Florida’s governor is bullish on construction. Whether or not the legislature goes along with these stimulus packages remains to be seen, but if you build in Florida there could be a multitude of projects coming up. This tracks along with what we’ve been seeing. The housing sector is attracting bail-out schemes and the public sector is racing to build projects in the face of a growing bond market. The interest in bonds has been fueled by the failings of the high risk sub-prime mortgage market. Investors want safety and bonds provide that, albeit at much lower earnings ratios.

What’s interesting about this Florida initiative is that they are tying in the transportation sector by fast tracking road construction and port improvement projects.

If you are a first time home buyer in Florida you could get up to $10,000 for a down payment and closing costs along with an interest rate a quarter percent less than the market rate. This money is coming from the state’s trust fund reserves (hmmm), and whether or not this will stimulate home building will depend upon the inventories there.

On the bond side the effort is toward building schools, community colleges and state universities and the mechanism that will allow that is the early release of funds.

I don’t know but when I see things like dipping into trust fund reserves to help people invest in homes when they don’t already have the money, I begin to think about the current and on-going sub-prime mortgage debacle. Is this really any different? And why exactly are the bond funds being released early? It just seems like there may be very little left of a market-controlled economy and so I wonder then who will have control?

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