Cocktail Waitress turned Realtor: “The market has gone straight down like an airplane nosediving,”

Posted on September 5, 2010 by grim

From the Press of Atlantic City:

Few buy into career as Realtor

Phillip Golden became a real estate agent for Re/Max Community in Mays Landing in 2009, the year homeowners across the country filed nearly 4 million foreclosures, the result of a financial crisis that continues today.

After his first year in the industry, he said he has learned a lot and also helped coach struggling homeowners through their own crises.

“The slowness of the market has acclimated me to what the market should be,” he said. “Real estate is a slow investment. It’s not run-and-gun like it was. It’s not something that should be bought and traded like a stock.”

When the housing market began declining in 2006 and then plunged the following year, being a real estate agent went from being a lucrative career to a stress-filled livelihood.

“When the bubble burst, a lot of people just jumped,” said Judy Appleby, president of the New Jersey Association of Realtors, whose membership is down from a peak of 55,0000 members to about 48,000 now.

Since then, the people who did choose to get their real estate licenses have varying perspective on their new jobs.
…
Peggy Silverman colored her experience with a slightly less rosy brush since she got her real estate license in 2008, when the federal government was funneling billions of dollars into the economy to stem a tide of foreclosures and layoffs.

“It’s been a nightmare,” said Galloway Township native who is now an agent for Prudential Diversified Realty & Associates in Smithville, Galloway Township.

Silverman, 61, was a cocktail waitress for 28 years in Atlantic City and needed a change. She had always been friendly and had a keen interest in interior design, so she thought selling homes would be a good fit.

She knew the market was bad, but had no idea how bad until she got in the midst of it.

“The market has gone straight down like an airplane nosediving,” she said. She now looks at the paper daily, looking to get a second career in the health care industry.
…
After being one of the first waitresses at Bally’s Atlantic City, and now a real estate agent for about two years, she hopes she can find a second job that’s a little bit more resistant to a bad economy.

“I got to pay my mortgage. I got to eat, and real estate has almost come to a standstill,” she said. “And that’s a known fact.”

Posted in Economics, Housing Bubble, New Jersey Real Estate | 156 Comments

Fannie Mae: Get going and foreclose

Posted on September 3, 2010 by grim

From HousingWire:

Excessively delaying Fannie Mae foreclosures will now cost servicers

Fannie Mae will now review the compensatory fees due to servicers in cases where the government sponsored entity feel servicers are unnecessarily delaying foreclosure.

In a letter sent to servicers, Fannie Mae said it plans to review compensation when it deems applicable, stating that loans “must not be put on hold on a blanket basis.”

Fannie Mae is clear that servicers must not jump the gun either, but rather must follow the letter of the law as it pertains to HAMP/HAFA guidelines.

In a July speech, Edward DeMarco, acting director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, told loss mitigation servicers that, “if you have an abandoned property or a borrower not willing to discuss or work with anything, then get going [and foreclose],” he advised.

Fannie Mae allows several exceptions in the case where the property is occupied, unless “the borrower has displayed an obvious lack of concern for the mortgage obligation.”

In cases where the property is vacant or the borrower is not going to pay any of the mortgage, “servicers must expedite foreclosure proceedings under the greatest extent allowable by law.”

Posted in Foreclosures, National Real Estate | 179 Comments

Thank you William!

Posted on September 2, 2010 by grim

A letter to the editor printed in the Mahwah Suburban News, written by William P. Deegan Jr.

Letter: Question accuracy of real estate story

After opening the [Aug. 19] Mahwah Suburban News, your [real estate section] item’s large headline, “Local real estate market sales jump 17 percent” took me by surprise. The day before, The Record’s headline (and widely reported elsewhere) read “Sales of Existing Homes Plummet 27.2 percent fall in July largest since 1968.”

Why the discrepancy? Your article quotes statistics from May 2010 when the effects of the government tax credit were just starting to wane. In other words, coming on the heels of the very different and widely reported national July figures the day before, the information you report is very misleading. I doubt that northern New Jersey was immune to the realty downdraft. USA Today reported that the New York/New Jersey/Long Island area was down 24.9 percent in July compared to 2009.

