unemployment

June 15 is the short sale day

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the nation’s two largest mortgage backers, will implement their new short sale guidelines on June 15. The changes require mortgage servicers to make a decision within 30 days of receiving a short sale offer. They also must consider requests for pre-approved short sales within that same timeframe.  If the lender needs more than 30 days, it must give borrowers weekly status updates and a decision within 60 days of the initial application. This extension gives lenders more time to determine the value of the property or to get the approval of a mortgage insurer.  The moves are aimed at streamlining the short sale process, which often takes months to complete. Faster response times could help thousands of homeowners. Short sale transactions can get so complicated that many prospective buyers won’t even consider making an offer on a short sale property. And many of those who bid often walk away from the offer because lenders take so long to make a decision.  ”Short sales are more complex than routine home sales since they may involve multiple parties and long-distance negotiating,” said Tracy Mooney, a Freddie Mac senior vice president. The new rules “are intended to help make the decision process more transparent and timely.”

Banks have also caught on to the benefit of approving short sales. Foreclosures take more time for the bank to recoup their money, and it costs upwards of $50,000 to process a foreclosure. But in the wake of the robosigning scandal, banks are more apt to help and even encourage a homeowner to pursue via a short sale.  In addition to the benefits of the bank, the homeowner comes out much better in the long run.  Along with a new home, their credit has been salvaged to a respectable level as opposed to letting a home go due to foreclosure. With a foreclosure it can take up to seven years for your credit to show signs of improvement.

Jobless claims stay high, jobs stall

Initial claims for state unemployment benefits dropped by 1,000 to a seasonally adjusted 388,000, the Labor Department said today. The prior week’s figure was revised up to 389,000 from the previously reported 386,000.  The four-week moving average for new claims, a closely followed measure of labor market trends, rose 6,250 to 381,750, its highest since the week that ended Jan. 7.  Economists polled by Reuters had forecast new claims falling to 375,000 last week. The reading was the latest example of fizzling momentum in the labor market recovery. New claims fell sharply during early winter but the improvement has largely stalled in recent weeks.  The number of people still receiving benefits under regular state programs after an initial week of aid rose 3,000 to 3.315 million in the week ended April 14.  The number of Americans on emergency unemployment benefits fell 45,930 to 2.73 million in the week ended April 7, the latest week for which data is available.  A total of 6.68 million people were claiming unemployment benefits during that period under all programs, down 87,160 from the prior week.  Employers added 120,000 new jobs to their payrolls in March, the least since October, after averaging 246,000 jobs per month over the prior three months.  Many economists believe a mild winter boosted payrolls growth earlier in the year and view recent stagnation as payback for those gains.

Foreclosures up in half of all American cities

More than half of US major cities showed an increase in foreclosures since the end of last year, according to RealtyTrac.  Mortgage servicers put a freeze on the process in 2010 to correct affidavit problems and resolve investigations from federal regulators and the state attorneys general. A $25 billion settlement approved in March brought new standards and relief requirements for struggling homeowners.  As servicers adjusted, foreclosures began to increase in different areas of the country during the first quarter.  Filings increased in 26 of 50 largest cities, led by Pittsburgh, where foreclosures jumped 49% from the previous three months.  Some cities still showed continued declines from the end of last year. Filings dropped 28% in Portland, Ore. and fell 26% in Las Vegas. Servicers put Vegas filings on pause since a new state law took effect bringing new affidavit requirements and stronger enforcement for violations. As a result, Stockton,

California held the highest metro foreclosure rate in the first quarter, where one in every 60 homes received a filing.  Vegas dropped all the way to eighth on a 61% decline from the first three months of last year, but it wasn’t the only city with filings well below year-ago levels.  Of the 50 major cities, 33 reported filings were down from the first quarter of 2011. Vegas showed the largest drop over that time, followed by a 53% decrease in Seattle and a 51% drop in Austin, Texas.  “First quarter metro foreclosure trends were a mixed bag,” said Brandon Moore,CEO of RealtyTrac. “While the majority of metro areas continued to show foreclosure activity down from a year ago, more than half reported increasing foreclosure activity from the previous quarter — an early sign that long-dormant foreclosures are coming out of hibernation in many local markets.”

Fed doing more harm than good?

The Federal Reserve is doing more harm to the US economy than good by keeping interest rates artificially low and continuing its “monetary medicine”, Peter Boockvar, portfolio manager and equity strategist at Miller Tabak said.  “Bernanke has put the US economy over the past bunch of years into monetary Fantasyland,” Boockvar said today. “When you have rates at zero, when you have an expanded balance sheet of about $3 trillion, the economy is not real.”  Boockvar’s comments followed the Fed’s policy statement on Wednesday that it would hold its key interest rate near zero. The Fed also indicated the economy would have to improve before it changes its policy. A 9-1 vote accompanied the statement, which renewed the pledge to keep rates low through 2014.  Boockvar said the Fed’s policy of keeping rates at zero misallocates capital and does not create a firm foundation for growth because “the cost of money is artificial.  It’s on monetary medicine, painkillers you can say,” he said. “The Fed to me is an impediment, not a boost, and they should just stop what they are doing.”  The Fed’s quantitative easing or bond-buying over the past several years has coincided with gains in stock markets, but it has also stoked fears of inflation and worries the Fed won’t be able to exit without causing turmoil in the bond markets and a jump in interest rates.  “At some point, the extraordinary policy (of bond buying) has to be reversed and it’s going to be a complete mess when it happens,” Boockvar said. “If they (the Fed) think they’re going to do it orderly, I have a big problem with that belief.”

