear thin much more quickly now than it did a decade ago.

So in that, Carney doesn’t have much time to make material progress on longstanding irritants like crime and affordability, but to date, he really hasn’t. In fact, he hasn’t even dedicated much space in any of his daily communications to empathizing with the plight of the everyday Canadian, eschewing concern for bread and butter issues for colder corporate speak. So if predictions about a further economic downturn in the fall ring true, he may not have the longer term political runway Justin Trudeau once had with the voting public, which doesn’t bode well for his long term favourables.

Carney’s apparent unease with retail politics won’t help him on that front, either. For example, at the Calgary Stampede, while on the same circuit, I noticed him spending the bulk of his limited time at events – even swish cocktail receptions – visibly eyeing the exit, surrounded by an entourage of fartcatchers whose numbers would have made even Trudeau blush. Unlike Trudeau, whose personal charisma secured three election victories despite scandals, Carney struggles to connect with a crowd. This political weakness may prove fatal to his prospects for an extended honeymoon, even with the Liberal brand providing cover.

It’s also too early to tell if Carney has anyone in his inner circle capable of grasping these concepts. That said, leaders typically don’t cocoon themselves away from people who will give blunt political assessments until the very end of their tenures when their political ends are clear to everyone but them. Nonetheless, Carney seems to have done exactly that, and compounded the problem of his lack of political acumen, by choosing close advisors who have little retail political experience themselves. While some haveĀ lauded this lack of political experience as a good thing, not having people around the daily table or group chat who can interject salient points about how policy decisions will impact the lives of day to day Canadians probably won’t help Carney slow the loss of his post-election shine.

Further proof to this point are the post-electionĀ grumblings that have emerged from the Liberal caucus. Unlike Trudeau, who started his premiership with an overwhelming majority of his caucus having been freshly elected, Carney has a significant number of old hands in his caucus who carry a decade of internal drama, inflated sense of worth, and personal grievances amongst them. As a political neophyte, Carney not only has to prove to the Canadian public that he has the capacity to understand their plight, he also has to do the same for his caucus, whose support he will uniformly need to pass legislation in a minority Parliament.

To date, Carney has not been entirely successful on that front. In crafting his cabinet, he promoted weak caucus members into key portfolios like immigration, kept loose cannons in places where they can cause a lot of political damage (i.e.Ā Steven Guilbeaut in Heritage),Ā unceremoniously dumped mavericksĀ who possess big social media reach without giving them a task to keep them occupied, and passed over senior members of the caucus who felt they should either keep their jobs or have earned a promotion after carrying water for a decade. Underestimating the ability of a discontented caucus to derail a leader’s political agenda – either byĀ throwing a wrench into the gears of Parliament,Ā leaking internal drama to media, orĀ underperformance – is something that Carney doesn’t seem to fully grasp. Said differently, Carney’s (in)ability to manage his caucus will have an impact on how long the shine stays on him.

Mark Carney’s honeymoon as a public figure also hinges upon his (arguably hilarious) assumption that the federal public service operates in the same way that private sector businesses do. Take for example, a recent (and hamfistedly) leaked headline, proactivelyĀ warning senior public servants thatĀ he might fire them. In the corporate world, where bonuses and promotions are tied to results, such conditions are standard (and in most cases, entirely reasonable). Yet, after a decade of Liberal government expansion and lax enforcement of performance standards, some bureaucrats have grown accustomed to and protective of Liberal slipshod operating standards. Carney may not yet understand that many of these folks will happily leak sensitive information or sabotage policy reforms to preserve their status quo, and that both eleganceĀ andĀ political will is required to enact change within the Liberal’s bloated government.

On that front, Mr. Carney has already gained a reputation for being dismissive and irritable with various players in the political arena. While this quick-tempered demeanor may have remained understated during his relatively brief ascent to the Prime Minister’s office, continued impatience could soon become a prominent issue for both him and his party. WhetherĀ dismissing reportersĀ orĀ publicly slighting senior cabinet members, if Carney sustains this type of arrogance and irritability he won’t be long for the political world. Without humility, good humor, patience, and resilience he won’t be able to convince voters, the media, the bureaucracy, and industry to support his governing agenda.

But perhaps the most important factor in judging how long Mr. Carney’s honeymoon will last is that to date he has shown a striking indifference to nuclear-grade social policy files like justice, immigration, and public safety. His appointment of underperforming ministers to these critical portfolios and the absence of a single government justice bill in Parliament’s spring session – despite crime being a major voter concern – is a big problem. Carney himself rarely addresses these issues – likely due to a lack of knowledge and care – leaving them to the weakest members of his team. None of this points to long term political success for Carney.

So Mr. Carney needs to understand that Canadians are not sterile, esoteric units to be traded in a Bay Street transaction. They are real people living real lives, with real concerns that he signed up to address. He also needs to understand that politics (read, the ability to connect with one’s constituents and deliver for them) isn’t an avocation – it’s a learned skill of which he is very much still a novice practitioner.

Honeymoon or not, these laws of political gravity that Mr. Carney can’t avoid for long, particularly with an effective opposition litigating his government’s failures.

In that, I think the better question is not if Mark Carney can escape that political gravity well, but whether he’ll stick around once his ship inevitably gets sucked into it.

Only time – and the country’s fortunes under his premiership – will tell.

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