Looking further at the “news article” one can see that it is really an promotional piece for a New Jersey realtors association seeking to drum up sales with their ever popular “it’s a great time to buy real estate.”

Mahwah Suburban News should practice better journalism and label advertising and promotional pieces as such.

From the Big Picture:

Attention RE Agents: NAR Spin is Counter-Productive !

We have had a god-awful run of Housing data. New and Existing Home Sales, Defaults and Foreclosure data, even the Case Shiller report — all have been utterly horrific.

In light of this, I want to make the following announcement: Attention RE Agents! The National Association of Realtors are doing you a terrible disservice.
…
In other words, mislead the public with spin. Create false hope. Lie. This agent was defending the National Assocation of Realtor’s blatant dishonesty — a mistake on its face — just as the damage they did began to have an effect.

What the NAR was offering to buyers, sellers, their agents, indeed, anyone involved with Housing, was the blue pill.

The sort of nonsense the Realtor’s group peddles helps explain why sellers have incorrectly believed a recovery was imminent, even as housing went through a historic collapse. It is why home owners incorrectly still expect their homes to go appreciate by 10% a year.

These false beliefs have real world consequences. They create ridiculous expectations among sellers, who selectively grab onto any positive news they can. They choose the temporary blissful ignorance of illusion — that damned blue pill — versus embracing the painful truth of reality (i.e., the red pill).

This confirmation bias leads sellers into mis-pricing the value of their homes. They have been a season or even a year or more behind the pricing curve the entire way down.

Ask any listing agent how difficult it is to get sellers to become realistic in their asking prices. Real Estate agents would be moving a helluvalot more houses if they were not fighting misinformation that the NAR has put into the marketplace. Many, many agents have confirmed that, even in this crummy environment, a good house properly priced will sell.

Here’s a question for you reality (vs NAR realty) agents. Ever wonder why you seem to be having such a hard time convincing sellers to set reasonable asking prices? Ever ponder why they have such a distorted sense of the true value of their homes? Ever try to get them to set reasonable asking numbers that are competitive with current market prices?

The short answer: NAR spin.

Posted in New Jersey Real Estate | 179 Comments

New Jersey Home Price Tracker – August 2010

Posted on August 31, 2010 by grim

The New Jersey Home Price Index Tracker has been updated to include:
* June S&P Case Shiller (Aggregate, Tiered, Condo)
* Q2 FHFA Home Price Index (HPI, Purchase Only)
* Q2 NJAR Home Price Index (Statewide Median)


(click to enlarge)


(click to enlarge)


(click to enlarge)

FHFA (Formerly known as the OFHEO) Home Price Index

HPI (Includes Refis) – Peaked in Q1 2007 and is down 13.9% from peak

Purchase Only – Peaked in Q2 2006 and is down 12.9% from peak

S&P Case Shiller NY Metro Commutable Area Home Price Index

Low Tier (Under $285,121) – Peaked in October 2006 and is down 24.6% from peak

Mid Tier ($285,121 – $441,469) – Peaked in September 2006 and is down 22.5% from peak

High Tier (Over $441,469) – Peaked in June 2006 and is down 15.0% from peak

Aggregate (Overall Market) – Peaked in June 2006 and is down 20.0% from peak

Condo-Only Index – Peaked in February 2006 and is down 14.5% from peak

NJAR/NAR – Median Home Price

Median NJ Price – Peaked in Q3 2006 and is down 20.4% from peak

NY Metro Area Aggregate Year over Year Changes

Jun 09 -11.50%
Jul 09 -10.22%
Aug 09 -9.48%
Sep 09 -8.79%
Oct 09 -8.03%
Nov 09 -7.42%
Dec 09 -6.30%
Jan 10 -5.26%
Feb 10 -4.08%
Mar 10 -2.51%
Apr 10 -1.04%
May 10 -0.41%
Jun 2010 0.24%

Posted in Economics, New Jersey Real Estate | 168 Comments

Case Shiller Day!