NAR – recovery is here!

Pending home sales increased in March and are well above a year ago, another signal the housing market is recovering, according to the National Association of Realtors (NAR).  The Pending Home Sales Index, a forward-looking indicator based on contract signings, rose 4.1% to 101.4 in March from an upwardly revised 97.4 in February and is 12.8% above March 2011 when it was 89.9.  The data reflects contracts but not closings.  The index is now at the highest level since April 2010 when it reached 111.3.  The PHSI in the Northeast slipped 0.8% to 78.2 in March but is 21.1% above March 2011.  In the Midwest the index declined 0.9% to 93.3 but is 16.9% higher than a year ago.  Pending home sales in the South rose 5.9% to an index of 114.1 in March and are 10.6% above March 2011.  In the West the index increased 8.7% in March to 108.0 and is 9.0% above a year ago.

Lawrence Yun, NAR chief economist and incorrigible optimist, said 2012 is expected to be a year of recovery for housing.  Of course, he said that about 2010 and 2011 as well, but who’s counting?  “First quarter sales closings were the highest first quarter sales in five years.  The latest contract signing activity suggests the second quarter will be equally good, ” he said.  “The housing market has clearly turned the corner.  Rising sales are bringing down inventory and creating much more balanced conditions around the county, which means home prices will be rising in more areas as the year progresses.”

Olick – noisy numbers or recovery?

“The spring housing numbers aren’t coming in along expectations.  That can’t be, right?  Unemployment has been easing, mortgage delinquencies falling, and affordability is off the charts. That means housing should be bouncing back with verve and vigor this Spring, except it’s not.  It’s not crashing again, it’s just bouncing along a bottom, which means the recovery, as we’ve been warning all along, becomes increasingly local.  Let’s look at some data out this week:  Sales of new homes dropped, but only after a large upward revision in February. That of course leads everyone to blame the weather.  S&P/Case-Shiller’s home price index reached new lows, but the amount of the annual drop was smaller than the previous month, so that’s an improvement, sort of.  Mortgage applications fell, even as the rate on the thirty year fixed hit a new low on the Mortgage Bankers Association’s weekly survey. Refis fell hard and purchase applications rose a little, although the four week moving average is down.  Zillow.com reports that home values rose from February to March (0.5%), ‘marking the largest monthly increase since May 2006, before home values peaked.’ That led analysts there to exclaim the headline: ‘Majority of Markets Covered by Zillow Home Value Forecast to Hit Bottom by Late 2012.’  Trulia.com released a report which mixes three indicators, construction starts, existing home sales and delinquency and foreclosure rates in order to gauge the housing recovery. Apparently it slipped backward in March ‘after a few strides forward.’  Then Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said, ‘The ongoing weakness in the housing market still represents a headwind to economic recovery.’

No wonder economists at Freddie Mac concluded in its April forecast that the data are, ‘noisy.’ Then they too blamed it all on the weather.  So what are we to think, and how are we to play housing, here at the almost, sort of, bottom in some markets but not in others?  ‘Investor demand will drive many markets this spring and summer,’ says David Stiff, chief economist at Fiserv. ‘This means that, at the moment, the MBA purchase application index is a less reliable predictor of sales activity.’  Stiff says he thinks the housing market has bottomed out, but that won’t be obvious until next year. He also makes clear that the recovery will be driven by investors, and investors largely buy in the lower cost markets.  The one truth I heard in all the heated talk of housing today came from CNBC’s Jim Cramer, with whom I often disagree. He said, ‘aggregate numbers make you no money.’ He was talking specifically about housing.”

BOA streamlining short sales process

Bank of America (BOA) says it’s making changes to its short-sale procedures that will shorten decision times on short sale offers to 20 days, down from 45 days or longer.  The new task flow in BOA’s short-sale management platform, Equator, will enable short-sale specialists to conduct tasks like document collection, valuations and underwriting simultaneously. When buyers walk, agents will have five days instead of 14 days to submit a backup offer.  Bank of America is requiring a new third-party authorization form for short sales initiated beginning April 14.  When the changes to Equator take effect Saturday, five documents will be required to process short sales initiated with an offer:

-  A purchase contract including buyer’s acknowledgment and disclosure.

-  HUD-1.

-  IRS Form 4506-T.

-  Bank of America short-sale addendum.

-  Bank of America third-party authorization form.

