Foreclosure sale in Germany as bidder

This past Wednesday, my wife and I went to a foreclosure sale in Überlingen for a house that was being foreclosed on in Markdorf. The appraised value of the house was 280K though my guess was that it would go for around the 300K mark. A house in Markdorf would run you in the viscinity of 400K and my guess was that someone would be willing to pay that price for the house, minus revonation costs (which I guessed would run between 50 and 100K)

However, there were several things which my wife and I thought may affect the price. The house was directly across from a bar. It bordered a street on one side which, while not busy, does get a fair amount of traffic. The access to the garage was a bit tricky and parking for visitors could be difficult. The house was originally build in 1900 though has been renovated several times in the interim. We felt like all these things put together could result in less interest in the house, though it was a small possibility. We bought our current place as a fixer upper at a good price when other people could not see the possibilities of it. But that was a different housing market. The housing market in Markdorf is very hot at the moment.

I was expecting a big turnout and was pleasantly surprised to find that there were finally only 7 bidders on the house. The auction started exactly at 2pm with the man responsible for the bidding giving out some information about the house before starting the bidding process. During this part, he mentions something about a lien on the house of 255K. My German is ok but when it comes to leagalese, I am more lost than usual. But it was not just me that was confused. Some of the other parties are also like "Can you repeat that?" and he clarifies the point: If you are making a bid on the house, you are liable for the outstanding load on 255K that is presently owed on the house.

You think they could've mentioned this in the prospectus. 255K is higher than our highest possible bid. So we are out of the bidding before it begins. In the end, there are bids placed by 4 of the seven parties. One, in a group of three Turkish men who are together, makes an initial bid of 29K for the place. No one places a hgher bid for a very long time. I was almost willing to bet that no one else would bid though no one leaves either. Eventually, an older German couple makes a higher bid.

Then something crazy happens. The person, who owns the house now and who is being foreclosed on, makes a bid. Next, his ex-wife, who is also being foreclosed on, makes a bid. WTF??? The Turkish guy makes a bid and from then on, it is a fight between him and the older German couple. It takes a really long time for the German couple to answer the bids. It is often at the last second. Even on the winning bid, the German couple make a higher bid a second after the bid processis closed. It is a bit wierd that they did not come with an upper limit. But I am the newbie in this process.

The final bit is a little over 50K, which makes the cost of the house a bit over 300K. What I kinda expected. Even though we weren't expecting to get the house, I did feel a bit of disappointment when we left. We had spent a good deal of time and energy visiting the place, figuring out what we would be willing to pay and thinking about logistics in case we won the auction. It was a bit of a letdown.

I feel like this could, at some point, get us a property at below market value. On the other hand, it is significant amount of work for each property. At the very least, we had to take half a day off of work to go to the auction. Which is significant if it comes to naught. Our plan is to keep checking on the properties that come up for auction. New properties are announced at the beginning of every month.

This is one place where they are published:
https://www.zvg-online.net/1100/index.php

Bavarian Elections 2018

The Bavarian state elections took place on Sunday (14.10.2018) and the two traditionally dominant parties, the SPD and the CSU, suffered historic losses (yet again in another German election)

The CSU, which has ruled Bavaria for the past half century, did not manage the 50% threshold and must now form a coalition to rule. It is the worst showing ever and the last time it did so badly was in 1954. SPD did even worse with by far the worst showing ever in its history in Bavaria.

The big story in the elections was the rise of the AfD, whose main issue was immigration, and not more of it. The CSU tried to coopt the issue, hoping to win back the voters who were defecting . I think the argument went that these voters would be easy to win back since the stink of voting for the AfD was terrible and all it would take would be to tackle the immigration question in a less rascist way. Unfortunately, the CSU were clueless about dealing with the immigration question without being rascist. It not only failed to attract back conservative voters, who knew their concerns would be shelved by the CSU once they were back in power, it also caused a hemmorage of voters from their left wing who saw the CSU resorting to same rascist tactics as the AfD.

This resulted in a historically good showing for the Greens and historically good showing for the AfD. Though the liberal media has been quick to laud the success of the Greens, it has literally made it dogma to ignore the AfD. Everyone is pretending they do not have a seat at the table. The Greens did not win by embracing the issue of immigration, but rather by sticking to other issues. They avoided any accusation of racism by shelving the issue, which was by far the smart thing to do.

On the one hand, the rise of the AfD for a vast majority of Germans is theoretical. It does not affect them in any way. Their hate is directed at a segment of the population which has little voice, either at the ballot box or in the media. The news media understand the rise of the AfD historically, in the framework of human rights and the German constitution but it does not keep them up at night. It is not something that they feel personally. It does not feel like the content of what the AfD are saying troubles Germany, rather it is the tone that they are taking which grates.

The breakdown of the two center parties and the rise of parites away from the center is to Germans just a matter issues. Land use. Housing. Economy. Etc. For immigrants, especially people of color, the change feels existential, a threat to their/my life, which is beyond the comprehension of the vast majority of this country's population. No one frames it in that way because Germans cannot understand it in that context and would dismiss it. But that is the road this election (and the ones previous) are taking. 

Foreclosure sale as spectator

This past Wednesday, there was a house auctioned off at the Amtsgericht (local court) in Überlingen. The process is called Zwangsversteigerung (forced auction) and we went as spectators to see how it worked as there is a place coming up for auction for which we would like to bid.

This place, however, was not of interest to us. The house was located in a village about 30 km away and not even in the village, rather outside in the countryside. The appraised value of the house was 380K euros, though just based on location, I expected it to go for less.

The auction took place in a room that seated about 50 people. There was a long metal desk at the front of the room where two officials who ran the process sat. The woman said very little. The man more or less ran the process. In front of the long desk, were three small desks each with 2 chairs, arranged in a semi circle around the long desk. Only the table on the far right was occupied, It was an older gentleman, dressed relatively shabbily who seemed to be the owener of the place.

Behind those three desks were three rows of chairs for the people taking part in the auction. In addtion of us, there were 2 couples who both placed bids, two men who were together who did not take part at all, and a man with a briefcase and a Lenin beard who also took part in the auction.

It started at nine with the male official reading out some information about the auction. There as the minimum bid that was required as well as information about the electrical connection to the house, which I did not really understand. He also explained a bit about the process, that it would last at least half an hour, and stressed that there was no advantage in waiting till the end of the half hour to place a bid. It would only end when no more bids were made. This was not like Ebay!

There are 2 requirements for submitting a bid. Identification and proof that the bidder has 10% of the appraised value of the property. It can be in the form of a check or it can be transferred over to the state bank prior to the auction

The bidding started at 9:12. A couple immediately went up to bid and placed a bid for 190K. Exactly half. And then the first problem. They have some form of proof about the 10% but not what is legally required. This requires the seller to say if he will accept the proof or not. Seems the bidder and the seller know one another and so this is clarified quickly.

Next the second couple walk up and place a bid. I do not remember what that is but again, the form of proof of the 10% is again not what is legally required. This time, the sellers and the bidder leave the room to discuss and when the come back in, the bidder says he dismisses the requirement that the bidder show proof.

At this point, there is a lull in the action. My wife uses this as an oppurtunity to walk up to the officials to ask some questions about the process that are not super clear. For example, if we transfer over the money, will it be automatically be transferred back? The man assures us that it is straight forward. He also tells us that if we are planning on bidding on the place, we should do the transfer right away. Good piece of info.

Next, the man with the Lenin beard approaches the seller and asks for a meeting outside the room. It takes a few minutes and the seller again says he dismisses the 10% requirement when he comes back into the room. Now the bidding heats up. The man with the Lenin beard and the first couple who made the bid bid against one another, first starting in 1000 euro increments, then lowering to 100 euro increments until the price reaches 250K. At that point, the couple stop. Its been more than 30 minutes since the timer began. There is no gavel thud to announce the winner, It is pretty low key.

We sneak out immediately as we need to get to work. It was surprising how unofficial and set of the pants the whole thing was. Rules just did not seem to apply.

And how much under the appraised value it went for. The place we are looking at is in Markdorf, right in the middle of town. I would guess there will be far more interest. I am also guessing the it will not go for so much less than the appraised value. My feeling is, based on what we are willing to pay, that we will not get the house. Let's see how it turns out.

Review - Ingrid goes west

What does friendship mean? What does happiness mean? When everyone on social media looks never alone, never unhappy, is that what real like should be like? Or is there nothing actually real in bubbly social media? Are all the bubbly lives on social media artificial creations, not even the edited best of those lives, but just staged scenes in the middle of actual lives?

That is the question facing the main character Ingrid in "Ingrid goes west". She is mentally ill and obsessed with social media. She mistakes lives on social media with actual lives. She cannot wrap her head around the way she actually feels and the way people's lives seem to be playing out on social media.

People's lives seem to have clear simple meanings on social media. They are able to succintly state truths about the world via quotes from their favourite books. They have favorite restaturants, opinions about art and fashion, and confident business ideas. They do not seem to have actual cares or worries. Their lives seem full and uncomplicated.

