Fort Monmouth Closes

Posted on September 15, 2011 by grim

From the Record:

New Jersey’s Fort Monmouth closing after 94 years

Anyone who has ever listened to FM radio, gotten a speeding ticket or wondered whether there is life on other planets has been affected by New Jersey’s Fort Monmouth.

The work done at the sprawling base near the Jersey shore led to communications advances including the development of FM radio, radar, and the ability to bounce signals off the moon to prove the feasibility of extraterrestrial radio communication. It launched the first radio-equipped weather balloon, and hosted hundreds of message-bearing courier pigeons that served in the two world wars.
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But the fort’s time is up. On Thursday, after 94 years of helping warriors communicate with each other while keeping tabs on the enemy, Fort Monmouth is closing, the victim of congressional budget cutting. Most of its thousands of jobs have been transferred to the Aberdeen Proving Grounds in Maryland.

“It’s sad. It’s depressing,” said Tom Hipper of Little Silver, a division chief who rode his motorcycle out the fort’s main gate Wednesday for the next-to-last time. “I just think it was all politics.
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The base’s fate was sealed in 2005 when the Base Realignment and Closure Commission included Fort Monmouth in a list of military facilities it would close to save money. The commission estimated it would cost $782 million to move the fort’s mission to Maryland, but the cost rose to nearly $2 billion by 2008, leaving a bitter taste in the mouths of many locals who depend on the base for jobs.
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Of the 5,570 civilian and military jobs at the fort, 5,400 were to be transferred to Maryland. There were 3,144 civilian employees who took the Army up on its offer to move, Kearney said.

Posted in Economics, Employment, New Jersey Real Estate | 164 Comments

Obsessed with fixing the unfixable

Posted on September 14, 2011 by grim

There is an easy fix for negative equity. All we need to do is pick who loses. Do we (taxpayers) want to lose? Should the homeowner lose? Should the banks lose? Should investors lose? Should we all lose?

From HousingWire:

More than 22% of mortgages still underwater

Nearly 11 million properties, roughly 22.5% of all U.S. homes, were worth less than the underlying mortgage in the second quarter, according to CoreLogic.

The percentage of properties in negative equity declined slightly from 22.7% the previous quarter and down from 24% one year ago. Another 2.4 million borrowers held less than 5% equity in their home, what analysts call near-negative equity. CoreLogic also showed nearly three-quarters of all underwater borrowers are paying above-market interest on their home loans.

“High negative equity is holding back refinancing and sales activity and is a major impediment to the housing market recovery,” said Mark Fleming, CoreLogic chief economist.

More borrowers could be in danger of falling underwater. JPMorgan Chase analysts expect home prices to drop another 5% by the beginning of 2012, pushing the amount of underwater borrowers to 15 million, according to a research note released earlier in the month. If prices drop more, possibly 10% further, the number of borrowers in negative equity would approach 20 million.

The Obama administration continues working on a proposal to boost refinancings, which many include eliminating some negative equity restrictions on Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac loans. Some analysts believe such a program would have only modest impact, but CoreLogic showed nearly 28 million outstanding mortgages hold above-market rates and, in theory, should be able to refinance.
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“The hardest hit markets have improved over the last year, primarily as a result of foreclosures. But nationally, the level of mortgage debt remains high relative to home prices,” CoreLogic said.

Posted in Employment, Foreclosures, National Real Estate | 152 Comments

Support for O’s housing bailout already waining

Posted on September 13, 2011 by grim

From CNBC:

‘Friction’ in Obama’s Refi Proposal

The response to President Obama’s recent proposal to refinance more borrowers into lower interest rate mortgages was at best underwhelming and at worst scathing. The plan would expand the government’s so-far disappointing, Home Affordable Refinance Program (HARP), which helps current but underwater borrowers with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac loans to refinance.

“Mr. President, the housing market is the foundation of the U.S. economy. It is cracked and chipping away,” writes Florida real estate consultant Jack McCabe in an editorial in the Herald-Tribune.

“The walls are beginning to cave. Your answer, anecdotally, seems to be put a new roof on it.”
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Unfortunately the plan, which could allow borrowers with more than 25 percent in negative equity to refinance, is being deemed too costly as well. While the Congressional Budget Office estimated it would cost investors in the original mortgages between $13 and $15 billion (while potentially saving 111,000 borrowers from defaulting), analysts at JP Morgan Chase say it would cost more:

If such a policy were successful on a large scale, it would clearly devalue higher coupons, and would threaten lower coupons with incremental gross supply. A more modest HARP overhaul, while less disruptive, still forces investors to require more conservative valuations until details emerge.

