The San Jose Way

Would you like to lower your monthly mortgage payment, but you're locked out of refinancing for one reason or another (e.g., self-employed or bad credit)?  Here's a little-known strategy that you may be able to use.  It's called recasting or re-amortization.  Not all mortgage servicers will let y...

The California Housing Finance Agency (CalHFA) program to help unemployed homeowners pay their mortgage is finally underway. I've written about this program and its delays before (see California Wants You to Keep Your Home and Keep Your Home Program Delayed), but now it is up and running and taki...

Fannie Mae, the government sponsored enterprise owning most mortgage loans in the U.S., has launched a new interactive, multi-media tool called WaysHome to help homeowners understand the options to avoiding foreclosure, and to motivate them to take actually seek help in 2011 rather than let bad c...

Short sales are a terrific option for homeowners struggling with unaffordable mortgage payments.  In fact, lenders' losses due to foreclosure are projected to increase at record rates in 2011, giving them more reason to pursue short sales.  Lenders are projected to incur losses as severe as 85 pe...

Looking at a 10-year history of property sales, single-family home prices remain approximately at the same level they were in 2002.  This hasn't changed from the previous quarter's chart published in October.  For condos and townhouses, prices are at the lowest level on the chart.  Both categorie...

The January 2011 edition of my Santa Clara County Real Estate Market Trends Report covering San Jose and surrounding communities is now available.  This report covers the state of the real estate market in December 2010, and is a wealth of practical and statistical information about the current s...

Actually, it's not so much that you wouldn't be able to sell it.  It's more that the pool of potential buyers would be very small.  And, even if you didn't want to sell, what if your chances of refinancing to better loan terms would be very small?  These are the potential ramifications of condomi...