The Equator platform will be offline the night of Friday, April 13, and into early Saturday, April 14, to implement changes. Offer documents and supporting documents for all short sales submitted with an offer must be uploaded before Friday, April 13, or files may be declined.

Import prices up

Overall import prices rose 1.3% in March, the Labor Department said today. That was the biggest gain since April 2011.  Economists polled by Reuters had expected import prices to rise 0.8% last month. February’s data was revised to show a 0.1% decline instead of the previously reported 0.4% increase.  Stripping out petroleum, import prices increased 0.3% after falling 0.1% in February.  Higher costs for energy have fueled inflation in recent months but a still-weak jobs market has made it harder for businesses to raise other prices.  Data on Thursday is expected to show tame price pressures at a wholesale level, with producer prices seen rising 0.2% in March when stripping out food and energy.  But today’s report underscores the size of the price shock that is stinging Americans when they refuel their cars.  Last month, imported petroleum prices increased 4.3%, the biggest gain since April 2011.  Elsewhere, imported capital goods prices edged 0.2% higher after being flat in February. Imported motor vehicle prices climbed 0.3% after being unchanged in February.  The Labor Department report also showed export prices rose 0.8% last month, above analysts’ expectations for a 0.4% gain. Export prices increased 0.4% in February.

MBA – mortgage applications down

Mortgage applications decreased 2.4% from one week earlier, according to data from the Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending April 6, 2012.  The Market Composite Index, a measure of mortgage loan application volume, decreased 2.4% on a seasonally adjusted basis from one week earlier.  On an unadjusted basis, the Index decreased 2.1% compared with the previous week.  The Refinance Index decreased 3.1% from the previous week.  The seasonally adjusted Purchase Index decreased 0.5% from one week earlier. The unadjusted Purchase Index increased 0.1% compared with the previous week and was 5.5% higher than the same week one year ago.  There was no adjustment made for Good Friday.  The four week moving average for the seasonally adjusted Market Index is down 2.08%.  The four week moving average is up 2.19% for the seasonally adjusted Purchase Index, while this average is down 3.45% for the Refinance Index.  The refinance share of mortgage activity decreased for the eighth consecutive week to 70.5% of total applications from 71.2% the previous week.  This is the lowest refinance share since July 29, 2011.  The adjustable-rate mortgage (ARM) share of activity remained unchanged at 5.5% of total applications from the previous week.

In March 2012, the share of applications for investment properties increased to 8.3% from 7.4% in February 2012.  However, the increase in investor share was driven by refinance applications for investment properties (which increased to 9.2% in March 2012 from 7.7% in February 2012), as the share of purchase applications for investment homes decreased over the month, from 6.1% in February 2012 to 5.7% in March 2012.  The investor share of purchase applications also decreased on a year over year basis, falling from 5.8% in March 2011 to its current level of 5.7% in March 2012.  While MBA tracks applications for second homes and investment properties separately, giving them the ability to distinguish between the two, the combined share of investment and second home applications for home purchase had the same directional components for the month of March 2012 – up on the whole and up for refinance applications last month, but down for home purchase activity.

Credit eases

Credit card lenders gave out 1.1 million new cards to borrowers with damaged credit in December, up 12.3% from the same month a year earlier, according to Equifax’s credit trends report released in March. These borrowers accounted for 23% of new auto loans in the fourth quarter of 2011, up from 17% in the same period of 2009, Experian, a credit scoring firm, said.  The banks are looking to make up the billions in fee income wiped out by regulations enacted after the financial crisis by focusing on two parts of their business — the high and the low ends — industry consultants say. Subprime borrowers typically pay high interest rates, up to 29%, and often rack up fees for late payments.  Some former banking regulators said they worried that this kind of lending, even in its early stages, signaled a potentially dangerous return to the same risky lending that helped fuel the credit crisis.  The lenders argue that they have learned their lesson and are distinguishing between chronic deadbeats and what some in the industry call “fallen angels,” those who had good payment histories before falling behind as the economy foundered.  Regulators with the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, which oversees the nation’s largest banks, said that as long as lenders adhered to strict underwriting standards and monitored risk, there was nothing inherently dangerous about extending credit to a wider swath of people.

Olick – debate over principal forgiveness

“The man at the center of the controversy over writing down mortgage principal on Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac loans isn’t wavering. He may be reconsidering previous loss formulas, factoring in new government subsidies for principal write-down, but his opinion seems largely unchanged.  After beginning a speech this morning about all the so-called ‘Enterprises’ (Fannie and Freddie) have done to help millions of borrowers behind on their mortgage payments, and reminding listeners of his agency’s mandate to, ‘preserve and conserve the assets of the Enterprises,’ FHFA Acting Director Ed DeMarco took a left turn.  ‘There is another human element in this story that does not seem to receive much attention,’ DeMarco continued. ‘Clearly, many households got over-extended financially. Some accumulated debts they couldn’t afford when hours or wages were cut or jobs were lost. Others withdrew equity from their homes as house prices soared. Others bought houses at the peak of the market, often with little money down, perhaps in the belief house prices would continue to climb. Yet there are other Americans who did not do this thing.’ 

That last part really clinches what may eventually be his decision not to allow principal forgiveness, or to do it in an extremely narrow way. Yes, there are all kinds of formulas, and ‘net present value’ analyses that have been and continue to be run. There will be Enterprise gains offset by taxpayer losses, and there will be estimates of operational costs to implement a wide-ranging and necessarily transparent program. But in the end, less than one million borrowers would be helped, and for DeMarco, as for many others, it will come down to fairness and cheating.  ‘One factor that needs to be considered is the borrower incentive effects. That means, will some percentage of borrowers who are current on their loans, be encouraged to either claim a hardship or actually go delinquent to capture the benefits of principal forgiveness?’ asks DeMarco.  ‘This is a particular concern for the Enterprises because unlike other mortgage market participants that can pick and choose where principal forgiveness makes sense, the Enterprises must develop the program to be implemented by more than one thousand seller/servicers. In addition, the Enterprises will have to publicly announce this program and borrower awareness of the possibility of receiving a principal reduction modification will be heightened among Enterprise borrowers,’ he explains.

In other words, this opens the flood gates to cheating. The fact is that there are 11 million borrowers who currently owe more on their mortgages than their homes are worth and yet the vast majority of them are still making monthly payments. Those who haven’t been paying have been delinquent, in some cases, for many years. The concern is that borrowers who are current on their loans might think it’s unfair that those who are not current are being rewarded and they are not. It would take a relatively small group of them strategically defaulting to offset the gains of any principal reduction program and turn it into a massive debacle.  ‘The far larger group of underwater borrowers who today have remained faithful to paying their mortgage obligations are the much greater contingent risk to housing markets and to taxpayers. Encouraging their continued success could have a greater impact on the ultimate recovery of housing markets and cost to the taxpayers than the debate over which modification approach offered to troubled borrowers is preferable,’ concludes DeMarco.  He is expected to announce a decision on principal reduction this month, but the analysts are already out:  ‘We see this as a strong political attack against principal reduction,’ says Jaret Seiberg of Guggenheim partners.  The Obama administration is clearly pushing for it, with Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner recently telling a Senate panel that there is a, ‘very strong economic case’ for principal write-down. He suggested DeMarco, ‘take another look at the math,’ which DeMarco is obviously doing. The trouble is, when it comes to today’s housing market and today’s borrowers, paying your mortgage, whatever it’s worth, is not always a simple equation.”

Oil to sink below $100?

Sandy Jadeja, Chief Technical Analyst at City Index, said the charts suggest US futures may drop to $98 a barrel, and if that level is broken, momentum could accelerate taking the crude to as low as $87.  Oil prices contained below $100 would help alleviate the strain on the US consumer, offering some relief to the broader economy. A gallon of gasoline cost $3.94 at the pump last week, two cents higher than the previous week and 5.9% more expensive than a year earlier, MasterCard said in its weekly Spending Pulse report on Tuesday.  The catalyst for the move lower in oil prices may come later Wednesday when the US Department of Energy’s Energy Information Administration releases weekly stockpiles data at 10:30 am ET.  The report is expected to show a 1.8 million barrels build in commercial crude oil inventories for the week ending April 6, driven by higher US imports of Saudi crude, according to analysts polled by Platts.

CoreLogic – April MarketPulse Report

CoreLogic today released its April CoreLogic MarketPulse report. The monthly economic publication provides insight into the current and future health of the US economic climate with particular focus on housing and mortgage metrics. Chief Economist Mark Fleming and Senior Economist Sam Khater authored the articles and commentary.  The April MarketPulse report:

-  Indicates “now is a good time to buy,” with housing affordability at its highest level ever (as of February 2012), and shows many of the key housing metrics are holding steady through the typically slow winter season.

-  Reports the single-family rental market is strong and vibrant with high and stable rents, low months’ supply and a healthy pace of signed rental leases. The report reveals what markets offer the best return for single-family rental investors. “The potential size of the rental market for REOs this year (and annually over the next few years) is over $100 billion dollars,” said Khater in the report.

-  Shows capitalization rates for single-family rental properties in 26 geographically diverse markets. Capitalization rates are the most common metric for determining the profitability of an investment property.

-  Provides a chart of the rent-to-mortgage ratio for Miami, Fla. The chart indicates the point in time when it became cheaper to buy than to rent, providing insight to investors buying and holding rental properties, as well as to new first-time home buyers.

For a complete copy of the April CoreLogic MarketPulse report, including a complete set of data and charts, visit http://www.corelogic.com/downloadable-docs/MarketPulse_2012-April.pdf.