All these arguments, however, may be moot, as the overseer of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA), which would have to approve the refinance effort, is sounding wildly cautious. In a statement following the President’s speech, Director Ed DeMarco states, “If there are frictions associated with the origination of HARP loans that can be eased while still achieving the program’s intent of assisting borrowers and reducing credit risk for the Enterprises, we will seek to do so.”
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Then there are issues of loan origination dates, put-backs on loans that default and borrower qualifications. Frictions. Beyond the friction, however, is the simple fact that a refinance program, while potentially an economic stimulus, is not a housing stimulus and shouldn’t be characterized as such. The HARP program is and always was for current borrowers and does nothing to address the millions of non-current borrowers, bank-owned foreclosed homes and falling home prices.

Posted in Economics, National Real Estate, Politics | 129 Comments

Screwed over a second time

Posted on September 12, 2011 by grim

From the NY Post:

$1T in sour notes

It’s the flip side of foreclosure fraud: Not only is the city fireman in danger of losing his home, he also might wind up with smaller retirement checks because his pension invested in home-mortgage-backed bonds that were bundled and sold off by banks during the real-estate bubble.

Pension funds, insurance companies, university endowments, charities, community banks and other investors are believed to be out hundreds of billions of dollars because of the mess big banks made of the housing market.

Although lawsuits against banks are mounting, the disputes over the almost $1 trillion in mortgage securities may take years to resolve — and most investors are likely to wind up with only cents on the dollar.

“It comes out of our pockets,” says Peter Henning, a Wayne State University law professor and securities-law expert. “No one reached into your wallet and took out cash, but it impacts all of us. If you’re a mutual-fund holder with a bond fund, you’ve probably taken a hit. Insurance companies have losses, and that cost has to get passed on.”

Investors are getting aggressive about getting money back, but they recognize that only a small amount might get recovered, says Steve Toll, a partner at law firm Cohen Milstein, lead counsel in eight class-action lawsuits over mortgage-backed securities.

“We’re trying to get as much as we can for investors, but there’s never enough money to go around,” he says.

Posted in Foreclosures, Housing Bubble, Risky Lending | 62 Comments

Take Three! (or is it Four?)

Posted on September 10, 2011 by grim

From the Asbury Park Press:

Developer buys Asbury beachfront site

Asbury Partners, the city’s waterfront developer, has bought the unfinished Esperanza high-rise site from Capital One Bank, which had foreclosed on the project, a company official said Friday.

The beachfront site on Ocean Avenue between Third and Fourth avenues is considered a key development parcel and central to the overall waterfront landscape.

But it has been jinxed. For 17 years, the former unfinished high-rise known as “C-8” sat abandoned, a symbol of the earlier failed waterfront redevelopment of the 1980s.

Then, Metro Homes bought the site and imploded the skeleton highrise in the spring of 2006. The Hoboken developer set out to build the dramatic 224-unit Esperanza full of flair and wavy architecture. But the national mortgage crisis set in and in December 2007, Metro Homes closed down the construction site.

“This property is critical to putting the larger waterfront redevelopment back on track,” said Brian Cheripka, a vice president with iStar Financial Inc., which took over ownership of Asbury Partners in December 2009 when the former Asbury Partners’ principals could not repay $70 million in loans.
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“I think it’s a great step forward and an exciting development, especially for that parcel of land which has just had so many false starts,” Mayor Ed Johnson said Friday. “I remain hopeful and confident that this is its final start, and we will begin to see development start on that site and throughout the waterfront.”

Posted in Housing Recovery, Shore Real Estate | 100 Comments

Why aren’t rock bottom rates spurring sales?

Posted on September 9, 2011 by grim

From HousingWire:

Mortgage interest rates plumb new depths

Continued turmoil in the financial markets, stubbornly high unemployment and economic uncertainty keep pushing mortgage interest rates to new depths, according to Freddie Mac.

The government-sponsored enterprise said its primary mortgage market survey showed the average rate for a 30-year, fixed mortgage fell to 4.12% for the week ending Thursday from 4.22% a week earlier. The interest rate for a traditional mortgage is now at the lowest level in five decades.

