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Home Values May Prove Political Football in Battleground States

Home values dropped an average of 16% in 15 of 16 key presidential battleground states since the financial crisis. Despite this key fact most of the Republican presidential candidates have chosen to be largely silent on what they would do to end the housing crisis. They have preferred to concentrate on jobs and unemployment issues. [...]

Home Values May Prove Political Football in Battleground States is a post from: REWealthCoach.com, Bob Massey's site for real estate investment news, information, tips, videos and podcasts. Visit today! All material is copyright © 2010 Foundation Publishing, LLC.

Survey Shows Real Estate Cash Buyers Place Downward Pressure on Home Values

A report associated with the Campbell Housing Pulse Tracking Survey concludes that real estate investors buying with all cash are putting downward pressure on home values. In December 2011 cash buyers represented 33.2% of the market, according to the Campbell study. Most of these real estate cash buyers are real estate investors buying investment properties [...]

Survey Shows Real Estate Cash Buyers Place Downward Pressure on Home Values is a post from: REWealthCoach.com, Bob Massey's site for real estate investment news, information, tips, videos and podcasts. Visit today! All material is copyright © 2010 Foundation Publishing, LLC.

Housing Inventory Declines

The NAR also released statistics on the inventory of homes for sale and shows a decline of 22.29% from a year ago. The 146 MSAs monitored by the NAR survey found that at the end of 2011 there were 1.89 million single family homes on the market in the U.S., a drop of 6% from [...]

Housing Inventory Declines is a post from: REWealthCoach.com, Bob Massey's site for real estate investment news, information, tips, videos and podcasts. Visit today! All material is copyright © 2010 Foundation Publishing, LLC.

Existing Home Sales Up 5% in December: NAR

According to the National Association of Realtors existing home sales surged 5% from 4.39 million units in November to 4.61 million units in December. Investors represented 21% of the market, up from 19% in November. All cash sales were 31% of all closed deals compared to 28% in November. The median home price was $164,500 [...]

Existing Home Sales Up 5% in December: NAR is a post from: REWealthCoach.com, Bob Massey's site for real estate investment news, information, tips, videos and podcasts. Visit today! All material is copyright © 2010 Foundation Publishing, LLC.

How is BOA Short Sale Incentive Test Going in Florida?

One would think that desperate homeowners would be jumping for joy in Florida with the opportunity of making up to $20,000 as an incentive for selling an under water house through a Short Sale or deeding it back to the bank with a Deed-In-Lieu for foreclosure. The results of Bank of America’s test program have [...]

How is BOA Short Sale Incentive Test Going in Florida? is a post from: REWealthCoach.com, Bob Massey's site for real estate investment news, information, tips, videos and podcasts. Visit today! All material is copyright © 2010 Foundation Publishing, LLC.

Is There Consumer Demand to Refinance?

A recent Harris Interactive poll asked a group of 2,237 adults who were online in December about their planned financial behaviors in 2012. One of the questions asked whether respondents planned on refinancing a mortgage in the new year. Only 5% responded positively, the same percentage as those who answered the same question in 2009 [...]

Is There Consumer Demand to Refinance? is a post from: REWealthCoach.com, Bob Massey's site for real estate investment news, information, tips, videos and podcasts. Visit today! All material is copyright © 2010 Foundation Publishing, LLC.

Freddie Mac Cuts Refi Credit Score Requirements for Some

In an effort to make refinancing available to more homeowners Freddie Mac announced that it would no longer require homeowners to have credit scores of 620 or higher as long as the loan is current, the LTV at 80% or higher, and the refinance is being completed with their existing lender. The new rule became [...]

Freddie Mac Cuts Refi Credit Score Requirements for Some is a post from: REWealthCoach.com, Bob Massey's site for real estate investment news, information, tips, videos and podcasts. Visit today! All material is copyright © 2010 Foundation Publishing, LLC.

Fed Makes Recommendations to Improve Health of Housing Market

This past week two Federal Reserve officials made suggestions to improve the housing market in addition to Fed chairman, Ben Bernanke, who came out with a game-changing white paper with numerous suggestions on how to reduce foreclosures and their negative impact on home values. Federal Reserve Bank of New York president, William Dudley, espouses the [...]

Fed Makes Recommendations to Improve Health of Housing Market is a post from: REWealthCoach.com, Bob Massey's site for real estate investment news, information, tips, videos and podcasts. Visit today! All material is copyright © 2010 Foundation Publishing, LLC.

Voters’ Biggest Concerns: Jobs and Housing

A Houselogic survey demonstrates that voters are most concerned about jobs and housing policy as election year issues for 2012. Respondents were asked: “What issue area will have the greatest impact on your vote in 2012?” Jobs were mentioned as the top issue by 54% of respondents. The next most critical issue was housing, which [...]

Voters’ Biggest Concerns: Jobs and Housing is a post from: REWealthCoach.com, Bob Massey's site for real estate investment news, information, tips, videos and podcasts. Visit today! All material is copyright © 2010 Foundation Publishing, LLC.

Federal Reserve Findings: Real Estate Investors to Blame for Housing Bubble

A research report by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York finds that amateur real estate investors were more to blame for the housing bubble in markets in California, Nevada, Arizona and Florida than was previously thought. More than one-third of the mortgages granted in 2006 went to people who owned more than one house. [...]

Federal Reserve Findings: Real Estate Investors to Blame for Housing Bubble is a post from: REWealthCoach.com, Bob Massey's site for real estate investment news, information, tips, videos and podcasts. Visit today! All material is copyright © 2010 Foundation Publishing, LLC.

