Who;s House Is Being Saved By Obama?

By Les Christie, staff writerFebruary 1, 2011: 2:07 PM ET

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- More than half a million Americans have received permanent mortgage modifications from the Obama administration's flagship foreclosure prevention program, the Home Affordable Modification Program.


So who are these homeowners?

To begin with, the reason they are falling behind on their mortgages isn't because their loans are unaffordable, according to a report released Monday by the Treasury Department.

Instead, defaults are stemming from the weak economy and unemployment: In December, 60% of the borrowers who received permanent HAMP mods were facing a loss of income. Just 11% were the result of unaffordable mortgages.

L.A. and New York City have the largest concentrations of these beneficiaries, and their ethnicity roughly reflects the nation as a whole: 33% of borrowers who received permanent modifications were white, while 12% were African American, 18% are Hispanic and 3% are Asian. (The numbers don't add up to 100% because many people did not report ethnicity.)

Median household income for them was just $46,000, well short of affluent. Their credit scores averaged about 570 at the time of modification, which would, under today's lending conditions, prevent them from obtaining loans.

Foreclosure pain index: 10 cities

Their mortgage balances -- after modification -- averaged $232,000. That is about five times median household income, about double what they'd usually be allowed to borrow on income of $46,000.

The help these borrowers receive is substantial, with the typical HAMP modification slashing about 40% off mortgage payments. About 18% of HAMP borrowers were able to reduce their payments by $1,000 a month or more.

Still, receiving a permanent HAMP mod does not guarantee that the borrowers will keep their homes. Of those who received a modification during the third quarter of 2009, more than 46% have already fallen at least two payments behind.

Homeowners with payment reductions of more than 30% were far less likely to become delinquent on their permanent modifications, compared with those receiving a payment reduction of 20% or less.

After 12 months, nearly 60% of borrowers whose loan payments went down less than 20% were at least two payments behind. Only 28% of those borrowers with payments reductions of 30% or more had fallen two payments behind or more

Sunday Brunch Seminar – Stiletto Tastes with Nine West Budget, How to be Financially Savvy When Buying a Home

This year I have combined efforts with other woman professionals to provided valued resources for helping woman. If you are single, divorced, separated, widowed, with or without children, this will be an invaluable resource for information to meet life changings short and long term financial goals.



Content and contacts will be available regarding the following areas:


Divorce lawyers
Financial planners
Mortgage brokers
CPA – tax
Home Stagers
Interior Decorators
Home Inspectors
More, much more!


Stay tuned as we build the blog. To begin, a monthly seminar series is kicking off and would love to have you come. Each month will be a new topic, varied speakers and helpful informative content.


UPCOMING EVENT

Stiletto Tastes on a Nine West Budget ~ How to be Financially Savvy when Buying a Home


Please join us Febraury 6th for Sunday Brunch Seminar Series with a Twist

Seminar Series with a Twist: View Stella & Dot jewelry (available for purchase) while sipping mimosas and enjoying French pastries and cap off with invaluable information about how to prepare for buying a home.

Learn:



 Financial Perspectives from a Realtor, a Mortgage Broker & a Financial Advisor


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Speakers:


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 Carrie Reed, Alpine Mortgage, Certified Mortgage Planning Specialist


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Cost: FREE


When: Sunday, February 6th


10:30a – 11:00a Refreshments (Mimosas & French pastries) + Stella & Dot Jewelry


11:00p – 12:00p Presentation with Questions & Answers

12:00p – 12:30p Stella & Dot Jewelry with Heather Morrison


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Tram: Goose Hollow/SW Jefferson St MAX Station


Parking available in front of Kamm House

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A secret tribute: Duck honors young man he's never met

Story Published: Jan 8, 2011 at 7:09 PM PST Story Updated: Jan 8, 2011 at 11:18 PM PST (KATU.com)

GLENDALE, Ariz. – One University of Oregon Duck is playing Monday's BCS Championship game in honor of a young man whose life ended too soon.


For more than a month it was D.J. Davis' secret. But after the Ducks' Civil War win, Davis was splashed on the front page of The Oregonian's sports section, leaving some to wonder whose picture was hanging from his uniform.

"Just knowing that somebody can have an impact on you, without even meeting them, is just an awesome experience," University of Oregon Wide Receiver D.J. Davis tells us.

It turns out that the photo tucked into Davis' waistband is of someone Davis has never met.

