SMC Discussion Areas

How is everyone holding up so far? I wouldn't be surprised if we are sheltering in place here in Michigan by the end of the day on Monday. No inside information rather a gut feeling. What is going on in your area?

Stay safe and stay well!

 :drinking: Tim  :drinking:

In Phoenix , AZ, not a mandated shelter in place yet, but mandated that restaurants are for take out only - closed for inside dining. Schools are closed and a lot of people who can work from home are doing so. For myself WFH is mandated until May 1st.
 
Hope you all stay well & safe!

Here in Missouri, in my town, a lot of Walmart shelves are still bare they even closed a few nights (24 hour usually) to try and restock shelves... restaurants are for carryout only or delivery (pizza) no inside dining, schools are closed till April 6th at this time. No mandated quarantine yet.. but Illinois I heard is going that way? I work from home so I am not out seeing it... but seems so surreal... I know this can be /is serious.. but it shows me how unprepared we are as a nation if something hit us hard and fast... I mean toilet paper and frozen pizzas were the first to go.. wow...

In California a few county's went to mandated lock downs first before the entire State went a couple of days ago. You can hardly see a difference. We still have traffic but not as bad. With so many "essential" business still open there are still plenty of places one can still shop.

Trying to stay positive and make the best of a "strange" situation. Personally I'm still working but coming home and staying home, for the most part, including this weekend. Great opportunity to detail the yard and catch up on other household projects.

Definitely worried about the economy as much as the virus, that's for sure.

Agreed!  The virus is not a large population killer and very survivable; however, if our financial institutions collapses in the coming weeks, that would cripple everything ! ! !
Be safe and hang on for the ride...

In North Carolina most companies are going to work from home that can.  Restaurants that are open are take out only.  Toilet paper is no where to be found.  Elementary and High Schools are all closed.  Colleges are going to online.  Had to move my son out of this dorm this weekend on short notice.  No mandatory lock down yet. 

In Ohio no lock down but no groups of more then 10 with a 6-10 foot spacing . Stores are thin on things .Restaurants are carry out only .And all schools and are closed Bars and Malls .

I know my company half the people can work from home ( I can’t )  I assemble machine’s that are used in production of most of everyone s common needs . So I’ve already been told if there’s a mandatory state look down I will  still be required to work to support the packaging machines .And have paperwork to show .



Up date !!!!!!   as of now March 22 the Governor has now said On March 23 at 11:59 PM all non essential personal will have to stay home till April 6

On Long Island all non-essential businesses have been ordered to close (including mine).  Schools and State parks are closed.  Restaurants are only for take out or delivery.  Governor is telling everybody to stay home unless you are going out for essentials.  Crazy stuff!

This country has withstood a lot, Pearl Harbor, 911, hurricanes, earthquakes, tornado's and fires etc.
This is another one of those shockers that we and the federal government are learning how to handle.
Big money is coming to the scientists who develop a cure, and there are thousands of them around the world working on it 24/7, in fact several vaccines have already been submitted for approval.
I can understand this quarantine because it allows officials to identify the people who may be carriers, from the rest of the population.
Once those folks are separated, the rest of us can go back to work (under stricter sanitation rules of course, like restaurants spacing tables further apart etc).
And by that time there will be a huge backlog of orders of goods and services that will need to be filled and those laid off workers will be called back.
But in the mean time I think Uncle Sam and the Federal reserve could get together and do more to help people out of work for no fault of their own.
Could they allow mortgage holders, both residential and commercial to postpone up to 3 months payments, to be added to the end of their loan?
This would be a huge relief to homeowners and landlords.  Maybe auto loans and credit card payments could also be manipulated to help keep our ship upright?

In the meantime keep an eye out for those $500.00 81's to start showing up  :happydrinkers:

Washington State is nuts.  Basically ground zero for this virus.  Stores are jammed, shelves empty , and people literally standing in line for toilet paper ! 

Hoping it’s over soon !!!

Well, our Governor announced the "Stay Home, Stay Safe" at 11AM this morning to go into effect at midnight tonight.  I have a home office so my routine is not too different other than I can't go see my customers.  A lot of them are freaking out because it is still pretty hard to hold a real estate closing online or remotely; however, some are being very creative.  We are deemed essential to the financial industry because title insurance is needed to close any real estate transactions.  The next three weeks should be interesting.

Everyone Stay Safe and Stay Well!

 :drinking: Tim :drinking:

Holding up here in Georgia but scary times , I think the worst thing I am afraid of are our politicians. Would just love to turn on the tv one day and see we are one nation under God again . Really miss the country I grew up in .

