Empty Costco

[hipmatt]

You will never.. or very rarely see a Costco with out lines. It is part of the business plan. They constantly monitor door counts, ave. shopping cart price, and payroll and then cut/add hours to a very efficient ratio.(usually on the understaffed side)

If sales are down, they send people home. If sales are up, they call people in early. They consider it a huge waste of payroll to have cashiers and boxers/baggers standing around waiting for shoppers to check out.

Most Costco’s will have decent waits in lines, it is better to judge how many lines, and how much and what is in the cart.

This is also the end of the fiscal year, and payroll bonus do play a factor if you see longer lines lately. That being said, sales are edging down lately.

On another note, an old RE agent I used to work with said he was applying to Costco due to the “horrible” RE market. He blamed the newspapers and media for scaring consumers with bad news. I told him they are probably putting it mildly. Another old friend says that most of the business from the saloon that she works at has all but dried up. People are beginning to get it.

[one_muggle]

I was driving around my old stomping grounds in D.C. last week and the traffic was half its usual, as were the crowds at Old Ebbit Grill AND Potbellies near the Whitehouse.
I thought, This is it! George is finally shrinking the Federal Government or the US really had run out of money-OMG!!!

Then I remembered. Congress is not in session in August–it’s always like this…

-one muggle

[one_muggle]

I was driving around my old stomping grounds in D.C. last week and the traffic was half its usual, as were the crowds at Old Ebbit Grill AND Potbellies near the Whitehouse.
I thought, This is it! George is finally shrinking the Federal Government or the US really had run out of money-OMG!!!

Then I remembered. Congress is not in session in August–it’s always like this…

-one muggle

[one_muggle]

I was driving around my old stomping grounds in D.C. last week and the traffic was half its usual, as were the crowds at Old Ebbit Grill AND Potbellies near the Whitehouse.
I thought, This is it! George is finally shrinking the Federal Government or the US really had run out of money-OMG!!!

Then I remembered. Congress is not in session in August–it’s always like this…

-one muggle

[cyphire]

Something like 2% of the California work force has a real estate license! I heard this twice on CNN this morning. Is it true? What are they going to do for food?

In my looking for houses here in La Jolla – my biggest turn off was the low quality of the Realtors. The high end Realtors know what they are doing. But the vast majority have gone into RE because they were looking for the big buck upsizing in their personal lives.

I have encountered: Housewives who never worked, teachers who don’t teach, an architect, a couple of stay at home dads, college grads without jobs, family members of other Realtors, ex-cops, ex-lawyers, ex everything.

Only one of them knew the true differences in the 3 school systems here in La Jolla. None of them knew the school principal names. Virtually all of them were less informed then I was about the community – even though I have never lived here before. As salespeople they basically didn’t have ANY skills. It was embarrassing. But Prudential kept hiring them. Someone told me that there were 400 agents in Prudential La Jolla alone.

The fallout from the housing bubble will be dramatic. My sister lives in OC and lots of her friends are losing their jobs or have lost their jobs in the financial sector of mortgages, etc. My cousin is a Realtor up by Malibu – no sales – he lives next door to Countrywide’s headquarters. His house has been on the market for a year – he refuses to lower his price significantly because he wasn’t willing to give away his equity. He has a reverse amortization resetting mortgage and will soon be upside down. It gets worse….

I was in Home Depot – it was a ghost town… Seriously – Costco might have been an off day, and maybe everyone had already shopped for their parties, but Home Depot was a wreck. We will suffer large executive and middle level job losses in Construction, financing, etc. My broker told me that WaMu has spent so much money and has so many offices dedicated to sub-prime and that these offices will be closed and the people fired. My last comment is my friend in New Jersey works for a subprime lender that WaMu owns. He is switching jobs this month, his volume went down by 97% since last year – (he went from making Real Estate money to McDonalds money over the last year)… He and a legion of others will start putting this state into recession.

[cyphire]

Something like 2% of the California work force has a real estate license! I heard this twice on CNN this morning. Is it true? What are they going to do for food?

In my looking for houses here in La Jolla – my biggest turn off was the low quality of the Realtors. The high end Realtors know what they are doing. But the vast majority have gone into RE because they were looking for the big buck upsizing in their personal lives.

I have encountered: Housewives who never worked, teachers who don’t teach, an architect, a couple of stay at home dads, college grads without jobs, family members of other Realtors, ex-cops, ex-lawyers, ex everything.

Only one of them knew the true differences in the 3 school systems here in La Jolla. None of them knew the school principal names. Virtually all of them were less informed then I was about the community – even though I have never lived here before. As salespeople they basically didn’t have ANY skills. It was embarrassing. But Prudential kept hiring them. Someone told me that there were 400 agents in Prudential La Jolla alone.

The fallout from the housing bubble will be dramatic. My sister lives in OC and lots of her friends are losing their jobs or have lost their jobs in the financial sector of mortgages, etc. My cousin is a Realtor up by Malibu – no sales – he lives next door to Countrywide’s headquarters. His house has been on the market for a year – he refuses to lower his price significantly because he wasn’t willing to give away his equity. He has a reverse amortization resetting mortgage and will soon be upside down. It gets worse….

