Crash Survival Zone

My housing insecurity, and why it should be yours.

By Mark Gimein

Two years away from the peak of the great housing bubble, the talk has turned to whether we’ve reached a bottom. And whenever there is talk of a bottom, there is also the inevitable talk of recovery, the speculation about just how long—five years? ten?—it [...]

Home prices sank by the sharpest annual rate on record in January, and the pace continues to accelerate, but there were a handful battered metro areas where price declines slowed, according to data released Tuesday.

The Standard & Poor’s/Case-Shiller index of home prices in 20 major cities tumbled by a record 19 percent from January 2008. [...]

City officials and housing advocates here and in cities as varied as Buffalo, Kansas City, Mo., and Jacksonville, Fla., say they are seeing an unsettling development: Banks are quietly declining to take possession of properties at the end of the foreclosure process, most often because the cost of the ordeal — from legal fees to [...]

The existing home sales data which was released to the market earlier was a “half empty, half full” set of data. The market seemed to take it as just full and left the empty part behind.

Home resale rates rose 5.1% in February to an annual rate of 4.72 million, according to the National Association of [...]

In its recent annual report to the Mortgage Banker’s Association, the Mortgage Asset Research Institute described three emerging mortgage fraud schemes that are either new or increasing in popularity.

Foreclosure Prevention Schemes
Elderly and Immigrant Identity Fraud
Builder Bail-Out Fraud

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Consumerist

Instead of having a Boston Tea party in your kitchen, check out the Homeowner’s Property Tax Reduction Kit (PDF, 1.4 MB). It’s got ways for you to check your assessment, identify errors, and how to appeal it. A state-by-state guide gives you the breakdown and specific laws for where you live.

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Consumerist

U.S. mortgage rates may fall to the lowest since World War II on the Federal Reserve’s plan to buy up to $300 billion of Treasuries and increase purchases of mortgage-backed bonds.

Rates for 30-year fixed home loans dropped to 4.98 percent this week, Freddie Mac said today. They may reach 4.5 percent as the Fed’s purchases [...]

Residential sales are cratering, which is making it more difficult to appraise homes. And that is making mortgages more difficult to obtain.

For real estate appraisers, determining what a house is worth has become increasingly difficult, which is making it even harder for buyers to purchase homes or for homeowners to refinance.

The main tool in the [...]

The attitudes and values of boomers heading into retirement are changing. They have to.

In the wake of a stock market and home price collapse, most boomers are not prepared for the future. Let’s explore that idea with a look at Is the Future Going Down the Drain?

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Global Economic Trend Analysis

Home foreclosures, sub-prime loans, and underwater mortgages have understandably dominated concerns about the collapse of the housing market. Yet plunging home values have also triggered equally devastating consequences for the retirement hopes of millions of older homeowners. Perhaps even more than falling retirement-plan investments, 30 percent to 40 percent drops in housing values are destroying [...]