The average rate for a 15-year, fixed mortgage decreased to 3.33% from 3.39% the prior week, according to the Freddie Mac survey.
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Mortgage interest rates are considerably lower than the year ago, when the 30-year averaged 4.35% and the average 15-year, fixed mortgage was 3.83%.

Freddie Mac said the average five-year, Treasury-indexed adjustable-rate mortgage stayed flat with the prior week at 2.96% and is down from 3.56% a year ago.

The average rate for a one-year, ARM fell to a new low at 2.84% from 2.89% a week ago. The rate is down from 3.46% at this time last year.

Posted in Economics, National Real Estate | 161 Comments

September Beige Book

Posted on September 8, 2011 by grim

From the Federal Reserve:

Beige Book – New York Region

Construction and Real Estate

Residential construction and home sales have remained sluggish but generally steady since the last report, while there has been further improvement in the rental market. Overall, prices of existing homes have edged up in recent months in many areas but are still down slightly from a year ago across most of the region. Buffalo-area Realtors report that market conditions remained weak in July and early August, with the median selling price little changed from a year earlier, but that a recent increase in pending sales suggests some recent firming in market conditions. An authority on New Jersey’s housing industry reports that a large overhang of distressed properties continues to weigh down the market but that the processing of foreclosures is now resuming; this is expected to lower reported transaction prices, on average, but increase sales activity and gradually reduce the inventory. New construction activity is very low and largely concentrated in the multi-family (rental) segment. A major appraisal firm reports a more-than-typical seasonal drop-off in activity in New York City’s co-op and condo market in August; some of the recent softness is deemed to reflect concern about the city’s financial sector. Still, the markets in Manhattan and nearby Brooklyn are reported to be holding up relatively well, buoyed, in part, by foreign buyers paying cash. New York City’s rental market has shown continued strength: the inventory of available units is down moderately, and rents on new leases continue to climb and are up 5 to 8 percent over the past year.

Posted in Economics, Housing Bubble, Housing Recovery, New Jersey Real Estate | 142 Comments

Cue bailout attempt #74

Posted on September 7, 2011 by grim

From HousingWire:

NY Fed economists urge coordinated mortgage, unemployment aid

Two economists at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York said states can design successful programs to help unemployed borrowers with monthly mortgage payments only if they are tailored to specific state needs.

The New York Fed economists James Orr and Joseph Tracy highlighted Pennsylvania Homeowner’s Emergency Mortgage Assistance Program, which began in 1983. At the time roughly 4% of the state’s labor force spent more than 26 weeks without a job, twice the national average. Delinquencies and foreclosures began to spike.

Through July 2011, the state received more than 183,000 HEMAP applications for bridge loans, designed specifically to provide up to two years of mortgage assistance at a total cap of $60,000. The success of the program, Orr and Tracy found is that program administrators carefully sifted through who should get funding.

Slightly more than 43,000 applicants received a loan. To date, 80% of them were able to stay in the homes and repay the loan in full.

“Lending to a carefully screened group of unemployed borrowers could be a successful strategy for states to assist distressed homeowners, reduce economically inefficient foreclosures, and help stabilize house prices for the benefit of the public at large. This approach avoids the complexity of working with servicers to change mortgage terms,” Orr and Tracy said in a note about their research Tuesday.
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“The program design would have to balance the expected benefits to the homeowner, and the wider community, of providing assistance against the expected costs to taxpayers from default on the loan,” Orr and Tracy said.
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“The logic here is simple: If the problem is the mortgage, fix the mortgage; but if the problem is temporary unemployment, fix the cash flow. Of course, if the problem is both, then tackle each in a coordinated manner,” Orr and Tracy said.

Posted in Economics, Foreclosures, Mortgages, National Real Estate | 109 Comments

Will retiring boomers drive the vacation home market?

Posted on September 6, 2011 by grim

From MarketWatch:

Low prices lure vacation-home buyers

Last year, Kelley and Jeff Barton bought their first vacation home in Mammoth Lakes, Calif., a ski-resort area about 350 miles from where they live in Seal Beach, Calif.

At $200,000, the condo unit was a bargain considering it had been priced at more than $400,000 in the past, said Barton, 52. Plus, since the couple rent out the home when the family isn’t using it, they’re able to cover their mortgage payments and all their expenses — and make a profit.

