Real Estate Advertising, Taxes, and Pot

From the Sacramento Bee:

The difficult times are far from over. The Bee's owner still faces an advertising and circulation slump that hurt the latest financial results and is expected to continue at least through June.
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"The overall advertising climate grew more difficult in the fourth quarter," Chairman and Chief Executive Gary Pruitt said in a conference call with investors and analysts.
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One big trouble point is classified advertising. McClatchy's classified sales fell 5.5 percent in the quarter and were down in every region of the country except the Pacific Northwest. Things will remain tough as the depressed housing market in California and Florida hurts real estate advertising in the coming months, Pruitt said.

Also from the Bee:

California's troubled real estate and construction sectors are likely culprits for state income taxes falling $1.3 billion below projections in January, state Controller John Chiang said Tuesday.

Chiang noted the revenue shortfall at a news conference highlighting changes that will affect state residents as the tax preparation season gets under way.
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The reasons for the sudden decline in income tax payments aren't yet clear, Chiang said. But the controller cited continued weakness in the state's housing sector, as well as fewer California companies going public.

"Obviously, we've known for a while that the real estate sector is slowing down," Chiang said at the news conference at the Franchise Tax Board Processing Facility on Butterfield Way. "Associated employment in the construction activity over the year is down.
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The statewide downturn has triggered earning losses and layoffs throughout the real estate, financial services and construction sectors.

From USA Today:

Rick Estrada didn't think it particularly odd that he never saw his next-door neighbor or that curtains were always drawn. On his block of new homes, everyone was a recent arrival. In fact, some homes still sit empty, owned by investors hoping to "flip" them at a profit.

Never in his darkest dreams did Estrada think the two-story house a few feet from his contained an indoor marijuana-growing operation that authorities believe is the latest wrinkle in drug traffickers' efforts to hide their illegal business.

"We came from San Jose to get away from that stuff," says Estrada, 42, a medical clinic supervisor with a wife and three young children. "Now here we are and it's right next-door."

Estrada watched on Jan. 12 as federal drug agents busted into the unoccupied, stucco-clad house, hauling out enough marijuana plants to fill a truck, along with high-intensity lights, fans and other indoor hydroponic growing equipment.

Agents that day raided five other houses nearby in Lathrop and one in Tracy, both suburban cities full of commuters to San Francisco Bay Area jobs. In August and September, 41 houses were busted in Elk Grove, Sacramento and Stockton.
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"They're purchasing homes and plunking down marijuana factories smack dab in the middle of our residential neighborhoods," Taylor says...Growers paid up to $750,000 for houses in new subdivisions, usually obtaining 100% financing and putting no money down.
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Samantha Malone says she's moving."I have babies. I don't want to be around that," she says. "Who's to say it's all taken care of anyway, or it's not going to happen next month."