Posted on August 31, 2010 by grim

From Reuters:

US home prices to eke out small June gain

U.S. home prices likely eked out a small gain in June, but a rise would represent the final tail-winds of the homebuyer tax credit that ended in April rather than housing market improvement, economists said.

Sales have failed to sustain traction in the wake of the federal incentive that drew summer sales forward into spring months.

Tepid home buying despite record low mortgage rates, combined with the high hurdle of foreclosure sales, will keep weighing on home prices.

The Standard & Poor’s/Case-Shiller 20-city composite home price index likely rose 0.2 percent in June after a 0.5 percent increase in May, seasonally adjusted, according to a Reuters survey of 18 economists.

Forecasts ranged from a 0.6 percent drop to a 0.5 percent rise.
…
If prices are flat or higher in June, based on the S&P/Case-Shiller series, it would likely be because the indexes are based on three-month moving averages and may be slower to adjust, several Wall Street firms noted.

From Bloomberg:

Home Prices Probably Cooled, U.S. Consumer Sentiment Languished

The rebound in U.S. home prices probably slowed, while consumer confidence languished near a five-month low, indicating threats to the economic recovery are mounting, economists said before reports toda
…
Record foreclosures, unemployment near a 26-year high and a plunge in sales following the end of a government tax credit will probably pressure home values in coming months. Further erosion in home equity may undermine Americans’ confidence and limit consumer spending, which accounts for about 70 percent of the economy.

“The housing market is in the midst of a double dip, with sales declining and prices likely to,” said Guy LeBas, chief fixed-income strategist at Janney Montgomery Scott LLC in Philadelphia. “Consumers are in a state of repairing their balance sheets. It would be fairly problematic for consumer spending if there was another home-price decline.”

The home-price data from S&P/Case-Shiller are due at 9 a.m. New York time. Estimates ranged from increases of 2.5 percent to 4.2 percent. It would be the first time the measure failed to improve since a 19 percent drop in the year ended January 2009, which was the worst performance in records dating to 2001.

From Seeking Alpha:

More Pain, Less Gain: S&P/Case-Shiller Preview

As I demonstrated in prior posts, given their strong correlation, the home price indices provided daily by Radar Logic, averaged monthly, can effectively be used as a preview of the monthly S&P/Case-Shiller home price indices.

The current Radar Logic 25 MSA Composite data reported on residential real estate transactions (condos, multi and single family homes) that settled as late as June 25 indicates that the final expiration of the government’s tax gimmick drove a second, albiet more tepid, price bounce with prices increasing slightly since May but remaining below the tax credit fueled peak reached last year.

Look for tomorrow’s S&P/Case-Shiller home price report to reflect an increase of prices as the source data moves further through months affected by the tax credit activity.

Posted in Economics, National Real Estate, New Jersey Real Estate | 135 Comments

“The problem is that every house on their block is for sale, too.”

Posted on August 30, 2010 by grim

From the NY Post (Hat tip Dan):

Town is down on its luxe

In this economy, it’s not uncommon for whole neighborhoods to be on the market. But Rumson, NJ, a leafy bedroom community of 7,200 residents, nonetheless stands out: It has 100 homes for sale — all for more than $1 million.

“The streets are filled with distracting ‘for sale’ signs,” says one resident. “Lots of husbands are hanging out at the bagel deli. They used to be working and now are picking up bagels. There’s a new class of Americans in Rumson: the formerly rich.”

The glut of luxury homes has lent a surreal quality to the town, and weekends find brokers sitting at open houses waiting for buyers that never come. Many of the properties have been on the market for more than a year.
…
Notable residents include Bruce Springsteen, as well as Goldman Sachs bankers, hedge-fund honchos and retired baseball and NFL stars.

But lately, even this community has felt the pinch of the recession. One resident said the top-rated restaurant in town, David Burke’s Fromagerie, which serves a $42 veal chop, has a waiting list for “Burger Night,” where locals can “enjoy a salad, burger & glass of wine or beer, only $25 per person.”

