Calling so-called raw delinquency statistics "meaningless and misleading," IndyMac chairman and CEO Mike Perry said late last week that the thrift -- which lost $509 million in the fourth quarter and suspended its dividend amid increasing borrower delinquencies -- would cease reporting them, as it looked to shift its reporting to so-called static-pool data. Perry said the company was "working feverishly" provide static-pool data to...
U.S. Housing Market Commentary
Posted by Paul Jackson on 3/26/08 at 1:51pm
Posted by Housingwire Staff on 3/26/08 at 10:41am
What does it say about this crazy market market that (a) securitization all but froze towards the back half of last year and (b) that securitizing loans was still more popular than traditional portfolio lending?
Inside Mortgage Finance reported Wednesday that securitization as a share of origination activity in 2007 reached a new record high, with portfolio lending accounting for just 25.9 percent of $2.43 trillion in total mortgage production last year.
Not...
Posted by Richard Bitner on 3/25/08 at 2:34pm
Over the last few weeks, I’ve had some time to go back and read the landmark agreement NY Attorney General Andrew Cuomo struck with Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and OFHEO a few weeks ago. Designed to prevent brokers from ordering appraisals and lenders from having an ownership interest in an appraisal company, I’ll readily admit that I was one of the first to hail the move.
Although it’s...
Posted by Housingwire Staff on 3/25/08 at 2:04pm
Earlier today we published a contributed piece from an attorney on the front lines of the foreclosure mess -- and he wrote about a Tennessee Supreme Court case pitting an insurer against a lender. The reason?
The insured property went into foreclosure, and then burned to the ground. When the lender went back to the insurer for restitution, the insurer balked and said the lender...
Posted by Housingwire Staff on 3/25/08 at 12:42pm
How about "what is the size of price declines from the top so far?"
We obtained a report from Tradition Financial Services, Inc. that definitely deserves some attention. The firm located high points in each major market and then calculated just how far prices have fallen since then.
Posted by Paul Jackson on 3/25/08 at 9:35am
Housing Wire was named to a list of five "Must-reads in a Web 2.0 world" by Fortune today, along with our favorite blog ever, DealBreaker. We're just humbled to be in such rarified company -- and it's motivating to see that the idea here of creating a financial news outlet for the mortgage industry has really caught...
Posted by Housingwire Staff on 3/24/08 at 5:24pm
We swear we thought we'd seen it all. Every possible tie into the mortgage meltdown -- lumber sales slowing, Home Depot and Lowe's seeing profits dip, paper sales off. You know, the standard items tied to housing.
But now we've seen it all. Because we found Rescue Rick. Leave it to our chum RR to tie the mortgage mess to a need for better lawn safety. Yes, lawn safety.
Posted by Housingwire Staff on 3/24/08 at 7:07am
Perhaps proving that the USA Today isn't really so much a newspaper as it is light reading for those whose delicate minds can't process actual news -- we dare you to find a story anywhere in the paper longer than 1,000 words -- the chart-toting daily named National Association of Realtors chief economist Lawrence Yun to its list of top 10 most accurate forecasters.
We're still trying to process what sort of 'accuracy' USA Today used as its benchmark, as Yun has been fisked repeatedly...
Posted by Richard Bitner on 3/21/08 at 8:40am
So how much did technology and more specifically, automated underwriting, factor into the current subprime crisis? In this former lender’s opinion, the impact was substantial.
The widespread use of automated underwriting (AU) technology eventually brought subprime lending into the 21st century. Although systems were slow to develop, most lenders had some form of AU technology in place by 2004. The more robust systems used risk-based decision-making that went beyond basic underwriting...
Posted by Paul Jackson on 3/21/08 at 6:44am
Via Bloomberg, a little slice of American lore:
The New York Stock Exchange is closed today, as it has been every Good Friday for nearly a century and a half except for in 1898, 1906 and 1907.
That last one was in the same year as the infamous Panic of 1907, when the value of U.S. stocks plunged by more than a third. Hence, a legend that persists 101...