In today's news: Median price of a home sold in Detroit in December was $7,500

[Drew Dowdell]

Detroit's outlook falls along with home prices

Link to Chicago Tribune

DETROIT — It may be tough to get financing for a new car these days, but in Detroit you can buy a house with a credit card. The median price of a home sold in Detroit in December was $7,500, according to Realcomp, a listing service. Not $75,000. Remove a zero—it's seven thousand five hundred dollars, substantially less than the lowest-price car on the new-car market.

......

On a positive note, Detroit's homicide rate dropped 14 percent last year. That prompted mayoral candidate Stanley Christmas to tell the Detroit News recently, "I don't mean to be sarcastic, but there just isn't anyone left to kill."

[Satty]

Hmmmm.....maybe its time to buy some property in D-Town.

[FAPTurbo]

For 7,500, I'd buy a house for the lulz.

[Satty]

Really, I could buy 12 houses in Detroit for what I paid for mine. How cool would it be to own an entire block for less than 6 digits? I could start my own gated community, maybe PCS will move in!

Edited March 3, 2009 by Satty

[FUTURE_OF_GM]

CELEBRATE!!!!

"We've finally killed the rust belt and the companies/amazing amount of history that it includes!"

I'd love to live in Detroit (because of all the old $h!) if it weren't so far north. With my depression and Detroit winters, I'd off myself in under 2 years.

[Satty]

Anyone who says they would love to live in Detroit has obviously never been to Detroit.

[Intrepidation]

BUY IT NOW! $7,500!! NEEDS A LITTLE WORK!!!!

http://www.maniacworld.com/perfect-timing-...ouse-wreck.html

[Satty]

I'm telling you, but up a bunch of property, knock down the abandoned houses and build one really big house. With a moat. And bullet-proof windows.

[Intrepidation]

And an electric fence with barbed wire...maybe a few sentry towers and land mines along the outside perimeter.

[Satty]

And a crew of vicious Pomeranians.

[FAPTurbo]

My dad saw me looking at the pictures, and asked if they were in some Slavic country that got bombed out. He wasn't at all surprised when I replied that those were just houses in Detroit.

[Oracle of Delphi]

You'd be better off building a house on top of a police station in Detroit ...

[FUTURE_OF_GM]

Anyone who says they would love to live in Detroit has obviously never been to Detroit.

Detroit is rich in both architectural and automotive history.

It would be a MECCA for me if the climate didn't suck so badly.

It's a shame that the city is in such bad shape when it could be a beautiful homage to some of what made america great.

[SAmadei]

This is the true story... of seven C&G personalities... picked to live in a run down house in Detroit... debate together and have their lives taped...

to find out what happens... when people stop being polite... and start getting stabbed and shot by the local gangs... The Real World Detroit!

As FOG has mentioned, Detroit does have some beautiful architecture, and seeing it in such a poor condition makes me want to cry. A few of those houses DF posted would have had great potential... 20 years ago... in a much nicer town... like the Bronx... or Newark.

[Teh Ricer Civic!]

I have an idea, lets get a bunch of rich people to buy out the entire city. Then rich and middle class people would move in (since it would now be dominated by rich and middle class people) and it will become a nice city again... and property values would necessarily skyrocket since it would become a desirable place to live again, and the returns on investment will be insane.

Find enough people to do this with you (like a couple hundred thousand ) and i guarantee you could make a ton of money over a long period of time doing this.

Edited March 3, 2009 by Teh Ricer Civic!

[Intrepidation]

I wish something could be done about turning it from a crime infested $h!hole into a nice place once again. It looks the ruins of a civilization or something post apocalyptic.

[FAPTurbo]

This is the true story... of seven C&G personalities... picked to live in a run down house in Detroit... debate together and have their lives taped...

to find out what happens... when people stop being polite... and start getting stabbed and shot by the local gangs... The Real World Detroit!

I'd watch it!

[Intrepidation]

[the_yellow_dart]

I'd worry more about the personalities shooting and stabbing each other than the gangs.

evok: Excuse me sir, WTF is with all these spark plug wires on your Tahoe? Haven't you heard that the V8 is dead???

NOS2006: BV! Put some pants on!

smk4565: Hey Oldsmoboi, what's with the shovel and lye? And why did you just lock the door?

Oldsmoboi: FUTURE_OF_GM asked me to pick it up for him. He said something about someone talking trash about Metalica. I don't want anyone to steal it.