Colorado kills foreclosure slowdown bill

Legislators who killed a bill requiring that lenders prove they have the right to foreclose on a home say they did so because they tired of laws reforming Colorado’s foreclosure process.  And some rolled their eyes at the ever-present grassroots group that brought it forth — the Colorado Progressive Coalition — suggesting it might have succeeded with different backing.  HB 1156 died in committee two weeks ago on a mostly partisan 8-5 vote, after five hours of testimony, mostly in its favor. One Democrat sided with a majority of Republicans.  Had it passed, it would have stopped a practice that allows foreclosures on just a lawyer’s say-so.  “They need someone other than those groups pushing this stuff,” said Rep. Spencer Swalm, R-Centennial, the vice chairman of the Economic and Business Development Committee, which killed the bill March 13. “But the bottom line, to me, is the big-government, overt intervention in this market.”  Others on the committee told The Denver Post that, in addition to “the same faces supporting and testifying in support,” they voted against the bill because the state already has passed too many laws addressing the foreclosure crisis.  Others decried adding regulation to what they called an overregulated industry.  “Since 2005, the legislature has run and enacted 15 different bills to affect and change the foreclosure process in Colorado,” said Rep. Chris Holbert, R-Parker, the former president of the Colorado Mortgage Lenders Association. “Now is a good time to leave it alone and stop changing things. The process we have in place works fine. Changing things for the 16th time isn’t the right solution.”

QE3 not needed?

A third round of Treasurys purchase is not necessary unless the US economy deteriorates further, according to James Bullard, president of St Louis Federal Reserve Bank.  Recent economic data have signaled that the US economy is doing better than economists think, Bullard told CNBC Tuesday, and a third round of bond buying by the Fed – in a program known as quantitative easing, or QE – is not needed.  “I think QE3 would require the economy to deteriorate somewhat from where it is right now,” Bullard said. “The basic story on the US economy is that we’ve had good news over the last six months or so, especially compared to the recession scenario that was being painted in the August-September time period of last year.”  Injecting too much liquidity into the system will also have the effect of driving commodity prices higher and reducing real spending power, Bullard said.

Olick – no housing recovery?

“Housing was charging back. Spring sprung early. Sentiment among home builders doubled in six months. Any talk that the fundamentals might not be supporting the sentiment was met with harsh criticism. And then suddenly it wasn’t.  A slew of new housing data last week disappointed the analysts and the stock market, and all of a sudden you started to hear concern that maybe housing wasn’t exactly in a robust recovery.  From home builder sentiment to housing starts, to home builder earnings right through to sales of newly built homes, there was not one hopeful headline in any of it (except perhaps if you invest in rentals, as multi-family housing starts made more gains, but that is a contrary indicator to housing recovery).  And then an email from a Realtor in New Jersey: ‘Just reviewed March buyer clicks, Google’s analytics on all the sites we monitor – March is turning out to be the weakest month since last October re: Buyer interest..’  Now we start another week with another disappointment. Pending home sales, a measure of signed contracts for existing homes, not closings, fell half a percentage point month-to-month.  That may not seem like a big deal, but the analysts were looking for a small gain. No doubt the Realtors will point to the solid 9% gain from a year ago, but so much of that gain is based on a change in the foreclosure pipeline.  Last year the foreclosure process stalled. The ‘robo-signing’ mess brought everything to a standstill, and that left investors with little to buy on the distressed side. Foreclosures began ramping up again in the late fall, and that led to a surge in investor buying. Was that the ‘recovery’ we were seeing?

 Investors are still rushing into the market, with distressed sales making up a near-record 48.7% of sales in February on a three month moving average, according to a new report today from Campbell/Inside Mortgage Finance.  Investors are now a full quarter of the market, and they are increasing their activity in short sales (when a lender allows the home to be sold for less than the value of the mortgage).  Don’t get me wrong, investors buying up the distress is necessary to cleanse the market, but it is not real recovery. Mortgage originations are at a 12-year low, despite record low rates. Normal, ‘organic’ home buyers, move-up owner occupants, are not flooding back into this market. Rents are still rising.  Mortgage analyst Mark Hanson runs some disturbing numbers to back up his contention that Q2 will disappoint: ‘Investor sales volume up 37%  year over year for a whopper 69% of all year over year existing home sales gains. First-timers are starting to look weak in Feb. The gains in first-timer and repeat sales can easily be explained by historic rates and weather and can easily reverse in a single month. 

That may be why the home builders, who had been on a streak of gains in confidence, suddenly stopped moving this month. KB Home, which builds lower-priced homes, also came in with wildly disappointing earnings and an 8% drop in new orders. Sales of new homes also disappointed, which one analyst called, ‘puzzling.’  ‘If new homes are not selling, then why are builder confidence and single-family housing permits moving up, and why is the S.& P. home builder index up 80% since last October?’ asks Patrick Newport at IHS Global Insight. ‘Time will tell if builders and investors have gone out on a limb.’  Several other analysts started to question the strength of the recovery as well, with some just hoping that perhaps a warm winter had pulled some demand forward from spring. Despite a miss on existing home sales in February, the headline pointed to, again, big gains from a year ago.  Yes, we are ahead of where we were, but as we’ve noted so many times here on this page, rising foreclosures will put added pressure on this market, and we may not be out of the woods yet.  ‘Despite an extraordinarily mild winter, home sales just plod along at a pace last seen during the mid-1990s,’ notes Mark Zandi in his monthly report from Moody’s Analytics. ‘Thus, the underlying pace of home sales may not yet be strong enough to support a long-lasting upturn by home prices.’  Tomorrow we get the monthly reading on the S&P/Case-Shiller home price index. This index hasn’t been improving nearly as much as home sales, but the ever-hopeful housing lobby keeps blaming that on the fact that prices always lag sales, which is historically true, but what in today’s market has followed history?  Home prices are still falling not because of some lag, but because this housing market is running on sales of distressed properties at the very low end. The rest of the market is still stalled.”

Should we ditch Obamacare?

As the US Supreme Court hears arguments over President Barack Obama’s health care law, the biggest issue is over whether the individual insurance requirement is constitutional.  The court is in the midst of three days of arguments on the Affordable Care Act after 26 states challenged the law. In addition to the question of whether Congress had the authority to enact the individual mandate, the justices must also determine if the rest of the law can stay in place if the insurance mandate is struck down.  Tom Daschle, a Democrat who represented South Dakota during his time in the Senate, wrote in an op-ed in Politico Monday, “Congress was well within its authority in passing the individual mandate to regulate the interstate effects of an industry that is almost 20% of our nation’s economy—more than $2.5 trillion each year.”  Sen. Tom Coburn, M.D. (R) Okla., disagrees with Daschle. He said that Medicare is a perfect example of why the government shouldn’t be in the health care business.  “The problem with health care in America it costs too much and this bill doesn’t do anything to help the costs,” he said. “What it does is it actually makes it much worse.”  He blamed government regulations and lack of “smart state government” for the high cost.  “What we have is a system that ignores market reality, will not use markets to allocate resources and put it back on the individual to make the best choice for their life,” Coburn said.

NAR – pending sales down

Pending home sales were down slightly in February but remain notably above the pattern in the first half of last year, according to the National Association of Realtors.  The Pending Home Sales Index (PHSI), a forward-looking indicator based on contract signings, eased 0.5% to 96.5 in February from 97.0 in January but is 9.2% above February 2011 when it was 88.4. The data reflects contracts but not closings.  The PHSI in the Northeast slipped 0.6% to 77.7 in February but is 18.4% above a year ago. In the Midwest the index jumped 6.5% to 93.8 and is 19.0% higher than February 2011. Pending home sales in the South fell 3.0% to an index of 105.8 in February but are 7.8% above a year ago. In the West the index declined 2.6% in February to 99.3 and is 1.8% below February 2011.  Existing-home sales for March will be reported April 19 and the next Pending Home Sales Index will be released April 26. The Investment and Vacation Home Buyers Survey, covering transactions in 2011, is scheduled for March 29.

Smart Real Estate News & Commentary by Chris McLaughlin March 16, 2012

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Whistleblower wins $18 million

Attorney Lynn Szymoniak had spent a career investigating insurance fraud when a bank moved to foreclose on her Florida home in 2008. Almost four years later, the fraud she said she uncovered by combing through mortgage documents earned her $18 million.  Szymoniak, 63, is among six whistle-blowers who will pocket $46.5 million as part of a $25 billion national foreclosure settlement that state and federal officials reached in February with five banks, including Bank of America Corp. and JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM), according to the US Justice Department.  Szymoniak’s examination, in which she relied on her experience as an insurance-fraud investigator, led to her claims against banks for submitting fraudulent documents to the federal government asserting that they owned loans insured by the Federal Housing Administration, she said.  The national foreclosure settlement with the five banks, which resolves claims of abusive foreclosure practices, provides mortgage relief to borrowers, pays $1.5 billion to those who lost their homes to foreclosure, and sets standards for how the banks service mortgage loans.

As part of the agreement, whistle-blower claims are being settled for about $228 million, according to court papers filed in federal court in Washington. A group of six whistle-blowers will receive $46.5 million out of that amount, said Alisa Finelli, a Justice Department spokeswoman.  Szymoniak’s foreclosure case began in July 2008 when Deutsche Bank AG (DBK), as trustee for a mortgage securitization trust, sued to seize her Palm Beach Gardens, Florida, home, which was once worth $1.3 million. The bank couldn’t prove it owned her loan and claimed it had lost the mortgage note, she said.  Szymoniak said she was first alerted to problems in the paperwork on her foreclosure when Deutsche Bank said it acquired her mortgage note in October 2008, three months after the bank sued her over the loan.  “So I began doing what I’ve done for years — go out and investigate,” she said. “It was pretty obvious to me that the paperwork was fraudulent.”  Her work quickly uncovered widespread document fraud in the mortgage industry, she said, and eventually led to the filing of her whistle-blower cases in 2010.  The whistle-blower claims resolved in the national settlement include a case filed in Atlanta in 2006 in which banks are accused of defrauding military veterans and the US government.  The banks violated rules under a Department of Veterans Affairs program for refinancing mortgage loans by charging improper fees to veterans, according to the complaint. The banks hid those fees and obtained government guarantees on the loans, according to the complaint.