The impact on real estate has been particularly acute. According to the sales Web site Trulia, there are about 100 homes — excluding private sales, foreclosures and quiet bank sales — on the block for more than $1 million. Expanding to include the homes within one mile, the number jumps to 190.

“People don’t have the money they used to have,” says Richard “Ric” Martel Jr., a broker in the Rumson office of Prudential Zack Shore Properties. “The scenario could be a banker who was making $1.5 million, and now their company went under — like Lehman Brothers or Bear Stearns — or they have seen their comp cut to $750,000, and the house they bought in 2005 for $1.6 million is now worth $1.1 million, and . . . the mortgage is $1.280 million.”

Residents are “still owning nice cars and belonging to beach clubs and country clubs, and they’re asking themselves, ‘Where can I cut my monthly nut?’ The answer is to put their home up for sale.”

The problem is that every house on their block is for sale, too.

Posted in Economics, Housing Bubble, Shore Real Estate | 48 Comments

“The housing market should improve but it probably won’t.”

Posted on August 30, 2010 by grim

From Time:

Housing Market: What’s Ahead?

Are housing prices near a bottom? It’s not just policymakers, realtors and bankers who yearn for the turn. Anyone who owns a house, a condo or coop is surely wishing for some modest improvement. Not the least of these hopefuls is homeowner-in-chief Ben Bernanke, chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, who just this past Friday lamented the heavy toll that tumbling housing prices are having on residential investment. Here’s what Bernanke had to say about housing in his speech to economists at Jackson Hole, Wyoming:

“Household finances and attitudes also bear heavily on the housing market, which has generally remained depressed. In particular, home sales dropped sharply following the recent expiration of the homebuyers’ tax credit. Going forward, improved affordability–the result of lower house prices and record-low mortgage rates–should boost the demand for housing. However, the overhang of foreclosed-upon and vacant housing and the difficulties of many households in obtaining mortgage financing are likely to continue to weigh on the pace of residential investment for some time yet.”

That’s a polite way of saying the housing market should improve but it probably won’t.
…
The bottom line for housing is that the bottom will be long–perhaps very long– and bumpy. Even in cities where the numbers are starting to improve slightly, such as San Diego, the inventory of unsold homes never seems to decline. What’s more, we haven’t yet seen the legions of Baby Boomers who are planning to unload their McMansions in favor of some cute bungalo by the beach. They, of course, are just waiting for the market to improve.

Posted in Economics, National Real Estate | 110 Comments

There are no American soldiers in Baghdad

Posted on August 29, 2010 by grim

From the NY Times (Hat tip Cindy):

Widespread Fear Freezes Housing Market

You have to wonder sometimes what they’re smoking over there at the National Association of Realtors.

On Tuesday, the self-proclaimed “voice for real estate” released its “existing home sales” figures for July. They were gruesome. Sales were down 27 percent from the previous month, and down 26 percent from a year ago. Annualized, the July sales figures would translate into fewer than 3.9 million homes sold this year — a staggeringly low figure. (The record high occurred in 2005, when more than seven million houses were sold.)

The months-to-sale number was depressingly high; the Realtors group reported that it now takes more than a year to sell a typical house, compared with six months in a normal market. The amount of inventory is high.

Lest we forget, these awful numbers are coming out at a time when the financial incentive to buy could hardly be stronger: the fixed rate on a 30-year mortgage is at an incredibly low 4.36 percent, according to an authoritative survey conducted by Freddie Mac.

Yet here was Lawrence Yun, the association’s chief economist, trying to turn lemons into lemonade: “Given the rock-bottom mortgage interest rates and historically high housing affordability conditions, the pace of a sales recovery could pick up quickly, provided the economy consistently adds jobs,” he said in a news release.
…
Mr. Yun also predicted that home values would not fall much further, since they were “back in line relative to income.” In other words, the July numbers were a mere blip.

