Archive for the ‘housing’ Category
Thursday, June 11th, 2009
So much for de-leveraging.
The Fed published its latest Flow of Funds report today. One key takeaway: While total debt is growing more slowly, it is still growing. Since Q3 '08 households have cut their debt (slightly), but the federal government is borrowing so rapidly, overall debt continues to expand.
(Click chart ...
Posted in debt, Economy, Fed, housing, leverage, politics, taxpayer issues, treasury | 16 Comments »
Thursday, June 11th, 2009
Thought I'd share a rental anecdote. I just renegotiated my rent on a 1BR here in Manhattan's Midtown West area. My savings compared to last year: 18%. Had I been willing to move, similarly sized apartments in the neighborhood could have been had for as much as 25% off last ...
Posted in housing | 3 Comments »
Thursday, June 4th, 2009
From Bloomberg: U.S. Mortgage Rates Jump to Highest Since December
Fixed U.S. mortgage rates jumped to the highest level this year, signaling the Federal Reserve’s plan to lower borrowing costs has stalled.
The average 30-year rate rose to 5.29 from 4.91 percent a week earlier, Freddie Mac, the McLean, Virginia-based mortgage buyer, ...
Posted in Fed, housing | 16 Comments »
Wednesday, May 27th, 2009
As Chair of the House Financial Services Committee, Barney Frank is the most powerful Congressional voice on issues facing banking and the economy....
People are investing in "homes, where there is not the degree of leverage we have seen elsewhere."
But at the height of the bubble, buyers were putting $0 down. ...
Posted in bubble, housing, leverage, politics | 13 Comments »
Tuesday, May 26th, 2009
Case-Shiller data for March was released today. The picture is still ugly. The Composite 10 and Composite 20 Indices continued to fall, down 2.1% and 2.2% respectively when compared to February. Since the peak of the housing bubble, the composite 20 is now down 32%.
Click to enlarge in new window
As ...
Posted in housing | 9 Comments »
Thursday, May 21st, 2009
This afternoon, FDIC took BKUNA's assets into receivership. It is the 34th bank to fail in 2009. The Deposit Insurance Fund will absorb an estimated $4.9 billion in losses, which represents 57% of the total deposits BKUNA had as of May 2nd. With total assets of $12.8 billion, BKUNA ...
Posted in banking, bankruptcy, FDIC, housing | 7 Comments »
Tuesday, May 19th, 2009
Edmund Andrews' Sunday confession in the NYT ended with the following line:
Eight months after my last payment to the bank, I am still waiting for the ax to fall.
The man spends a couple thousands words chronicling his personal credit crisis, how debts have tormented him and nearly ruined his marriage, ...
Posted in accounting, housing | 16 Comments »
Monday, May 18th, 2009
Reader Note: Last fall, OA told the story of BankUnited in the pages of Housing Wire Magazine. With the bank's future likely to be settled over the next week, we thought readers might appreciate a look at the piece. Thanks to HW's Paul Jackson for allowing us to re-publish.
October 2008
No ...
Posted in banking, bankruptcy, housing | 3 Comments »
Friday, May 8th, 2009
In its Q1 balance sheet published today, Fannie Mae reported its liabilities exceeded assets by $18.9 billion. To plug that hole, the company put in for $19 billion cash from Treasury. This request follows the $15.2 billion infusion Fannie received 6 weeks ago. Taxpayers should anticipate further payments---the Obama administration ...
Posted in GSE, housing, politics | 3 Comments »
Tuesday, April 28th, 2009
February Data for the S&P Case-Shiller Index was released today. Prices are still falling, and quickly. Each of the 20 major metro areas measured by the index showed another a month-over-month decline, for the fifth month in a row. The Composite 20 Index is now off 31% from its peak, ...
Posted in housing, Interest Rates | 15 Comments »
Monday, April 20th, 2009
A hedge-funder well-known to OA---who wishes to remain anonymous---chimes in with a rather fascinating idea in our humble opinion, one that (at least in the state of Maryland) could take the foreclosure process for many houses/condos out of the hands of banks.*
We thought worthy of sharing because of the larger ...
Posted in debt, housing, taxpayer issues | 16 Comments »
Sunday, April 12th, 2009
Lots of great data in this updated presentation from T2 Partners. The authors of the slideshow have a book coming out in May, More Mortgage Meltdown. (ht Paul M.)
The crux of their argument, that their is more pain to come, is based on mortgage reset/recast schedules. We've come through the ...