Illinois is locked down where I am.  After the governor saw that all the youngsters were still hanging out at bars on St. Patricks day, after he suggested that everyone stay inside or have social distancing, he closed the bars and restaurants shortly afterwards.  St. Patty's day is huge in Chicago.  No dying of the river this year.  They also cancelled the Chicagoland Jukebox and Advertising show and any venue with a large amount of people.  It seems that all the same rules have been laid out in every state and the hoarding of odd items are the same state to state.

I work maintenance at a school and they decided to lock down until April 25th.  I'm in today for a construction project.  Today we had scheduled to replace all the original domestic water lines feeding the school.  After this, five weeks off.  The nice thing is that all the staff is still going to get paid.  I started to work on all my half done projects.  This week is plastering the front room and dinning room, and painting the ceiling and walls.  Then I can either paint the second floor or work on some games.  I have a sick shuffle that's been ticking me off for three years now.  Time to strip it all the way down again.  Then I have a neat pinball and other projects.

How about them stocks and 401's??  I lost 1/3 of my savings.  Pretty typical I guess.  The funny thing is, I was going to switch everything over to bonds when the virus left China and went to two other countries.  That happened on a Friday after the market was closed.  My transactions, through work, happens at the close of the next day which would have been the Monday when everything hit the fan.  If it happened on Thursday, I would have moved everything to bonds and bought everything back later on.  As Maxwell Smart would say "Missed it by that much!"  Oh well, at least I'm buying low and have ten more years to recover.

I hope this craziness will end soon.  Stay healthy.

Still no mandatory stay at home yet here in my county in Missouri though there are a few that have started that... Restaurants are take out or delivery... many small businesses are closed.. Walmart is only open till 8:30 (usually a 24 hour store) in the evening so employees can help restock shelves as they are still bare for the most part...
wife works in a doctor's building... they started this morning to check every employees temperature at the door before entering... if you have a temp you go home.
kids are doing schoolwork on line I guess like most are... not sure when they go back now... this is my son's senior year so this really sucks for him...
Be safe folks.

Indeed "Hang On" is the best advice. Majority of our income is derived from trade shows this time of year. All cancelled or rescheduled. Will not be able to make all rescheduled shows because conflict with preexisting shows.Not fun times but the house/collection is better organized than has been in many years :-).
Creighton     

Hope you guys are all doing well and getting some projects done around the house.

Massachusetts required all non essential business and employees that do not provide “COVID-19 Essential Services” to close as of March 24th for a two week period.  The kid's school initially said the same, but have extended it through May 4th.  I believe that their school is essentially over for the year.   

I thankfully work out of the house so having them home hasn't been a problem, aside from the fact that having an 8 & 11 year old home all day is somewhat distracting.  We live far enough outside Boston that we have plenty of places to go for long hikes in the Middlesex Fells and Town Forest.  I feel terrible that the kids aren't able to see their friends; the older one gets it much better than the younger one does. 

Stay safe gentlemen

Into week two of the Stay Home Stay Safe and my grayer that I remembered beard is coming along quite nicely.  We will be here till at least 4/13 but I expect Governor Whitmer to extend it to 4/30. I suspect she doesn't want to jump on that train right away because she would appear to be agreeing with the President and they have been at odds with each other ever since Gov Whitmer made the short list for VP in the Biden camp.  Very childish and unproductive on both sides and that is as political as I will get.

The Detroit area is the hardest hit with some hospitals at capacity and others getting close.  My bro-in-law is on staff at one of the large hospitals and they have 500 COVID-19 patients there alone.  The National Guard is setting up a 900 bed makeshift hospital in Cobo Hall where the International Auto Show should be setting up if times were normal. My wife is a project manager for a large health system and has been setting up the drive through testing tents at the clinics as well as converting all available space to potential treatment areas.  Her world is incredibly crazy right now.

Our biz is still plugging along so we are still working trying to assist our title insurance agents remotely as best as we can. Refinance applications are up so that will keep the title insurance industry busy for the time being.  Realtors are obviously not showing homes at present so the resale market is taking a hit and I think that will be the slowest part of the housing market to recover as people are not going to want strangers coming into their homes. If there is a silver lining, there has been a lot of technology on the table to improve the entire real estate viewing, buying and closing experience and people are now finally getting on board.  I won't say that will replace the old fashioned process of buying a home but it will allow the real estate economy to continue to operate through times like this when it would otherwise have to shut down.  In MI real estate (residential and commercial) accounted for almost 20% of the total economy last year so that is kind of important.

In any event, thought I would check in.  Have a lot of yard work and garage organizing on the list for the weekend if the weather cooperates.  Stay safe and stay well everyone!

 :drinking: Tim :drinking: