home loan: Las Vegas short sales can sting homeowners later on - 10/15/09 09:02 AM
Mortgage banks have been pushed between the rock and the hard place in today's reeling real estate market. They are trying to make the right moves to keep their bleeding books from totally blowing up during this perfect storm as more and more home loans go bad. To deal with that, they generally look at three basic options; a mortgage loan modification, a short sale or then the foreclosure, the infamous word that has been in the media a lot lately.
Southern Nevada - with communities like Henderson, Boulder City, Summerlin, Mountains Edge, Southern Highlands, North Las Vegas and Green Valley … (8 comments)

home loan: MBA, NAR and NAHB push hard for tax credit expansion, yes expansion - 10/13/09 09:56 AM
Affordable mortgage money and in many areas really mouth-watering prices are helping the real estate market out, but it needs much more than that in this frustrating economic environment. The famous up to $8,000 tax credit, it is due to expire at the end of November, for first-time home buyers did boost sales a degree or two. Still, the housing sector keeps on drifting along without too much purpose.  
Mortgage Bankers Association, or MBA, National Association of Realtors, or NAR, and National Home Builders Association, or NAHB, are the heavy hitters on the real estate scene who now are twisting … (10 comments)

home loan: Mortgage lenders now more inclined to lower principal - 10/03/09 11:47 AM
The home loan industry has been steadily resisting giving homeowners any principal reduction breaks throughout this real estate inferno.The government has been all over it to do mortgage modifications at a reasonable clip in an effort to keep the foreclosure epidemic from getting out of control. The banks have been slow in helping out even with them. The ones they have channeled through have generally been rather tame, all too often leading the borrower to redefault within months.  
Mortgage loan providers, banks and investors that is, have obviously decided to change course somewhat.In a fresh report from OCC, or the … (70 comments)

home loan: Fannie Mae tightens mortgage requirements a notch - 09/28/09 11:07 AM
The key home loan financier operating on the secondary mortgage market has seen much better days with its immense portfolio. Just like most other lending institutions it, too, has been slowly bleeding as foreclosures keep shaking its once solid foundation. So much so that Washington had to bail it out a while back. Yet, it's still doing what it was mandated to do, invest in mortgage paper.
Fannie Mae, to stem growing losses, is gradually hiking mortgage underwriting criteria, though. In the latest round of updates that'll go in effect November 1, the borrower's FICO has to be 620 or better … (8 comments)

home loan: Mortgage securitization becoming more transparent - 09/26/09 09:38 AM
The U.S. housing industry is very dependent on how the secondary mortgage market is doing. That's where a large share of mortgage-backed bonds generated here are traded. In the recent past the private investor class purchased about 60% of the home loan paper for sale, the rest mostly being gobbled up by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Now, after the angry tsunami swooped in a few years ago to decisively maul the real estate market, the private sector has all but disappeared from the scene. It's licking its wounds while trying to deal with the losses the devastation left behind.
The … (2 comments)

home loan: Fed to continue buying mortgage securities into 2010 - 09/24/09 06:37 AM
The secondary mortgage market is the life blood of the massive housing industry. If it catches any kind of ailment, the consequences can be rather dire. A serious virus invaded it not so long ago - it can also be called the great escape of the private investor - and threatened to bring the besieged real estate market to its knees. Or worse.
The Fed had to step in to fill the void and started buying Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and Ginnie Mae mortgage-backed securities, or MBS, to maintain liquidity. To give the housing industry a chance to work itself out … (2 comments)

home loan: Las Vegas real estate prices slow to recover? - 09/21/09 12:11 PM
Moody's Economy.com analyst believes housing values will take a long while to regain the levels they reached around 2006, the peak year of this recent ultra expansion. Prices went up at a rather steep curve and then hit the breaks and plunged at a breath-taking velocity. With that a lot of other economic fundamentals were thrown out the window, too, and there apparently are the seeds to the sluggish real estate recovery.
Housing values will take 20 years to reach the earlier high point in California and Florida, the Moody's Economy.com forecast says. That's possible knowing what those states have gone … (8 comments)

home loan: Fannie Mae accelerates mortgage buying process - 09/12/09 11:33 AM
The mortgage industry could use some good news for a change and it's getting a little bit of it from Fannie Mae, the GSE, or government-sponsored enterprise, which buys mortgage-backed securities on the secondary market. Its actions bring crucial liquidity to the vast home loan sector. Life hasn't been easy for it lately, as it struggles with a record number of foreclosures and even outright corrosion of its once untouchable mandate.
Fannie Mae is moving forward with new ideas, though, despite its troubles and criticism. The latest it came up with is to speed considerably the warehouse lending routine. A warehouse lender provides … (18 comments)

home loan: FICO update a tad more tolerant - 09/08/09 09:32 AM
Mortgage applicants are quite familiar with FICO, the much-used scoring model that has a lot to say about the type of a home loan and interest rate they could qualify for. Besides being widely employed in most consumer credit requests, it's nowadays also checked in many other situations, like in insurance and employment.
FICO 08 is the latest version of the model, fresh out of the oven. It is updated periodically to reflect what is going on in the credit marketplace, as it should be. Equifax, Experian and TransUnion, the big three, have already put their arms around it.
What's new … (9 comments)

home loan: Housing may not pull the economy out of the fire this time - 09/01/09 09:05 AM
Residential real estate plays a large role in U.S. economy. Recessions are an inevitable experience in a market economy like ours. They come and go. Historically housing has been the engine that has usually generated the necessary momentum to pull the country back onto a path of solid growth. This time, however, things could shape up differently.
Co-chief investment officer at Pimco, a huge bond fund from Newport Beach, California, Bill Gross makes that argument. His reasons include reduced consumer spending, more government regulation and a newly-discovered trend for people to save. All basic macro-economic developments and definitely valid points.
The … (6 comments)

home loan: Southern Nevada mortgage challenge in the making - 08/30/09 11:11 AM
Las Vegas real estate market has undoubtedly seen better days. Anyone who knows something about the timely topic is well aware of that. Now there is an altogether new, bizarre twist to the notion.
National Association of Home Builders, or NAHB, convention comes to Southern Nevada every January to showcase the latest in their product lineup. It really is an impressive event and usually draws huge crowds year after year. One of the annual must-see displays is a model house, called The New American Home, which introduces the hottest new technologies available in home building. Domanico Custom Homes from Las Vegas … (4 comments)

home loan: Mortgage securities gaining acceptance again? - 08/17/09 12:50 PM
Mortgage-backed securities were some of the most-sought-after paper on Wall Street not so long ago, when the residential real estate market was still cruising along smoothly. The yields were solid and risk was seemingly minimal. Everybody and his nephew wanted at least some of them in their portfolios.
Then the mortgage securities business rolled right over the cliff, shoved there by the rapidly-deteriorating housing market. And the deep hurt was on, felt all across the industry. Now even well-qualified borrowers find it challenging to obtain a home loan, for refinance or purchase, as requirements have tightened considerably. The government had to … (36 comments)

home loan: FHA Energy Efficient Mortgage helps homeowners lower utility bills - 08/09/09 03:57 PM
Energy Efficient Mortgage, or EEM, by FHA has been around for quite some time but hasn't really caught on that well. Not yet anyway. The government is just now revving up a national campaign to highlight the importance of energy conservation in housing. It's putting a lot of resources into it. As a result the EEM is definitely going to get more media exposure and could even see some additional incentives added to its current program.
Here is how the FHA EEM basically works now. The borrower would purchase or refinance a principal residence, undergoing a regular FHA home loan approval … (2 comments)