It's Declan Sullivan, a 20-year-old Notre Dame student whose death made national news. Sullivan died while taping a Fighting Irish football practice, when a wind storm toppled the tower where he stood.

"It just stayed with me," Davis tells us. "It's hard to shake something like that when it just stays in you ... I have a little brother who's 20 years old. He'll be 21 come Jan. 24, so I just kept thinking about my little brother being in that situation. I don't know what I'd be able to do if I lost him."

That's why, a few days after the accident, Davis searched for Sullivan's name on a computer at the team's hotel where they were staying before the U.S.C. game, printed a picture of Sullivan and turned a quarterback wristband into a tribute. He has worn that wristband on game days ever since.

"He's been a real help to me, just as far as wearing it and letting other people know the tragic event that happened," Davis said. "...[T]o let them know about his story is one of the things that I want to do."

After The Oregonian's picture took Davis' secret-tribute public, the wide receiver ended up making a connection with Sullivan's family.

"I've actually e-mailed back and forth a little bit with his brother, Max Sullivan," Davis said. "We've had a couple conversations, just about the situation, and ... that he'd be rooting for me come Jan. 10."

30-Year Fixed Mortgage Rate Dips to 4.77%%

Published: Thursday, 6 Jan 2011  10:42 AM ET By: Reuters (CNCB.COM)

Rates on fixed mortgages dipped this week after rising steadily over the last two months.


Freddie Mac said Thursday the average rate on the 30-year mortgage dropped to 4.77 percent from 4.86 percent the previous week. It hit a 40-year low of 4.17 percent in November.

The average rate on the 15-year loan slipped to 4.13 percent from 4.20 percent. It reached 3.57 percent in November, the lowest level on records starting in 1991.

Rates have been rising since November. Investors have shifted money out of Treasurys and into stocks. Many expect the tax-cut plan will fuel economic growth and increase inflation. Yields tend to rise on inflation fears.

Mortgage rates tend to track the yield on the 10-year Treasury note. Those rates have been fluctuating in recent weeks.

Low mortgage rates did little to boost home sales last year and higher rates now could hamper a robust recovery.

The number of borrowers who applied for a mortgage in December was 10 percent below the same month in 2009, according to Capital Economics. Refinance activity has dropped off 44 percent since rates hit their lows. The number of purchase applications has been rising along with sales, but last year's sales pace was shaping up to be the slowest in 13 years.

To calculate average mortgage rates, Freddie Mac collects rates from lenders across the country on Monday through Wednesday of each week. Rates often fluctuate significantly, even within a single day.

The average rate on a five-year adjustable-rate mortgage slipped to 3.75 percent from 3.77 percent. The five-year hit 3.25 percent last month, the lowest rate on records dating back to January 2005.

The average rate on one-year adjustable-rate home loans fell to 3.24 percent from 3.26 percent.

The rates do not include add-on fees, known as points. One point is equal to 1 percent of the total loan amount. The average fee for the 30-year and 15-year loans in Freddie Mac's survey was 0.8 point. The average fee for the five-year ARM was 0.7 point, and the fee for the 1-year ARM was 0.6 point.

Hooray? Higher mortgage rates spurred home sales uptick

Posted by Nin-Hai Tseng, writer-reporter December 23, 2010 3:18 pm

The country's economic engine seems to be running in reverse as more expensive borrowing spurs home sales, and an uptick in borrowing sends mortgage rates back down.


The recent surge in mortgage rates, by all rational calculations, should have made America's already troubled housing market worse off. Instead, higher borrowing costs modestly boosted homes sales in November.

Before slipping down slightly this week, mortgage rates had risen for several weeks in a row as yields on 10-year Treasury bills, which largely influence the cost of mortgages, rose. The average rate for a 30-year fixed loan increased to 4.83% in the week ending December 16 from 4.61% the previous week, marking a fourth week of increases, according to Freddie Mac (FRE). The rate increases were some of the highest seen since June of this year.

Intuitively, it would make sense that higher borrowing costs would discourage potential homebuyers. And vice versa. But quite the opposite has happened.

Before the recent surge, mortgage rates had fallen to historic lows but failed to spur much refinancing or home purchases as virtually all major banks tightened lending standards. When mortgage rates started rising recently, potential homebuyers waiting in the sidelines took notice.

In November, the share of home purchases by first-time buyers surged to 37.2% from 34.4% the previous month, according to a monthly survey by Campbell/Inside Mortgage Finance, which tracks mortgage and housing industry trends.