Foreclosure Dockets are Crowded

LPS reported that foreclosure starts jumped 5.7% between September and October as processors served notices on 232,865 families. On the positive side, delinquencies are down significantly. Homeowners who were 90 days late but not yet in foreclosure in October were down 19% from last January. A total of 1.76 million homes were in that category, [...]

Foreclosure Dockets are Crowded is a post from: REWealthCoach.com, Bob Massey's site for real estate investment news, information, tips, videos and podcasts. Visit today! All material is copyright © 2010 Foundation Publishing, LLC.

BOA Developing Foreclosure Rental Program

Ron Stuzenegger, head of Bank of America’s legacy asset servicing division, has indicated that the bank is in the process of preparing a rental program for former homeowners of property it is taking back as REOs. BOA is currently looking through 1.1 million loans that are 60 days or more delinquent to determine which might [...]

BOA Developing Foreclosure Rental Program is a post from: REWealthCoach.com, Bob Massey's site for real estate investment news, information, tips, videos and podcasts. Visit today! All material is copyright © 2010 Foundation Publishing, LLC.

Fiserv Optimistic About Housing Market Stability

Even though 2011 home values dropped an average of 5.1% and prices fell in 302 of 384 housing markets tracked by the Fiserv Case-Shiller Indexes, the picture should get considerably brighter as housing approaches 2013. Fiserv’s chief economist, David Shiff, believes that the housing market will see greater stability in 2012 than in the past [...]

Fiserv Optimistic About Housing Market Stability is a post from: REWealthCoach.com, Bob Massey's site for real estate investment news, information, tips, videos and podcasts. Visit today! All material is copyright © 2010 Foundation Publishing, LLC.

FHA Extends Allowance of Flipping Houses Another Year

FHA has traditionally (and incorrectly) considered flipping houses—the practice of Investors immediately reselling a distressed property for more money—to be a red flag for abuse. The practice does tend to lower the value of homes around the distressed property, but the FHA agrees that the alternative would be slower restoration of distressed properties to normal [...]

FHA Extends Allowance of Flipping Houses Another Year is a post from: REWealthCoach.com, Bob Massey's site for real estate investment news, information, tips, videos and podcasts. Visit today! All material is copyright © 2010 Foundation Publishing, LLC.

Payroll Tax Break Extension Bad Deal for New Mortgage-Holders

In December, the U.S. House approved a 2 month extension of the payroll tax break in order to avoid a 2% New Year tax boost on millions of workers that would have impacted the GDP negatively by nearly 1%. The agreement comes at a price to those who sign up for a new mortgage or [...]

Payroll Tax Break Extension Bad Deal for New Mortgage-Holders is a post from: REWealthCoach.com, Bob Massey's site for real estate investment news, information, tips, videos and podcasts. Visit today! All material is copyright © 2010 Foundation Publishing, LLC.

Fannie Mae Matches Freddie Mac in Extending Mortgage Forbearance

A couple weeks ago Freddie Mac announced that it would extend the terms of forbearance agreements in order to help more unemployed families to stay in their homes. This past week it was Fannie Mae’s turn to help out the unemployed families in homes backed by its mortgages. According to Fannie Mae’s servicing guidelines the [...]

Fannie Mae Matches Freddie Mac in Extending Mortgage Forbearance is a post from: REWealthCoach.com, Bob Massey's site for real estate investment news, information, tips, videos and podcasts. Visit today! All material is copyright © 2010 Foundation Publishing, LLC.

Foreclosures Declining in Top Foreclosure Markets, But Still High

The 1.8 million foreclosure filings recorded by Realtytrac in 2011 is 35% below the total set in 2010. The 205,000 recorded in December was the lowest total recorded since 2005. That’s the good news. The bad news is one in every 69 homes on average, received a foreclosure filing of some kind during the year. [...]

Foreclosures Declining in Top Foreclosure Markets, But Still High is a post from: REWealthCoach.com, Bob Massey's site for real estate investment news, information, tips, videos and podcasts. Visit today! All material is copyright © 2010 Foundation Publishing, LLC.

Which Area is Fastest at Processing Foreclosures?

When it comes to churning through the backlog of foreclosures the western states are far more efficient than eastern states. This is because the majority of eastern states resolve foreclosures through a lengthy judicial process while western states, by and large, are non-judicial states where trustees can process foreclosures without going to court. In three [...]

Which Area is Fastest at Processing Foreclosures? is a post from: REWealthCoach.com, Bob Massey's site for real estate investment news, information, tips, videos and podcasts. Visit today! All material is copyright © 2010 Foundation Publishing, LLC.

HARP 2.0 Impact May be Felt by February

Analysts are watching the figures on prepayment of loans to determine when the next wave of home refinancing kicks into high gear. The impact has not been felt yet. Prepayments dropped 6% in December for Fannie Mae 30 year loan securities. January is also expected to be sluggish before the effects of HARP 2.0 kick [...]

HARP 2.0 Impact May be Felt by February is a post from: REWealthCoach.com, Bob Massey's site for real estate investment news, information, tips, videos and podcasts. Visit today! All material is copyright © 2010 Foundation Publishing, LLC.

Short Sales Stabilized Neighborhoods?

A popular session at the mortgage industry Five Star MPact Conference in Dallas, Dec. 4-6 focused on the use of bulk short sales to help stabilize neighborhoods quickly in the highest impacted areas. The idea seems to be gaining favor among lenders, housing non-profits and investor groups. Participants commented that the one-up method of selling [...]

Short Sales Stabilized Neighborhoods? is a post from: REWealthCoach.com, Bob Massey's site for real estate investment news, information, tips, videos and podcasts. Visit today! All material is copyright © 2010 Foundation Publishing, LLC.