Lately, more people are wondering if the market is ripe for turning the dream of owning a vacation retreat into a reality.

Prices on vacation homes have fallen even more sharply than on primary homes. Last year alone, the median price of a vacation home fell 11%, while the price of a typical primary residence fell 5%, according to the National Association of Realtors’ annual Investment and Vacation Home Buyers Survey, which includes information from about 1,900 buyers.

In some cases, people are scooping up cabins in the woods for less than $100,000, said Charlie Young, president and chief executive of ERA Real Estate, a residential real-estate brokerage franchiser. Even some individuals who rent their primary residences are looking to buy a vacation property in a more affordable market, Young said.

But unlike a primary residence, a vacation home is a discretionary purchase, and in times of financial uncertainty, people are reluctant to shell out unnecessary funds.

It’s wise to think about a vacation-home purchase carefully, looking at the financial and tax implications, and monthly maintenance costs, said Michael Kay, president of Financial Focus, an investment advisory firm in Livingston, N.J. Potential buyers also should consider the opportunity cost of making the purchase, or the benefits of investing the money elsewhere, he said.
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Dan White, president of Daniel A. White & Associates, a wealth-management firm in the Philadelphia area, said prospective vacation-home buyers need to be cautious before acquiring more debt, carefully considering the stability of their employment before committing to another mortgage. White said he has worked with many people in their 50s who suddenly find themselves out of work. And if they have a second mortgage on a vacation home, that becomes a big problem.

Before buying, you also need to come to terms with how much you really will use the home and how you will maintain it, said Troy Thiel, a real-estate agent with First Weber Group in Madison, Wis.

An important factor for many people is how long it takes them to get to the vacation home: A two-hour drive from their primary residence is often more palatable than a four- to five-hour trip.
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Some baby boomers are seizing an opportunity to get a deal on a vacation home they can enjoy now but that’s also a home that eventually will become their primary residence when they retire, Thiel said.

“That’s one of the primary drivers in the market: people selling their big house and buying a smaller home or condo in their current market and using the equity to purchase the second home,” he said.

According to the National Association of Realtors’ survey, 34% of people who purchased a vacation home in 2010 plan on using that property as a primary residence at some point in the future.

Posted in Economics, Housing Recovery, National Real Estate | 146 Comments

Buyers reminded of what “flood” really means

Posted on September 5, 2011 by grim

From the Star Ledger:

Post Irene, houses for sale in flood zones now give buyers pause

That house for sale on River Road might be viewed a little differently now by prospective homebuyers.

Add to that the storm damages some listed properties suffered in Hurricane Irene and the autumn real estate market in some parts of the state is looking a little shaky.

“Right now, this is fresh in (the buyers’) mind,” said Joanne Liscovitz, a real estate agent with Coldwell Banker in Hillsborough. “This is going to take a while for it to go away — that feeling of, ‘Well, I don’t want to put myself in that situation.’”

Earlier this week, Liscovitz took one property — a three-bedroom house in Manville that was up for a short sale — off the market so its owner could fix flood damage. After Hurricane Floyd in 1999, the owner redid the kitchen and floors, but with Irene, water was up through the basement and into the living areas once again.

It was most recently listed for $189,000, but as soon as buyers see its proximity to a bridge, they tend to waver.

“You can only ask so much money for a house in a flood zone versus not in a flood zone, and there’s a lot of work involved and a lot of inconvenience when you’re the owner,” Liscovitz said.

“Buyers are scared as it is,” she added.

The housing market may be affected more in towns that were affected most by Irene, like like Manville, Fairfield, Wayne, Paterson and Bound Brook.

“Since we’ve had all these floods this year, the flood zone properties have been (hit) very, very hard,” said Joe Palermo, owner of Re/Max Tri-County Realty in Wayne. “There are very few of them actually selling.”
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The storm will have other ramifactions as well. Owners will take their damaged houses off the market for repairs and it could be a while before the properties are ready to show. New kitchens or floors will be one perk for new buyers, but the fact remains — the house is in a flood zone. With Irene fresh on their minds, few buyers are willing to gamble on these kinds of houses, no matter the price.

