09/30/2009 - Stabilization Seen in Housing Market - MF Global Head of Sales Manus Cranny says stabilization in the housing market is a huge positive. - www.foxbusiness.com

09/30/2009 - Housing's Fake Band-Aid - We break down why the good news coming from the housing sector might not be sustainable. - www.foxbusiness.com

09/29/2009 - Foreclosure blight: The cleanup crawls along - The Neighborhood Stabilization Program, passed by Congress last year, gives states and localities money to acquire and rehabilitate abandoned properties. The big problem: officials are having trouble getting their hands on those houses, which are being
www.cnn.com - VIDEO -
Read More: SCOOPED UP FORECLOSURES, A YEAR AFTER it's ENACTMENT

09/29/2009 - Foreclosure crisis: The $4 billion fix - Washington will give funds to states and cities to rehab houses. Proponents say it will help stabilize neighborhoods, but others say it's too little to do much good. - www.cnn.com

09/29/2009 - Government's New Programs Aim To Buy Buy Banks' Bad Assets, Help Home Buyers - Since July, the Treasury Department has been working with a group of private firms to build investment funds that would combine public and private resources to buy troubled bank securities. The firms plan to buy the assets at bargain prices in hopes that they will turn profitable over time. - www.washingtonpost.com

09/29/2009 - Index Shows Boost In Home Prices For The Third Straight Month - Home prices rose for the third month in a row in July, new data Tuesday showed, more proof a fragile housing recover is underway. - www.huffingtonpost.com

09/29/2009 - Subprime Uncle Sam "UNCLE SAM'S TRILLION-DOLLAR GAMBLE" - The FHA makes Countrywide Financial look prudent. Unfortunately, Washington won't touch more significant reforms for fear of angering the powerful nexus of Realtors, mortgage bankers and home builders. - www.huffingtonpost.com

09/28/2009 - Income Inequality Widens, Poor Take Big Hit During Recession - The wealthiest 10 percent of Americans - those making more than $138,000 each year - earned 11.4 times the roughly $12,000 made by those living near or below the poverty line in 2008. - www.huffingtonpost.com

09/27/2009 - State and Local Housing To Get $35 Billion Boost - The move would further cement the government's role in propping up the housing market even as some lawmakers push to curb spending at a time of rising debt. - www.wsj.com

09/27/2009 - Tow to apply for the $8,000 first-time buyer tax credit - There's still time to apply for the $8,000 federal tax credit, but you'd better hurry. Here's what you need to know. - www.sun-sentinel.com

09/27/2009 - The $8,000 first-time owner tax credit may get a new life - As a result of the 36-month rule, many military and diplomatic employees have been hesitant to buy a house and claim the credit, or are worried that their absence from the country could force them to repay the money. - www.heraldtribune.com

09/26/2009 - Payback time for homebuyer tax credit - There's a lot of confusion surrounding the housing tax credits for first-time buyers. Here are some answers. - www.cnn.com

09/25/2009 - Mortgage-mod program questioned, protested - "Getting a homeowner's DTI (debt-to-income) ratio to 31 percent won't help the unemployed, since 31 percent of their income is zero," said Paul Willen, senior economist and policy adviser Federal Reserve Bank of Boston. - www.miamiherald.com

09/27/2009 - What the housing 'rebound' means for you - Homes are selling again, but what's the best strategy to unload yours? Your best strategy depends on where your home sits on that spectrum. - www.miamiherald.com

09/25/2009 - Raising $250,000 - without a bank. Looking beyond loans: Where to find financing now - Bank vaults have been slammed shut this year to small businesses, but entrepreneurs are pulling cash from other places to get their ventures off the ground. - www.cnnmoney.cnn.com

09/25/2009 - Shiller on Housing Slowdown - Prof. Robert Shiller on whether the current slowdown is a glimpse of the housing industry. - www.huffingtonpost.com

 

09/25/2009 - Loyal Employee Burned By Bankruptcy Considering Revenge Default On Mortgage - Now, stuck in a home she bought on that small acreage in Maysville (pop. 1,247) just one week before the bankruptcy filing, Amick is pondering revenge. - www.huffingtonpost.com

09/25/2009 - Banks Aim To Kill Consumer Protection Agency - the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is leading the fight against the proposed agency on grounds that it would make credit less available and more costly. The American Bankers Association, the Independent Community Bankers of America, and the Financial Services Roundtable also oppose the measure. - www.mcclatchydc.com

