All Forum Posts by: Ray R.

A good maps / data on Corona Virus. I find the John Hopkins, so you can see where in the US is being affected:
https://www.arcgis.com/apps/op...

Just numbers from BNO News:
https://bnonews.com/index.php/...

@Hunter Fitch

Have your insurance company look at the steps. We had to add a handrail to a property we bought due to feedback from the insurance company, for stairs that had none. 

And advice on the thread of document every communication. If you can afford it, have every communication go through your lawyer. 

Find out what the laws are in your area for stairs, along with the relevant codes.

And find out what your tenant wants, if it's a cheap repair, just do it.

And when their lease expires, give notice if it makes sense financially. You don't need a headache client, life is too short.

Lawsuits are so expensive...

@Greg M. - You are right, the March Prop 13 was just school bonds, I got it mixed up with a November Ballot initiative the seeks to repeal for Commercial Properties, that definitely include multi family housing, Prop 13.

https://ballotpedia.org/California_Tax_on_Commercial_and_Industrial_Properties_for_Education_and_Local_Government_Funding_Initiative_(2020)

Interesting how much money Michael Weinstein has been able to pump into Rent Control Measures, due to his foundation, that makes money by selling medicine for Aids. And the first Rent Control lost, so then the CA State Legislature, with support indirectly from a foundation tied to FB, passed Rent Control.

Agree with you, this first rent control measure is just the camels nose under the tent, more will follow. It's amazing the negative effects rent control has had on the housing stock in areas it's in effect.

The statewide rent control measure, AB1482, does allow you to increase the rent, if you do major renovation. Basically, you need to budget in for a month of loss of rent. But, if there is already rent control that is stricter for a city, then you need to go by those rules. The bill expires in 10 years. And new housing is

You are allowed to raise  the rent by 5% plus rate of inflation (CPI, but there are questions on which one). But 10% max.  We used 7.5%. 8.3% should be OK.

And there is an effort to repeal the Prop 13 restrictions on raising property taxes for Commercial Properties. The one in the recent election failed.

And the person who funded the last rent control initiative I believe is going to be back in November with another one.

@Karen Margrave - The CoronaVirus Test will be free and covered under all private medical insurance in the US, and medicare and medicaid.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news.... 

VP Pence announced the everyone gets tested who thinks he has COVID-19
yesterday (3-4-2020) simultaneous with the deployment of 1.5 million
test kits nation wide. There are reports this level is not being
reached, but huge numbers of tests appear to have reached the field from
the numbers of new cases being reported today.
https://chicagoboyz.net/archiv...

The problem in the US, was nobody (past tense) was allowed to do CoronaVirus Testing, but the CDC. Seems there was a SNAFU involving an FDA Rule and CDC, and lots of finger pointing. The got fixed (FDA emergency authorization), and now private labs can do testing for CoronaVirus. During the first 2 months the amount of tests done in the US was in the hundreds, while other countries were in the tens of thousands. The initial tests in the US had a flaw.

Global Impact due to Corona Virus

Disneyland Tokyo, Japan will close for 2 weeks, through March 15.

The HAJJ has been canceled this year by Saudi Arabia. This is HUGE. Each Moslem is supposed to visit Mecca as a religious obligation once in their lifetime, if they can physically and financially.

US and Australia stopped travel to China for non citizens.

The Lourve is closed Sunday due to CoronaVirus fears.

France banned all indoor gatherings of more than 5,000 people.

The above is going to hammer airlines, and tourism.

CoronaVirus Vs. Other Viruses

Disclaimer - My background is not Medical or Biology, but my Engineering background makes me pretty good at research.

Ebola - We got lucky. It kills the host so fast, it reduced it's spread. One case shut down an entire hospital in Dallas, and the US only has 11 beds to handle that type of virus. A vaccine has finally been developed, as well as changing customs in the affected areas. The lack of travel from those areas to the US helped. More than 13,000 dead, but none that caught it in the US died. Death rate now is around 50%, but one outbreak was at a 90% death rate. R0(2)

SARS- 774 deaths worldwide, 3 month delay until the Chinese government notified WHO of the outbreak, and no deaths in the US. The key was it seems to only contagious, one the person gets sick. So if you quarantine the person, that stops the spread. So lots of testing for fever via digital thermometers. Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Singapore learned a lot from this experience. I had won a free trip to HK, but did not go due to this. The one time I ever won anything meaningful in my life. R0(4).

MERS - Comes from Camels, and is very hard to spread from person to person. 40% death rate. 900 or so deaths. Interesting, South Korea had the largest amounts of cases after Saudi Arabia. Now, South Korea has the largest amount of CoronaVirus cases, 4212, after China's supposedly 80,026.

Bird Flu (H5N1, 2006) - 359 dead. The usual prevention method is kill all the poultry in area.  H7N9 2013. 43 dead. A vaccine has been produced that is used to vaccine poultry.