Inflation leaps, gas leads

The Labor Department said its Consumer Price Index increased 0.4% after advancing 0.2% in January. That was in line with economists’ expectations. Gasoline accounted for more than 80% of the rise in consumer prices last month, the department said.  Outside the volatile food and energy category, inflation pressures were generally contained. Core CPI edged up 0.1% after gaining 0.2% in January. The February increase was below economists’ expectations in a Reuters poll for a 0.2% rise.  The Federal Reserve said on Tuesday that the recent spike in energy costs would likely push up inflation temporarily. Over the long-term, inflation was likely to run at or below the its 2% target, it said.

While the US central bank reiterated its expectation that overnight interest rates would remain near zero until at least through late 2014, it offered no clues on whether it would launch a third round of bond buying or quantitative easing, to keep borrowing costs low to stimulate the recovery.  Last month, overall inflation was pushed up by gasoline prices, which soared 6%, the largest increase since December 2010, after rising 0.9% in January.  Although surging gasoline prices are a strain on consumers, they have so far not caused a sharp pull back in spending, thanks to a strengthening jobs market.  Food prices were flat last month after rising 0.2% in January. Food prices were the weakest since July 2010.  Overall consumer prices rose 2.9% year-on-year after increasing by the same margin in January.  Core consumer prices were last month restrained by apparel prices, which fell 0.9% — the most since July 2006 — after rising 0.9% in January. There were also declines in the prices of tobacco, airline tickets and used cars and trucks.  But new motor vehicle prices rose 0.6% after being flat in January. While housing costs held up, owners’ equivalent rent rose only 0.1% last month after increasing 0.2% the prior month.  In the 12 months to February, core CPI increased 2.2% after rising 2.3% in January. This measure has rebounded from a record low of 0.6% in October and the Fed would like to see that closer to 2%.

Olick – Miami condos – bust or boom?

“South Florida real estate developer Martin Margulies has been sitting on prime ocean-front property for five years, waiting for the condo market to rise from the grave. When the market here crashed in 2007, amid overzealous speculators and an abundance of cheap and easy credit, condo construction ground to a halt. The joke had been that the unofficial bird of Miami was the crane, but that bird flew the coop. Apparently it is now swooping back in.  ‘This is the moment because we’re going to be delivering this property next year, and so by that time there will be good demand, there is good demand now,’ says Margulies, who began construction on a brand new high-end condo tower in December.  And he is right. Foreign buyers, largely from South America, but also from Europe, Russia and China, are flooding into the Miami area, and that has developers rushing to keep up with demand.  ‘The music started again in South Florida,’ says Peter Zalewski of CondoVultures, a Florida real estate data and investment firm. ‘We have an arms race of developers moving into the marketplace trying to put up condos or planned condos in anticipation of a recovery in the next two years or so.’

And they are doing it fast. Twenty five new towers with 5200 units are proposed while there are still 4200 unsold units left from the crash. Sounds crazy, but the foreign demand developers and real estate agents are seeing now is just that hot.  ‘The foreign buyer is coming in looking for wealth preservation or taking advantage of the weak US dollar, or coming in because of problems back home, whether it’s Venezuela or Mexico with the drug war,’ says Zalewski, who has been watching and working this market for the past decade.  Foreign buyers are investing as well as foreign developers, like the Melo group, a family business from Argentina. They began construction last August on the first new tower in Miami in at least four years. A lot of people thought they were crazy, but now the tide has decidedly turned. The Melo’s say they have pre-sold the entire building, and they required buyers to put 50% down. Most of their buyers, again, are foreigners with cash.

This new condo boom, while reminiscent of the recent one, is not built on easy credit. In fact, credit is still very tight here, especially for developers. Martin Margulies tried to get a construction loan for his Hollywood project, the Bellini, but could only get 50% financing along with putting up collateral. He called that ‘onerous,’ and instead took out a personal loan, using his massive art collection as collateral. He says he’s not concerned, as his buyers will be putting down 30% on one to four million dollar units.  ‘The kind of buyers we get they don’t need financing, they’re all cash buyers,’ says Margulies. ‘It’s a lifestyle they have, so they’re not reliant on a bank to give the money.’  Most of the foreign buyers in Miami are renting the properties to locals who have either lost their homes to foreclosure or whose credit is not good enough to get a home loan in today’s tough US mortgage market. The question now is, what happens to all these renters when Florida’s single family housing market recovers and credit opens up again?

Will all these foreign investors want to unload their units at the same time?  ‘You wonder if we’re not kicking the can, where we dealt with the problem at hand by dumping it off to foreign buyers, and now as the domestic buyer starts to move back into the marketplace, is that domestic buyer going to pay the same price that the foreign buyer is willing to pay or take the same chances that the foreign buyer is willing to pay?’ asks Zalewski.  It all sounds frighteningly familiar.”

