I suspect that hotels will be turned into boarding houses without maid service & meals, in the not too distant future.

Time for smokin' travel deals.

general growth files bankruptcy
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601103&sid=aWnpytLhu3Rs&refer=news

Does not seem to be effecting large metro area hotels yet, I am seeing the same or higher rates as the last couple of years and these are sky high.

I have to go buy a new clothes dryer tonight for the better half...does this count as doing my part for the economy?

Trust me I can think of a million other things I could be doing.

The real estate boom usually includes overbuilding of hotel rooms. This leads to overcapacity and tough times for hotels. The recession that normally follows kills the weaker players as demand declines. So this is just business as usual in the economic cycle.

Maybe the decrease in traffic will give them time to clean the ecoli and smegma off their bedcovers.

I am going to NYC in June and hotwire is offering 4* for around $150, which is about 1/2 off what hotels are offering directly. I assume you can do even better via priceline. Seems hotels are still afraid to offer real discounts directly, but pleanty of bargins out there for those who are willing to be flexible.

(I am going to plug a good website for those who seek to master hotwire/priceline- www.betterbidding.com.)

Wow, empty hotels, empty office spaces, empty houses, empty stores,...where did everybody go? Did the Rapture take them away?

There all at the teabag protests.

"Remember ... when the rapture does come, you get all their stuff. "

Yes, but there won't be anyone left to sell it to at a profit.

Remember ... when the rapture does come, you get all their stuff.

What's the ruling on Silicon Breasts and Botox everthing else? Does that get raptured? If not, we're looking at a major toxic clean-up, and heaven's looking at some ugly freakin bitches.

The bad news is that we overbuilt our capacity in recent years.

Now we must wait for demand to grow into that excess capacity.

The good news in this is that the economic expansion will enjoy cheaper occupancy costs because of the overcapacity.

Normal cyclical stuff...

Sign of the times...

PORTLAND, Maine (AP) - Drivers may have a new reason to fear an automobile break-in: the inspection stickers they must plaster to the inside of their windshield in many states.
In Portland, Maine's largest city, about 40 cars have been hit in the past several months by thieves who have caused thousands of dollars of damage to get the stickers.
And there are sporadic reports elsewhere in the 16 states that require motorists to pay for and display the stickers, which signal that a car has passed a safety or emissions test.
Investigators can't say for sure that the Portland thefts are tied to the economic recession, but one theory is that people who have lost their jobs and can't afford costly car repairs are buying the stolen inspection stickers on the black market.
"Until recently you wouldn't believe there was a market for this, but there's a market for this," said Portland police Lt. Tony Ward.
The thieves smash a window to get inside and then heat the outside of the windshield to loosen the glue on the sticker, police say. The technique allows the thieves to carefully peel away the supposedly tamperproof stickers.
The victim usually ends up with a cracked windshield from the heat, in addition to a broken side window and thousands of glass shards inside the vehicle.
A team of detectives is working to crack the case, Ward said, but another driver worried that authorities don't think it's a big problem.
"It's incredibly infuriating," said Jack Rent, a Gorham resident whose commercial van has been targeted six times in Portland, causing out-of-pocket repair costs of about $3,000. "Most of the police officers say there's not that much they can do."
In most of Maine, the annual inspection costs $12.50, regardless of whether a vehicle passes or fails. It costs $18.50 in Cumberland County, home to Portland, where an additional emissions inspection is required.
It's unclear what the stolen stickers might be selling for, Ward said.
All told, 18 states and the District of Columbia have some sort of inspection program for vehicles, according to the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators. All but two require the sticker to be displayed, usually on the windshield.
Because of the economy, motorists are hanging onto their cars longer, and some are delaying maintenance to save money, said Christie Hyde, an AAA spokeswoman in Florida. Sometimes that backfires when costly repairs are needed to pass inspection, she said.
Someone last month broke into two vehicles to steal inspection stickers at Dixie Motorsports Inc. in Suffolk, Va., said owner George Murray.
"It's just the time and hassle and aggravation more than anything else," said Murray, who paid $350 for repairs because the damage didn't meet his insurance deductible.
Down the road, another auto dealership, Ride Time, was the victim of four smash-and-grabs in one night. "Every one had high-value CD players in them, and the only thing they took was the inspection sticker," said Randy White, Ride Time's service manager.
Rent knows the routine well. His primary job is as a fish broker, but he also owns a day care center. And it's the center's 15-passenger van that has been targeted six times, each time over the weekend while parked in a commercial lot.
A call from the day care center on a Monday morning rarely yields good news, he said: "I say, 'Let me guess. They smashed the window again.'"

Normal cyclical stuff...

Yep...it's all good until the ocean's start belching methane and hydrogen sulfide.

I bought your note last week from the Treasury @34¢ on the dollar. I used 3% of my money and FDIC conduit guarantees for the rest. Please, make at least 4 payments before walking away from your certainty. That way I'm made whole with a little profit and then I don't care. Stick it to those stupid taxpayers.

At least I can walk away from you....but you can't walk away from China. They own your ass and you can't walk away. You have no choice but to service them. Well, you could kill yourself, even though it's illegal.

Disaster porn?

Please, don't conjure images of Rob's nakedness. I just finished lunch.

I think CR owns srs and is pushing his position. I'm all for it.

30% of China's exports come to the US. They are very concerned about maintaining employment. They cannot afford to do anything that would damage that volume. The political unrest would escalate. They will continue to choose the lesser of evils, which is to sell to us even if the terms of trade are not good for them.