Many Guyanese in New York have been hit hard by the US economic meltdown, losing homes, jobs and pensions due to bad mortgages and risky investments that did not pay off.
Faced with soaring food and gas prices, they are cutting back, making adjustments to their lifestyle, while trying to protect their dreams of a better life for their children. In Guyana, the impact of the financial crisis has not had a huge effect on remittances as yet, although it is believed that it will be felt soon. A local cambio dealer expects the slump in the US economy to be felt by the middle of next month. Now, she said, her business is experiencing just about a two to three percent decline in money transfers from the USA.
In 2000, a census found 130,496 Guyanese-born residents living in New York City. Licensed real estate broker and writer/artist Edgar Henry said the crisis has taken a heavy toll on Guyanese and other Caribbean nationals, particularly in the housing sector. He said a number of Guyanese who went into purchasing houses “were caught with their pants down.” He knows at least ten Guyanese who were affected to varying degrees on home purchases but he believes there may be many more. They were affected mainly on account of bad mortgages due to predatory lending which was unregulated and they have no choice but to walk away from their homes.
While the real estate business has been badly affected since people right now do not want to take chances, he said, “I am rolling with the punches.” He said that during the time of plenty he had invested in other businesses in which he is part owner and some of them were now proving worthwhile. “I will ride it out,” he said referring to the financial crisis.
As a real estate broker, he said that getting the best terms on a mortgage now requires a high credit score, a substantial down payment, full documentation and solid financial reserves. However if time is on one’s side, he said a purchase now could improve their position. “If you need a loan now and have less than stellar credit or a minimal down payment, ask your broker about mortgage insurance,” he said.
He added: “If you can’t make a mortgage payment, don’t be shy, call your lender. Banks and lending institutions do not want to own your home, and the sooner you call the more options they can offer to cure your problem”.
Henry said that no one can deny that times are tough due to the financial meltdown which has resulted in recent mergers, thousands of layoffs, the Merrill Lynch, Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae fiascos, coupled with the proposed government bailout of the world’s largest insurance company AIG. He expects that remittances to Guyana and barrels and packages sent to Guyana from New York would decline in the coming months.
America is struggling with soaring prices, mounting debt, a volatile stock market, housing woes, and fluctuation of fuel prices, he said adding that in spite of the gruesome economic situation and the terrible ricochet effect on every phase of daily lives “we still have to find ways and means to survive. It is imperative that we cut costs, retire when our nest egg has taken a hit, pay back student and car loans and at the same time avoid foreclosure.”
For a woman who asked to be identified only as Sonia, the crisis has meant becoming the sole breadwinner for her family. She left Guyana three years ago to join her husband and two children in New York. In the first year and a half after she arrived in Brooklyn, Sonia and her family lived in the basement of her in-laws. She worked at two jobs to help her husband “to pay down” on a house so that they could eventually move out. Her husband was forced to take early retirement so as not to lose out on some of his benefits. While that might have been good, Sonia said he has lost substantial money on investments he had for their children’s education. She did not say how much was substantial. For now, she is still holding down two jobs: as a clerical assistant during the day and as a caregiver in the evening. She and her husband have had to “give up” the house they had mortgaged in Queens and they are now back in her in-laws’ basement; a situation which she does not like. Sonia wants to come back to Guyana but her husband does not, she said. One good thing that has come out of the financial crisis, so far she said, was that he has stopped drinking. He now tries to be more understanding to her, since he has all his family in New York and she had no one but him and the children.
Suffered heavily
In a telephone interview with the Stabroek News, investment banker Carlyle Stewart said he has suffered heavily in the markets, losing about US$100,000 on an investment in equity. “For me, it is painful,” he said. The loss, he said may not be a big deal on the part of market volatility, but he called it a huge loss for him considering the impact on his future plans, including vacations, tuition fees for his children and his general lifestyle.
On the real estate front, he said everything was safe with him. But he feels those losing homes, especially in the Jamaica and Liberty areas were due to “very bad financial decisions because they do not understand the markets and financial strategies.” On Monday, he said a number of houses on one block in Queens – where a number of Guyanese and Caribbean nationals live – was boarded up. “They had just lost their homes or they had just walked away from them. They cannot meet the mortgage, which in some cases are less than the mortgage balance. They might as well give up. Real estate value has depreciated,” he said.
Stewart, who has worked with the investment bank Barclays Capital for over a decade in various capacities and is on the trading floor for fixed investment income, expected to make back some money when the situation gets stable but described it currently as discouraging. Losses were part of the risks on the stock markets, he said.