MR. DETROITMETAL: I painted the house while everyone was away! How do you like it?

Satty: Change it back right now!

MR. DETROITMETAL: I'm afraid I can't do that, Dave.

Satty:

I can haz episode 2?

[CSpec]

Wow, that's amazing. I live in upstate NY, which is extremely similar to Michigan in a lot of ways. Rochester is itself a small version of Detroit, which is anchored by 3 failing companies (Xerox, Kodak, and Bausch and Lomb). Many beautiful old houses are now in $h! neighborhoods and are derelict; the city can't demolish them quickly enough. Also property values here are absolutely terrible, with a high violent crime rate and awful public city schools. Basically, the people who live here have roots and family here, or they can't afford to get the hell out and move south.

[David]

Amazing at the price and sad at the run down homes and what I would assume was a Hells Night during Halloween and left empty homes burning. The city really should just send in the bulldozers and bill the property owners which is probably the banks thinking they have a million dollar home but have not checked it in 10 years to realize it is nothing.

[FUTURE_OF_GM]

I think a C&G reality show would score BIG ratings!

Ironically, I can't help but look at Detroit and think of the neighborhood I live in now...

At one time, it was impoverished and crime ridden. A wealthy couple came in and bought the majority of the historic buildings and started the movement to revitalize the place. Fast forward 10 years later and it's Charlottes ONLY arts district which encompasses multiple restored historic structures and where small mill houses sometimes sell for $500,000.

It's very sad that america pisses on it's history like this.

[Intrepidation]

FOG, yes it is very sad, and it's a shame so many people are dumb $h!s who make it this way.

I want episode 2 as well WMJ

[Intrepidation]

Holden employee rips out a chunk of PCS's abundant body hair

PCS:

Later that night, across the border in Canada

Enzora: Dammit yellow_dart, you spilled bong resin on the carpet again.

loki: Ron Paul '08

CaptainBooyah: All of you! Out of my igloo!

At the nearby Detroit Auto Show...

wildmanjoe: Hey Dodgefan, that computer you speced out for me is kind of expensive. I have a clock radio and a copy machine, can a build a computer out of those instead?

Dodgefan:

:rotflmao:

MOAR EPISODES!!

Make a thread for it

[SAmadei]

I have an idea, lets get a bunch of rich people to buy out the entire city. Then rich and middle class people would move in (since it would now be dominated by rich and middle class people) and it will become a nice city again... and property values would necessarily skyrocket since it would become a desirable place to live again, and the returns on investment will be insane.

Find enough people to do this with you (like a couple hundred thousand ) and i guarantee you could make a ton of money over a long period of time doing this.

Unfortunately, I can look out at a smaller scale version of this across the inlet from my kitchen window... the northern parts of Atlantic City are blocks and blocks of vacant property that are mostly owned by people who want to develop it (or at least before the economy crapped). Unfortunately, for every block there are two speculators who refuse to sell for less than 50x the value of the property, making the rest of the block undevelopable.

Of course this all battles out in court with buzz words like ""emminent domain", and it takes decades to move any project along. Now, I'm all for property rights and generally against emminent domain, but when your talking about a little tiny, useless piece of vacant land you are squatting on, you are just a nuisance.

Dfelt: In AC, they have a VERY aggressive demolition process... those pictures DF posted would never had gone so far. In fact, a large crack or a unsecured window or door can be cause to start the demo process. The city just bills the property owner... the exception to this is property owned by the city... that stuff rots, undemolished.

FOG: Charlotte is probably very lucky to have had such success... likely a combination of not being too far gone and not giving scumbag speculators a chance to get a foothold.

Being in the northeast, roaming from Washington DC to Boston, I see a lot nasty neighborhoods... but nothing compares to the wholesale implosion in Detroit. I think the cities near Chernobyl have a brighter future.

[Teh Ricer Civic!]

Unfortunately, I can look out at a smaller scale version of this across the inlet from my kitchen window... the northern parts of Atlantic City are blocks and blocks of vacant property that are mostly owned by people who want to develop it (or at least before the economy crapped). Unfortunately, for every block there are two speculators who refuse to sell for less than 50x the value of the property, making the rest of the block undevelopable.

