As Vegas Goes So Goes America
 

Las Vegas is one of the symbolic icons of American prosperity and wealth. the others being Detroit, New York City, Washington DC and Hollywood among others. Detroit as the heart and symbol of American industrial power succumbed long ago, now NYC and Vegas are falling as well.

Sands corporation which includes Sands Expo, The Venetian and Palazzo is owned by Sheldon Adelson has been put up for sale for 6B. Revenues have been falling and expenses are high in Vegas so Adelson has decided to sell his American assets and instead rely on his more profitable Macao and Singapore operations.

Wynns Encore resort is closed Monday thru Thursday as there is not enough business to justify keeping it open.

The local Station Casinos has shuttered it's 2 Fiesta, Texas Station and Palms locations

The RIO remains closed and maybe re purposed..then we may see other more marginal properties close down as well

With the Adelson move out of Las Vegas the speculation is that other operations will be sold off as well. Perhaps at bargain pricing? The Convention biz is non existent, and since reopening the crowds that Vegas has been attracting with lower pricing has been less savory. Crime is up dramatically with shootings and fights occurring with regularity on the Strip. Metro police have beefed up their presence to maintain some semblance of civility.

So far residential RE has held up because of the influx of people relocating from other areas.... but the fact remains that 35% of renters are not paying their rent.

With the restrictions on travel and inside buildings...I'm not surprised at all.

The question is...Who would take a chance in todays world to buy one of these huge ventures??.....with no end in sight.

Our Operations person, who lives in Las Vegas, tells a completely different story.

i wonder if Lake Meads drawdown is less than usually with the diminished demand.

the industry is the casinos..i cant see how its not taking a beatdown the full social spectrum.

You mean it actually worse than I represented it!!!

I know 1M homes at the Lakes are down to 270K. But in my area they are at post Great Recession highs and have been selling quickly..as inventory is low and interest rates correspond.

We’ve been to Vegas at least yearly for at least five years in a row. I’d love to go back but not wearing a mask and social distancing everywhere. You reap what you sow...

I have no idea Tabs. We chat every morning before our 0900 GTM when management and engineers vent their spleens and we adjust tasking....then throughout the day as she gently reminds us to stay on schedule.

She is my age, Filipina, worked for me when we were in the government together. We hired her when she retired and we didn't care where she wanted to live...she is a complete wonder of organizational skills and kindness wrapped in iron.

Her extended family works in the Casinos in Vegas in different roles. She simply has a different take on how the Casinos are doing from her families perspective. Hotel rooms are basically free and the casinos are busy.

Your perspective is, of course, different.

As an adult I have been to Vegas one time, only because it was on the way from Sacramento, CA to home. We stayed in a old hotel in the old downtown area away from the strip. I gambled a entire quarter on the slot machine in the lobby of the hotel. Lost it all, and reminded myself why I don't gamble.

We ate at a local Burger King for dinner, and got the heck outta there early the next morning. I have never been to the strip. I don't miss it.

If Vegas is waiting on me, they are screwed. We have the worlds largest casino right here in Oklahoma. 600,000 square feet and I have never been and never will go. There is a full blown horse racing track and casino about 7 or 8 miles from my house. In 30 years I have been twice. Lost 20 bucks both times.

https://www.casino.org/blog/10-of-the-worlds-largest-casinos-the-biggest-casinos-ever/

casinos are for people who don't understand statistics

Only been to Vegas 3 or 4 times but what i saw was a hanging by a thread, all its eggs in one basket tourist town surrounded by worker housing. considering gambling would be the very first luxury spending item to go on most folks list of expenses in tough times i feel like Vegas is one heck of a risky play even in good times. not to mention the money/control appears to be in a very few hands with the bulk of the local economy being supported by hourly staff.

that is to say even the slightest of pushes is all it would take to topple Vegas. vegas could be razed to make a homeless shelter and i don't think i'd feel we were close to the end.

I don’t gamble and I love Vegas. So much to do and see, and if nothing else the people watching is incredible.:D

^^^ exactly...you never know what you might see in Vegas.
Worth it just for that.
A couple years ago, was walking down the strip and a limo stopped and J-Lo stepped out and said 'Hi' to me. Made me feel real good!

I know something that you will never, ever see in Vegas....

Me :D

^^^ J-Lo or KC ???
easy decision. :D

I used to go to Vegas often for conferences. Have never gambled in a casino, not my thing. My favorite places to stay were the Venetian and Bellagio.

Isn't LV a cartoon of America?

It's only a matter of time before they rebound. You STRONGLY underestimate the desire for lots of people to gamble.

Tahoe really hasn't opened up fully yet, but more than Vegas, and here are the results so far.
https://www.tahoedailytribune.com/news/stateline-casinos-post-nevadas-biggest-win-for-september/

Or pool players entering major tournaments. Sometimes the same. Many pool players are degenerate gamblers. That's why casinos love to host tournaments.

That said, I witnessed a decline in a local economy...when the greens pretty much did all they could to kill Oregon's timber industry. The plywood plant on one end of town closed, followed by the paper plant on the other end. It wasn't pretty. Many here lost everything. A lot of good people left the area, never to return home.

So, although I've never been there, I feel sad for many in Las Vegas. Especially those finding themselves suddenly out of a job, with mortgages they'll have to walk away from.

Yea, you didn't go to Vegas.
You went to a rest stop.

Vegas has almost nothing to do with casinos.
That's not why people under 40 go there.
They probably don't even realize there are casinos in Vegas.