Clearly, Mr. Yun needs to get out a little more often. Specifically, he ought to talk to people on the ground — like mortgage lenders or prospective borrowers. Talking to these people would probably give him a more sober take on the larger meaning of the latest sales numbers for existing homes. Sometimes, you see, lemons really can’t be turned into lemonade.
…
“In the financial markets, a lack of liquidity immediately leads to falling prices,” said Lou Barnes, the founder of Boulder West Financial Services. (Boulder West was acquired last year by Premier Mortgage Group.) “In the real estate market, something different happens,” he added. “Illiquid real estate markets freeze.” That is what is happening now. For months, the Obama tax credit had been the only grease in the housing market. Now that it is gone, the buying and selling of houses is essentially grinding to a halt.
…
The second reason is that, Mr. Yun notwithstanding, most people simply do not believe that housing prices are even close to hitting bottom. “In the Bay Area, a house that was worth $300,000 a decade ago became a million-dollar home,” said Greg Fielding, a real estate broker and blogger. “Now it is listed at $800,000.” That price, he suggested, was still unrealistically high. The seller, meanwhile, doesn’t want to face the fact that his or her home is too richly priced, and won’t sell at a more realistic price — which may well be below his or her mortgage debt.

Posted in Economics, Housing Bubble, National Real Estate | 80 Comments

Bergen and Essex County Mega Comp Killers!

Posted on August 27, 2010 by grim

Wooooooooo!!! Double comp killer weekend! Might just bring a tear to my eye.

From AMHS:

Hi Grim. Hello all. I’m a long time lurker—thoroughly addicted to this blog for many, many years now. We just moved into our Montclair REO—-we paid $272,000 in July 2010—–previous owner paid $474,900 in 2005! Our mortgage payment (including Montclair’s outrageous taxes) is less per month than renting our old 2 bdrm apt.

————–

Congratulations to the blog regulars who made their way to what might possibly be one of the best comp killers I’ve seen to date!

Yes skeptics, blog regulars do buy, but the deal has got to be clearly in their favor. This is probably the best example I’ve yet seen of patience paying off in spades.

While not the largest percentage drop we’ve ever recorded (which always seem to fall in the lower-end urban areas), this was a huge percentage drop along with being in a town considered to be one of the top in Bergen County. Not only a top town, but a desirable area in a top town. Who says Bergen prices don’t fall?

I’m going to keep the details thin, because it isn’t my story to share, and the owners would like to stay private. But the new owners wanted to see it up, so I’ll oblige.

Oh, and thank you for letting me take part in the wholesale pillaging of JP Morgan (who lost somewhere near $400,000 in this transaction)!

The nasty truth:

Property went lis pendens in 2008, and was taken back by the bank at the BC sheriff sale 16 months later. National City lost close to $300k at this point, being a junior lien on the property. JPM kept the property off-market for almost 10 months.

Sale price was 50% off the 2007 asking price. Bubbly, but then again everything was bubbly.

Sale price was 30% off the last asking before the house went into foreclosure. This was an aggressive price at the time, very aggressive. The property had gone under contract at this price, but the deal fell through.

Sale price was on the 2-3% trendline from prior sales in the mid-80s and mid-90s. Clearly non-bubble pricing, if anything, the price is firmly in-line with the prior two cyclical troughs.

Sale price was approximately 10% under what the Case Shiller HPI (High Range) would have estimated for this area, given historical sales prices and prior asking prices. Tomorrow’s price today?

Property assessed at a value considerably higher than sale price.

The house represents a significant comp killer for the area. The neighbors (who live on one of those hoity-toity streets that people just HAVE to HAVE as a mailing address), probably aren’t very happy.

Posted in Comp Killer, Housing Bubble, New Jersey Real Estate | 297 Comments

Home price outlook not rosy

Posted on August 26, 2010 by grim

From MacroMarkets:

Home Price Expectations Continue to Dim

“For the third consecutive month, the consensus from the experts indicates weakened overall
confidence in the U.S. housing recovery, with only 21% of our panelists now predicting positive growth in prices nation-wide for 2010, and average expected cumulative price appreciation through 2014 falling almost one-third since our inaugural survey just three months ago,” said Robert Shiller, MacroMarkets co-founder and chief economist.
…
Although the average projections of the survey panel have continued to dim, a wide range of views among some of the survey panelists persists, and the August survey data confirms that a path to housing recovery remains intact. Terry Loebs, MacroMarkets managing director reported, “The slope of the expected recovery path, although flattening, remains positive and implies a $1.4 trillion gain in aggregate U.S. homeowner equity from current levels by the end of 2014, assuming that other relevant factors such as mortgage debt levels do not change.”