"That's extremely significant," says Tom Popik, the survey's research director. Since the survey launched in 2009, there's typically only been a one-percentage point change, if any at all, among first-time homebuyers.

The higher rates seem to have served as a warning shot, drawing in buyers eager to lock in historically low rates before they edge any higher. In a sense, they were waiting for an uptick to prove that rates had gone as far down as possible, before deciding to buy. Unlike current homeowners, first timers are positioned well to respond quickly to fluctuations in mortgage rates.

Popik says it's unlikely the rise in rates will spur many more home purchases. After a while, potential homebuyers will again think mortgages are becoming too expensive. For now though, rising rates have brought a boost, however small, to the struggling housing market. November sales of new homes rose 5.5% to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 290,000 units, the Commerce Department reported December 15.

Naturally, in response to the uptick in home sales and increase in demand for lending, mortgage rates have most recently . . . fallen again. Somewhere, that makes perfect sense.

November Home Loan Modifications Up: Treasury

Published: Wednesday, 22 Dec 2010 11:24 AM ET By: Reuters (CNBC.com)

The U.S. Treasury Department said on Wednesday that about 30,000 homeowners facing foreclosure got permanent help in November through a loan modification program that should help them keep their homes, an increase from 23,750 in October.

But dropouts from the Obama administration's premier foreclosure prevention program, called the Home Affordable Mortgage Program or HAMP, since its inception now total 774,081. About 1.46 million delinquent borrowers were eligible for help under the program.

Treasury said there were about 505,000 borrowers at the end of November who had active permanent loan modifications in place, up from 483,000 in October.

Christmas 2010 Could be Merriest Since Recession: CNBC Survey

Published: Monday, 13 Dec 2010 10:00 AM ET By: CNBC.com

Christmas 2010 could turn out to be the merriest since the recession began, with the exclusive CNBC All-America Economic Survey finding Americans somewhat more optimistic but real optimism remains elusive.


The survey of 800 people of all income groups, regions and walks of life finds that pessimism is down across the nation, but Americans will still hold a tight grip on their holiday spending dollars, with only a small increase in spending compared to last year.

Just over half of the survey respondents judge the current state of the economy as poor, but the 53 percent figure is the lowest reading since February 2008.

About 20 percent of the nation expects the economy to get worse over the next year, well below the 43 percent reading registered during the height of the recession in June 2008 and the lowest reading in three years.

Yet, just 7 percent judge the current state of the economy as excellent or good and just 37 percent believe it will improve next year, virtually unchanged from October and last Christmas.

Among other findings of the survey:

A very Apple-y Christmas: One in six Americans plan to give or receive an Apple product for the holidays; for upper income groups, the figure is one in four.

The wealthy get thrifty: 60 percent of Americans say they’ll spend more this Christmas than last year, up from 50 percent in 2009

But the average amount they plan to spend is up 0.7 percent compared to actual spending last year. One reason for the small increase: the wealthy seem to be getting more thrifty.

No stocks in the stockings: The holiday season finds Americans still down on the stock market with 46 percent saying it’s a bad time to invest. It’s an improvement from the 51 percent who were negative in October.

But rather than getting optimistic, Americans became more uncertain. The percentage saying they were unsure about whether to invest in stocks rose to 19 percent from 12 percent in October.

More upbeat on wage gains and home values: For the first time since 2007, average Americans believe their home prices will rise in the next year. American optimism about wage gains over the next 12 months hit a two-year high, with an expected gain of 2.1 percent, up from 1.3 percent a year ago.

Wal-Mart , Best Buy Rebound: 48 percent of Americans pick big box stores like Wal-Mart as one their top two choices for spending their holiday dollars. That’s the highest level since 2006.

Online surge: Online spending hits a milestone with one in four Americans saying that shopping on the net is one of their top two choices for spending, the largest percentage ever.

Online security worries: But on-line security remains a major issue. 60 percent of Americans still do little or no shopping at all on line, which equals the percentage of Americans who say they are concerned about on-line security.

In hard times, kids win, adults lose: When it comes to cutting back their spending, Americans will first choose to economize on gifts to adults, friends and co-workers.

One place they're reluctant to cut back is on gifts to kids. And the last place they'll cut back is on food and holiday meals. 7 percent of the public say they’ll economize by regifting.

Video madness: 44 percent of Americans say video games make bad gifts because kids spend too much time in front of the screen. 33 percent say they make good gifts because kids love them. Americans with kids are just about split on the issue.