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Visas 4 Sale - Two years late
Two and a half years ago I wrote a proposal that would have addressed a portion of the overhang of residential real estate in the USA. Pretty simple idea. Swap a US visa for a foreign national's purchase of a property in the US.
Today we have Chucky Schumer, Senator, NY on the airways and in print with exactly the same proposal as I made back in 09. From the WSJ (Link):
Way back then I sent my proposal to all sorts of folks in government. Given that Schumer is my Senator I sent a copy to him and never heard a word.
I don’t think that this concept is really going to change the direction of RE values, but it would have made some difference these past few years. There would have been fewer defaults, smaller losses on housing values and significantly less red ink at Fannie and Freddie (now$140b and counting). If the proposal had been adopted, economic activity would have been somewhat higher over the past 30 months.
I’m left wondering what Chucky did with my letters to him. I’d like to ask him why he waited so long to come forward with this plan. Maybe he does not read his constituent mail. I hope that he does not try to sell this as an original thought. It’s been in his in box for years.
The original article can be found here (link). I cut and past a copy below.
A Proposal to Stimulate the US Housing Market
In order to stimulate demand for residential housing the United States expands the existing EB-5 visa program to include immigrant investors who purchase a home in the US with a value of not less than $250,000.
The demand for this type of visa from non-residents could be substantial. It could exceed 100,000 per year. The current volume of unsold homes is in the range of 2,000,000. Therefore this proposal will address 5% of the problem per year. This by itself would be a significant source of stability for housing prices. Stability must come before recovery.The following is a description of the existing EB-5 visa program.
Congress created the EB-5 immigrant investor visa category in the Immigration Act of 1990 in the hopes of attracting foreign capital to the US and creating jobs for American workers in the process.
There are three basic requirements as follows:
• First, the alien must establish a business or invest in an existing business that was created or restructured after November 19,1990
• Second, the alien must have invested $1 million ($500,000 in some cases) in the business
• Third, the business must create full-time employment for at least 10 US workers
This language could easily be amended/expanded to create demand for housing. The framework is there. This proposal re-directs the objectives but not the intent of Congress.
The devil will be in the details. If there was a will in Congress it could be done in a week. These laws already exist. We do not need a new Bill to do this. This proposal only addresses legal immigration.
There is another advantage to this approach. This proposal will not cost us a cent. That would be a first.
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Proposal to help the housing market- 'Americans are all bankrupt, so sell all the real estate to foreigners!' WOW what a great fukin idea Bruce!!
Fuktard.
Thank God I am not the only one that came to the same conclusion....
Americans are poorer and will continue to get poorer. However, instead of letting housing prices lower so that people can afford them, these people seek yet more ways to allow the prices to be propped up. It is not going to work, and will actually just make things worse... People love the free market when prices are going up, but seem to always run from it when the market is falling...
Alan Greenspan proposed carpet-arsony :-P
60-70 Millions Chinese more in US would be a fun. They're coming anyway, and much cheaper .
Who wants to bet USA will have 1 billion people(not 450million as per current growth models) by 2050? Only way to sustain the ponzi scheme. USA has the premier unpolluted land, air, and water living space. Asian lebensraum. Natives currently being outsourced and displaced may have to worry further because the brief respite it might give to housing will also bring along 2 kids competing for your job. This bill only looks like its free. Nothing is free. As we have observed this immigration thing did not turn out too well for the previous natives.
It's an excellent idea for 2008. As soon as you add Chucky to the mix go ahead and assume the ABSOLUTE WORST. When Chucky says "investment" he is really saying money for the DNC Complex.
Schumer should be in prison.
AMERICA FOR SALE!!! AMERICA FOR SALE!!! CALLING ALL THOSE WHO HAVE CLEANED OUT THEIR FELLOW CITIZENS IN FOREIGN LANDS UNTIL IT IS COLLAPSING, COME SPEND YOUR MONEY IN AMERICA AND WE'LL GIVE YOU ENTRY!!! AMERICA FOR SALE, AMERICA FOR SALE!!!
Give me a fucking break.
sorry bruce it won't work those who want vsas can't afford the re
There are millions of rich Chinese who want US greencard. I also wrote about the same idea three years ago on some other forum.