From HousingWire:

House Price Outlook Continues to Dim

Based on today’s report that found new home sales plunged to record lows in July housing analysts said they may have been too conservative in estimations in this case, but are keen not to make the mistake again.

The just released August MacroMarkets home price expectations survey, compiled from 107 responses of a diverse group of economists, real estate experts, investment and market strategists, is titled “Home Price Expectations Continue to Dim.”

The MacroMarkets index is assuming house price declines for the remainder of the year, with cumulative negative activity likely until 2012 and beyond.

Posted in Economics, National Real Estate | 185 Comments

July contracts continue downward trend for NJ

Posted on August 25, 2010 by grim

Jeffery Otteau reports contracts signed, not closed sales. This is a more timely indicator of market activity, since closed sales represent purchase activity from approximately 2 months prior. Contracts is also a forward looking predictor of closed sales over the next 1-3 months. Given the declining trend in contracts in NJ, the sales numbers we saw yesterday were not an anomaly, and that trend appears to be firmly in place for at least the next few months, absent another round of government subsidization of course.

Otteau’s commentary is a bit surprising, since he usually takes a bit of a more upbeat tone, or at least he had for the last year or so. His point about sales activity being significantly depressed at what would otherwise be the strongest market of the year, is an important one. We are clearly witnessing a market that is no longer acting true to it’s normal seasonal variations.

From the Otteau Group:

Housing Slide Continues During Prime Selling Months (no link)

Home purchase contracts to buy a home in New Jersey fell for the third consecutive month following the expiration of the federal home buyer tax credit on April 30th. These recent declines have occurred during what would otherwise be among the strongest months for home sales leading up to the seasonal slowdown in the fall and winter. In July home sales were off by 27% in New Jersey compared to one year ago, which follows declines of 23% in May and 27% in June.

Posted in Economics, Housing Bubble, New Jersey Real Estate | 159 Comments

Northern NJ – July Home Sales

Posted on August 24, 2010 by grim

With July Existing Home Sales widely expected to disappoint at 10am this morning, I thought I’d share with you all the equally gloomy Northern NJ data.

The local July declines are significantly worse (at least 2-3x) than the consensus estimate of economists taken by Bloomberg for the National number. While I haven’t run the correlations on the local markets to the greater Northeast region in a while, they’ve always been close enough that I’d consider a wager that the Northeast region will have the poorest showing this month.

Bergen (NJMLS)
July 2009 – 724
July 2010 – 555 (Down 23.3%)

Essex (GSMLS)
July 2009 – 405
July 2010 – 287 (Down 29.1%)

Hunterdon (GSMLS)
July 2009 – 130
July 2010 – 82 (Down 36.9%)

Middlesex (GSMLS)
July 2009 – 140
July 2010 – 80 (Down 42.8%)

Morris (GSMLS)
July 2009 – 490
July 2010 – 296 (Down 39.6%)

Passaic (GSMLS)
July 2009 – 266
July 2010 – 138 (Down 48.1%)

Somerset (GSMLS)
July 2009 – 381
July 2010 – 230 (Down 39.6%)

Sussex (GSMLS)
July 2009 – 148
July 2010 – 86 (Down 41.9%)

Union (GSMLS)
July 2009 – 411
July 2010 – 256 (Down 37.7%)

Warren (GSMLS)
July 2009 – 98
July 2010 – 51 (Down 47.9%)

Posted in Economics, Housing Bubble, New Jersey Real Estate | 178 Comments

Housing transitions from cash cow to dog

Posted on August 23, 2010 by grim

From the NYT:

Housing Fades as a Means to Build Wealth, Analysts Say

Housing will eventually recover from its great swoon. But many real estate experts now believe that home ownership will never again yield rewards like those enjoyed in the second half of the 20th century, when houses not only provided shelter but also a plump nest egg.

