The Great Housing Bubble Book Proposal — Irvine Housing Blog.pdf
I have completed my manuscript on The Great Housing Bubble. I have never published a book, and I know very little about the publishing industry. It was suggested to me that I use the power of the blog to get some help. Please, help me. My first attempt at a book proposal is contained in the PDF link above. It contains the information typical of a submission including a table to contents, a list of tables and exhibits, the preface explaining why I wrote the book, and introduction describing the book in more detail, and 2 sample chapters. Advice on writing a good book proposal would also be appreciated. If any of you know publishers or agents who could help me get my manuscript in print, I would appreciate any advice or contacts you can offer. My first choice would be a large, commercial publisher. I would like this book to reach the widest possible audience. Smaller publishers, niche publishers or University Presses would be my next choice, and self-publication would be my last resort.
Please direct all inquiries to:
irvinerenter@irvinehousingblog.com
Thank you.
I am glad to see IR moving forward with this idea. I’m confident it will be published … as IR is a talented writer, and a deliver in layman’s terms.
Great start! Best wishes in getting it done.
Best Wishes!
nit-picky, but hopefully useful..
in the description you wrote “big up prices” rather than “bid”
best of luck on the book, I’ll mention it to my friends in publishing, but they’re mostly copy-editing types…
Thank you. A spell checker misses errors like that one.
I also have done a little bit of writing. Mostly magazine articles, which I have had published. I found there were quite a few good books at Barnes & Noble on the subject of getting published. It’s been a while, so I don’t have any specific titles, but go take a look. The best tips I got involved the initial contact letter (there’s some special name for that letter, I forget it)- what you should and should not put in it. I always got compliments from the magazines on my letters. They liked that they caught their attention and were professional in tone and content.
On another note, 17 Seawind is on the market again. You might remember, this was the one that the genius real estate agent bought as a flip for a little over $490K, I think almost 2 years ago (It was a foreclosure, that means it HAS to be a great deal, right?). It sat empty for almost a *year* while she tried to sell it for $599, gradually lowering the prices, chasing the market. I think it’s at $499 now. Which ain’t gonna happen.
Can’t wait to buy this book!!!!! I wish I could help with more than my support but I have no experience or connections with publishing. I hope someone out there does because you are definetely gifted and this book deserves to be published!
Hi IR –
I think we should create a fund to buy these books and then distribute to all high school students as part of mandatory personal finance. One of the reasons the Great Housing Bubble occured in the first place is because of wide-spread financial illiteracy. This is what led to profligate borrowing and spending in the belief of easy money and the greater fool. Just a thought but, if you created this fund on the blog people could register / pledge and pick a school or county. Nothing is a better teacher than real life examples. In their own back yard.
What do you think?
Good Luck!
BD
Lower rent, coming to a neighborhood near you.
http://lansner.freedomblogging.com/2008/04/18/high-oc-rents-mean-higher-vacancies/
Great read so far! Love the religio-cultural allusions … fresh writing style. Btw, have you thought of self-publishing? And/or on the web? You could quickly reach a large audience with almost no overhead.
A couple of options:
http://www.lulu.com
http://www.google.com/search?q=self+publish
Regardless, I will be one of the first to buy your book.
Thanks!
Can’t wait to see Michael Moore’s film adaptation of the book!
good luck with the book! i was just a tiny bit disappointed that none of your graphs were in the book.
They are all in there, all 77 of them. The two sample chapters I used as part of the proposal do not have any graphs, but the book has plenty.
IR,
Briefly looked thru your TOC, looks pretty comprehensive.
Q… Are you including case studies, that’s what makes this really interesting.
Also, I didn’t see this, but do you have an appendix for real estate blog sland, FOB, knifecatcher, REO, etc. Most people con’t know what these terms mean so listing them in an appendix would be useful.
Anther comment,
You state the Irvine is ground zero…
I beg to disagree…
Bubbles result in speculation which lead to misallocation of assests, or in this bubble, housing. Irvine may be overpriced based on fundamentals but I would argue that it isn’t overbuilt. In the Inland Empire, some subdivisions outside of Phoenix or Vegas you will find ghost towns of houses built but few people interested in buying. I would think that the ghost towns are ground zero…
Another suggestion, you should have another appendix listing all (or at least most of the larger) the housing bubble blogs.
ground zero could be interpreted many ways. is it where the biggest peak-to-bottom declines occur? most vacant homes? highest % of delinq homeowners?
irvine is a good choice for ground zero because it’s THE model of the american suburb, smack in the middle of a county which has gotten so much attention during this decade as the most perfect, most lavish, most desirable place to live in the universe. donald trump himself couldn’t come exaggerate this place where the sun always shines, everyone is beautiful, rich, and poops solid gold nuggets. it also happened to be the center of the real estate world from a financial and business standpoint.
all that combined together and irvine is the perfect place to ask the question: “WHAT HAPPENED?!?!”