Via e-mail, Editor of the Caribbean Voice in New York Annan Boodram told the Stabroek News he has lost directly through his accounts. He also lost out US$8,000 from a college fund for his son. Boodram, who is also teacher, said his income has not been affected directly since his job was contractual. But with the cost of basic groceries and other consumables having gone up, he said: “We pay more for less and we have to restrict some purchases while eliminating others.”
To deal with the impact of the crisis, he said he was trying to exercise more caution over spending and is being more conservative, generally.
In New York, he said some Guyanese have lost homes, while some of their homes are in foreclosure; and some who rent homes are being scammed and find themselves being evicted.
“Some have lost money on their pension, retirement investments or commercial investments. They have to deal with higher prices. Some have lost jobs while others are struggling – those in real estate, travel financial investments for example. They travel less, entertain themselves less, are more cautious in spending, bargain hunt, buy less, etc.”
He also said some businesses owned by Guyanese, particularly in the Brooklyn area, are closing.
Trade union activist and teacher Chuck Mohan lost US$10,000 on his Individual Retirement Account and his 410K Savings Plan. A friend of his has lost US$46,000 on similar retirement plans. He is a teacher and does not expect to lose his job since his skills are more or less needed.
JOE
IF YOU WANT TO GO GUYANA YOU JUST GET IN TOUCH
WITH ME. I COULD GET YOU A PEACE OF LAND,
I HAVE ENOUGH,
I AM GOING BACK TO GUYANA NEXT YEAR FOR GOOD
I WILL BE IN THE NEDERLANDS TWO MONTHS EVERY YEAR
I WILL STILL KEEP MY HOUSE IN THE NEDERLAND SO
WHEN I COME I HAVE MY OWN PLACE.
IN GUYANA I HAVE TWO HOUSES, I BUILD THE FIRST IN 1996
AND IN 200O I BUILD THE OTHER ONE,
YOU COULD TAKE ME OUT OF GUYANA BUT YOU CAN,T
TAKE GUYANA OUT OF ME.
THERE IS NO PLACE LIKE HOME.
I STILL HAVE HOPE IN GUYANA, CRIME IS THE PROBLEM
YOU SEE A HUNGRY MAN IS ANGRY
IF THE PORE PEOPLE GET GOOD JOB THAT THEY CAN
MAINTAIN THEIR FAMILEY, AND KEEP DRUGS OUT
ALL SO NOT SO MUCH TAX ON THE FOOD.
GUYANA HAVE GOOD CLAY AND ENOUGH BAMBO,
IN INDONICHA THEY MAKE HOUSE,ES WITH BAMBO, ALL SO
TABLE CHAIR BED ALL WITH BAMBO.
THINK ABOUT IT, I HAVE BOOKS OF THESE HOUSE,S
I AM GOING TO DO SOME FOR MY COUNTRY,
I AM ALL SO A NURSE, ALL SO I WORK WITH OLD PEOPLE
IN HOSPITAL.
BY SEE YOU
Dear fellow “foreign-based” Guyanese;
Our Guyana needs us more than ever before,
our grasses are still greener on that shore.
We are needed there as much as of yesterday,
as natives to our soil, we must be home to stay.
“Wake-up and walk in unity”
(Guyana Chronicle : 20. 10. 2008 : “letters” )
Eloise, I dont believe this, you are actually going to give me a piece of your land.
Where is Carl Veecock? eat your heart out, my girl friend Eloise is going to give me some land, and I am going to marry her, make a dozen kids and live happily ever after.
Carl you can be our bestman. LOL
Thank you Eloise.
Joe.
Wish you luck with an official standing in your way for everything you want to do,and good luck for your new security detail. You will need it.
JOE
GUYANA NEAD YOU
It is an eye-opener situation. Suddenly we have sobered up. Certainly Guyanese are certainly not the only ones.
Do not look to the politicians as a saviour. Elections here are all about making people happy in being controlled.
Yes, I am not too happy that I have cut back on my remittances and barrel sending.
But sometimes we need to be reminded that tough times teaches.
I can see a slimmer population for sure. I can see closer family ties. I can see the more humane part of us coming out. We certainly are learning to conserve. I don’t see it lasting for years even though it can easily flip that way. Government gets more taxes when more people are working. Government gets more taxes when less tax-paying citizens are in jail. But you can’t help but feel something is in the air. It bothers me.