home loan: FHA mortgage coming on strong in Las Vegas - 07/14/09 09:11 AM
FHA barely had any market share in Southern Nevada a few years ago because the conventional product was generally offering home loans with better terms. And then comes the mother of all housing slumps that manhandles the conventional mortgage segment and gives FHA another chance to show what it can do. And it's rising to the occasion.
Much of the real estate activity in Las Vegas is now at the lower end of the market where prices are truly affordable, be it a single-family home or a condo or a townhouse. Values have been mercilessly rolled back to the levels of the … (2 comments)

home loan: Is the mortgage industry on the mend? - 06/16/09 04:14 PM
Maybe it is if the focus is on the mortgage-backed securities market. More specifically on privately-issued mortgage bonds. Just a few months ago there was hardly any market for them at all, and if there were one, the prices of them were on life support.
But now this particular sector is stirring. At least a little bit. Mortgage bonds secured by 30-year fixed-rate prime paper issued in 2006-07 traded for 55 cents on the dollar in March, reports Amherst Securities Group, a dealer and market maker in mortgage-backed securities. That was then, now the same paper is going for almost 80 … (8 comments)

home loan: Home buyer tax credit could expand to everybody - 05/23/09 06:27 AM
Tentative discussions are already underway on it, although not yet where it really counts. Which is Washington. The Democratic Leadership Council has brought up the idea and it seems to be getting some traction. But as of right now, it's still in its infancy. No legislation has been introduced.
The first-time buyer tax credit of $8,000 has been fairly successful, boosting demand for the sagging real estate market. This new idea would then make every potential buyer eligible, a move that would give the still sluggish demand side another jolt forward. That's where the big problem right now is, as strict … (8 comments)

home loan: Mortgage approval requirements getting tougher, the Fed asserts - 05/12/09 08:39 AM
Washington has been super busy for months in trying to shore up the ailing financial sector, hoping to keep it from being swallowed into an abyss by the real estate market meltdown. It has used rented front loaders to distribute cash to banks weighed down by nearly-worthless mortgage paper. In addition, the Fed's key short-term lending rate has been butchered down to almost zero. All this frantic activity has given the country some sense of comfort that the dire problem is getting the attention it needs.
Perhaps that's not quite enough, though. The Federal Reserve, or Fed, just published a quarterly … (16 comments)

home loan: Another mortgage regulatory agency in the works in Washington? - 04/25/09 03:47 PM
It just might happen. Both the House and Senate presented bills in March that would set up a brand new agency responsible for keeping a keen eye on all sorts of consumer credit, including home loans. It would ensure everyday financial products would be safe for consumers to use, as a broad term. If such an outfit is created sometime down the road it would be called Financial Products Safety Commission.
It is understandable that policy makers in Washington are highly concerned about soaring mortgage delinquencies and foreclosures and sinking real estate values. The housing industry, after all, is a key … (4 comments)

home loan: Vegas housing market getting demand help, from vulture funds - 04/21/09 09:42 AM
The numbers are still too high. Southern Nevada existing home inventory, according to the local MLS, continues to hover up there where no one wants to see it. It has been over 20,000 for months. Much of it has to do with the high mortgage foreclosure rates here that seem to be marching along unabated, month after month.
Bottom line is, demand is still too weak. Low home loan interest rates have been a big help and the various government incentives are also weighing positively in. But that's not enough. To change the real estate market dynamics in Las Vegas more qualified … (8 comments)

home loan: Mortgage industry reform plans skirting the real issues - 04/07/09 01:24 PM
There is no question that the home loan industry needs a fresh look and some adjustments have to be made to prevent in the future what just happened to it. Easy underwriting requirements were part of the reason the real estate market ultimately tanked and dragged the entire economy into a filthy gutter. But those, the underwriting criteria, really were poor business decisions and can't be regulated.
Anyway, Congress is working on all sorts of angles now to find the right reform solutions. The House just introduced an act that has a long name and lots of ideas, some reasonable and … (20 comments)