Tiz’s Door Sales, an Everett business for the past 45 years, has apparently closed, a victim of the housing crisis. Opened by the Tisdel family, the company sold doors to builders. It had 29 employees, according to a worker. She said the company held a meeting Tuesday with employees to say it was closing. An effort to reach company officials Wednesday for comment was unsuccessful.
State adds jobs but jobless grow
Washington’s economy is slowly adding jobs, but not quickly enough to have a serious impact on the state’s unemployment rate, officials said Wednesday. In a report Wednesday from the Employment Security Department, economists found mixed signals about the Washington economy for the month of June. The state’s unemployment rate grew to 9.2 percent, up from 9.1 percent in May, even though a separate indicator showed that the state added 3,600 jobs — boosted by a private-sector expansion. Dave Wallace, the department’s acting chief economist, said the state would have to add roughly 6,000 jobs a month for a year to reduce the unemployment rate by 1 percentage point. “It’s less than ideal growth, but we are moving forward,” Wallace said.
Wells Fargo pays to settle charges
Wells Fargo & Co. has agreed to pay $85 million to settle civil charges that it falsified loan documents and pushed borrowers toward subprime mortgages with higher interest rates during the housing boom. The fine is the largest ever imposed by the Federal Reserve in a consumer-enforcement case, the central bank said Wednesday. Wells Fargo, the nation’s largest mortgage lender, neither admitted nor denied wrongdoing as part of the settlement. The bank agreed to compensate borrowers who were steered into higher-priced loans or whose income was exaggerated. The Fed alleged that Wells Fargo inflated borrowers’ incomes on loan documents to qualify for mortgages they otherwise couldn’t afford from 2004 until 2008. Wells Fargo sales personnel also pushed borrowers toward higher-interest, subprime loans, even though they were eligible for lower rates, the central bank said.
EBay acquisition stifles profits
EBay Inc. says its second-quarter profit fell 31 percent, as growth in its online marketplace and PayPal payment service was overshadowed by charges related to its recent acquisition of GSI Commerce. However, the San Jose-based e-commerce company’s results easily beat analysts’ forecasts, as PayPal gained members and the value of merchandise sold through eBay.com rose. For the quarter that ended June 30, eBay earned $283.4 million, or 22 cents per share, compared with $412 million, or 31 cents per share, a year earlier. Excluding one-time items, the company earned 48 cents per share — 2 cents more than what analysts expected.
From Herald staff and news services
Talk to us
> Give us your news tips.
> Send us a letter to the editor.
> More Herald contact information.
