From HousingWire:
Programs save 1.5 million homeowners: Obama Housing Scorecard
The Obama Administration’s foreclosure mitigation programs continue to provide relief for millions of homeowners in the housing recovery.
As a result, the Making Home Affordable Program has assisted more than 1.5 million distressed borrowers since its inception in 2009, the Obama Administration said in its February Housing Scorecard report.
HOPE Now lenders alone offered families and individuals more than 3.4 million proprietary mortgage modifications from the program’s beginnings through December 2012.
The Home Affordable Refinance Program also grew, continuing to offer homeowners affordable and sustainable relief to avoid foreclosure.
As of January, more than 1.1 million homeowners received a permanent modification through Home Affordable Modification Program, saving $546 on their monthly mortgage payments, and an estimated $17.9 billion altogether, the report noted.
Homeowners currently in permanent HAMP modifications were granted about $9.2 billion in total principal reduction. Of all non-agency loans eligible for principal reduction entering HAMP in January, 69% received a principal writedown.
The Federal Housing Administration has offered more than 1.6 million in loss mitigation and early delinquency interventions since the launch of HAMP.
In January, more than 105,000 second-lien modifications were completed through the Second Lien Modification Program. Additionally, more than 114,000 homeowners exited their homes through a short sale or deed-in-lieu of foreclosure with the assistance of the government’s Home Affordable Foreclosure Alternatives Program.
From the NYT:
The Time, and Place, to Buy
As both mortgage rates and housing prices head higher, home buyers may be wondering whether they ought to settle for whatever property they can get now, rather than risk paying more later.
The answer depends on where you’re buying. Interest rates aren’t expected to rise much this year, but the same cannot be said for prices.
Economists in recent interviews agreed that the rate for a 30-year fixed mortgage was unlikely to rise much above 4 percent this year. House prices, however, are rising nearly everywhere, and nowhere as rapidly as in the Sunbelt states.
The national average for a 30-year fixed-rate mortgage was 3.52 percent, according to Freddie Mac’s weekly survey released on Thursday, up from 3.51 percent the previous week. The average rate for a 5/1 adjustable-rate mortgage was 2.63 percent, up from 2.61 percent.
Despite an upward trend over the last few months, the 30-year rate is unlikely to rise beyond 3.75 percent “for the foreseeable future,” said Keith T. Gumbinger, the vice president of HSH.com, a financial publisher.Stan Humphries, the chief economist of Zillow.com, agreed. Given the Federal Reserve’s continuing effort to keep rates down, and barring unexpectedly fast economic growth, he said, “it feels like we’re in an environment for the next year, year and a half of really low rates.”
Homeowners hoping to refinance a loan are likely to be the most sensitive to incremental upticks in what are still attractive lending rates, said Jed Kolko, the chief economist of Trulia.com. Indeed, the Mortgage Bankers Association predicts that by year-end, refi volume will shrink to 40 percent of all mortgage originations, versus 75 percent in 2012. Another association prediction for year-end: the 30-year rate will be about 4.4 percent.
Buyers, on the other hand, may be in a stronger position. “When rates are rising, it’s because the economy is improving,” Mr. Kolko said, “so buyers are in a better position to put down the down payment and qualify for a mortgage.”
…
In much of New York, New Jersey and Connecticut, buyers need not be so concerned about beating price appreciation. All three still have a backlog of foreclosures yet to make their way through the courts. A “looming shadow inventory” could keep prices fairly flat this year, with Manhattan the exception, Mr. Yun said.
“As anyone of moderate income who has wanted to buy a house or condo in the Northeast knows, young couples and families are increasingly being priced out of the market.”
– Lisa Prevost (author of NY Times article above) from her upcoming book, Snob Zones: Fear, Prejudice, and Real Estate
http://www.amazon.com/Snob-Zones-Fear-Prejudice-Estate/dp/0807001570
She’s also a realtor in Mumford, NY.
Good Morning New Jersey
Yield MFers..
Does economic anxiety help sell homes? I don’t think so.
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/middle-class-expenses-grow-faster-111900178.html
re# 2 – Mumford? Sat maps show lots of single wides.
Doesn’t she say she lives in CT? Mumford is Rochester.
re # 1 Grim – “When rates are rising, it’s because the economy is improving”.
Pravda’s article mentions the Fed but not to the degree they are effecting the Mortgage Market and how it is being manipulated. When the Federal Reserve buys mortgage bonds in the market, it actually increases banks mortgage profits since it increase the size of the markup banks take when they sell their mortgages. The historical markup was about 0.5% now it is closer to 1.25%. Banks that bundle and sell MBS if they were competitive could easily pass on real savings to homeowners by reducing their profits to the historical norm of 0.5%. But we have a buyer right the Fed now sucking up all of the MBS to the tune right now of about 18 Billion a week, nobody is going to outbid them for the bonds. There is no competition only manipulation and there in lies the lie that Pravda is promoting today that the economy is really and truly recovering.
History rhymes, and we are Japan, circa 1995, just like them right before the next recession or crisis strikes another killer blow, and they the Fed will have to intervene again. How much $$$ next time is the question?
Go Cats!
“Our national educational aspirations and the debt crisis that they’re creating are colliding. We are on an unsustainable track. This will not end well.”
Above from an op-ed piece in today’s Times. I had to double check the author; the above quote sounds straight from Clot.
4 This was one of the responses to that Yahoo article : If the Bruister family lost $270 a month to the 2% payroll tax increase, they are making about $162,000 / year. ( 270/.02 = 13,500 mo x 12 mos =$162,000). Very good money for Mississippi. And not much of an argument for this article.
Cheers Mike
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