Odd Bond Offering Reflects Housing's Woes
Never bet against the house unless it asks you to.
The housing market is in such bad shape that one home builder is even helping investors bet that its stock will drop.
That's not a misprint - it's exactly what Standard Pacific Corp. added as a sweetener to attract buyers for a $100 million convertible bond offering.
Good grief.
Robert Schiller has noted that the ability to buy a put against your home equity would be very valuable to securing the wealth of the average American. I believe that is one of the impetus for his 20 city housing price options market.
ReplyDeleteIVR that he outlines this in his The New Financial Order: Risk in the 21st Century (Princeton).
It seems somewhat like yet another ponzi scheme to me (although I'd be an early adopter perhaps, lol).
ReplyDeleteThe thought that we can run up home prices to the moon, then use insurance to lock in the gains really makes me scratch my head.
If nothing else, who would want the other side of the bet?