“Trying to sell a home that’s in a flood plain is challenging at any time,” said Gary Large, branch manager of Prudential New Jersey Properties in Morristown and president-elect of the New Jersey Association of Realtors. “But when you’re coming off a storm (like Irene), obviously buyers are going to be gun-shy.”

Posted in New Jersey Real Estate | 107 Comments

July Contracts Fall Short

Posted on September 2, 2011 by grim

From the Otteau Group

Home Purchase Contracts Losing Steam

Although home purchase contracts in July exceeded the year ago level for the 3rd consecutive month, they appear to be losing strength along with the rest of the economy. During July, the rate at which home buyers signed contracts to purchase existing and new homes was 4% higher than one year ago which follows a 12% increase in June and 13% increase in July. Considering that these recent gains follow 12 straight months of declining purchase activity should be good news for the housing market. But the declining strength of the increases coupled with slowing job growth, recent stock market losses and the debt ceiling crisis suggest that the housing stabilization may be crumbling.

Posted in Economics, Housing Bubble, Housing Recovery, New Jersey Real Estate | 200 Comments

Hidden costs of stockpiling foreclosure inventory

Posted on September 1, 2011 by grim

From the Star Ledger:

Even empty N.J. homes need repair post-Hurricane Irene

Once a house has gone through foreclosure — and is therefore likely unoccupied — who watches out for it during storms like Hurricane Irene?

Even before the properties suffered storm damage, the bank-owned houses already had a negative reputation that they are not properly maintained. Linda Fisher, a law professor at Seton Hall, studies low-income neighborhoods where this “foreclosure contagion” effect is particularly common.

“Given that owners of vacant properties tend not to maintain them well, particularly in declining markets, further property deterioration as a result of a natural disaster is going to exacerbate the problem,” Fisher said.

Since February alone, banks have repossessed more than 1,600 houses, according to RealtyTrac.

After weather events like Irene, the task of checking in on these properties often falls to real estate brokers and agents like Bill Flagg who market and sell the houses the banks own. Flagg and his team at ERA Queen City Realty in Scotch Plains have spent all day, every day this week checking in on some 100 houses he oversees throughout the state.

There are downed trees to consider, crushed fences to repair, flooded basements to drain and shattered shards of glass to sweep, as well as concerns over whether the electricity is keeping the pumps going. In one case, the wind blew siding off a property. Flagg couldn’t even get to another house in Lincoln Park because of the flooded roads.

“We check the properties, fill out incident reports, and when there’s damage, we send people out,” Flagg said yesterday as he drove from one house to another on a whirlwind day of site visits. “This stuff takes time because there’s a lot of properties. You can only do so many in a day.”

Posted in Economics, New Jersey Real Estate | 40 Comments

June Home Prices – Signs of Recovery or Crap?

Posted on August 31, 2011 by grim

From Bloomberg:

Home Prices in U.S. Showed Signs of Stabilizing

Residential real estate prices in the U.S. decreased in the year ended in June at a slower pace than in the prior month, a sign the market may be stabilizing.

The S&P/Case-Shiller index of property values in 20 cities fell 4.5 percent from June 2010, after a 4.6 percent drop in the 12 months ended May that was the biggest since 2009, the group said today in New York. The median forecast of 31 economists surveyed by Bloomberg News projected a 4.6 percent decline.

Values fell by 0.1 percent in June from the prior month after adjusted for seasonal changes, matching the decrease in May, indicating the deterioration is slowing. Nonetheless, any recovery in home values is probably years away as foreclosures dump more properties onto to the market, while a jobless rate hovering around 9 percent and strict lending rules hurt sales.

“Prices aren’t going to rebound back rapidly,” said Paul Dales, a senior U.S. economist at Capital Economics Ltd. in Toronto. “Most people think that when the downturn ends the recovery will be pretty good, but that’s not going to be the case at all.”

From the NY Times:

Home Prices In June Tally Showed Gain

Spring buying pushed home prices up for a third consecutive month in most major American cities in June, a private report showed. But the housing market remained shaky, and further price declines were expected this year.

The Standard & Poor’s/Case-Shiller home price index said prices increased in June from May in 19 of the 20 cities tracked. Prices rose 3.6 percent in the April-June quarter from the previous quarter. Neither of those numbers is adjusted for seasonal factors. Over the last 12 months, home prices have declined in all 20 cities.

