Quote:
Originally Posted by Heel n Toe
Jim, do you know what percentage of those are because of unemployment and what percentage are because the bubble burst and people were upside down and decided to walk away?
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No telling.
When I was at one house a City Utility worker pulled up to turn on the water. She told me the city cut 60 jobs in the utility dept. alone. As I mentioned we have 3 entire schools shutting down due to budget problems. Again, as mentioned this cities industry was building houses, that has all but come to a screeching halt.
Layoffs are everywhere, I used to be a 15 employee company, now a 2 person outfit. I am loosing competitors left and right. 2 local ones decided to check out on their own, another died of cancer, 3 other outfits closed down and many will follow. I am honestly not sure if I will make it. I have enough money in reserve personally to live for 2-3 years with no income. I still have 1 employee but he is expensive, I put him on notice today to be prepared for the worst.
Tons of retail and major food chain outfits are shut down. Every shopping center has vacancy and there are many instances where the entire commercial building is empty.
One client built a 3 story commercial building and could not rent a single unit in it. He was in my office last week sobbing about the loss he has taken on it, he built the building for 4.5 Mil and it just went in a short sale for 2 Mil.
Right now we are grabbing all we can work and money wise and being frugal. I have changed a lot of my personal lifestyle habits in order to keep expenses down. All we can do is keep a positive attitude, its encouraging how many houses are selling here, I mean we are actually busy busy busy for a 2 man outfit, doing 7 jobs in one day is humping it hard and I am beat. I also have to take work home tonight to finish drawing up. But I am glad to be busy.
I can go on and on, I am curious what its like elsewhere in the country.