mortgage

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Foreclosures on Pricey Properties Pick Up

Well-to-do buyers weren't immune to wacky loans, and they're coming due

(Newser) - The country's most expensive homes are now making up a larger segment of foreclosures in the most recent spike of mortgage defaults. An analysis of recent data shows that 30% of June foreclosures involved homes valued in the top third based on location; that’s up from just 16% at...

Watchdog: Feds Need to Expand Foreclosure Plan

$50B plan proving ineffective as more mortgage holders lose their jobs

(Newser) - The Treasury's $50 billion loan-modification program is in danger of being swamped as the foreclosure crisis accelerates, the Congressional Oversight Panel said in a report yesterday. The Home Affordable Modification Program has met its target of 500,000 trial mortgage modifications started by November 1, but the watchdog warned that...

The Next Mortgage Lender Bailout: The FHA

Critics think fallback agency will need a rescue in next couple of years

(Newser) - Another mortgage lender specializing in low income borrowers is in trouble: the Federal Housing Administration. The agency which oversees Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac could soon share their fate, as borrowers default on the low-downpayment mortgages it insures, critics told a House subcommittee yesterday. “It appears destined for a...

Sleazy Middlemen Stiff Homeowners Trying to Refi
 Sleazy Middlemen 
 Stiff Homeowners 
 Trying to Refi 
mortgage meltdown
Oct 4, 2009 3:31 PM CDT

Sleazy Middlemen Stiff Homeowners Trying to Refi

Foot-dragging 'mortgage servicers' step into role of fox in henhouse

(Newser) - The federal mortgage modification program is mired in trouble, with just 12% of the 3 million eligible loans in the process of modification, the "servicers" that helped create the problem tasked with helping to untangle it, and the Treasury Department falling down on the oversight job. In one...

Banks Yanking Homeowners' Last Hope: Short Sales

Healthier lenders no longer anxious to cut deals

(Newser) - As banks get healthier, they're getting stingier with one of the few remaining lifelines for underwater homeowners—short sales. To keep home sales moving in leaner times—and to get bad loans off their ledgers—lenders would forgive the difference between the outstanding mortgage balance and the purchase price. Such...

BofA Severs Ties With ACORN
 BofA Severs Ties With ACORN 
Sep 28, 2009 9:08 AM CDT

BofA Severs Ties With ACORN

ACORN Housing advocated for homeowners facing foreclosure

(Newser) - Bank of America has cut off ties with ACORN’s housing assistance arm following revelations that employees of the community organizing group gave ill-advised assistance to videographers posing as a pimp and prostitute. ACORN Housing has worked with BofA—among other banks—since the '90s to help homeowners in danger...

Mortgage Scammers Prey on Strapped Homeowners
Mortgage Scammers Prey
on Strapped Homeowners
investigation
Sep 24, 2009 7:50 PM CDT

Mortgage Scammers Prey on Strapped Homeowners

So-called rescue firms promise to negotiate lower rates, then take money and run

(Newser) - Mortgage brokers who made a mint during the housing boom setting up homeowners in toxic loans are now profiting from a different sort of shady deal. So-called foreclosure rescue firms are proliferating across the US, taking money upfront and promising to negotiate with homeowners’ banks for better interest rates. Instead,...

Treasury's Secret Formula Slows Loan Modifications

But one thing's clear: it favors banks, not homeowners

(Newser) - The Obama administration’s mortgage modification program has been a big disappointment, and part of the reason could lie in the invisible hurdle troubled homeowners have to clear to get their mortgages renegotiated: the NPV test. Devised by the Treasury, the secret formula is designed to determine if modification is...

ACORN May Sue After New Tape Emerges
ACORN May
Sue After New Tape Emerges
Sep 14, 2009 10:00 AM CDT

ACORN May Sue After New Tape Emerges

Second film shows staffers advising fake hooker, pimp

(Newser) - ACORN is weighing legal action after another undercover sting tape emerged, this time in Brooklyn, the New York Post reports. Like a tape made in Baltimore, the new footage shows a man and a woman dressed as a pimp and a prostitute getting advice on housing loans. “Honesty is...

Commercial Real Estate May Set Off 2nd Crisis

Another mortgage-backed securities market gets into trouble

(Newser) - Just as the economy starts to recover, a second mortgage disaster may be looming. The commercial real estate sector is tanking, with many properties unable to generate enough cash to make mortgage payments. Lo and behold, those commercial mortgages have been sewn into securities—comparable to the packages of home...

Crypt Above Monroe's Sells for $4.6M

(Newser) - An anonymous bidder paid more than $4.6 million to win an online auction for the crypt directly above the actress' final resting spot at a Los Angeles cemetery. Bidding started at $500,000 on Aug 14. The final bid was $4,602,100. The Los Angeles Times reported earlier...

By 2011, 48% of Mortgages Will Be Underwater

(Newser) - Nearly half of US homeowners will owe more than their house is worth by 2011, Deutsche Bank analysts said yesterday, predicting that the number of such “underwater” mortgages would nearly double from today’s 26% to 48%. Their report stated that home prices will fall another 14% between now...

White House Weighs 'Bad Bank' Fix for Fannie, Freddie

(Newser) - The White House’s National Economic Council will meet today to discuss a drastic overhaul of beleaguered nationalized mortgage dealers Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the Washington Post reports. Among other proposals, officials are contemplating a “good bank, bad bank” split. Fannie and Freddie would dump their troubled loans...

BofA, Wells Fargo Rank Worst for Loan Modifications

Treasury report rates banks' performance

(Newser) - Bank of America began modifying just 4% of its loans eligible under the Making Home Affordable Act, according to a Treasury report on big banks' performance, while Wells Fargo started just 6%. JPMorgan Chase led the pack with 20%, Bloomberg reports, while Citigroup had 15%. “Some of the servicers...

Bad Loan Fees Too Juicy to Give Homeowners a Break

(Newser) - The government's foreclosure prevention program is failing largely because of mortgage companies who can make more money when loans go delinquent, industry insiders tell the New York Times. Companies servicing mortgage loans charge many lucrative fees as loans go bad—recoverable, if necessary, out of the proceeds when the foreclosed...

Despite Obama Push, Banks Often Prefer Foreclosing

(Newser) - There’s a big problem with government efforts to keep delinquents in their homes by modifying mortgages: Banks would usually rather foreclose, economists tell the Washington Post. Lenders are only interested in modification for the small group of borrowers who will keep paying only if they get help. For those...

Dodd, Conrad 'Knew They Scored Mortgage Deals'

(Newser) - Democratic Sens. Chris Dodd and Kent Conrad were fully aware they were getting sweetened mortgage deals, the Countrywide Financial exec who handled their loans has told congressional investigators. The testimony from the loan officer to the House Oversight and Senate Ethics committees directly contradicts the senators' assertions that they had...

White House Foreclosure Plan a $50B Bust

(Newser) - The Obama administration's plan to help millions of homeowners avoid foreclosure has so far been a major failure, Politico reports. It's reached just 160,000 of the 3 to 4 million homeowners it was supposed to protect, and another 2 million homes are expected to be foreclosed upon before the...

Creditworthy Shunned Under Tight New Mortage Rules

(Newser) - Would-be homeowners with good credit are finding themselves shut out of the mortgage market by stiff restrictions from wary lenders, the New York Times reports. Many believe that in an effort to move away from the laxness blamed for the financial crisis, lenders have gone too far the other way...

A Quarter of Defaulters Are Doing It on Purpose

(Newser) - As many as 26% of mortgage defaults are deliberate moves by homeowners who owe more than their house is worth, finds a new study that asked 1000 people if they knew anyone who had defaulted even though they could still make payments. Researchers caution that the study isn’t precise,...

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