More Bad News for the Chicago area...

[damba]

Originally Posted by Taco1234

Based on recent trends, Geoffrey Hewings predicts it will take 1.2 to 2 more years for Chicago-area homes to reach their peak 2006 values again.

That info is actually surprising and not so horrible in the scheme of things. AFAIK, price recovery can positively impact adjacent suburbs, etc.

Are you still hanging around these parts?

[OyCrumbler]

Originally Posted by Taco1234

Absolutely! The warning signs are plentiful and a few silver linings here or there won't take away from the bigger picture and massive debt.

Illinois companies eyeing an exit - Chicago Tribune

Sluggish home sales, bad economy, etc

https://www.google.com/amp/www.chica...story,amp.html

"Further, the Chicago area is one of the nation's worst for homeowners in serious financial pain. About 12.2 percent of homeowners are underwater on their mortgages, meaning they owe more on the mortgage than the house is worth, according to CoreLogic. Among the nation's largest cities, Chicago is less troubled than only Miami and Las Vegas, which were hotbeds of investor speculation in the housing mania that preceded the crash.
The cure is rising prices, but the Chicago area's prices are moving so slowly the wait is long. People are holding on to their homes, waiting for a better day to sell if they have the luxury of waiting, according to real estate agents. If they must move for a job or sell due to an issue like a divorce, they must swallow hard and take what the depressed market will give them.
Based on recent trends, Geoffrey Hewings predicts it will take 1.2 to 2 more years for Chicago-area homes to reach their peak 2006 values again. As the director of the Regional Economics Applications Laboratory at the University of Illinois, he analyzes the area's home sales and prices each month.
The problem, he and other analysts say, is the sluggish local economy."

Did you actually look at that first Tribune article (not even really an article, but a slideshow)?

Anything about that link seem just a tad bit odd to you?

Or was this a kind of scattershot to try to best fit a narrative you had in mind and as long as you saw a good headline you reckoned it made sense to post?

[dtcbnd03]

Originally Posted by OyCrumbler

What about the warning signs of lower unemployment, increasing construction, and incoming corporate headquarters? Are those also deeply worrying to you?

Those counterarguments are only specific to Chicago and not Illinois. So Chicago is stealing corporate headquarters frommmmm Illinois? McDonald's, Caterpillar, Motorola, Kraft Heinz, Hillshire, ConAgra. It's like robbing Peter to pay Paul. Only out of state ones I can think of off the top of my head is Google opening up the big office in the West Loop and Hickory Farms moving from Ohio to Chicago.

I think we all will agree with you. Chicago is booming and will always be a top city. But this issue is statewide and everywhere else in downstate Illinois is struggling big time. So while people move out of the rest of Illinois...it will inevitably drag down Chicago.

[OyCrumbler]

Originally Posted by dtcbnd03

Those counterarguments are only specific to Chicago and not Illinois. So Chicago is stealing corporate headquarters frommmmm Illinois? McDonald's, Caterpillar, Motorola, Kraft Heinz, Hillshire, ConAgra. It's like robbing Peter to pay Paul. Only out of state ones I can think of off the top of my head is Google opening up the big office in the West Loop and Hickory Farms moving from Ohio to Chicago.

I think we all will agree with you. Chicago is booming and will always be a top city. But this issue is statewide and everywhere else in downstate Illinois is struggling big time. So while people move out of the rest of Illinois...it will inevitably drag down Chicago.

General Electric Healthcare moved from London to Chicago. ConAgra moved from Omaha (Nebraska, not Omaha, Illinois if that exists). Oscar Meyer moved from Wisconsin. EXP moved from Toronto. There are probably a bevy of smaller ones I haven't listed.

I get what you're saying with robbing Peter to pay Paul in regards to taking from other parts of Illinois. Certainly it's better for Chicago as well if Illinois as a whole is prosperous instead of just having a couple of bright spots, but it's not true that Chicago has poached solely from Illinois and not from further out as well.

The good thing about some of this is that many of the moves, whether from within Illinois or not, are consolidating some of Chicago's key industries in one place and the hope is that doing so actually allows these companies to grow better and react faster to global and national markets. One criticism I've heard is that Chicago is a jack-of-all-trades and master of none, but it definitely seems like food and agriculture commodities industries have steadily been coalescing around Chicago. The healthcare industry and the architecture/design/engineering industry which have both played large roles in Chicago's economy also seem to be being bolstered. On top of that, robust year on year growth of venture capital investment in Chicagoland's tech scene has created at least a half dozen "unicorns" (companies valued at a billion or more) within the last few years and many more multi-million dollar companies while several large tech companies from elsewhere have greatly grown their footprint within Chicago.

These are some good points for Chicago and indirectly for Illinois. Does this mean everything's roses? No, but it's also not as extremely and almost wholly negative as some people seem to believe it is.

[OyCrumbler]

It does exist! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omaha,_Illinois

[DavePa]

Originally Posted by chet everett

Folks that shove their heads deep into the sand ignore the reality that there have been four decades of cities and states adjusting to a world where pension returns are no longer detached from actuarial scrutiny; Illinois and Chicago are unique in their disregard for these things.

The situation in NYC was in most ways a "test case" for how other states and cities could say to their unionized government workers AND bond holders: "things are going to change, either cooperate or suffer the consequences". States around the country have adopted plans like 403b so that there are no longer the "funds to be raided/ lent" as was the case for NYC Teachers' Pension funds. The various political dramas that played in Wisconsin or California when states have overhauled their strategic pensions / work rules are so far beyond overdue as to be mind-boggling to anyone not utterly snowed by the unique dictorial power of Madigan and the Chicago Dems...

One need only look to Detroit to see how little involvement the Federal or state government in that storied bankruptcy. Given the very partisan nature of how things are going down it is foolish to suggest anything would be less harsh in making an example of how "crime does not pay"...

The difference is like my Fathers example. Preached depression was at hand all my life. I'm getting closer to retirement and my Father has passed. His legacy of doom and gloom helped nobody. In fact NO child should be taught negativity as if a religion against something.

I applaud Chicago keeping the doomsayers preaching doom into their retirements. Yet reap a benefit of that very system?

No one keeps their head in the sand. But as you see soooo many other states (including my own and neighboring one NJ) catching up fast in issues and debt. Even sunbelt cities like Dallas seeking the state to spare it from bankruptcy. Apparently they did? Even Houston approaching 30-billion in REAL DEBT. You realize Chicago is far from alone.

Also politically. Chicago was always cast with the label of politically corruption allll the way back. Heck Windy city was a reference in boisterous and loud. But also pulled strings to steal a Worlds Fair it successfully pulled off.

Then NYC eventually sent Chicago Al Capone lol. Da rest is history - Fa'get'about'it. I always say, one thing Big business and corruptible politicians have in common is? Da ability to make deals under da table even.... lol

The political wrangling in my state over a budget that last year lasted through state workers and other funded aspects not getting paid occurred. This includes pension debt. School aid was robbed for pensions even. This year no budget, a huge Pittsburgh prison closed, looking into stopping funding of State Colleges even. The list goes on too..

Don't get Philadelphians on their city government and Harrisburg. Another lol.