Even More News Stories For You

It is all because of the weather these days. Summertime has started so early and the temperatures are in the 90's mark. I know there was a prediction that we would have a hotter summer than normal but seriously, isn't this ridiculous.

I do like going out for several walks every day but in these days I'm lucky if I can go out early in the morning before it gets too warm. Even in the morning, by about 10:30 AM or so, the sun comes out and it starts getting almost unpleasant outside thereby making  it too difficult to stroll.  I must admit that this is not very positive is it.

Normally, I don't even like air-conditioning to be honest. It just makes me too cool and I need a lot of water to drink as well. However, in this kind of weather, what other choice do I have but to put it on.

Oh, well.  At least it gives me the opportunity to write more stories about what is going on in our area. It is better than going outside now. Here are a few of them now.

BUYING AND SELLING A HOUSE

Here's a recent point of view about buying and selling a home in our area. If true, I wonder how long it will last and how prices will change, presumably increasing significantly:

"Windsor housing boom pressuring buyers

Competition and failed bids force many to drop conditions on sales

By Alex Brockman, CBC News Jun 16, 2016

 

A home is listed for sale, realtors in Windsor, Ont. say homes are getting multiple bids, forcing potential buyers to forgo conditions like a home inspection. (Mark Blinch/Reuters)

Windsor's hot housing market is pressuring buyers, forcing many to take drastic measures to compete in the race to buy a home, according to area realtors.

Home sales in the first half of this year have outpaced figures for the same time period last year, the Windsor-Essex County Association of Realtors reports. In May, sales jumped 18 per cent and prices spiked 13 per cent compared to May 2015.

With homes getting as many as eight to 10 offers, area realtor Paul Renaud said potential homebuyers don't have as much leverage when trying to make a deal. It's forcing potential buyers to drop conditions or offer more than the asking price."

WILL OUR HOUSE PRICES REALLY CONTINUE TO GO UP

They seem to be going up in Windsor as well as in Vancouver and Toronto but not in too many other places from what I have read.

Again, it is interesting to read an article written with comments by some Bankers about what is going to happen in the future. Take a look at this:

"A statement from the Bank of Canada even warned that folks who want to buy homes in Vancouver and/or Toronto should probably recognise that prices are unlikely to further increase dramatically, given economic fundamentals.

"Prospective homebuyers and their lenders should not extrapolate recent real estate performance into the future when contemplating a transaction," BoC governor Stephen Poloz said in the statement...

"This is a bubble. A very big bubble. And it is going to end in tears," wrote Capital Economics' chief North America economist Paul Ashworth...

TD Bank expressed similar concerns, warning that these housing markets are "ripe for a correction" and that "the party will come to an end," according to CBC News."  (Elena Holodny, Business Insider, June 18, 2016)

Sometimes I just feel cynical about comments like these. Haven't we heard them for a very long time and yet the prices still seemed to go up.  If there are so many consumer financial problems, then why haven't the Federal Government and those in the Provinces acted to try to keep prices down. After all, I can remember that happening when I lived in Toronto many years ago and prices were skyrocketing upwards until there was Government housing action and prices dropped considerably.

I remember reading some articles saying that prices in a good part of Canada are now declining except in the high-priced regions. If so, perhaps the Governments actions are working this time without imposing difficult legislation that would kill the marketplace for a period of time.

WINDSOR'S NEW CITY HALL

I see that the new one in Windsor is just starting to be built. However, I keep scratching my head wondering why it really is necessary to have a new one at all compared with fixing up the old one.  Oh I understand the reason given: the cost to fix up the old one is almost the cost of building the new one.  Whether that is true or not doesn't really matter now since construction is starting.

The headline in the Windsor Star story by Dave Battagello on June 20, 2016 makes the comment that the project itself cost $44 million while the building itself only cost $32 million with the expectation that it should be finished by May, 2018. 

In case you are wondering what the difference is for, I assume it is for these costs:

"The final stage and remaining costs of the project include the decommissioning and demolition of the existing city hall. That will begin some time around the end of 2018 and take about a year to complete."

There was this line in it about the new building:

"It will be 120,000 square feet — almost double the existing structure."

I assume that what it must mean is that many civil servants who are in offices all around the City will be moved to the new City Hall. In other words, everything should be centralized or why is the City building such a large structure. It surely cannot mean that so many more civil servants are going to be hired to fill up that space.

Let's see what happens and what the costs are.

NOISE POLLUTION

It appears that people in the West End of Windsor still suffer at night when they try to sleep because of very bad noise pollution that happens every so often that arises in Detroit. It is the famous "HUM" that has been around for some time and has not yet been dealt with in a significant manner as far as I know.

One of the problems obviously is that no one seems to know what the source of that noise pollution is from although some people have made a reasonable guess about its source on the other side of the River. Or, if they do know, they don't want to put it on the record officially:

"Windsor Hum discussion goes to Washington

A member of Parliament is in Washington to discuss the mysterious hum that plagues residents of Windsor, Ont...

The source of the Windsor Hum, which sounds like an idling train engine or diesel transport truck, has been traced to Zug Island in River Rouge, Mich., directly across from west Windsor, according to a federally funded report released in 2014.

Zug Island is home to several industrial sites, including a U.S. Steel foundry. The Canadian federal report stopped short of identifying the precise source of the noise, only that it comes from the island." (CBC News, Jun 21, 2016)

I expect that not very much is going to happen since the MP involved, Brian Masse, NDP MP for Windsor West, is hardly in a position to put a lot of pressure on the Americans considering that he is a Minority Party Member of Parliament.

To be blunt about it, if there is little impact on the Americans, why would they do anything to make big American companies upset.