Which is most people.

---

Vegas is on my bucket list :)

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1604105577.jpg

OK, so what's the draw? And why do people under 40 go there?

There are significant numbers of people who actually enjoy gambling, and consider their losses simply as the price of their entertainment. Winning is nice, but there's more to it than that.

^^^Yep, no desire to see the flashing lights, and crowds of drunk people either. Mardi Gras has no pull for me as well !

I would like to see one of these homes. I just looked on Zillow and it seems there are many homes for sale, but the price drops that I am seeing are along $1000.00 not $700K.

I would certainly entertain picking up a place with a 70%+ discount.

Sex.

And of course labor cost via the Service Employees Union International has absolutely no impact at all in any way, factor, spreadsheet, ROI, P&L, or any other metric vs labor cost outside the reach of the union had no impact on a business owner in a down business year with an uncertain return to normal date. Yeah I would just stay in Vegas too...

I rather enjoyed living in Las Vegas...other than the really hot summers. The rest of the year, it is warm and dry. If you live out in the burbs in the northeast or in Henderson...it is much like any southwestern city, but it is a short drive to Vegas with world-class entertainment and restaurants which are largely funded by tourists (so you can use them cheaply and at a large discount). It is a pretty easy drive to CA, TX or NM. You van get a lot of friends and relatives to visit (if you like that sort of thing)...but can send them to the strip (Or take them) to keep from having to constantly entertain them yourself. If I could talk my wife into it, I would consider retiring there and spending the summers elsewhere.

My dad was a defense lawyer and he was very connected in Vegas back in the '70s and '80s because of his close friendship w Morris Shenker, (Jimmy Hoffa's lawyer who ran the Dunes casino), he also knew "Lucky" Rosenthal, who DeNiro's character in Casino was based on along with many other players. Oscar Goodman, another defense lawyer who became the mayor of LV, was his good friend.

To say that my dad could get a good hotel room comped in Vegas would have been an understatement. He never went, not even once. The only time he used his juice was to get his secretary and her husband tickets to see Elvis at the last minute for his comeback in Vegas. My dad thought it was "a schit hole" and I agree. I would add that the more they build it up and try to make it fancy, the more of a dump it is, to me. There is absolutely no enticement that could make me live there...none.

If it went out of business, it would be like America wiping its ass and flushing the paper. :)

I visited Vegas once and hated it. Spent a couple days downtown. When I lived there, it was far from that area...and, like a lot of small city suburbs in the southwest, a lot like much of CA, just a lot cheaper and a lot cleaner. Just no beach, but less taxes and less restrictive laws.

My daughter worked in a shop in Ballagio and lasted six months.

She detested every single second of it. The tourists treated the help like dogs. The people were filthy, obnoxious and rude. Plus, her boyfriend found out he had a gambling problem and dumped her for a stripper on Industrial Drive or whatever it’s called.

For three days I spent a week there.

It was inspirational. It showed me how advanced humans are with regard to their ability to make other humans give them money.

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1604164939.jpg

While it may sounds like something out of a sci fi novel, suppose we made every sort of vice legal but only in Las Vegas? Gambling, drugs, sexwork, whatever. And then suppose we took a part of Las Vegas, walled it off, and made absolutely anything legal? Like Caligula meets Escape From New York?

It would be entertaining to watch.

I think they tried something like that in Seattle recently. Didn’t work out too well.

I hear there is some good rock climbing south of Vegas

There is a lot of really neat places within an hour drive of Vegas...Red Rock Canyon, Mt. Charleston, etc.

When I was heading Navy and Marine Corps UAS, I spent a lot of time at Creech AFB outside of Vegas in Indian Springs. Loved the area.

North of Vegas, we did UAS testing at Delamar Dry Lake and stayed in Caliente and Alamo. Some of the most intriguing landscape anywhere. Second time we rented ATV and had a hoot with the Park Service folks.

The desert is an acquired taste, one I have.

Agreed, nothing like the desert. Did you make it through the singular wonder that is Death Valley?

I have been there 1 time. Two nights and had a great time. Played blackjack and did ok. We were on the way to Zion and most of the Utah NPs on the way back.

Whenever I see a TV commercial for a casino, all the people are attractive, well-dressed, happy, and look like they're having the time of their lives. Same thing when a movie includes scenes that take place in a casino, or on a set that represents one.

But it's quite a different story when you actually go there. Many people in these places look more like poorly-dressed hayseeds who haven't showered in a week. Half-drunk tourists are wandering up & down the strip in the middle of the day, and sad-looking seniors are pumping their social security checks into the slots as the sun's coming up. Bad behavior abounds, and it's all quite a depressing scene. Maybe the high-rollers who are treated well and play the back rooms and private clubs see Vegas differently, but for the average visitor, it's a far cry from what's seen on TV or in films.

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1604174236.jpg

Yeah....but what about the ayce buffets?
Are they able to stay open?

Many times. I did a lot of work in China Lake in those days and would fly into Vegas and drive to Ridgecrest, California through Death Valley. I made a point to find the smallest roads possible:cool:

Have been a half dozen times over twenty five years. Ran into Jesus C one day riding the Deuce on the strip, interesting to say the least. There are many people in Vegas with mental issues from what I saw. Wandering around fast food restaurants eating condiments and keeping cool looking for a "weak" tourist to jump or fleece. Can't imagine it can get much worse.

Tabs, "Le Buffet" is closed Monday to Thursday at the Wynn, what will you do?