Those are all the opposite of Ingrid's existence. All the confusion swirling around her seem to be absent in the social media. She feels like her elixir is to live one of these lives. She wants to befreind a social media darling and be part of that. She wants the meaning that having people see her on social media. She wants the meaning that she ascribes to the people she follows.

The movie is about what she does in search of that empty meaning, and how her life is ultimately devioid of meaning beyond who she really is. Its also about freindships and pretending to be someone and how that will always unravel, with terrible consequences.

I really enjoyed watching the movie. Basically because it is a dark exploration of themes I struggle to comprehend. It is not exactly feel good. Though it does have a Hollywood ending. But the end is not exactly hopeful. It feels like the way life is

First steps to bidding on a foreclosed house in Germany

We own the place we live in in Germany. Its a relatively small place (140 sq m) on the ground floor in a building that that has four apartments in total. The street we live on has four of the same buildings, one next to one another. I like the place. Its only that dealing with neighbors can be a pain.

Our area, the Bodensee, has a problem with housing, both the availability and the cost. There's too little and it costs too much. My wife looks regularly, hoping to spot something that's a good value.

Suddenly something popped up. A single home, not too much bigger than our current apartment,  in the middle of Markdorf, for 280K. This is a price we have not seen in years. There has to be something wrong with it. And there is.

It is in foreclosure. Its kind of hidden in the details of the listing (Dieses Objekt wird beim zuständigen Amtsgericht versteigert) I have one friend who bought his place via an auction and he says he got a great deal. I was intrigued.

My wife called the number give in the listing. On German Reunifcation day. A holiday. Surprisingly somebody answered. But it wasn't a real estate agent. It was a call center for the company that does the listings. Any details about the place can only be found by buying the foreclosure catalog (Versteigerungskatalog) for the month that the place is listed. Details about if we could just buy this month's catalog or if we needed to get a subscription were difficult to decipher from the woman who took the call. Very rude was how my wife put it. She eventually hung up.

A quick search on the internet found that only this month's catalog could be bought (~20 Euros) and we could get it as a PDF
https://www.zwangsversteigerung.de/

I found some basics about the process here:
https://versteigerungspool.de/info/20-fragen-zur-zwangsversteigerung.6

Key things are that all the information about the place in question are in the catalog. A visit is in general not possible. So you are buying the place unseen. You are buying the place without any guarantee. Buyer beware!

Let's see how this progresses.

Grafana-server Init Failed: Could not find config defaults, make sure homepath command line parameter is set or working directory is homepath

This error is, I think,  a generic error.
In my case, the problem was that the postgresql server was not accepting the connection that the grafana server required.

Adding the homepath did help as it generated the actual error which was causing the issue:
/usr/sbin/grafana-server --pidfile=/var/run/grafana-server.pid --config=/etc/grafana/grafana.ini --homepath=/usr/share/grafana cfg:default.paths.data=/var/lib/grafana cfg:default.paths.logs=/var/log/grafana cfg:default.paths.plugins=/var/lib/grafana/plugins

Everything's fine: the first film about integration in Germany

Trailer for Alles Gut

The original title of the movie is "Alles gut", and it roughly translates to "Everything's fine". It can also be translated to "I don't know where to start. Let's just say everything's fine so we can move forward"

The trailer markets it as the first film about integration in Germany, though it should be clarified to say it is the first film about integration of the wave of refugees that arrived starting in 2016. Movies about integration, especially about the guest workers that arrived from Turkey starting in the 1960s, are numerous. I can think of 2 great movies without much effort: 'Gegen die Wand' and 'Almanya'.

'Alles Gut' follows 2 families, one from Syria and one from Macedonia as they try to navigate German bureaucracy and German society in order to build a life in Hamburg. The stories take place in the here and now. It is not about how they got here. It is not about how their lives used to be. It is told primarily from 4 points of view: the Syrian father, his teenage daughter, the Macedonian mother, and her elementary school age son.

The story is started from the father and mother's perspective, the mother as she enrolls her son in the German school system and the father as he tries to get his family to Germany from Beirut (from where they arrive by plane about a third of the way through the film)

Then the perspective shifts drastically as it is told from the son and daughter's points of view. The most interesting parts of the film are the parts which are shot in the primary school, during classes, during recess, and during school events. The boy is thrown in with the German students and it shows really drastically the chasm that must be crossed.

The German kids come across as understanding and accepting while the boy clearly displays the enormous weight of living as refugee in Germany. He absorbs the fragile nature of their situation from his mother and struggles to deal with that in addition to having to live in a new country.