Swine Flu 2009 - A vaccine was produced.  18,449 dead. From what I read, next years vaccine was used early. The current production of Vaccines for Flu uses Eggs, and it's a long production cycle.
R0(1.4-1.6)

1918 Influenza - 40-100 Million dead world wide. R0(1.4-2.8).

CoronaVirus (COVID-19) - At least 3,000 dead so far. The problem is China is lying, so the numbers may be off by a factor of 10. Outside China, death rate seems to be 2%. 2 deaths in the US so far. Iran is getting hit hard, with several senior leaders becoming infected. Seems to be highly contagious, and people can spread it that don't have a fever. R0(2-4).

Notes: R0 is number of people a sick person will infect.

@J Scott - Good write up, and pretty much tracks my thinking on the Economics. ZeroHedge has been saying similar things.

The problem with companies that source from China, is there is no extra capacity around Asia available right now. It all got swallowed up after the first round of tariffs. Some low margin consumer electronics are just not economical at this time to source from other countries, China had the magic formula of cost and quality - per a warehouse tenant of mine.

It's amazing how many items are made just in China. Batteries and Pharmaceuticals are great examples.

Looking at the flow of shipping containers, it's going to be a while until China will be able to get back into the bulk export business, even if they magically get their workers back to work.

Right now due to mistrust of the press in China, workers are afraid of dying, and are not going back to work. The Chinese government has lied so much, and are continuing to do so on the Coronavirus, I don't know how they will convince workers to report back to work. Especially if their are more flareups of CoronaVirus in worker dorms.

An unknown is if Sun Light, with the change in season, will have a huge impact on reducing the spread of CoronaVirus. I hope so. Right now Tropical Countries don't seem to be getting hit, but that may be due to lack of test kits. Damage to Lungs due to pollution and smoking may make people more susceptible to the Corona Virus.

A positive, is the US is pretty self sufficient in what we import / export, especially with the growth in fracking, about 80%. Europe is going to be hit hard by China's slowdown.

I expect a huge increase in manufacturing in the US as an aftermath of the CoronaVirus.

I expect there will be tremendous advances in Vaccine development and manufacturing in the next 24 months, which will reduce the impact of future viruses. I also expect the processes inside bio testing labs to be improved tremendously, to reduce accidental releases. Bio Engineering is getting cheaper and cheaper, which causes more headaches.

Numbers out of China are highly suspect on infected and deaths. China is downplaying the effect, while at the same time taking draconian action on the ground. Economic hit due to China basically shutting is huge for world trade.

HK and Taiwan due to the SARS Virus seems to be handling the CoronaVirus well.

CDC has only done 500 tests in the entire US so far. HA as of a week ago had zero test kits. CA has 200.  South Korea is up to 2337 infected, and Italy 888. Iran seems to be getting hit hard, where you have some senior level politicians now in quarantine.

So far areas with lots of sunshine don't seem to be getting hit. Hopefully the changing of the seasons, with more sunshine, will help. As well as the end of the flu season.

20 Vaccines are in development, and an Israeli one may be ready in 90 days.

2nd Case just diagnosed in Northern California, with no known connection to overseas travel.

@Santos Ricardo Tellez

I still hope the US has a low risk. My hope is the changing of the season with lots of sunshine will help. Right now high sunshine areas don't seem to be getting CoronaVirus. And with the end of Flu Season, it may also retard the spread.

There seems to be 20 Vaccines being worked on, with an Israeli one being ready within 90 days supposedly, with the worst case being 2 years.

Economic Impact we are starting to see. Time to stock up on anything made in China, your business will need for the next 6-12 months, such as batteries.

The case seems to be near Travis Airforce Base. Seems to be a very SNAFU situation. CA currently only has 200 test kits, and the Federal Guidelines on testing, was only test those that came from a CoronaVirus Area. And since CoronaVirus may have an incubation rate of 14 days, that does not make sense. The Hospital was asking for a CoronaVirus Test earlier, but the CDC in the US has only done 500 test to date, takes 1-3 days to process (since it has to be flown back to CDC Atlanta) and would not do one initially since the patient did not meet the guidelines as prime infectee. And the current test has a high negative rate. S. Korea can do 10,000 a day with a 6 hour turn around. HA per a WSJ article had zero test kits a week ago.

And then there was the FUBAR in Costa Mesa, where they wanted to take an old mental hospital, and make it a place for quarantine. A place that CA had said was in such poor shape, it could not be used for homeless.

The canceling of the Hajj by Saudi Arabia is huge.

Iran I am surprised at the amount of cases. South Korea seems to have been a unique circumstance (cult with very close worship), which hopefully will get under control now.

References:

COVID-19/SARS-CoV2 Update 2-23-2020 — When the “New Versailles Class” Meets Reality Without Privilege
https://chicagoboyz.net/archiv...

HA has Zero Test Kits:
https://www.wsj.com/articles/w...

per Gavin Newsom, CA only has 200 test kits.
https://calmatters.org/health/...
FDA has some involvement in this, by not allowing other tests. So private labs have not been allowed in the US to do CoronaVirus Testing.

Top health official denies low number of confirmed coronavirus cases in US caused by faulty tests
https://www.washingtonexaminer...

Israeli Vaccine Information:

https://nypost.com/2020/02/28/...