If you want to prop up overinflated housing prices, why not just add a zero to everyone's paycheck? If I were pulling in over a quarter mil a year, I'd buy a small 2BR 1.5BA house on a quarter acre plot for $350K.
Then you wouldn't need to import foreigners to buy overpriced houses.
Think I may have an answer to this. Some of our 1% are looking to move to other sovereign nations where they are unknown post collapse, thus avoiding the head lopping they earned here. If they can help someone else get in the US, they use the q uid pro quo to change places with them.
Clever tactic. for squid
I think it's a douche idea!!!
Why buy a visa when you can buy citizenship?
http://www.gaebler.com/Buying-a-Business-to-Get-United-States-Citizenshi...
Because ... if you buy a US citizenship you become ... a US citizen. ;-)
Bruce, with all due respect, this is a bad idea. You are not looking at the unexpected consequences. Among other things, you would be making home prices more unaffordable and making business purchases less affordable for existing US residents.
Thats the point - to keep asset prices high...keep the bubble inflated. Over the long term, I would argue it's pointless. If real wages continue to fall, and the cost of food, fuel, housing and health care stay static or rise - any wealth effect from higher home prices will vanish.
Not to appear partisan - but with the current xenophobia present in the GOP - isn't this DOA?
This plan may not be necessary since DHS is already implementing their own plan:
"Napolitano: DHS Authorizing Illegal Aliens to Work in U.S.
October 20, 2011
Print Version
Source: CNS News
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano told the Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday that under the administration’s policy of exercising “prosecutorial discretion” in the enforcement of the immigration laws, her department is currently authorizing some illegal aliens to work in the United States.
Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), the ranking-member of the Senate Judiciary panel, asked Napolitano: “According to the information from your department, some individuals who are given relief will obtain work authorizations. So people with no right to be in the country will be allowed to work here. Is that correct?”
Napolitano said: “Well, senator, since around 1986 there has been a process where those who are technically unlawfully in the country may apply for work authorization. This goes to CIS [Citizenship and Immigration Services]. It’s not an ICE [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] or CBP [Customs and Border Protection] function. And those cases are reviewed by CIS in a case-by-case basis. So there’s no change in that process. Like I said, that goes back to the mid-80s that is contemplated now.”
Sen. Grassley then asked, “But yes, some of them could have an opportunity to work here even though they are here illegally?”
“Well, that happens now, senator,” said Napolitano.
The three agencies she mentioned are all components of DHS.
Full article here"
http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/napolitano-dhs-authorizing-illegal-a...
Let's see ... I buy a house, and I get a visa ... and I get liability to taxation on all of my income and an obligation to disclose all of my assets everywhere else in the world as a kicker in the deal. Unless you are from a truly hellish third world country, the people with this kind of money can get less onerous deals from equally amenable countries. This is a non-starter with the people Chucky hopes to lure into the net.
Never underestimate the lure of the United States. We have Craigslist hookers with big fake tities, strip joints in every city, drugs cheap and readily available, and a criminal state that lets rich people do what they will. Sounds like Russia, now that I think about it.
My favorite part of the tax code says that if a person who has never been to the US, and who is not a US citizen, resident, etc., and may be in some remote part of the world holds more than $60,000 in "US assets" when they die, they have a taxable estate in the United States. So, if they buy APL, buy IBM, more than $60K, and they have to pay taxes to the United States. Great, just great.....
How ridiculous is that-- how is Unca Scam going to collect? Apparently non-domiciled, non-resident aliens should hold any U.S. intangible property indirectly via foreign trusts, foundations, or (in a pinch, shelf) corporations.
My idea was,
instead of TARP, instead of bank bailouts ...
anyone underwater could sell their house to the Federal Govt for the price of the mortgage.
The house would then promptly be bulldozed. (shovel ready projects, man .....!)
too late now ....but it was a good idea ....
Is this kind of like buying an overpriced seat on th U.S.S. Titanic? After she has hit the Debtberg in August 2008?