Posted in housing | 5 Comments »
Monday, April 6th, 2009
Today's Journal had a very good, very comprehensive op-ed by Steven Gjerstand and Vernon L. Smith. It asks a couple very interesting questions. For instance, how can Greenspan argue there was no evidence of inflation during the first half of this decade even as an asset bubble was inflating very ...
Posted in housing, inflation, stocks | 2 Comments »
Sunday, April 5th, 2009
The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency published 4th quarter data for loan delinquencies late last week. The pdf of the report is available here. Below are some highlights. Note the spike in delinquencies for prime loans.
From the report's executive summary: "The biggest percentage jump was in prime mortgages, ...
Posted in housing | No Comments »
Tuesday, March 31st, 2009
January data for the S&P Case-Shiller Home Price Index was released today. I've created a chart and a table from the data in order to tell the tale. (Click to enlarge)
Despite the government's efforts to put a floor under house prices---printing money to buy MBS in order to hold down ...
Posted in housing | No Comments »
Wednesday, March 25th, 2009
The Mortgage Bankers Association continues its downward spiral. Last summer OA wrote about the association's albatross: brand new HQs constructed, at the top of the market, by former President and CEO Jonathan Kempner. Not helping matters was MBA's trouble finding tenants to fill the 60% of the building they don't ...
Posted in housing, politics | No Comments »
Thursday, March 12th, 2009
An explanation below Chart #2 on why this data indicates we're still in the early stages of the financial crisis.* (Click charts to enlarge)
To put data from the chart above in perspective, the one below compares the data to GDP. I'm using annual data here, so the increase at ...
Posted in debt, housing, leverage | 12 Comments »
Monday, March 9th, 2009
[Reader note: recently Yves Smith asked me to contribute to her blog Naked Capitalism. I hope to generate a post a week that will be simul-published on NC and OA. Regular OA readers may notice some repeated content in this post. My hope was to give NC readers a comprehensive ...
Posted in credit crunch, debt, Economy, Fed, government spending, housing, Interest Rates, politics, taxpayer issues | 19 Comments »
Wednesday, March 4th, 2009
Yesterday HousingWire published an article about hedge funds getting back into the market for MBS. It got me thinking, why are banks having trouble if there's a market being made in distressed assets? So I chatted up a few of my friends that know a lot more about the MBS ...
Posted in credit crunch, housing | 5 Comments »
Thursday, February 26th, 2009
Anyone taking bets on which company will be the single largest money sink for taxpayer cash between now and 2012? Fannie, Freddie, AIG, Citi, BofA, GE, others? WSJ:
Fannie Mae said its fourth-quarter net loss widened to $25.2 billion amid massive fair-value losses and credit-related expenses, bringing its net loss for ...
Posted in bailout, GSE, housing | 1 Comment »
Tuesday, February 24th, 2009
Now that unemployment has kicked into a higher gear, more folks will be defaulting on mortgages, meaning house prices are likely to continue their slide in coming months. As they do, household and bank balance sheets will continue to deteriorate. Said another way, their leverage ratios will continue to increase ...
Posted in Economy, housing | 1 Comment »
Thursday, February 19th, 2009
If Bush's strategy for dealing with the banking and housing crises was to bury his head in the sand, Obama's strategy has been to bury his head even deeper. The housing crisis, like the banking crisis, isn't going to be "solved" until asset prices are allowed to fall. The Bush ...
Posted in banking, housing | 16 Comments »
Monday, February 16th, 2009
This is a very good piece from last night's 60 Minutes. The charts at the bottom quantify how big the Option ARM problem is going to be and when it's going to hit.
What they don't tell you is that Option ARMs written by World Savings are far more toxic than ...
Posted in banking, housing | 44 Comments »
Sunday, February 15th, 2009
Because it will lead to higher interest rates, doing more damage to the economy than if we'd simply done nothing. A few relevant links before I get to my argument...
U.S. Budget Deficit: Heading for $1.6 trillion CR
Moody's: Rescue Efforts Ding U.S.'s Triple-A Rating WSJ
“I used to think if there was ...
Posted in credit crunch, Fed, government spending, housing, Interest Rates | 13 Comments »
Tuesday, February 3rd, 2009
The homeownership rate is falling fast, as the chart nearby demonstrates.
I have "own" in quotes because I think the Census Bureau's data misrepresents reality.
If a homeowner has a mortgage on his house, does he really "own" the house? Well, sort of. What he "owns" is the equity in the home ...
Posted in Economy, housing | 26 Comments »
