Is Now a Good Time to Buy a Gulf Coast Slip ?

[Therapy]

Originally Posted by s/v Beth

BTW- I have no problems carefully investing the money I have saved. And I am just a regular joe- not a carpetbagger. I find it interesting that current residents think that others buying thier land is somehow wrong. If you feel that way, do not put it up for sale...

That is what I was thinking.

If no one ever took advantage of a "situation" then no one would ever make a profit.

[Jim D]

Underlying all forms of commerce, or trade, is the notion that each party feels they are getting slightly more than they are giving up. If what you give and what you receive are exactly equivalent in your view of value or worth, then there isn't any reason to make the trade.

~

[denverd0n]

Originally Posted by Therapy

If no one ever took advantage of a "situation" then no one would ever make a profit.

More to the point, if no one ever took advantage of a "situation" then people who find themselves in a "situation" would have no way to get out of it! When someone is desperate to sell, the person who buys from them is doing them a favor.

And please, don't anyone here try to pretend that when you buy or sell a used car you don't try to get the most, or pay the least, that you can. If you tell me that you have paid MORE for a used car than the seller would have taken, just because you felt bad for the seller, then I will simply have no choice but to consider you a bald-faced liar. Trying to get a good deal on real estate because some people are foolishly panicking is absolutely no different.

[sww914]

I'm pretty sure that yacht marinas will be about the last places to be cleaned up, after the wildlife refuges, beaches, parks, and other places that warm fuzzy little things live. Probably after the commercial fishing marinas too.
The truth is, saving the little warm fuzzies and the commercial fishermen is probably more important than yachting even though we might not like it.

[Dick Pluta]

One of the most effective ads I ever saw featured an executive at a brokerage house saying something to the effect that "When you buy a stock, you do so in the expectation that it will go up. Unfortunately, you are buying it from someone who is equally convinced that it will go down". If it is somehow immoral to profit from others misfortunes I had better stop looking for a house in SW Florida. I, and thousands of others, have no moral compunctions whatever about buying a house in a depressed area because the former owner is suffering. I didn't cause the suffering. By not buying, I am providing no relief whatsoever to those who are suffering. In fact, by taking it off their hands I am often releiving them of a burden. Finally, while I have great sympathy for those who have truly experienced misfortune, many of the unfortunates are, in fact, speculators who believed the price of "Paradise" would never go down and, instead of buying one house on conservative terms, leveraged five houses and are now stuck with them. Even now, they are back in Florida, doing the same thing. There is even a realty company in the Fort Myers are called "Selling Paradise". If you can find a good deal, go for it.

That said, I owned a dockominium once and it was the worst investment I ever made. It didn't appreciate anywhere near as much as real estate and the maintenance charges were brutal. Then, when I had to move, I couldn't sell it. Personally, when you take all the costs into account IMHO you're better off renting.

Dick Pluta
AEGEA

[DaveOnCudjoe]

Sailorcrat,
Upon reflection, I feel I owe you an appology for pubically villifying your interest in waterfront property. Your attitudes reflect mainstream thought and mine do not. I've lived on this island for 25yrs, seldom venture to the mainland and have embraced a low impact lifestyle. I'm the oddball not you. All of us rely on this oil to maintain our economy and standard of living. Many of us have completed haz mat classes so that we can volunteer to help in the cleanup. It will take more than $'s to clean up this mess and it's impact will be felt for years, directly or indirectly, by all of us. Please help if you can. Dave

[Liam Wald]

Originally Posted by S/V Illusion

Despite the current hysteria, I think most people realize this is a short-term problem. The spill will eventually be stopped and cleaned up so why would you think there are any "deals" to be had? If you could be accused of anything, it would be taking advantage of some idiot who thinks the world is ending because of this.

A year from now, it will be a bad memory

A year from now it might be just a memory to someone living a thousand miles away, but I guarantee that it will still be a disaster to those who live there.
It is attitudes like yours that allow this kind of **** to continue to happen.
I find your statement as ignorant as it is offensive!
Liam.

[Captain Bill]

From what I hear from friends in the area the media has really hyped this up. Except for some areas on the coast of Louisiana very little oil has actually come ashore in areas where recreational boats are stored. This is not to say it won't, but most of Louisiana, where the oil has made it ashore, is salt marshes and wildlife refuges. You don't see any pictures of oil fouled marinas because there aren't any. Most of the oil is off shore and is well weathered by the time it does get to shore( again with the exception of the Loiusiana salt marshes which are close to the spill). The barrier islands in Mississippi are about 10 miles off shore and are unihabited government property. There is some oil on the outside of those Islands but very little has made it past them. To the east the oiled is well weathered and is essentially tar balls which are relatively easy to clean off the beach. One friend who is working on the spill cleanup has told me that there is some less weathered oil several miles off of Pensacola Beach which may come ashore this weekend. I'm told that the inlets will have barriers in place on the incoming tide to prevent oil from coming into the bays and estuaries. Since all of the slips are inside it is unlikely that there will be any severely contaminated slips or waterfront property. Once this thing is stopped it is likely that tar balls will be washing up on the beaches around the Atlantic for years. When I was young, before laws were passed banning the dumping of oil at sea we used to cary a rag and a small vial of turpentine to the beach to clean the "tar" off of our feet. While it was nice not to have to do that, it looks like we'll be doing that again for a few years. Before anyone jumps on my case I am not saying this spill isn't a disaster that is affecting the lives of millions of people, it is. However I've had to deal with the press a few times in my life and for the most part these people are morons. If they're not morons, they simply distort things to fit their agenda. They will often go out of their way to find the worst example they can and imply that what is happening in a relatively small area is happening in the whole region. For Example they find some oiled birds in a Louisiana marsh and then talk about the entire region. They don't show you pictures of oiled bird from Florida, Alabama, or Mississippi because they can't find any but they will show you the oiled bird and then go on to show you a map of the oil spill affecting all four states implying that this is whats happening along the whole coast. Just be careful to look at the news with a bit of skepticism.