I am mad that a few years ago the greedy bankers told millions of poor guys with a mere 15k savings that they can afford to buy a house when they knew fully well that the plan they had in place to reclaim the property and with it, all the guys savings with it would be criminal. I am angry that with every war the price of minerals like gold goes up because the looters and planners don’t want to risk stocking a bundle of paper money they have stolen and might become severely de-valued, and choose to convert it to gold and other stuff like Warren Buffet is now able to buy up.
But, I am glad that somethings did backfire on the banks. Some disgusted homeowners made their houses so un-useable before they walked out of it that the banks found themselves becoming home managers and renovators.
Anyway, all of these bank-illegally owned homes are going to be bought up by the looters for next to nothing.
But this recession is not ‘made’ to last for very very long. It is made to make the rich gets richer later and the poor ever moreso poorer and controllable.
Barack the Vote .. Vote Obama for President ..
america do not stay down for long.it is the richest and most powerful country in the world.the constitution of america guaranteens freedom.america is beautiful.any foreigner who bad talk america should not come to america or if they are in america they should go back to where they came from.america is one of the largest democraciesin the world.most guyanese are doing well in america.they are not afraid of crimes.i am doing well and i love america.GOD BLESS AMERICA.GOD BLESS THE WORLD.
ha ha ha ha
JOE
MY FRIEND I MEAN IT,
IT IS NOT A JOKE
GOOD MOURNING TO YOU I AM GOING TO WORK.
AND DON,T FORGET WHAT I SAID
GUYANA NEADS YOU.
Dude,
We have just interesting guyanese folks with the knowledge and know-how to make things better for our little dear guyana.
But the big question is HOW, WHERE AND WHEN and by WHOM
I would love to go back and have a jolly nice time there too but…no way for now.
joe do not waste time take eliose offer
GUYANA need alot of joe right now and we can do with some plumber too
The horrible economic, political and social situation in the world today is due to all of us ( Americans, Europeans, Asians, West Indians, Guyanese) discarding the values of selflessness, generosity, compassion, thrift, hard work, humility, etc. and adopting the new ways of greed, coveteousness, discontent, wantoness, wastefullness, selfishnessness, etc. My arawak grandmother always told us not to gather (from our natural environment) more resources than we could use efficiently at any point in time. If we did this, she said, we would be exhibiting greed,since we were taking more than we could use. And in doing so we would waste, since we could do nothing with what we could not use. And in times of scarcity, we would suffer. That was our way, in the bush, before “civilisation” visited us and changed our lives forever! Do not misinterpret what I am saying. I am not advocating that we go back to the days of my ancestors from the Orinocco delta, lock, stock and barrel! We need to recognise what has worked for us in the past. Then we need to recognise what we can adopt effeciently from the new knowledge which we generate every day. We must then combine the seasoned, tested, proven and successful ways with the new! Getting the mixture right is the challenge for modern man! And the explosive development of technology in the last fifty years has been more a hindrance than a help in our quest to strike that happy mean! I worked with Lehman Brothers for eight years as a researcher and left my job and America to return home because I was constantly reminded of the admonitions of my grandmother. The “eyes” she gave me when I was a child made me see, long in advance, the terrible tragedy that has now befallen the modern world. Joe is right! We have to go back to basics. If we don’t, the suffering which we are now experiencing will pale into insignificance, compared to what we shall in the very near future…..if we do not change our ways..and dust off for use , some of the values which we learnt in the little villages , all over the world. It always freaked me out…living in an apartment building which housed hundreds of people…and most of us were not even acquaintances! No man is an island ! United we stand, divided we fall. The new individualism now has us lurching like drunks, day in day out..looking desperately for a way out of the mess we have created for ourselves. If we unite, like we used to, in the villages of Buxton, Mabaruma, Nappi, and countless others, we shall overcome!! May God help us!
Thanks for the knowledge provided to me by the GDF in my youth. I saw this coming a mile away after living through the Regan and first bush years. So I sold our condo and invested the money we got into my house in Guyana and Jamaica. While business is so slow here, I had to move my biz from the volatile Spanish Town, where the shottas shoot at the police in the open, and locate the shop and internet cafe in Negril. I am biding my time her and am well prepared for this giddeon swing. Plant the land and you will not suffer. My yams, dasheen and bananas sure look good along with my vege garden. Everyone’s yard/kitchen garden should be able to feed them for 5 days. This is how my parents survived in William St Kitty during the 60″s.
Lend a helping hand to each other and smile because it will get better. Remember when the british pound was withdrawn and the GT dolla went into free fall shortly after issue? We survived and will do so again..
“Keep it “LIT”