Chicago, Minneapolis, Washington and Boston posted the biggest monthly increases. Metro areas hit hardest by the housing crisis, including Las Vegas and Phoenix, reported small increases.
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Analysts say home prices have stabilized in coastal cities over the last six months. Seasonally adjusted prices have fallen a modest 1 percent in the last six months, according to the index. That is less than a third of the decline from the previous six months.

Home prices are certain to fall further once banks resume foreclosures, millions of which have been delayed because of a government investigation into mortgage lending practices. If the American economy slips back into another recession, prices could drop even further.

Posted in Economics, Housing Bubble, Housing Recovery, National Real Estate | 89 Comments

July pendings fall from June, but up from last year

Posted on August 30, 2011 by grim

From Bloomberg:

Pending Sales of Previously Owned U.S. Homes Fell in July

The number of contracts to purchase previously owned U.S. homes fell in July for the first time in three months, a sign that lower prices and borrowing costs aren’t luring in buyers.

The 1.3 percent decrease in the index of pending home sales followed a 2.4 percent gain the previous month, the National Association of Realtors said today in Washington. Economists forecast a 1 percent drop, according to the median of 40 estimates in a Bloomberg News survey.

Unemployment at 9.1 percent and the prospect of more foreclosures in the pipeline mean it may take years to clear the oversupply of houses, a sign the market is struggling to stabilize. The prospect of contract cancellations due to stricter underwriting standards and low appraisals means some signings may not translate into closings.

“Housing is still on the ropes,” Ian Shepherdson, chief U.S. economist at High Frequency Economics in Valhalla, New York, said in a note to clients. Shepherdson said he was concerned that “the chaos in the stock markets might have persuaded a greater proportion of buyers to walk away after signing contracts,” leaving sales short of the level implied by the pending data.

From MarketWatch:

Pending Home Sales Slip in July but Up Strongly From One Year Ago

Pending home sales declined in July but remain well above year-ago levels, according to the National Association of Realtors(R). All regions show monthly declines except for the West, which continues to show the highest level of sales contract activity.

The Pending Home Sales Index,* a forward-looking indicator based on contract signings, slipped 1.3 percent to 89.7 in July from 90.9 in June but is 14.4 percent above the 78.4 index in July 2010. The data reflects contracts but not closings.

The PHSI in the Northeast declined 2.0 percent to 67.5 in July but is 9.7 percent above July 2010. In the Midwest the index slipped 0.8 percent to 79.1 in July but is 18.8 percent above a year ago. Pending home sales in the South fell 4.8 percent to an index of 94.4 but are 9.5 percent higher than July 2010. In the West the index rose 3.6 percent to 110.8 in July and is 20.6 percent above a year ago.

Posted in Economics, Housing Recovery, National Real Estate | 74 Comments

“Feeling the pains of an old-fashioned recession”

Posted on August 29, 2011 by grim

From the Record:

Bad loans continue to rise for NJ banks

Toxic loans held by New Jersey-based banks continued to climb in the second quarter even as bad loans at U.S. banks declined, according to new government data.

The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. said Tuesday in its quarterly industry profile that loans more than 90 days past due or no longer accruing interest at New Jersey’s 117 banks and thrifts rose to 3.61 percent of total loans as of June 30, up from 2.91 percent a year earlier. Those banks’ combined seriously delinquent debt climbed in each of the past four quarters.

Meanwhile, the combined bad loans at the nation’s 7,513 banks fell to about 4.4 percent of the total, down from 5.2 percent a year earlier, the fifth straight quarter of declines.

Paramus-based Hudson City Savings Bank, the largest thrift based in New Jersey and a high-end residential mortgage lender, had 123 foreclosed properties on its books at the end of June, up from 52 a year earlier.

A weak economy, persistent high unemployment and a slow foreclosure process have all contributed to the recent rise in bad loans throughout the state, said Bill Brewer, partner at the Livingston office of Crowe Horwath LLP, a community bank auditor. “Banks have had a hard time moving this stuff off the books,” he said. “The banks have the capital to withstand this, but it is a continuing problem.”

Increased delinquencies have been across the board with weakness in residential mortgages, commercial real estate loans and other types of business and consumer loans, Brewer said.

Kevin Cummings, chief executive officer of Short Hills-based Investors Savings Bank, said New Jersey is “feeling the pains of an old-fashioned recession.”

Posted in Economics, New Jersey Real Estate, Risky Lending | 116 Comments