09/24/2009 - A Tale of Two Bailouts. Why The Housing Market Bailout Won't End Any Time Soon - Newsweek: Mortgage Market: U.S. Government Still Propping Up Real Estate: there's a new subprime lender in town: the First National Bank of You and Me. - www.newsweek.com

09/21/2009 - U.S. bolsters FHA program that insures home loans - More homebuyers depend on government-insured FHA loans and defaults are rising. Federal housing officials take steps to lower the program's risk. - www.cnn.com

09/16/2009 - LANDMARK DECISION PROMISES MASSIVE RELIEF FOR HOMEOWNERS AND TROUBLE FOR BANKS - the Kansas Supreme Court held that a nominee company called MERS has no right or standing to bring an action for foreclosure. MERS is an acronym for Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems, a private company that registers mortgages electronically and tracks changes in ownership. - www.opednews.com
Read More: Landmark National Bank v. Kesler, 2009 Kan. LEXIS 834, 60 million mortgages, California attorney Timothy McCandless, MERS, U.S. District Court Judge Christopher Boyko, Ellen Brown author

09/21/2009 - Mortgage Holders With High Credit Scores Are Leaving Their Homes - Homeowners who 'strategically default' on loans a growing problem. With foreclosures, delinquencies and loan losses at record levels, strategic defaults and walkaways are among the hottest subjects in residential real estate finance. - www.latimes.com

09/20/2009 - The Geriatric Bandits: Not Your Usual Suspects - Meet the Geriatric Bandits: One has a cane, the other needs an oxygen mask. They're old enough to be your grandfather. This past week, they've both robbed banks. And one is still at large. - www.nbcsandiego.com

09/20/2009 - Why The Bailout Money Should Have Gone To Real People, Not Banks - "there are a lot of Americans who understandably think that government money would be better spent going directly to families and businesses instead of banks - "where's our bailout?," they ask". - www.nakedcapitalism.com

09/18/2009 - Renting vs. Buying a Home - Amir Korangy, founder of The Real Deal, on whether it's a good time to buy a home. - www.foxbusiness.com

 

09/18/2009 - Treasury: Unemployed Homeowners Could Get Financial Assistance - Proposals include getting servicers to let jobless homeowners skip some monthly payments, according to Faith Schwartz, executive director of Hope Now. - www.usatoday.com

09/18/2009 - "Option" mortgages to explode, officials warn - The federal government and states are girding themselves for the next foreclosure crisis in the country's housing downturn: payment option adjustable rate mortgages that are beginning to reset. - www.reuters.com

09/17/2009 - Homeowners leave it all after a foreclosure, and someone has to clean it up - The trash-out business has spiked in recent years along with the number of foreclosures across the country. Debris disposal is just one of many "property-preservation services" companies large and small provide to banks that have foreclosed on homes - www.twincities.com

09/17/2009 - Officials Promise to Fight Scams Targeting Homeowners - Lenders and consumer advocates complain that the firms are charging for a service that can be obtained free through a housing counselor. Federal officials say the services often do not bring results and, in some cases, are outright scams. - www.washingtonpost.com

09/16/2009 - Commercial Real Estate the Next Bubble? - John Levy, president of the John B. Levy & Company, on whether the sector is really in such bad shape. - www.foxbusiness.com

 

09/16/2009 - Credit Swaps Are Back En Vogue As Market Confidence Returns - the financial instrument that helped bring down AIG and played a key role in causing the biggest financial crisis since the 1930s -- are, a year after the fall of Lehman Brothers, back en vogue on Wall Street . - www.huffingtonpost.com
Read More: Credit Default Swaps, Credit Derivatives Research, Financial Crisis

09/15/2009 - Fight Looms in Congress on Tax Break for Home Buyers - Analysts say the credit is directly responsible for several hundred thousand home sales. Now the question is becoming whether the housing market can function without it. - www.nytimes.com

09/15/2009 - For Thousands, Home Loan Modifications Are Actually Making Things Worse - Tens of thousands of financially strapped homeowners who have asked lenders to lower their mortgage payments are instead winding up with higher monthly payments and larger debts on their homes. - www.usatoday.com