I think his ground zero takes into account the number of mortgage banks here in Irvine, specifically sub prime. New Century, Freemont, Fieldstone, BNC, Argent etc..
I have been noticing more articles proclaiming Orange County and Irvine as the center of the housing bust. I think the combination of subprime lending and extreme price movements make a strong case for Irvine’s importance in the housing bubble.
… and we all know how lazy the mainstream media has become. So having a good blog do their research for them probably helped 😉
I have a book that I put on a website….
AFMUniversity.org
After being on the internet for about a year I got a call from a few publishers.
Will the book give away your identity or will you continue to be Superman, I mean IrvineRenter?
I assume the publisher would have to know who you really are, right?
Yes, everyone will know who I am soon. In fact, I am quoted in a national magazine article due out in May. All will be revealed…
Will you still remain anonymous? I’m seeing more people using their real names on the web now. It seems that the alias age is starting to wane, with more bloggers owning up to their work.
I heard you can self-publish an electronic form of your book on Amazon.com. This is their Kindle link – dunno if this is the same as the epublishing I heard about.
http://dtp.amazon.com/mn/signin
That is how Amanda Brown self-published her story that was “discovered” and became the Legally Blonde movie.
So when is the book signing party?
e-book signing. send IR an email between 3-6 pm and he’ll reply back.
😉
Your blog rocks, really great info. that doesn’t appear anywhere else. I’m certain you can convert this to book format. Keep up the great work!
Call Paul Davidson with any questions regarding publication. He and his wife are well-connected in the industry and he’s published a couple of books himself. He’s a genuine great guy and we started a fraternity together WAYYYYYYY back in the day at UCI (think “Old School” – he was the Luke Wilson character.)
his website/blog is at http://www.pauldavidson.net and I believe his email is paul@pauldavidson.net.
Good luck and best wishes.
-IrvineRealtor
Thank you. I will contact him.
Hi IrvineRenter,
Congratulations and best wishes to your new book. I read your website several times a day. You have an excellent knowledge about real estate. You are also a talented writer. I hope I could help you more… Good luck… Thank you for your great analysis posts.
Dear Irvine Renter:
I will comment on the content tomorrow. Allow me first suggest the following:
Reserve the book title and sub-title and related titles. This is paramount to prevent any cretins to copycat.
Second, as my father advised me when I was writing my own dissertation in Germany (he had written several academic books in his own field in German): “The Table of Content is for an academic what a patent is for an engineer – guard it and share it sparingly and selectively prior to publication”
We are all honored that you share your thoughts and the order of your thoughts and that means your vantage points (and your vantage points is most likely what will set your book apart). Please be careful (yes, I know it is a blog). You might already encounter copyright issues (I am not familiar with US law, but when my dissertation was printed in Germany my publisher asked to declare that the content was “original”.
Do you have already a Literary Agent ? If not, get one. Do you have already a Speech Agent? (who books you for lectures)? If not, get one. I don’t know any but New York is probably the place to look (and many have counterparts in LA with whom they collaborate / coordinate).
Sometimes, the publisher of your book will prepare a book tour (this is the exception). However, your topic surely warrants one.
What about movie rights ? Don’t lough. This topic deserves one. What “Fast food nation / Supersize me” was for food, your book could be for Housing / Real Estate / and the pathologies that are perhaps not limited to South California.
While the financial side is difficulty to portray visibly in a movie as can be sen in the pathetic failture of the movie “Maxed Out” which was so bad that the topcic housing (which was covered only sparingly and not knowingly) is still to be regarded uncovered.
However, it is possibly as the movie “An Inconvenient Truth” from Al Gore has demonstrated, which is in essence a “Powerpoint Movie”. And your topics can yield more sequences with actual people and also provide systematic context.
When I say Movie Rights, your book could yield an exceptional Documentary, e.g., your book tour itself could become part of the Documentary (think Michael Moore and he brillantly covered guns in “Bowling for Columbine”).
You could team up with James Kunstler (who is currently on book tour for “World Made by Hand” in case you (and he) wish to do so.
You could include scathing details about Arizona, Maricopa County, Oranga County CA, Central Valley and what they mean for American zoning desaster and breakdowns in county planning.
You could perhaps run your script with academics that are very familiar with this issue and share your head-shaking about the amount of imprudence: For example Dean Baker of the American Prospect could be great peer reviewer prior to publication.