The wealth generated by housing in those decades, particularly on the coasts, did more than assure the owners a comfortable retirement. It powered the economy, paying for the education of children and grandchildren, keeping the cruise ships and golf courses full and the restaurants humming.

More than likely, that era is gone for good.

“There is no iron law that real estate must appreciate,” said Stan Humphries, chief economist for the real estate site Zillow. “All those theories advanced during the boom about why housing is special — that more people are choosing to spend more on housing, that more people are moving to the coasts, that we were running out of usable land — didn’t hold up.”
…
Dean Baker, co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, estimates that it will take 20 years to recoup the $6 trillion of housing wealth that has been lost since 2005. After adjusting for inflation, values will never catch up.

“People shouldn’t look at a home as a way to make money because it won’t,” Mr. Baker said.

If the long term is grim, the short term is grimmer. Housing experts are bracing themselves for Tuesday, when the sales figures for July will be released. The data is expected to show a drop of as much as 20 percent from last year.

Posted in Economics, Housing Bubble, National Real Estate | 113 Comments

How do we sleep when our beds are sinking?

Posted on August 21, 2010 by grim

From Reuters:

Dropout Rate for Mortgage Aid Program Nearly 50%: Treasury

The percentage of homeowners dropping out of the Obama administration’s premier housing rescue program rose in July to nearly half of participants, as owners receiving aid continued to struggle with documenting their eligibility, the U.S. Treasury said on Friday.

In its monthly report on the Home Affordable Modification Program, the Treasury said 48.1 percent of the 1.3 million homeowners who started a mortgage modification through July have dropped out. This compares to a 41.2 percent dropout rate through June.
…
But the modification trials offered in the program prior to June 1 did not require up-front documentation of income or eligibility, and many trials are now being canceled.

As a result, Treasury said 100,114 participants dropped out of the program in July—more than four times the 24,577 new modification trials started.

“The number of new cancellations is expected to exceed the number of permanent modifications for the next few months as servicers clear their backlog of aged trials,” the Treasury said in a statement.

From the AP:

Nearly 50 percent leave Obama mortgage-aid program

Nearly half of homeowners seeking help from the Obama administration’s flagship effort to help those at risk of foreclosure have fallen out of the program.

A new report from the Treasury Department says approximately 630,000 people who had tried to get their mortgages modified through the program have been cut loose through July. That’s about 48 percent of the 1.3 million homeowners who had enrolled since March 2009.
…
The report suggests foreclosures could rise in the second half of the year and weaken the ailing housing market.

Posted in Foreclosures, Housing Bubble, National Real Estate | 95 Comments

Hot Potato

Posted on August 20, 2010 by grim

From Housingwire:

Fitch: Big Four Banks Face $180bn in Buybacks from Fannie and Freddie

Government sponsored enterprises (GSEs) Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae may exercise the right to force the big four banks, JP Morgan, Citigroup, Bank of America, and Wells Fargo, to repurchase up to $180bn delinquent mortgages, according to a report released by Fitch Ratings Wednesday.

As of June 30, the GSEs hold $354.5bn troubled mortgages, with 50% serviced by the big four banks. Fitch estimates the big four banks already received repurchase requests up to $19.1bn in the Q110 and Q210 — $10.7bn of which related to the GSEs.

Fannie and Freddie are “actively exercising their right to put back to the original lenders a considerable amount of the troubled mortgages in their portfolios,” write analysts Tom Abruzzo and Christopher Wolfe. The agencies have a right to require lenders to buyback delinquent mortgages, if it is determined the mortgage loan did not meet GSE investor underwriting or eligibility standards.
…
“Fitch is concerned that a more aggressive request for loan repurchases could potentially expose banks with large mortgage origination operations to future losses that have not been previously incorporated into Fitch’s existing exposures, and effectively into current ratings,” the report said.

Posted in Housing Bubble, National Real Estate, Risky Lending | 182 Comments