Shmucky Schumer --
Wall Street Lackey n' Bitch
Let us not forget the Schmuckster took in over $433,700 in political campaign bribes from Bernie Madoff & Freinds...
The Schmuckster:
Campaign Finance Fraud, Inc.
Madoff circumvented campaign finance laws by gving to a variety of Shmucky Schumer PACs, and campaign "committees" designed to hide the fact Madoff and his associates evaded campaign contribution limits to the smiling Schmuckster...
And of course collect campaign bribes...
What a coincidence Shmucky hangs out with a ponzi fraudsters and counted BMIS as a major donor and supporter...
Sen. Chuck Schumer among politicians giving up money from Bernie Madoff
Well, I say, just import all 6billion700million people not already in this country. Open the subprime loan spigot again and let everyone buy a house that wants one and dump the consequences on the taxpayer once again.
Oh that's right we already tried that.
Well, why do we need to offer more incentives, we already allow over 2 million people to immigrate legally to America each year, should we open the spigot to 5 million a year, 10 million a year, how about 20 million a year.
Personlly, I think we should just build great ocean liners, (jobs program), back them up to every third world hell hole and transport them over to America and just get it all over with.
I guess there's more than enough jobs for that type of influx.
Thankfully, I won't be around when America finally transforms into a third world hellhole.
American families and individuals first.
Usually your posts are better quality than this. While we are selling pieces of the land on which houses are built to the foreigners, why not extend to whole cities and then states? there is a lot of land that is not as densely populated in US as rest of the world, we could make more money that way. Also that way the govt can keep on their deficit spending trajectory and US citizens on their lethagy trajectory. The indirect costs of this type of thing are intangible, what about security threats coming through this ownership and quality and prductivity of who are given this visa? how hard would it be for someone to pony up money buy some houses in remote Montana and cause trouble? oh! I forgot, we can beef up the security by employing more govt workers.
Yeah seriously, help out the banks recapitalize after we bailed them out but don't help out Americans...Bruce it's too early to be drinking...hydrate, get some rest then think about that again.
Are you out of your fucking mind? It was bad enough that the American government is available for purchase by the highest bidder....and here you want to put America up for sale to foreigners? Nuts.
Do you put your shit on a radiator to see if you can make cake? Do you then eat it just before you write this crap to support the 1% and fuck the rest of us?
Post your picture Brucie. Your neighbors want to know what you look like and why you have helped starve them all.
Bruce, could you please remove the picture of Schumer? I have already vomited 3 times and I am getting dehydrated.
Sorry BK, but that proposal is highly discriminatory. Why is it that the bankers can receive essentially unlimited amounts of money (100's of billions) at interest rates of 0-1% while the homeowner who is underwater in their mortgage and facing foreclosure can't even refinance? This foreclosure mess could have been mostly avoided if people were given the same creative opportunities afforded the banks.
1. Vancouver's bubble is FINISHED.
2. Hello L.A.
3. Chinese road signs in California
"Hello. Hello. Mr Smith? Where is my money?? You late with rent again!! I kick you out! You Americans bad tenants! BAD TENANTS!!"
This legislation, this idea, is pathetically whorish...Better idea, instead of further balkanizing an already amorphously tribal "unum", how bout removing all the bullshit ponzi supports and let the housing market find its true bottom...some of us have been renting for years, waiting for the free market to reassert itself...
Arent foreigners already buying real estate in the US? They certainly do in Florida & Arizona.
No thanks. This will just be another scam for more mass immigration.
More and more last ditch effort schemes will be presented to strip mine any remaining wealth left on Main Street, just like what unfolded in the last days of Weimar Germany. In no time Main Street embraces AmeriKKKan incarnation of Adolf Hitler in droves. Will greater holocaust take place in this land? Just curious. I know Shanghai is building an international money-laundry center while Singapore's already got one functional.
http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6170/6235777560_b5be8bb186_b.jpg
As a tie-in from an earlier thread, even if this gets pushed through, you still end up with millions of deficient chain-of-title mortgages, usually in the lower to middle class spectrum (in parts of Massachusetts, $500k homes is middle class).
So even if we have an influx of "visas-for-homes", we still have a problem, my State made certain of that, twice.