You did include his name in the bibliography with an entry from 2002. He has written constantly in the last six years about this issue. You could perhaps contact him, meet him and he could perhaps arrange for you to meet some think-tank types in Washington (e.g., at Brookings Institution).
What I am saying is be prepared that you might enter a phase in your life similar to “Roger and Me” by Michael Moore. This will likely not just be “a book”.
Your book will not only appear at the End of the Great American Housing Bubble. In the views of some, it also appears at the end of Suburbia, the end of Exurbia, a recurrence of New Urbanism and a longing of more Americans to live in denser living arrangement to espace their canned lives. Overconsumption in monster houses has not only brought financial ruin to many, it has also produced horrendous social costs in solitude and indifference to our fellow man.
With a possible Peak Oil only a few years ahead (a unfolding already), housing finance is only part – but an essential part – of a larger moment. Don’t get me wrong: I am not recommending that you cover all that, but the potential that your book meets with great resonance is because of the potential for amplification of your issue because of the others I mentioned.
Good luck and thank you very much for your passionate effort to bring your topic to more prominence.
Thank you for the detailed response. You have given me a great deal to think about. Your post has opened my eyes to possibilities I had not even considered.
You are right. I need an agent. I need someone to guide me through this process.
Do you know anyone you would recommend?
Kottan pretty much said what I was gearing up to say. I’m a former academic type myself (PhD Berkeley, engineering), his advice rings true.
The only thing I would add is that with just little bit more work, your “ship” is about to dock.
Are you prepared for being a huge success?
I like the movie idea, but I have to claim dibs on playing myself. I do not think there is a single actor out there, that could truly convey my snarkiness.
Wait a second… I don’t remember me being mentioned in the book. I think I need to have a little chat with the author.
How to copyright your literary work
http://www.copyright.gov/register/literary.html
Don’t worry about copyright protection — you have it without needing to do anything further. You don’t need to register your copyright with the Copyright Office, you only do that before you file suit for infringement. And you don’t need to mark every page with a (c) (as IR has correctly avoided doing). In fact, putting a copyright notice on a manuscript is a sure fire sign of being an amateur.
The blog Making Light has had some good discussions of the publishing business. Give it a try.
Good Luck
Yeah, Making Light has a lot of good discussion on publishing books. They work for publishers (sci fi, so no direct help) and spend time warning people about scam publishers and so on.
Other than helping with the actual publishing, which regrettably I can not help with, is there any other assistance you seek?
Best of luck to you.
I am interested in the book just for the fact that I may get to know who IR really is. Of course, that is before the TIC people get to him.
I’ve read the whole excerpt now. I especially appreciated your solutions section. Great great food for thought. I’m trying to brainstorm what unintended consequences your proposal might have, and I’ll let you know if I think up any crazy ponzi schemes that could be built in the new regime, or any other obvious problems, but none come immediately to mind.
This has the makings of an absolutely excellent book, but I think you’re right to stick with a real publishing house, because I do think conversations with a good editor are needed to take this book to the next level. (no offense intended)
I totally agree. I imagine that during the editing process, an editor would have experts in the field review the books contents and try to poke holes in it. The crucible of the editing process should improve the final product.
I’d like to recommend a book launching party in Las Vegas.
Impressive achievement.
One thing that might help: I would suggest putting something about your blog in the very first sentence of the book proposal. The fact that you have already gained an online readership give you a headstart over other unsolicited writers, and will help your manuscript stand out. Stress the number of hits that your blog gets, and the fact that it has already been mentioned in publications such as Slate.
Can I also suggest that there is something slightly awkard about the opening sentence. If nothing else, I think the comma after “fall” is unnecessary. Again, that opening sentence is the one that counts.
Good luck.
What a crazy mind!
“Longtime DataQuick analyst John Karevoll said he has picked up early signs of a possible bottoming out of the housing downturn in southern Riverside County, where many San Diego workers live. Karevoll also said he thinks there is pent-up demand from would-be buyers who have been largely shut out of the market since last summer.
“The market needs to get its footing and it’s not going to get its footing until a bottom has been determined,” Karevoll said.
He predicted that San Diego’s overall median may slip another $45,000 and bottom out at around $350,000.
“If that happens between now and summer, I think there is also an equal chance that the median could go back over $500,000 by the end of the year,” he said. “That’s how crazy it is out there.”
But that prediction assumes San Diego is not in a recession, even if the rest of country is. If a serious economic downturn develops, Karevoll said, many homeowners may lose their jobs, default on their homes and extend the real estate woes well into 2009.
