Pickle Real Estate

Reading Between the Head-Lines

Gift Cards for the Holidays? Think Again…

from a friend of mine, via email

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i wanted to give everyone a heads up that if you tend to give gift cards around the holidays, you need to be careful that the cards will not be honored after the holidays.

Stores that are planning to close after Christmas are still selling the cards through the holidays even though the cards will be worthless January 1. There is no law preventing them from doing this. On the contrary, it is referred to as ‘Bankruptcy Planning).

Below is a partial list of stores that you need to be cautious about.

Circuit City (filed Chapter 11)
Ann Taylor 117 stores nationwide closing
Lane Bryant, Fashion Bug ,and Catherine’s to close 150 stores
nationwide
Eddie Bauer to close stores 27 stores and more after January
Cache will close all stores
Talbots closing down specialty stores
J. Jill closing all stores (owned by Talbots) Pacific Sunwear (also owned by Talbots)
GAP closing 85 stores
Footlocker closing 140 stores more to close after January
Wickes Furniture closing down
Levitz closing down remaining stores
Bombay closing remaining stores
Zales closing down 82 stores and 105 after January
Whitehall closing all stores
Piercing Pagoda closing all stores
Disney closing 98 stores and will close more after January.
Home Depot closing 15 stores 1 in NJ ( New Brunswick )
Macys to close 9 stores after January
Linens and Things closing all stores
Movie Galley Closing all stores
Pep Boys Closing 33 stores
Sprint/Nextel closing 133 stores
JC Penney closing a number of stores after January
Ethan Allen closing down 12 stores./>Wilson Leather closing down all stores
Sharper Image closing down all stores
K B Toys closing 356 stores
Lowes to close down some stores
Dillard’s to close some stores

November 20, 2008 Posted by | Stats | Leave a Comment

Why a Gold Standard?

Once a Gold Standard Warrior, has Alan Greenspan lost his youthful wisdom?

Donald Grove
Washington Correspondent
Casey Research, LLC.
The Casey Report

The $800 billion bailout, and billions more being pumped less obviously into the global economy, will cure nothing. Americans are clamoring for a savior. No one is willing to believe that the party is over. In the past, someone always came to our rescue.

Like a parent dispelling a childhood nightmare, FDR soothed the masses with the assurance that they had nothing to fear but fear itself. To this day, he is revered for turning a depression into the Great Depression. In the aftermath of the dot-com bubble, Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan came to the rescue with a brand-new bubble in real estate.

Even if there was someone out there who could pull off one more illusionary rescue, it would only delay the inevitable and worsen the pain. Pain now or more pain later. The compassionate solution is to let Adam Smith’s invisible hand guide us, as should have been happening all along. Almost no public figures have the backbone to speak honestly about what’s wrong. There is no free lunch. Still, voters believe the promise that “I will give you what you want and make someone else pay for it.” Neither Congress nor either presidential candidate can take us back to the fairytale world of mortgaged opulence we blissfully enjoyed in the recent past.

Full Article Here

November 20, 2008 Posted by | Banking, Foreclosure, Lending, Stats | Leave a Comment

   

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