Develop???? FOR RESALE? naw, my idea is to buy all this cheapo land and then bulldoze the buildings and build nice houses and then LIVE in them. You get enough rich and middle class people to do that and voila, upscale expensive community which will attract a lot of companies.

Eventually it will happen, it always does, the "nice" neighborhoods always shift around towns as the populations move around.

[the_yellow_dart]

Was PCS' German tyrade inspired by Samuel L Jackson?

ps. Sorry to break your stereotype but I don't smoke weed (anymore)

[SAmadei]

Develop???? FOR RESALE? naw, my idea is to buy all this cheapo land and then bulldoze the buildings and build nice houses and then LIVE in them. You get enough rich and middle class people to do that and voila, upscale expensive community which will attract a lot of companies.

In AC, there was really little room for a decent sized house... just a rowhouse. So to have a decent piece of land, you need at least 3 lots to bulldoze to make one house.

Eventually it will happen, it always does, the "nice" neighborhoods always shift around towns as the populations move around.

There is little population left to move around Detroit.

Given the loss of jobs, lousy neighborhoods, cold weather, Detroit has little chance of survival. High taxes like most cities have seals the doom. You see this in New Orleans... it has the benefit of nicer weather, yet the people still haven't come back. Detroit also _was_ too close to Canada for my comfort. ;-)

OTOH, with the American people stepping down a notch or two in the world social order, it might someday be cheaper to build cars in Detroit again, rather than in Mexico or China... leading to a rebirth of jobs.

[Oracle of Delphi]

Real World Detroit, Episode Two!

The first scene takes place in a holding cell in a Detroit police station. FOG has been brought in for questioning regarding the disappearance of a an emo kid who was known to talk trash about Metalica.

FOG: Camino? What are you doing in here? Were you the one they arrested this morning at the RenCen for driving your truck through management's offices?

Camino_LS6: Guilty as charged. I warned those fools that canceling the G8 ST was going to have negative consequences.

FOG: Yeah, but their offices are on the 14th floor. How did you get your truck up there?

Meanwhile, at a nearby cafe...

Trinacriabob: Buongiorno!

Paulino: Buongiorno!

Trinacribob: Specificamente ho ordinato una pizza a forma di moustache.

Paulino: Vorrei comprare alcuno mousached i acessories dell'automobile per il mio Ferrari.

Trinicriabob: Grande!

A short time later, in the basement of the the RenCen, Pontiac Custom-S is speaking with a Holden employee...

Holden Employee: What?

PCS: Aus welchem Land kommen Sie?

Holden Employee: What? What? Wh - ?

PCS: "Was" ist kein Land, das ich jemals gehört. Sie sprechen Englisch in Was?

Holden Employee: What?

PCS: Englisch, ficker! Sprechen sie es?

Holden Employee: Yes! Yes!

PCS: Dann wissen Sie, was ich sage!

Holden Employee: Yes!

PCS: Beschreiben Sie, welche Carl Peter Förster aussieht!

Holden Employee: What?

PCS: Sagen "was" wieder. Sagen "was" wieder, ich darf Sie, ich doppelt wagen Sie ficker, sagen, was man mehr Zeit, verdammt!

Holden Employee: I don't have time for this.

Holden employee rips out a chunk of PCS's abundant body hair

PCS:

Later that night, across the border in Canada

Enzora: Dammit yellow_dart, you spilled bong resin on the carpet again.

loki: Ron Paul '08

CaptainBooyah: All of you! Out of my igloo!

At the nearby Detroit Auto Show...

wildmanjoe: Hey Dodgefan, that computer you speced out for me is kind of expensive. I have a clock radio and a copy machine, can a build a computer out of those instead?

Dodgefan:

Even I smiled at that ...

However if you going to mention CPF, get his name straight (Carl-Peter Forster), please note the hyphen between Carl and Peter. Also there are no UMLATS over the o in Forster.

Here are what Umlats look like.

I don't think I sound like Gestapo Officer Major hockstader, from Hogan's Heroes but it sure made me laugh.

[Northstar]

This is actually not that surprising. Not many people are buying nice new houses these days, especially not in Detroit. If that was the mean price, then I would be concerned. Median of $7500 simply means there were the same number of houses sold for less than $7500 (such as the POS ones pictured) as nicer houses costing $200+k (or whatever).

[FAPTurbo]

I resent the insinuation that Canadians live in igloos.

Now, if you excuse me, I have to weed the walls of my sod house.