AGBeat » mortgages

13 graphs charting home purchase finance trends in 2011

Tara Steele — Sun, 04 Dec 2011 19:34:50 +0000

Home purchase finance trends The 2011 National Association of Realtors® Profile of Home Buyers and Sellers recently surveyed 5,708 home buyers and sellers and discovered that the percentage of home buyers using mortgage financing is on the decline and that there is a major difference between where first time and repeat buyers come up with down payment funds. Additionally, the profile revealed that [...]

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Mortgage applications at highest level in three months

Tara Steele — Wed, 09 Mar 2011 21:33:46 +0000

According to the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA), the seasonally adjusted index of mortgage application activity jumped up to the highest level in three months last week. The index accounts for home purchase and refinancing loans, rising 15.5% last week as unemployment rates were announced as markedly improved employment numbers. Home purchases saw gains of 12.5% while refinancing apps jumped 17.2%. [...]

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Fannie and Freddie – R.I.P. – what happens next?

Ken Montville — Sun, 08 Aug 2010 12:47:07 +0000

The handwriting is on the wall. Fannie and Freddie failed as Government Sponsored Enterprises (GSEs) and are now wards of the State. Talk about your socialism. It seems that when push comes to shove and the only people willing to take mortgages off the hands of private lenders (banks,etc.) are Government bureaucrats, well, I guess that’s OK. Unfortunately, even Congress — that bastion of [...]

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USDA funding may not run out after all – HR 5017 passed today

Tara Steele — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 04:07:06 +0000

HR 5017 passed Today, the Kanjorski bill (HR 5017) passed unanimously in the House Financial Services Committee, a bill aimed at supporting the rural housing market that has struggled to get passed. HR 5017 also known as the Rural Housing Preservation and Stabilization Act of 2010 will end the current method of using federal funding to backstop the guarantee, but [...]

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Financial and Mortgage Reform? Nah. Who Needs It?

Ken Montville — Sun, 13 Dec 2009 13:00:56 +0000

This week the House of Representatives passed a sweeping financial reform package that would deter, in part, some of the most egregious practices of the financial and mortgage industries. In essence, it would curb, or try to curb, some of the sub-prime and other “exotic” mortgage products as well as create a bit of transparency for the average consumer of [...]

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FHA Changes May Cause More Loans to Go Underwater

Ken Montville — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 13:00:43 +0000

I first caught whiff of this in an Inman News article by Matt Carter. Then I saw an editorial about it in The Washington Post. Then I heard a short piece on Marketplace Money from American Public Media on my local NPR station (you know how us liberals love our NPR). So I know I wasn’t hallucinating. It seems that [...]

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Some Much Needed Perspective

Jim Duncan — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 06:00:11 +0000

Perhaps to the collective short-sightedness that has been one of the contributing factors to the current housing market shift, but not to those who see housing as a long-term, buy (and live in) and hold investment. ... Let's shift the perspective from one that tracks the housing market on a week-to-week and month-by-month basis and recognize that " relatively" 6% is as close to free money as we're likely to see.

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Zillow’s Mortgage Referral Program

Shailesh Ghimire — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 17:59:55 +0000

The Zillow mortgage is about to launch and the first phase is already underway. Several industry bloggers have covered the main features of the coming Zillow mortgage offering and I’m not going to rehash it here. The first phase apparently involves loan officers registering on Zillow to receive free Internet consumer referrals. This includes a $25 fee for background check [...]

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Equity Management Is Overrated

Shailesh Ghimire — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 16:23:19 +0000

A few years ago, in the middle of the housing boom, I came across the equity management philosophy of wealth creation. The basic premise is that in order to maximize your wealth over the long term you should not pay off your mortgage. Instead you should leverage the mortgage debt to create wealth. Debt leveraging is where you borrower as [...]

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Conforming Loan Limit Increased

Shailesh Ghimire — Mon, 11 Feb 2008 20:29:02 +0000

As part of the $150 billion economic stimulus package Congress and the Bush Administration have agreed to raise the conforming loan limit. Congress has already passed the bill and President Bush is expected to sign it this Wednesday. This increase in the limit is only temporary until December 31st, 2008. The new conforming loan limit allows Fannie, Freddie and FHA [...]

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