Spot on! This is just accelerating the sell off of America so we can keep partying a little bit longer. Yeah, let's prop up housing so our own children keep paying more, or can't even afford a house. OH ya, but it will bail out the bankers?????????????????
Bruce - what are you thinking? This has to be one of the most stupid ideas put on the table.
A better idea would be to have Schumer - Khadafied. Schumer is a corrupt POS and Bruce is sounding is obviously a big lib. The only people who would want to emigrate to Obamaville would be third worlders who would bring more third world ideals to Amerika.
You don't suppose drug-laundering cartels would take advantage of this deal?
Naaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah.
They are already in the USA!
Stop any person under 30 driving a car worth more than $100K. It will be a drug dealer or a wall streeter....maybe they are the same thing?
Every one of us faces a client ...
Or a college athlete.
First of all anyone who has enought wealth to invest 250K cash to buy property and take up residency in the US with an EB-5 or other visa is A COMPLETE IDIOT. They would make themselves tax slaves to the US for at least 10 years. They would have to declare ALL of their offshore wealth to the IRS and would leave themselves vulnerable to any US death taxes, US income taxes, and any capital gains taxes on the historical value of their property PLUS they would have to pay luxury taxes of 28% on any profit from any gold they might posess anywhere else in the world. Addidionally, any FX that they have that would constantly appreciate against the toilet paper dollar and they would have the good fortune of being able to pay cap gains on that as well. Finally, they could look forward to hiring one of those ultra expensive US international tax attornies to figure out every year how much they owe the IRS and how much they owe the attorney.
Great idea Bruce (not).
Schumer that arrogant prick would obviously love it if wealthy people anywhere fell into his trap and became his tax slaves.
Based on ConfederateH's analysis, exactly how many aliens, (not extraterrestrial in nature) are currently queuing up to take advantage of the following:
• First, the alien must establish a business or invest in an existing business that was created or restructured after November 19,1990
• Second, the alien must have invested $1 million ($500,000 in some cases) in the business
• Third, the business must create full-time employment for at least 10 US workers
I doubt adding in a free visa if you purchase a house is going to sweeten the deal.
And if you are a millionaire and you hear Obama talking about heaping new taxes on the millionaire boys/girls club, then why would you even start to think about coming to this country.
Better off heading to Hong Kong or Singapore.
Agreeing with Chuck Shumer on a proposed policy is a dubious achievement.
Bruce:
My take is a little differnt. I say claw back all mortgage payments made between January 1, 2005 through December 31, 2010. Reapply all of those payments directly to the PRINCIPAL portion of the mortgage. Re-issue new mortgages effective January 1, 2011. Do this and you put a floor in housing (although artificial), you give people skin in the game and reduce the liklihood of people playing jingle mail or doing a strategic default. You also immediately reduce the debt load of mor than 50% of Americans, giving them that incentive to spend that Ben Bernanke through his infinite wisdom has failed to create. Yes, I know and understand about all those MBS investors getting fucked in the back end....big deal. i don't care. If we actually forced the banks to carry this debt correctly and utilize mark-to-market they would all blow up anyway.
Do this and do it now.
As for this plan....Schumer is merely selling America to the highest bidder. I consider this treasonist. I fully understand what the punishment is for treason, and believe it should be carried out accordingly.
This really isn't a ploy to buoy housing but rather part of attracting capital and a better driven ambitious citizen.
We need capital, we need smart, ambitious people with capital to come to America.
We should make the process easier to attract the best and brightest to our shores.
We are being diluted and being dragged down to lowest common denominator now with our restrictive immigration.
We do nothing about low quality illegals coming here, illegally. but make it tough for people to come here legally, that have an education, ambition, and capital.
America does have something unique to "sell". We should charge higher and higher prices and have higher quality standards, but make the process easier for those that qualify.
As the rest of the world burns, American way will look better and better. Even though we are trying our best to destroy it, relative to the rest of the world, it is still the best, safest game in town.
Open borders or welfare state; pick one, you CANNOT have both!
We're the best country since we've got the best whores in the world inside the Beltway. But, the problem is that most of us can't afford them.