Wall Street was major driver behind real-estate get-rich-quick scam

Project S.H.A.M.E.: Recovered History: How Wall Street-Funded Self Help Propaganda Greased the Real Estate Bubble « naked capitalism: "Why would anyone think that buying a $500,000 house in a desert 100 miles away from Los Angeles be good idea, no matter what kind of loan deal you got or how booming the market. What kind of propaganda were these people subjected to?

Well, this book provides a part of the answer: people were explicitly instructed to do so.

The Automatic Millionaire Homeowner hit the front bookcase displays at Barnes and Noble in March 2006, at the very top of the real estate market and just a few months before the whole thing crashed and burned. Its main message was simple: If you take out a mortgage to buy a home, you will always make money. There is no way you can lose—no matter when you buy, how much you pay or what type of loan you get. And the kicker is: both the book and finance expert who wrote it were bankrolled by Wells Fargo and Bank of America."

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California Gas Stations Shut as Oil Refiners Ration Supplies - SFGate

California Gas Stations Shut as Oil Refiners Ration Supplies - SFGate: "Oct. 4 (Bloomberg) -- Gasoline station owners in the Los Angeles area including Costco Wholesale Corp. are beginning to shut pumps as the state’s oil refiners started rationing supplies and spot prices surged to a record."

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