The big lenders raised interest rates this week, with the 5 year fixed rising by 0.35% to 5.69%. Noted here for the chronological record.
“Mortgage lenders and realtors I know are really busy because rates are rising. Buyers are trying to beat the higher rates and are scambling to spend their preapproved and locked in mortgage money.” – SethM at RE Talks, 5 Apr 2011 7:03pm (with Global TV news video)
This is pretty much what did it in the US. The Fed started raising rates .25% at a time coming out of the post-dotcom recession, and finally with housing overheating the economy they were raising rates by 0.5% at a time. It took awhile, but the escalating rates finally found a tipping point.
dude,
it’s a completely different situation – didn’t you read the main page from the GVREB this week?
“Vancouver, BC – Activity in the Greater Vancouver housing market continued to strengthen in March with both the number of homes sold and added to the region’s Multiple Listing Service® (MLS®) reaching near record levels.”
get with the program, man
Google translate makes your name to be “Harmony Real Estate Bubble”. Which I rather like.
i’m a pro
i actually speak <1000 words of conversational mandarin, i am forgetting more and more of it every day – since at the time of my education 90% of Chinese in Van were cantonese – only now are we getting the Mandarins, so I suppose I could take it up again – though I have no intention of traveling to the Mainland.
i believe the reason for the skewing is that the southern cantonese areas of china were so heavily involved in trade that at the time of the civil war/communist takeover and subsequent purging of the merchant/shipping capitalist classes they ran like no tomorrow.
every time a Mainlander asks where i learned and why my accent is strange i have to just say "Shanghai – but my teacher was Korean."
the kool-aid is spiked with nationalism over there – look out.
funny joke from my dad "this is what they call full employment over there" – all well and good to make jokes when you're 75 years old, lol.
i for one, welcome our overlords.
You know this word then, 抢 qiǎng. meaning to fight over; to rush; to scramble; to grab; to rob; to snatch.
Common usages as in: qiǎng salt, qiǎng houses, qiǎng condos, qiǎng anything before others get them before you.
A Vancouver lawyer chided his community and here is an extract that can be easily mistranslated:
“First, are you willing to rob, would you not try to steal?
Second, even if you are willing to rob, do you know how to?
In Chinese “rob ” has a lot of meanings that is not in the English word.
Not to say that Westerners do not try to snatch profit, food, business, and grab purchases; it is just that they do not associate these activities with rushing or robbing.
This rush is often legitimate, and sometimes one carries the money to grab the merchandise.
第一、你愿不愿意去抢、肯不肯去抢？
第二、你就算肯去抢，你懂不懂得抢？
中文“抢”字很多意思，是英文没有的。
不是说西方人不会去抢，只是英文没抢钱、抢食、抢生意、抢购这种“抢”的意思。这种抢往往是合法的，有时是拿着钱去抢。
para 7
http://www.gcpnews.com/articles/2011-04-05/C1063_64120.html
well
not to wade too deep into the xenophobia (though i am an excellent swimmer)
some of these ‘cultural traits’ are the result of centuries upon centuries of learning to adapt to horrifying misery at the hands of an innumerable legion of corrupt emperors, bureaucrats, mandarins, eunuchs, mongols, warlords, and of course, whitey.
i love trolling the Wu Mao Dang online, and i hope they find us here so we can wage a holy LuLzz-war on their feeble brains.
“The Chinese word for America is 美國, pronounced meiguo, a transliteration which means literally “beautiful country”. This would seem to be overtly flattering; however, the first character 美 (mei), though it does mean beautiful, is a vertical combination of the characters 大 (da) and 羊 (yang), meaning, respectively, “large” and “sheep”.
The contrast between the conspicuous “beautiful” and the subtler “big sheep” contains a hidden truth and tells you everything you need to know about China’s public versus private opinions of America and Americans. Rightly so.”
off topic much? lol
i’m sure the “giant glass parking lot” contingency plans that Kennedy ordered are still kicking around, though.
You have a long way to go.
United States of America is 亚美利坚合众国 in full.
In short, it becomes 美国 (2nd & last words).
lol i have never, EVER heard the states referred to as anything other than meiguo in chinese, and i studied traditional mandarin, not simplified commie-speak. how many strokes is that extended form? 150+? no thanks.
sorry.
the text is not mine, i ctrl-v’d it from Encyclopedia Dramatica, one of the greatest temples of satire on the web – i thought you’d laugh.
Canada 加拿大 is shortened to 加国.
Germany 德意志 to 德国.
England 英格兰 to 英国.
Exceptions are Japan 日本, Denmark 丹麦 … etc.
I had a good laugh at the concocted meaning of ‘meiguo’
Try these sites. Good luck.
http://www.onlineuniversities.com/blog/2010/02/100-free-tools-resources-to-teach-yourself-chinese/
lol
you seem to misunderstand
i have no need to learn any more chinese – i know enough to mock them from behind a .50cal in the foxhole when they come over the bering strait.
and i’m not denying that these are shortened phrases, you sir, are winrar!