[Ocean Girl]

We are a bit out of touch with the reality of this accident, reminds me of a patient who comes into the ER all banged up with crushed legs and loosing more blood by the minute. The patient can't understand why they are being striped, poked and examined, you have to keep reminding them that they need treatment. Even when they say they understand they are severely injured they talk about going back to work in a day or two or complain about missing their favorite program on TV. Clearly the patient is still in deep denial of the big picture, blissfully ignorant that more pain is to come and a long road of recovery is ahead.
We seem to be at that stage that we know we have a bad oil spill, but still can't wrap our mind around the full reality of just how many will suffer, how bad that suffering will be, just how much we will loose, and especially how long this recovery will be. BP is relying on our ability to stay in deep denial even when the facts slap us in the face, it has worked so well this far! Life has changed as we know it. Beyond sadness.

If you want to buy a slip -go for it, but don't expect us Gulf folks to rejoice over a thread about the deals to be had or the flippant way it is discussed

Erika

[Sam Plan B]

In 1979 the Ixtoc 1 oil well blew out. It was located south of Brownsville, Tx in mexical waters. It was owned by Pemex, the Mexican state oil company. Ixtoc leaked 30,000 barrels per day gradually declining to 10, bpd. This went on for nine months until the Red Adair team sealed the well. I was in grad school in Houston and saw the results of the oil spill on South Padre Island. The results were tar balls about 3 inches in diameter and less than 1/2 inch in thickness. The year after the well was plugged the Texas Gulf Coast shrimp harvest was larger than the year before the well rupture. According to a study funded by the State of Texas, the only economic impact was a 25% decline in tourism for one season. Today there is no sign of environmental damage.

In conclusion, I would say buy the slip. And buy BP stock.

[Captain Bill]

As pointed out by Sam Plan B, an oil spill in a warm water area like the gulf will rectify itself much faster than in a cold water area, but it will take years for this to happen in areas near the spill. Ixtoc was further away fro South Padre Island than Louisianna is from this spill. It is quite likely that there will be severe damage to the fishing industry in Louisiana. I hope this isn't taken wrong but from a biological point of view there are a lot worse places this could have happened. There is already a large "Dead Zone" off of the mouth of the Mississippi river where there were low oxygen levels before the spill. Oil mixed with dispersant that sinks to the bottom will be bacterially degraded and consume even more oxygen, expanding the existing dead zone for many years to come. How large of an area will be affected as yet to be seen. In areas far enough from the spill that they only get tar balls there will be little or no long term environmental impact. For the poor fishermen in Louisianna, it's probably best if they start looking for a new line of work as they'll probably be unemployed for several years.

[Dick Pluta]

Originally Posted by Captain Bill

From what I hear from friends in the area the media has really hyped this up. ....Except for some areas on the coast of Louisiana very little oil has actually come ashore in areas where recreational boats are stored. This is not to say it won't, but most of Louisiana, where the oil has made it ashore, is salt marshes and wildlife refuges. You don't see any pictures of oil fouled marinas because there aren't any. .... However I've had to deal with the press a few times in my life and for the most part these people are morons. If they're not morons, they simply distort things to fit their agenda. They will often go out of their way to find the worst example they can and imply that what is happening in a relatively small area is happening in the whole region. For Example they find some oiled birds in a Louisiana marsh and then talk about the entire region. They don't show you pictures of oiled bird from Florida, Alabama, or Mississippi because they can't find any but they will show you the oiled bird and then go on to show you a map of the oil spill affecting all four states implying that this is whats happening along the whole coast. Just be careful to look at the news with a bit of skepticism.

Amen to the press comments. There is a saying in the press community..."If it bleeds, it leads". No reporter ever got a Pulitzer for reporting good news. CNN has been showing a map with the affected areas in red. It is only a small percentage of the LA, MS, AL, FL coast. At the same time they are showing the same oil soaked pelican and marsh over and over again. Those affected in these zones are in a natural disaster area and deserve our sympathy and help. On the unsoiled part of the coast the impact on tourism in the unaffected areas creates a press made disaster area. Whether you go broke because you can't fish or because the tourists stop coming you're still broke.

Dick Pluta
AEGEA

[Sam Plan B]

Originally Posted by Dick Pluta

Amen to the press comments. There is a saying in the press community..."If it bleeds, it leads". No reporter ever got a Pulitzer for reporting good news.
AEGEA

With respect, Walter Duranty writing for the New York Times as their Moscow bureau chief received a Pulitzer in 1932 for a series of articles claiming that there was no starvation in Ukrane. In fact, Stalin's grain confiscations are estimated to have caused from 2.6 to 10 million deaths from famine and disease. It is suspected that Duranty actually never left Moscow to check his facts. Instead he wrote his articles around verbage delivered to him from the NKVD.

So, if you want to know the truth of things, look up someone that lives on the Gulf Coast and has seen the situation with their own eyes. Do not trust the media. They are lazy. They only report what their cronies are saying. In this age of the internet, cell phones and the webcam, there is no need to get your news second hand. If you want to find out what the long term environmental damage along the Louisana coast is likely to be find someone who lives in Brownsville, Corpus Christi or Galveston and ask about the Ixtoc 1 blow out. Ask about the fishing in the early 1980's. Let that answer guide your thinking about the environmental effects of Deepwater Horizon.