There are fascinating (and often accidentally funny) interviews with the other kids in the class and a part where the boy is absent from school for an extended period of time due to his refugee status during which the teacher tries to explain why to the kids why he has been missing. There are also meetings during which the teachers, administrators and parent representatives discuss the resources needed for the boy, which enlighten one to the predicament of the school.

The girl's story has a more positive bent to it. Her German is too bad join a German school and so she goes to a school with other kids in her predicament, i.e. kids from immigrant backgrounds who are trying to improve their German to join the traditional education system. It is clear from the beginning why she becomes a focus of the film.

The first shot of her is in a traditional muslim outfit, body fully covered, hair completely wrapped, her face peering out, bewildered at where she is. The film shows her coming out of her shell, realizing that the rules for women in Syria (not allowed to ride a bike, for instance) are sometimes nonsensical. It is not a sudden transformation as she is well inculcated with the rules for Muslim women in a traditional society. But just experiencing Germany on her daily routines, on the bus, in the school, wandering around where she lives, one sees subtle changes that are taking place, questions that are being asked. She comes from a place where there are rules for everything (one hears that about Germany as well) and now she is in a place where a lot of those rules are absent. Some may find that terrifying. She on the other hand seems to find it liberating.

The parents stories lean toward tragedy. They have arrived as adults, as parents, penniless and without accepted qualifications in a very competitive country. They have a mountain to climb in front of them. That is apparent to them from the very start. They place their hopes in their children. What I took away from the film is that Germany needs to as well, help these kids contribute to this country, make them feel like they can play a part in strengthening this place.

Malayalee Heirlooms

On my last trip to India, I ended up at an aunt's place and in the course of conversation, she started pulling out the bric a brac that she had rescued from her grandmother's home (where she grew up). The house was being torn down after her grandmother died and it was a free for all for the contents of the house. By the time my aunt showed up, all the large items had been carted away and she tried to grab a couple of things before they too disappeared.

Below is what a newlywed woman would wear around her ankle from her wedding day till the day she gave birth to her first child

The one pictured is solid copper and weighs in at at least 5 kg. My aunt said that the wealthy had them forged in silver or gold. The custom is long past but it was practiced till the turn of the 20th century. Quite a weight to carry around. I guess it would push one to pop out the first kid sooner than later.

Shown below, what now is being used as a flower vase, is actually a receptacle to spit the remnants of chewing tobacco.

It would be carried by a servant when the master would go somewhere. And whenever, the master needed to spit his tobacco juice, the servant would run up to provide the vessel to catch it. Talk about a shitty job.

I think I need to find the names for these two things.

elementary OS - A postmortem

I finally ended up installing Lubuntu over elementaryOS, after using eementryOS for about 8 months. Just a little background on why I installed it in the first place and why I eventually switched to Lubuntu.

I have an iMac that I purchased in January of 2009. For all the things I use it for, primarily email, surfing, netflix and some hobby programming, it works great. The CD drive gave out a while ago but otherwise, it is a perfectly good computer that I hope lasts a lot longer. I like the design of the hardware, I liked the way the user interface looked and generally worked. What ended up happening though was as the OS kept getting upgraded, the iMac got slower and slower. It just turned annoying to use.

I also use Linux at work and am relatively good at using the tools for development. It annoyed me when I attempted to set something up on OS X, which I already had working on Linux, that cost me a couple of hours of googling to find a solution, time which I had already invested in Linux.

All in all, I just wanted to try Linux on the iMac to see what the experience would be like. I really like the UI design of OS X and was looking for a Linux interface that would mimic that experience, hence elementary OS.

It was relatively easy to get it installed and the UI was a decent attempt at porting the OS X UI. Good enough, I would say. I could live with it. But there were annoying problems that I could not get over.

The most annoying:  I have a bunch of external drives on which I store my files. For some reason, automount on elementaryOS always mounted them read only. I managed to get them mounted as rw using fstab but then on the next boot, they would go back to read only. I never got this to work. It was not a deal breaker but more annoyance than I needed.

Freezes: elementaryOS worked fast and stable for the first couple of months but then it started getting slow like OS X. Then it started freezing, i.e. the I could move the mouse but could not click on anything, mostly when playing videos or using google maps. It would happen like once a week. My laptop at work runs Ubuntu, gets hammered a lot more that my home computer, gets rebooted far less often and it runs without issue. Not sure why elementaryOS has this problem.

Wierdo stuff: Programs started disappearing from the dock (though this could be due to my kids), it started asking for the password to the keyring all of a sudden, the experience overall just got kinda unpleasant.

I ended up installing Lubuntu today. Let's see how I feel about this in 6 months.