The current woes frustrate desperate owners because of the lengthening time it takes to find a buyer and the backlog of listings, which stood at 18,504 yesterday, according to the San Diego Association of Realtors. By contrast, when prices were skyrocketing during the seller’s market five years ago, the listing total was a third as big. “
Unfortunately, I don’t know anyone in publishing. However, I will definitely buy this book when it gets published. The analysis on this blog is unusually clear and logical. In some ways, its a shame the blog is superficially Irvine specific, since the analysis is almost always broadly applicable.
love the manuscript. in the 1st paragraph of the preface, shouldn’t “education” be “educate”?
We could get some folks together and make our own hack documentary for publishing on YouTube. It can also serve as advertising/promotion for your book.
So, who wants the lead actor/actress role of a couple who used no doc loans to buy a house they couldn’t afford in 2005, and 3 years later the house as depreciated, causing all kinds of problems in marriage and creating drama, divorce threats, suspicion of an affair, and the eventual, tearful forgiveness as the couple walk away from their foreclosed home to start a new life together, with an unborn child on the way?
IR this has been a great read so far! Thanks for taking the time to research, become aware of the market, and gather & present the data to us in an easily understood manner.
I love your section about the “Reservoir of Schadenfreude.” One thing I find lacking in every definition and description of housing-bubble-fueled schadenfreude is the single most important source of my own personal anger: the fact that all the irresponsible lending, buying, & speculation made it impossible for me to responsibly buy a house. It’s not that I chose to wait to buy a house…I was FORCED to wait.
In my mind, the greatest sin of the bubble blowers (lenders, brokers, Realtors, BUYERS) was to completely price out an entire generation of young professionals. I had to stand by and watch a greed-fueled frenzy as people bought 2nd and 3rd homes they intended on painting, putting in granite, and selling for $200K more in 5 months. I couldn’t shake the feeling that if people weren’t speculating like this and creating a spike in demand, I would own a house by now. If people making less than me weren’t taking out 600K loans for townhouses, and getting in bidding wars, the townhouses would never have reached that price in the first place! They wouldn’t HAVE to borrow that much.
Sure, the pretentious condescension from Realtors, brokers, in-over-their-head homeowners, et al. was bad enough…but I can overlook that; it didn’t affect me in a tangible way. But being unable to purchase a home as a direct result of other people’s stupidity and greed really eats at me. And it further adds to the fire that politicians want to tax me to to help these stupid greedy people.
Congratulations on completing your manuscript. I have a few editorial suggestions on your proposal that I can offer, for you to take or leave.
I’ve never done a proposal for a popular press book, but I got several offers from University presses for my academic book (published 2002 by SUNY). I didn’t have a faculty position or institutional support, so I guess my proposal was effective.
Shall I send them as comments, or do you have an email address I should send them to.
You can do either. My email address is
irvinerenter@irvinehousingblog.com
THE NEW BUBBLE???
Well, I think I finally figured out where the speculators and “stupid money” has now run to … oil futures.
According to a series of very good articles in BusinessWeek, it seems there is no solid, fundamental reason for retail gasoline prices to be where they are today … except for perhaps rampant speculation driving futures away from fundamentals. Sound familiar?
http://www.businessweek.com/lifestyle/content/apr2008/bw20080422_520796.htm
Irvine Renter,
Congratulation on this final chapter. I seldom post on the blog because this is the serious and academic side of IHB. This is the time I should pay my tribute to you for your accomplishments. I came to this site because of your writings, analytical thinking and the presentation of complex subjects translated into simple laymen perspective.
I’d buy a copy of this book if it were published. If for some reason you do end up self publishing, stay away from those vanity publishers that publish for a fee. My wife’s father went this route with his book (against my advice) and all he has to show for it are the 30 boxes of books that he received after printing and about 5 more boxes with the covers removed that were returns from Barnes and Noble and Media Play when they didn’t sell as quickly as those outlets would have liked (about 3 months)
I wish I had some advice on how you can get published, but I don’t. Kottan does seem to have some great advice, and I hope you don’t get burned by having already done some things that he/she has advised against. The book is great, informative, well-written, and not boring. I will recommend this book to my family and friends, especially the ones who don’t like to read. I now have another book to look forward to reading since I just finished Harry Potter #7.
Good luck getting published and don’t forget the little people when you become rich and famous and buy your million dollar house in Irvine. Or will you still want to live in Irvine when you hit the big time? Hmmm…
A great read, IR. I’ll order 3 copies, please.
The list of lenders towards the end of your intro, are those amounts in millions? Or maybe even billions, of dollars?
