Job Losses Have Homeowners Late On Mortgage Payments

[NNN0LHI]

http://money.tbo.com/money/MGA8NXEQLKD.html

WASHINGTON - More homeowners were behind on their mortgage payments in the last quarter as job losses put a strain on some households' budgets.

The seasonally adjusted percentage of mortgage payments 30 or more days past due for all home loans rose to 4.62 percent in the April-to-June quarter, up sharply from 4.52 percent in the first three months of this year, the Mortgage Bankers Association of America reported Wednesday in its quarterly survey. The survey covers roughly 34 million mortgage loans.

The second quarter's delinquency rate was the highest since the third quarter of 2002, when the delinquency rate was 4.66 percent. The delinquency rate does not include loans that are in the process of foreclosure.

``The delinquency uptick we've seen here is related to unemployment,'' said Doug Duncan, the association's chief economist. The economy lost 181,000 jobs during the April- to-June quarter.

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[meegbear]

1. Earth to media ...

DUH!!!

[Warren Stuart]

2. But, but, productivity is picking up

Oh Right, that's due to all people that were let go, making others work harder for the same pay. Nevermind.

[liberalhistorian]

3. I'm a paralegal for a real estate attorney who's been in the

business for thirty years, and he says he has NEVER seen such a high foreclosure rate before, nor so many desperate people trying to make new payment arrangements with banks because they've lost their job or been demoted, etc., etc.

The worst are the fly-by-night mortgage companies that have sprung up like weeds during the past decade; their terms and interest rates are horrendous, and if you miss ONE payment they file foreclosure. At least most banks wait several months before taking such a drastic step. It's incredibly sad, we're seeing people who've worked for decades and all they really have is their house, yet suddenly it's being sold out from under them at a sheriff's sale because they suffered a job loss, illness, demotion with lower pay, etc.

[AP]

6. A while ago, someone speculated that banks were not foreclosing

and letting people miss payments because the publicly traded banks didn't want to jeopardize their share prices by having to admit that their source of revenue -- mortgaage interest -- was drying up.

I also read somewhere that all the federal agencies are concerned with one thing: making sure that the real estate bubble didn't burst. They've all been juggling a lot of things, with all the balls in the air, just trying to keep real estate from imploding.

I'm sure one of those balls in the air was begging banks not to foreclose.

It makes sense that the small mortgage companies won't have the share price concern and won't be subject to pressures from the white house.

[bleedingheart]

4. at the pittsburgh gathering this weekend

one of the du'ers who is very familiar with this stuff said that there has been a dramatic upswing in sheriff sales in Allegheny county...
something like 3000...up from an average of 300...

[leesa]

5. This is what the Crime Family wanted. All the property goes back to its

rightful owners (the rich)in a depression.

[AP]

7. They probably wanted to hold out until the second term, but

if it looks like there will be no second term, you can expect the last coveted wealth (middle class wealth built up in home equity) will transfer to the wealthy very soon in a very dramatic blow-out of the economy.

[slappypan]

8. home equity -- too late

The middle class has been pulling equity out of their homes by refinancing, and spending it on crap. Some never had any equity due to the growing popularity of interest-only mortgages.

[AP]

9. Every month, some tiny % (for most) of you mortgage payment is equity

and people are about to lose all of it, whether it was the month they just paid, or the last year, or the last 10 years, if they have to sell their homes in a shrinking real estate market.

The banks will have gotten their profit (all that interest) when they foreclose.

[Trajan]

10. I re-fi'ed 18 months ago ....

and pulled NO cash out (though I did add 15,000.00 in costs to the note) ....

Now: ... Im in escrow to sell: .... I'll make 130,000.00 ....

My house appreciated $130,000.00 in 44 months since I bought the house .... it increased $85,000.00 since I re-fi'ed 18 months ago ....

Unfuckinbelivable ....

I am SO glad I finally put this house up on the market: .... Since I was LAID OFF on Labor Day, I didnt really have enough money to pay the monthly payment .... chuckles ...... fancy that .....

The house sold in 3 days ..... for more than the asking price ....

GEEEEZ .... I couldnt, wouldnt buy it for THAT price ....

WE lucked out: ... we are taking the money and RUNNING ....

[InkAddict]

14. You must mean prep/college crap, and I resent it!

This family remains headed by an itinerant(no LOL-that's what it's felt like)IT pro who found lots of fruited fields (private and contract) in previous years, even with downsizing, merging, outsourcing/Read: BushI/Ray-gun/Clinton's penis...and not at Silicon Valley wages either, though just enough to keep going, trying, struggling to get another job over and over and over, commuting 200 miles daily (just try all that interstate stuff in the wintertime in anything but an SUV) for that opportunity to slow the spiral of descent into what?) just to see that his kids got the grades, the activities, the opportunity for college educations. My daughters were lucky and got some scholarship funds. (I once told them to get that "piece of paper," even if it meant the military--Gee, I'm
m so thankful they failed to succumb to their mother's advice.) Then, just when one is caught up -WHAP again - and the BS excuses and cons we've heard, OMG!. There hasn't been two years of stability strung together since 1986. SOMETHING ABOUT THIS TIME IS VERY ROTTEN! We've been federally betrayed and persecuted, selected out, and don't ask what case it most reminds me of - because I believe that case is tangled up in the present root system of this invasive weed of an administration!
:mad:

[Nottingham]

11. if the Real Estate market goes Its Going to be TERRIBLE

I would say most Americans have their money in their homes! :bounce:

[InkAddict]

15. Yeah, guess they can also kiss

their federally-backed Stafford college loans good-bye forever too!

[Neutrino]

12. Appraisers pressured to overvalue Homes to qualify

for Refinancing. (It's from Freep, but I read it on my Gold Traders
Forum.)
I've said it before, Housing is a bubble--and the numbers are bogus.

http://www.freep.com/realestate/renews/harney14_20030914.htm

[davsand]

13. Sure there is pressure to hit a specific number.

Any appraiser who says there isn't is lying. My license is lapsing as of the end of this month and I do not intend to renew it.

As with any business, you have a number of regular clients (lenders) you do work for. The call usually goes something like this:

"I've got an appraisal I need done by____. The selling/contract price is _____." Right off the bat, the client is telling you (without saying it) what you need to value that property at.

For those appraisers to tell a third party (the polling agent) that they felt pressure is pretty amazing to me given the fact that it is considered unethical to accept any assignment if it is contingent on meeting a certain value. they are, in essence, admitting to a stranger that they have done work that is unethical.

Other guys I know in the business have talked about the fact that sometimes people just pay too much for a property, and they end up with NO WAY to juggle the numbers enough to bring it in at the sales price. Calling a lender and telling them a property is not worth what the mortgagee needs is not a fun thing to do, but I have seen it done more than a couple times.

The appraisal done by an independent fee appraiser is about the only protection the banks have that they are not lending too much money on properties. If they lend too much and the buyer defaults on that mortgage the bank is out that money unless THEY can then sell it for too much.

We have to carry liability insurance for what we do, but I'll tell you right now that if the foreclosure rate gets too high there are gonna be a bunch of banks that are in deep shit. There is not enough insurance to cover the level of losses banks face in some areas.

Just reflect back to the S&L crashes several years ago (In Texas!) when banks got stuck with a bunch of property. That could happen nationwide.

Laura