I was in Home Depot – it was a ghost town… Seriously – Costco might have been an off day, and maybe everyone had already shopped for their parties, but Home Depot was a wreck. We will suffer large executive and middle level job losses in Construction, financing, etc. My broker told me that WaMu has spent so much money and has so many offices dedicated to sub-prime and that these offices will be closed and the people fired. My last comment is my friend in New Jersey works for a subprime lender that WaMu owns. He is switching jobs this month, his volume went down by 97% since last year – (he went from making Real Estate money to McDonalds money over the last year)… He and a legion of others will start putting this state into recession.

[cyphire]

Something like 2% of the California work force has a real estate license! I heard this twice on CNN this morning. Is it true? What are they going to do for food?

In my looking for houses here in La Jolla – my biggest turn off was the low quality of the Realtors. The high end Realtors know what they are doing. But the vast majority have gone into RE because they were looking for the big buck upsizing in their personal lives.

I have encountered: Housewives who never worked, teachers who don’t teach, an architect, a couple of stay at home dads, college grads without jobs, family members of other Realtors, ex-cops, ex-lawyers, ex everything.

Only one of them knew the true differences in the 3 school systems here in La Jolla. None of them knew the school principal names. Virtually all of them were less informed then I was about the community – even though I have never lived here before. As salespeople they basically didn’t have ANY skills. It was embarrassing. But Prudential kept hiring them. Someone told me that there were 400 agents in Prudential La Jolla alone.

The fallout from the housing bubble will be dramatic. My sister lives in OC and lots of her friends are losing their jobs or have lost their jobs in the financial sector of mortgages, etc. My cousin is a Realtor up by Malibu – no sales – he lives next door to Countrywide’s headquarters. His house has been on the market for a year – he refuses to lower his price significantly because he wasn’t willing to give away his equity. He has a reverse amortization resetting mortgage and will soon be upside down. It gets worse….

I was in Home Depot – it was a ghost town… Seriously – Costco might have been an off day, and maybe everyone had already shopped for their parties, but Home Depot was a wreck. We will suffer large executive and middle level job losses in Construction, financing, etc. My broker told me that WaMu has spent so much money and has so many offices dedicated to sub-prime and that these offices will be closed and the people fired. My last comment is my friend in New Jersey works for a subprime lender that WaMu owns. He is switching jobs this month, his volume went down by 97% since last year – (he went from making Real Estate money to McDonalds money over the last year)… He and a legion of others will start putting this state into recession.

[PadreBrian]

This is a good time to buy costco and walmart stock. when people have tight budgets these are the places we have to go.

[PadreBrian]

This is a good time to buy costco and walmart stock. when people have tight budgets these are the places we have to go.

[PadreBrian]

This is a good time to buy costco and walmart stock. when people have tight budgets these are the places we have to go.

[NotCranky]

Cy:

What are they going to do for food?
We raid the refridgerators and pantries of the houses we show.I don’t even take clients because,as you know I am morally against selling to the last GF. That said the free food is better in La jolla.A nice seaside view lunch does wonders for the moral.

“But Prudential kept hiring them. Someone told me that there were 400 agents in Prudential La Jolla alone.”

Prudential hires people because they make money off of the realtor’s. They pay a pittance of the commission to the new hires for the first 5 sales(or something like that).
The broker is hoping that the newbies circle of influence is fairly large and that they can cherry pick it.
If people knew the system the brand names use they would overcome the surprise at finding a lack of expertise and intergrity in the ranks of agents.

BTW: I am not a very good agent by your standards(so that you know I am not pretending).I am not complaining. What you and others on this blog post are good reminders of what people expect from an agent.

[NotCranky]

Cy:

What are they going to do for food?
We raid the refridgerators and pantries of the houses we show.I don’t even take clients because,as you know I am morally against selling to the last GF. That said the free food is better in La jolla.A nice seaside view lunch does wonders for the moral.

“But Prudential kept hiring them. Someone told me that there were 400 agents in Prudential La Jolla alone.”

Prudential hires people because they make money off of the realtor’s. They pay a pittance of the commission to the new hires for the first 5 sales(or something like that).
The broker is hoping that the newbies circle of influence is fairly large and that they can cherry pick it.
If people knew the system the brand names use they would overcome the surprise at finding a lack of expertise and intergrity in the ranks of agents.

BTW: I am not a very good agent by your standards(so that you know I am not pretending).I am not complaining. What you and others on this blog post are good reminders of what people expect from an agent.

[NotCranky]

Cy:

What are they going to do for food?
We raid the refridgerators and pantries of the houses we show.I don’t even take clients because,as you know I am morally against selling to the last GF. That said the free food is better in La jolla.A nice seaside view lunch does wonders for the moral.

“But Prudential kept hiring them. Someone told me that there were 400 agents in Prudential La Jolla alone.”

Prudential hires people because they make money off of the realtor’s. They pay a pittance of the commission to the new hires for the first 5 sales(or something like that).
The broker is hoping that the newbies circle of influence is fairly large and that they can cherry pick it.
If people knew the system the brand names use they would overcome the surprise at finding a lack of expertise and intergrity in the ranks of agents.

BTW: I am not a very good agent by your standards(so that you know I am not pretending).I am not complaining. What you and others on this blog post are good reminders of what people expect from an agent.

[JES]

As ironic as it sounds, they will likely go to Costco’s deli for food since it is so cheap…

[JES]

As ironic as it sounds, they will likely go to Costco’s deli for food since it is so cheap…

[Author]

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