Industrial output down

The Federal Reserve said Friday that the output of the nation’s factories rose 0.3% last month. That followed even stronger increases in January and December, which combined for the best two month stretch since 1998.  Overall industrial production, which includes output by mines and utilities, was unchanged. Mining activity declined sharply and utilities were flat.  Factory output has risen 17.4% since the depths of the recession in June 2009. It remains 6.7% below its pre-recession peak, reached in December 2007.  Growth at US factories was a little slower in February because auto production edged lower after big gains in December and January. Manufacturers made more electronics, energy products and electrical equipment.  Still, manufacturing has strengthened substantially since last summer, when it faltered because of global supply disruptions caused by the Japan earthquake and tsunami. Factories are benefiting from strong auto sales and growing business investment in machinery and other equipment.

Sales up 14% in San Francisco

San Francisco Bay Area home sales grew 14.2% from last year in February with the region recording 5,702 sales, up from 4,991 a year ago, DataQuick said.  The San Diego-based real estate research firm said sales are up over year-prior levels for the eighth straight month, suggesting a tepid recovery could be under way.  New and existing home prices continue drag, with the February median of $325,500 down 0.3% from $326,000 in January and 3.6% from $337,250 a year ago.  Prices in San Francisco hit their peak of $665,000 in June 2007 before plummeting to $290,000 in March 2009 after the nation fell into a prolonged recession.  Much like the Southern California market, distressed home sales accounted for half of the Bay Area’s resale market in February. Foreclosure sales alone made up 27.4% of all resales in the market, while short sales represented 23.1%.  The average monthly mortgage payment in the Bay Area hit $1,225 in February, down from $1,233 in January and $1,440 a year earlier.

Obama to release emergency oil in front of election?

Britain is poised to cooperate with the United States on a release of strategic oil stocks that is expected within months, two British sources said, in a bid to prevent fuel prices choking economic growth in a US election year.  A formal request from the United States to the UK to join forces in a release of oil from government-controlled reserves is expected “shortly” following a meeting on Wednesday in Washington between President Barack Obama and Prime MinisterDavid Cameron, who discussed the issue, one source said.  Britain would respond positively, the two sources said, and Cameron said a release was worth considering.  “We didn’t make any decision, this has to be discussed broadly. We’ve got to look at this issue carefully, it’s something worth looking at. Short-term should we look at reserves? Yes, we should,” Cameron said during a meeting with students in New York.  “We’d both like to see global oil prices at a lower level than they are.”  Details of the timing, volume and duration of a new emergency drawdown have yet to be settled but a detailed agreement is expected by the summer, one of the sources said.  Other countries may also be approached by Washington to contribute, a further source said, Japan among them.   Rising world oil prices have pushed the cost of gasoline in the US up sharply, threatening to stall economic recovery ahead of Obama’s bid for re-election in November.

Renting jeopardizing affordable housing

More Americans are renting houses instead of buying them, a trend that could disrupt price affordability, analysts say.  With more homeowners unable to secure mortgages and uncertain about future finances, renting is the only sure-fire way to live in a single-family property, according to Capital Economics.  But as more Americans turn to home renting, the influx of demand is set to squeeze the nation’s rental supply, pushing monthly rents even higher.  Paul Dales, senior economist with Capital Economics said that rental vacancy rates will fall again in the future, pushing prices up. The median rent is already up to $712 per month—well above the average monthly mortgage cost of $647, Dales reported.  He estimates vacancies in the home-rental market will push average rental rates up as much as 5% by early 2013, compared to 2.4% in January.  “We expect the annual rate at which rents are rising will rise to 3% this year and remain at that level in 2013,” Dales said. “Assuming that the economic recovery gains firmer footing, in future years there is scope for rents to rise by around 4% a year.”

And as single-family renters head into the market, the supply of rentals is unlikely to meet new demand.  This reality is playing itself out in Denver, where the vacancy rate for home rentals fell from 3.4% in the third quarter to 2.1% in the fourth quarter. At the same time, the vacancy rate edged up slightly from the 2% level reported in the fourth quarter of 2010.  “The vacancy rate went up slightly year-over-year,” said Ryan McMaken, a spokesman for the Colorado Division of Housing. “That doesn’t mean much, though, because when you’re looking at vacancy rates below 3%, the bottom line is that the market is tight. For many people, it’s not easy to buy a house right now, so they’re renting.”

See you at the top!
Chris McLaughlin

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About the author:

Chris McLaughlin is widely known as America’s top
Real Estate Attorney and Investment Consultant.

* As the top Florida foreclosure and pre-
foreclosure expert, he oversees more than
100 short sale & REO closings each month

* Long-time authority on real estate investing
and rapid reselling of distressed homes.  Owns
portfolio of nearly 150 high-value, high-profit
properties

* Owner of one of Florida’s largest Real Estate firms,
running 4 different offices, supporting over
420 agents, uniquely positioning him to help
thousands of investors make money in the
biggest market opportunity ever!

* In 2011, Chris’ 4 Central Florida real estate offices
closed 3,336 sides for a closed sales volume of
$430,902,643!

* Highly sought-after speaker, consultant, and
seminar leader for current trends and hot topics
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