09/15/2009 - Foreign buyers avoiding U.S. homes - Almost half of international home buyers pay cash to dodge difficulty of securing a mortgage, survey finds. - www.cnn.com

09/14/2009 - Unable To Sell Their Houses, Millions Of Homeowners Are Turning Into Landlords - Homeowners unable to keep up with monthly mortgage payments are renting out their homes or rooms in their homes to help cover costs, recently-built condominiums originally slated for sale are instead being converted into rental apartments and buyers of foreclosed properties are renting out the homes rather than selling them. - www.huffingtonpost.com

09/14/2009 - DEBTORS REVOLT BEGINS NOW! - Debtor's Revolt: Woman Refuses To Pay Off Bank Of America Credit Card (VIDEO) - Bank of America rewarded her loyalty this year by repeatedly raising her interest rate, which reached 30 percent in July - www.huffingtonpost.com

09/12/2009 - FDIC pushes mortgage help for jobless - Some unemployed homeowners at risk for foreclosure could get a temporary break on their mortgage payments under a plan being pushed by the FDIC. - www.cnn.com

09/10/2009 - Finally, Americans are saving. For retailers, that's a disaster - Whether it's because of job losses, uncertainty about employment, banks tightening lending, high debt or eroding income, the U.S. consumer is tightening her belt and doing without. - www.mcclatchydc.com

09/10/2009 - Robocalls Banned By Government? Not So Much - Among the unaffected mortgage lenders are banks and other financial institutions. The ban also does not apply to insurance companies, telephone carriers, politicians, most charitable organizations. - www.huffingtonpost.com

09/10/2009 - Deadline looms for first-time home buyers, but where's promised cash? - Only a few tenacious South Florida home buyers are likely to get a timely advance on the $8,000 federal income tax credit for first-time home buyers that the Florida Legislature approved this year. - www.sun-sentinel.com

09/10/2009 - Florida had the nation's second-highest foreclosure rate in August - and filings soared in Palm Beach and Broward counties, according to data being released Thursday by RealtyTrac Inc. - www.sun-sentinel.com

09/10/2009 - Backlash against banks growing over mortgage modifications - It's not hard to see why. While banks and loan servicers have promised for almost three years to better address rising stresses on their home loan borrowers, foreclosures and defaults still haven't seriously slowed - www.miamiherald.com

09/10/2009 - Best place to haggle your home price? Florida - Nationally, homebuyers negotiated a median discount of 3.3% in August. Of the 25 cities with biggest median discounts, 14 were in Florida. - www.cnn.com

09/10/2009 - Repossessions drop, but mortgage payments lag - Report indicates that government modifications may be working, but that banks may just be delaying action. - www.cnn.com

09/09/2009 - Priceless: How The Federal Reserve Bought The Economics Profession - The Fed failed to see the housing bubble as it happened, insisting that the rise in housing prices was normal. The Fed has been dominating the profession for about three decades. - www.huffingtonpost.com

09/09/2009 - One Year After Takeover, Problems Still Growing At Fannie, Freddie - The companies are unlikely to return to their former power and influence, the bailout is sure to cost taxpayers even more money and the government will have a big role in the U.S. mortgage market for years to come. - www.huffingtonpost.com

09/09/2009 - Alan Greenspan: Market Crisis "Will Happen Again" - The world will suffer another financial crisis, former Federal Reserve chief Alan Greenspan has told the BBC. - news.bbc.co.uk

09/09/2009 - The Recovery May Depend On Luring Luxury Buyers...But Will Consumer Spending Ever Recover? - The top 20 percent of the nation's households -- with income of at least $150,000 -- account for 40 percent of all spending, according to government data. That makes them a crucial spoke to any turnaround. - www.washingtonpost.com

09/09/2009 - Cramdown Is Back: Banks Against Homeowners, Round 2 - House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank (D-Mass.) tells the Huffington Post he plans to revive the effort to give bankruptcy judges the authority to renegotiate home mortgages - www.huffingtonpost.com

09/08/2009 - Eligible For Help Under Obama Plan But Still Facing Foreclosure - Her bank, JPMorgan Chase, lost her paperwork and then denied her application on May 8 because it was incomplete. She has reapplied twice and each time the bank has claimed it is missing documents that Whitaker says she sent more than once. - www.huffingtonpost.com

