Postal Service draws criticism for $1.2 million home buy

[RamboLiberal]

Source: CNN

LAKE WATEREE, South Carolina (CNN) -- At a time when the U.S. Postal Service says it is experiencing a financial crisis, it purchased a $1.2 million home from an employee so he could relocate, a CNN investigation has found.

Postal Service spokesman Greg Frey said the home will be resold, as others have been.

"It's not like we threw away a million dollars," Frey told CNN. "We are hoping it's going to go for the appraised value."

But a real estate agent in the area said the home could be a tough sell in a depressed housing market -- and the USPS said it lost an average of more than $58,000 on the 500-plus homes its relocation program bought and sold in 2008.

The 8,400-square-foot, six-bedroom home on Lake Wateree, about 30 miles north of Columbia, is likely to be the last million-dollar home purchased by the Postal Service. A $1 million cap on homes eligible for the relocation program took effect in February, Frey said.



Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/03/05/postal.service.relocation/index.html

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The Postal Service bought this 8,400-square-foot South Carolina home so an employee could relocate.

[Lasher]

1. I take it this was not an entry level employee.

It is actually not unusual for companies to have such relocation programs.

[No Elephants]

10. Like individuals, companies ought to live within their means. If money is tight, you find a less

costly way of providing temporary housing for employees whom you are relocating.

No one said they should not have any relocation program.

[tclambert]

12. The article said he was postmaster of Lexington, SC.

Not a big city. So he would be mid-level management.

[merh]

14. He gets a lovely salary, he should buy his own home

This is outrageous, pay to move his furniture, give him a bonus, but a million dollar home?

[Liberal_in_LA]

2. crazy

[aquart]

3. "An AVERAGE of $58,000" LOSS on 500 homes?

Uh, someone please check my math. I get a loss of $29,000,000.

[unhappycamper]

4. This is why we will be paying $0.43 for first class mail in May. n/t

[Vinca]

5. I have one word for the postal service: rental.

[formercia]

6. The Postal Service has been a money sink for years.

This is a perfect example of how privatization has led to increased cost with huge reductions in jobs, all to deliver the same mail as before.
I don't care if my mail gets there a day later because some human has to read the address.

The postal service should be nationalized asap.

[Stalwart]

7. The Navy Never Bought My House

When I relocated.

[peacetalksforall]

8. We are paying all these fee increases to pay employees a salary

that allows them to own houses like these? We need to know more. This is outrageous. Did this owner have an inheritance that allowed this.

I have a business that depends on the post office and the increases keep coming one after another

They are trying to shift all their work to automation to cut jobs. I wouldn't even be surprised to learn that they are outsourcing part of it to India after hearing this news.

If the good times are over their post office users and some of our people are now living in tents with no mailboxes, it's time to make changes.

What a way to start a Friday. The truth hurts.

[mbperrin]

9. What's the problem? No tax dollars are involved, since the Postal Service

receives no money from the government and hasn't for many years.

There are alternatives - UPS, FedEx, email, fax, you name it.

Personally, when I look at my electric bill which is higher than my first house payment in 1978, or when I look at my cable/internet/landline bill, which is higher than my first car payment in 1975, or when I look at my grocery bill, which is now more per week than it was per month in the late 90s, I could not care less about a few cents on my first class mail. I mail two or three items a week.

Meanwhile, I'd really like a bit more info on the bastids who've screwed around my retirement.

[No Elephants]

11. The factors you mentioned are probably more responsible for postage increases than

the Post Office's relocation program is. However, it grates when companies spend money foolishly, than raise prices, especially when the company received a monopoly that the government built over many years at taxpayer expense.

We are also subsidizing the mailers of catalogues and the like to send us mail we don't want on paper made from trees we do want; and that also grates.

[high density]

13. That's quite the relocation package.

What are they thinking, buying temporary homes for people in this screwed up market? By all means have a relocation package that helps new employees sell their existing home and buy a new one, but temporary housing should be the responsibility of the employee even if it's the Postmaster General we're talking about.

I've talked to employees that say the USPS has taken color toner cartridges out of laser printers and forced them into duplex mode. And at the same time they admit to losing tens of millions to buy and sell temporary homes. Talk about being penny wise and pound foolish.

[Hannah Bell]

15. that house looks recently built. no landscaping. i wonder if the owner built it & got caught in

the downturn.

[jmowreader]

16. Read the article; this isn't the most expensive home they bought

It says the USPS bought in the 2007-2008 period fourteen homes with prices over $1 million--the most expensive $2.8 million.

You want to see something really screwed up here? The homeowner, who served as the postmaster of Lexington, South Carolina, earns (according to payscale.com) somewhere between $59,752 and $71,598 depending on his length of service. The midpoint there is somewhere around $65,000. In South Carolina that's very good money anywhere outside Charleston, and it's above median in Charleston. It's not million-dollar-house money anywhere, so...unless there's serious family money here we have no business knowing about, you're looking at a really flaky mortgage.

But fuck it, y'know...even postmasters can get hard-sold into interest-only option ARMs.

[Overseas]

17. Who do they think they are-- AIG? //nt