I wish I knew how to get published. You should definitely get an agent and pursue the “real” publishers. This topic is so hot right now, I think it’ll fly with the big presses, especially those in New York. New Yorkers love to read how crazy it is in California, that’s the east coast’s flavor of schadenfreude.
Don’t self-publish! You have a serious body of work here, so it should be treated as such.
I’m putting my photography book on blurb.com because people emailed me, wanting to buy my photographs after seeing them on flickr. It’s a temporary fix to satisfy those folks, and just as a fun thing for me to see where it goes. Your project is different, and it deserves a real publishing house.
As always, I look forward to you and your wife’s house-warming party in Shady Canyon.
Even for a Canadian this blog is a great read and very enlightening but now a book! and then a movie! and then……wow!
Put me on the list.
put down the kool-aid
I love the idea of a 28% DTI limit based off 30 year fixed rate loans for qualification.
If wide spread, this means so much more money in people’s pockets for both savings and non-essential spending. This could be the basis for sustainable economic growth, as opposed to credit-fulled leveraged growth we’ve been burning through since at least the 80s I would guess.
My potential worry is that similar protection for renters will be needed to protect against rent-bubbles. And rent-bubbles could help sustain housing bubbles as well in the income model (though they should be smaller). The anecdotal data I’m worried about is San Francisco starting in the late 80s. My sister moved out there in ~1992 to crappy little apartments at a rent of about $800/month. By the time they got their last apartment in say 1995ish it was a 1 bedroom ~700 sq ft. place with character for $1200/month. At that point they stayed there for as long as they could, until in it’s infinite wisdom a rent-control reprieve was enacted. Previously there was a cap on the yearly rental increase of maybe 2-3%. But around 2000, this was deemed unfair to long-time landlords and their rent went to market prices of about $2000/month. At this point they needed a bigger place anyway starting a family and bought a ~1200 sq ft 2 bed 2 bath condo in Oakland for $450k. What’s nuts about this, is that given “fundamentals” this was not far off rental income for the place at the time with a rent to own ratio of about 150. Now. what I don’t know is whether in fact the rents themselves were driven up by the existing house-price increases or not. My guess is, only partly. There was a huge influx of new people to the area, and they were largely not buyers yet. So while your 28% DTI, income-value solution will prevent bubbles in flatland and lessen bubbles in places like the OC, it won’t necessarily create affordability for everyone, and given that renters are amongst the voters with the least clout, bad things could again be in store. The government backed down-payments are part of the solution, so that people can get out of expensive rentals and into less expensive home-owning, but I don’t know how this will all play out.
Best I could do for unintended consequences.
sign up:
http://www.angryrenter.com/
I’m being forced out of my current home rental situation because the owners are selling yet again for the third time in two years with unrealistic price expectations. They have had umpteen people march through the house while I am trying to make time to see rental homes and pack up, but the only comment those people make is that the price is too high and yet the owners will not extend my stay while I continue to look.There is a great story here if you are intrigued…
I am only finding more “floplords” as you call them out there and am very frustrated with the lack of certainty that any of them can give me that they plan to stay a rental home. I am just not ready to buy right now. Any tips on how to tell for myself?
Check out http://www.lulu.com
Very easy. A friend was able to publish on that platform in a few hours.
I read the post, downloaded the book, skimmed and then…
I couldn’t resist drafting up a book cover.
Here it is:
http://www.pixelslide.com/quickStuff/HousingBubble/The_Great_Housing_Bubble_Book_Cover_01_onJacket.jpg
Here’s the straight take:
http://www.pixelslide.com/quickStuff/HousingBubble/The_Great_Housing_Bubble_Book_Cover_01.jpg
and an alternate layout:
http://www.pixelslide.com/quickStuff/HousingBubble/The_Great_Housing_Bubble_Book_Cover_02.jpg
Hope you enjoy!
That is an awesome cover design! Thanks for taking the time to do that JesseBee. You have a real talent in design.
I really hope IR uses it.
😆 Ha! Cool! Glad you liked it! I kept checking back on the post all day to see if anyone noticed… I was going to say in my post that I’d be willing to help with any graphics, photography or illustrations for the book and then I thought I’d just do something instead…
So.
Here’s an offer:
If Irvine Renter needs/wants any help with graphic design, photography or illustration, just let me know… I’d be happy to help!
Hey jessebee, are you a member of the forums? If not, check out the thread here https://www.irvinehousingblog.com/forums/viewthread/2116/
Once you are a member, you can send private messages, and it is easier to get in contact with me or IR. Hope to see you in the forums.
Very cool. Thank you.