09/08/2009 - A year after financial crisis, the consumer economy is dead - One year after the near collapse of the global financial system, this much is clear: The financial world as we knew it is over, and something new is rising from its ashes. - www.mcclatchydc.com

09/07/2009 - Owners of new homes suffer when lenders back out - As property values plummet, those caught midway through new home construction learn an awful fact: They can't find a lender willing to give them a loan. Just before the closing, the lender backed out, saying the home was no longer worth the original loan amount. - www.heraldtribune.com

09/07/2009 - WATCH: How Your Favorite TV Shows Are Handling The Recession - While veteran shows struggle to incorporate the ailing economy into their story lines, networks are launching new shows born of the recession. - www.huffingtonpost.com

09/07/2009 - Nearly 90% Of All New Home Loans Are Funded Or Backed By U.S. Government - Classes of Borrowers Cannot Find Loans as Publicly Backed Debt Mounts - The government has the power to decide who is qualified for a loan and who is not. As a result, many borrowers among both poor and rich are frozen out of the market. - www.washingtonpost.com

09/06/2009 - Saving homeowners - 1 at a time - Housing counselors in New Haven struggle to help an avalanche of distressed borrowers avoid foreclosures. - www.cnn.com

09/05/2009 - G-20 Promises Crackdown On Bankers' Pay - Instead, the G-20 proposed clawback mechanisms to ensure that bonuses are linked to the long-term success of deals and could be forfeited if they fail to deliver over a period of years. - www.huffingtonpost.com

09/04/2009 - NYT: One-Sixth Of All Construction Loans Are In Trouble - With more than half a trillion dollars in such loans outstanding, that represents a source of major losses for banks. - www.nytimes.com

09/04/2009 - The Rise Of Fed-Up Judges: Frustration Mounts Over Lack Of Due Diligence By Banks In Foreclosures - "Bankruptcy judges are more frequently expressing this frustration about lack of responsible record keeping by the financial services industry," said Robert Lawless, a law professor at the University of Illinois, in an interview with the Huffington Post. - www.huffingtonpost.com

09/04/2009 - Not all qualify for first-time home buyer tax credit - Buyers expecting to get the first-time home buyer tax credit should check the fine print. They may not qualify. - www.miamiherald.com

09/04/2009 - Troubles For 'Prime' Borrowers Intensify - The pace of delinquencies for prime borrowers is accelerating. Since prime loans account for 80% of U.S. bank exposure to mortgages and credit cards, these losses could ultimately exceed those from weaker borrowers. - www.wsj.com

09/04/2009 - Where Are The Handcuffs Now? Thousands Of Bankers Went To Jail During S&L Crisis - Why? In part, it may be a matter of timing. The wheels of American justice often grind slowly, and many cases are now passing through the system. - www.ft.com

09/04/2009 - WHAT RECOVERY? Even The Most Credit-Worthy Borrowers Are Falling Behind On Mortgage And Credit-Card Payments - Despite Talk Of Recovery, Long Recession Is Taking Toll On The Most Credit-Worthy Borrowers - www.huffingtonpost.com

09/03/2009 - McMansions are out; affordable shelter' is in - As the McMansion boom goes bust, the focus is moving toward high-density, single-family houses on small lots - www.miamiherald.com

09/03/2009 - Caught up in the economy's undertow - John Montgomery is a property appraiser who loves being a property appraiser the way a pilot loves being a pilot or a cop loves being a cop or a teacher loves being a teacher. - www.miamiherald.com

09/01/2009 - Home prices are likely to continue to fall; -
Here're some strategies for making a purchase decision.

09/01/2009 - IRS to Mine Mortgage-Payment Data - To Catch Tax Cheats, Agency May Soon Audit Your Mortgage Payments. - www.filife.com

09/01/2009 - The housing recovery mirage - With home prices rising even in California, it might seem that the worst is over for the housing market. But the good vibrations may be short lived. - www.cnn.com

09/01/2009 - Homeowners frustrated by mortgage assistance program - The Kollars thought they had one last hope: the Making Home Affordable program, which should have reduced their monthly mortgage to affordable payments. - www.cnn.com

09/01/2009 - Only 6 Percent Of Eligible Homeowners Have Gotten Help Through Obama's Housing Program - Are the new program's growing pains responsible for the slow start, as bankers say, or is pain to their bottom lines really preventing the program from working, as critics say? - www.cnn.com