HOUSING, THE ECONOMY, AND THE LOTTERY

Sales up! Sales down! Short sales. Foreclosures at record levels. Bail outs. Buy outs. What does it all mean?

V.W. Resident knows the economy is bad, bad, bad. He read recently a couple of articles regarding housing. One stated Lee County, to the North of us, is ranked number three in the country for foreclosures. South West Florida, in general, is doing poorly. That is not good news at all.

In another article it was suggested that sales are up in Naples, but the homes that were selling were high end. That is not us, so this news is not the greatest for our home values here in "The Walk." On another page it stated Mr. Pulte was forced to sell over 700,000 shares of his stock on a margin call.

A third story also suggested sales were up in the home market across the board as foreigners were scooping up bargains. I guess that is good for them. It might be good for us as they can't homestead, as they are our only tourists not residents.

I don't know what to make of all this. Will I be worse off in a few months? Maybe I'll just become a foreigner after the Country is purchased by Japan, Germany, or China. Who Knows, but it just might be a good idea to buy some foreign language books and start learning another language. A lottery ticket might even be better.