Crash Survival Zone

Foreclosure notices on U.S. properties in January rose 18% from a year earlier while they fell 10% from December, RealtyTrac reported.

Foreclosure filings, which include default notices, auction-sale notices, and bank repossessions, totaled 274,399 in the month.

And one in every 466 U.S. housing units was the subject of a filing, the Irvine, Calif., online real-estate-data provider [...]

There’s no shortage of blame for the mortgage crisis that drove the economy into the ditch.
But here’s a fresh culprit: the 2005 bankruptcy reform act, which was strongly pushed by the credit card industry.

So say three researchers at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, who argue that the legislation shifted risk from credit card [...]

As foreclosures and tightening budgets lead people to downsize their living spaces, some folks are moving their valuables into self-storage facilities.

Charles Ray Wilson, president of Self Storage Data Services Inc., says the self-storage industry should continue on its “smooth road of solid performance considering its strong fundamentals.” His research company, which tracks self-storage trends, says [...]

Bloomberg News last week reported that the chairman- designate of the National Economic Council, Lawrence Summers, had been conferring with conservative icon and Columbia Business School Dean Glenn Hubbard about a housing plan Hubbard designed with Columbia colleague Christopher Mayer. Obama’s economic advisers appear to have embraced the proposal, which is already “on a fast [...]

In a move that provides relief to thousands of renters who face eviction but draws the federal government even deeper into the housing market, the loan giant Fannie Mae said Sunday that it would sign new leases with renters living in foreclosed properties owned by the company.

It is the first nationwide effort to provide widespread [...]

Homes in the United States have lost trillions of dollars in value during 2008, with nearly 11.7 million American households now owing more on their mortgage than their homes are worth, real estate website Zillow.com said on Monday.

U.S. homes are set to lose well over $2 trillion in value during 2008, according to an analysis [...]

U.S. foreclosure filings climbed 28 percent in November from a year earlier and a brewing “storm” of new defaults and job losses may force 1 million homeowners from their properties next year, RealtyTrac Inc. said.
A total of 259,085 properties got a default notice, were warned of a pending auction or were foreclosed on last month, [...]