Tag Archives: Foreclosures

mtg apps dip

Posted on by

How does that go again about low rates helping housing?

Mortgage Applications Dipped Last Week

June 29 (Reuters) — Applications for U.S. home mortgages slipped last week as demand waned, even as mortgage rates dropped, an industry group said Wednesday.

The Mortgage Bankers Association said its seasonally adjusted index of mortgage application activity, which includes both refinancing and home purchase demand, fell 2.7 percent in the week ended June 24.

The MBA’s seasonally adjusted index of refinancing applications fell 2.6 percent, while the gauge of loan requests for home purchases lost 3.0 percent.

The refinance share of mortgage activity increased to 69.5 percent of total applications from 69.2 percent the week before.

Fixed 30-year mortgage rates averaged 4.46 percent in the week, down from 4.57 percent.

Share

mtg apps for new purchases fall again

Posted on by

Seems the fall off after the tax credit ended April 30th has yet to fully run its course:

US Mortgage Applications Soar on Refinance Demand

July 7th (Reuters) —Refinancing drove total U.S. mortgage applications to a nine-month high last week, while demand for loans to purchase homes sunk to a near 13-year low as buyers remained sidelined after the expiration of federal tax credits.

Mortgage rates stuck around record lows, the Mortgage Bankers Association said on Wednesday, giving homeowners another chance to cut monthly payments by refinancing.

Refinancing requests jumped 9.2 percent in the week ended July 2 to the highest level since May 2009, lifting total applications by 6.7 percent, seasonally adjusted, to the highest level since early October 2009.

Demand for mortgages to buy homes slipped 2 percent. It was the eighth weekly drop in the nine weeks since the federal tax credits for homebuyers expired on April 30.

“For the month of June, purchase applications declined almost 15 percent relative to the prior month and were down more than 30 percent compared to April, the last month in which buyers were eligible for the tax credit,” Michael Fratantoni, MBA’s vice president of research and economics, said in a statement.

The average 30-year mortgage rate was little changed in the week ended July 2, climbing 0.01 percentage point to 4.68 percent.

The borrowing rate lingered just above the record low of 4.61 percent set in March 2009, according to the MBA’s records that date back to 1990.

Fifteen-year mortgage rates rose to 4.11 percent last week from the record low 4.06 percent set the prior week.

Refinancings accounted for 78.7 percent of all applications last week, the highest share since April 2009, the industry group said.

Tepid employment growth and a surprisingly steep slump in pending home sales kept interest rates low.

Home purchases will stay weak over the next few months as the housing market adjusts to the end of government incentives, and prices should bottom around the third quarter, said Robert Andrews, senior research analyst at IBISWorld in Santa Monica, California.

Fallout from record defaults and foreclosures are also likely to sway many younger buyers from making such a big commitment in the near term, he said.

“People in my generation, people 20 to 30 years old, saw the downside risk associated with housing, so I think there’s going to be a bit weaker demand over the next few years,” said Andrews.

Refinancing, likewise, is unlikely to approach the levels seen last year when mortgage rates were near current levels.

Borrowers who could qualify for refinancing have in most cases already refinanced, most analysts agree.

Share

Foreclosures and existing home sales data

Posted on by


[Skip to the end]

this is telling:

From a contact in Texas:

When I went to the bankruptcy / foreclosure auctions here a few weeks ago I found out that the whole thing is a charade. Bank of America (for instance) auctions off houses that have gone into foreclosure for the amount owed plus any carrying costs which usually makes the auction price higher than what was owed. A pre-bid was submitted by Bank of America Home Loan Servicing (the rename for Countrywide) in the exact amount of the auction minimum (mortgage owed plus carrying costs). No one else bids so the house is “sold” by Bank of America to Bank of America Home Loan Servicing. In essence, the property is simply transferred from one division to another so that clear title is established. But this is counted as an existing home sale which artificially inflates existing home sales numbers. This is what was happening for most of the 102 BAC mortgages and the 130 Wells Fargo mortgages. For the house I “rent” where the original mortgage was with Countrywide (and then transferred to B of A when B of A bought the property) this is simply a process for getting the house off of B of A’s books and back on Countrywide’s books (now BAC Home Loan Servicing). As I said, it is all charade or smoke-and-mirrors or a shell game.

Later Bank of America Home Loan Servicing will contact a realtor who will eventually put the house on the market for sale. Let’s say that the auction price was $200,000 but the house is now worth only $150,000. The house hopefully gets sold for $150,000 so that the “loss” is reduced from $200,000 to only $50,000 and the property is disposed of. Of course when this house is sold by the realtor it is again counted as an existing home sale.

Staggering 22 % of The State Of Florida are in Some Stage Of Forclosure

A staggering 22 percent of all mortgages in the state of Florida are non-current, according to a new report from Lender Processing Services.

By non-current, they mean loans that are either delinquent or in some stage of foreclosure; perhaps more troubling is the fact that 10.4 percent of home loans in Florida are in foreclosure.

The LPS October Mortgage Monitor also revealed that the nation’s foreclosure rate was 3.12 percent as of September 30, up 2.6 percent from a month earlier and 88.9 percent year-over-year.

And remember that’s with all the government intervention, foreclosure moratoria, loan modifications, and the like; the national mortgagedelinquency rate was 9.37 percent as of September 30.

The report also highlights the large shadow inventory of foreclosed properties that could wreak havoc on home prices and a possible housing recovery.

“The number of loans deteriorating further into delinquent status is now more than twice the number of foreclosure starts, indicating another major wave of troubled loans in an already clogged loan pipeline,” the company said.


[top]

Share

Associated Press: Forclosures FALL 4% in February

Posted on by

Note the fact that foreclosures went down a tad in February versus January is buried at the end of the article.

Number of US homes facing foreclosure jumps nearly 60 percent in February

by Alex Veiga

(AP) Nearly 60 percent more U.S. homes faced foreclosure in February than in the same month last year, with Nevada, California and Florida showing the highest foreclosure rates, a research firm said Wednesday.

AP

A total of 223,651 homes across the nation received at least one notice from lenders last month related to overdue payments, up 59.8 percent from 139,922 a year earlier, according to Irvine, Calif.-based RealtyTrac.

Nearly half of the homes on the most recent list had slipped into default for the first time.

Nevada had the nation’s highest foreclosure rate, with one in every 165 households receiving at least one foreclosure-related notice. It had 6,167 properties facing foreclosure, a 68 percent increase from a year earlier and up 1 percent from January, RealtyTrac said.

Most of the troubled properties were located in California, Florida, Texas, Michigan and Ohio — states where home prices have plunged as the housing boom went bust.

The overall U.S. foreclosure rate last month was one filing for every 557 homes.

February’s total represents a 4 percent dip from January, but the decline was just a seasonal blip, said Rick Sharga, RealtyTrac’s vice president of marketing.

“We seem to be settling in at a new plateau in terms of monthly activity, but it’s a much higher plateau than we were at a year ago,” he said.

Share