Nice report from the front lines
Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis: Waiting for the Blood to Rise

Here is a graph that shows a very clear trend:

Blogger: Page not found

Well, I guess that answers the question of how wide the impact will be of lending standards tightening....

Now the ALt-A shoe is dropping, which is an additional 30% of loans in California.

I think as California goes, so goes the sanguine thinking about a bottoming.

Employment: Expired

re Yal's post: Citigroup, like American Express, is a bunch of bottom feeders. Always have been.

months inventory is interesting, but it doesn't tell you whether the sales rate is slower, and if it is slower because of delays in closings due to the sub prime lender problems or if the # months inventory is growing because we all decided to list our homes.

What I'm hearing is there is a surge of loans trying to be processed at surviving lenders.

So, which will it be? Princess Di or Goldilocks?

Well arbo if you want tasteless analogies tied to women's names... put me down for the 'Terri Schiavo' economy... it looks 'alive' on video tape... at least when CNN runs footage.

Until the FCBs pull the plug.

What I'm hearing is there is a surge of loans trying to be processed at surviving lenders.

What I'm hearing is that lenders who would like to survive are trying not to process those loans. I'm guessing that some people--relitters, usually--are seeing a "backlog" at the lenders and assuming that's because the lenders are just swamped. I am seeing a "backlog" at the lenders, at least in some cases, because it's hard to "process" loans with a 10-foot pole, and nobody will get any closer to some of that stuff.

Sippin - we're trying to sell a home (estate sale) right now. Very desirable property in a state with a strong economy (nto Ohio or Michigan) & only mid-to-partial bubbly.

It hasn't cleared estate yet so hasn't officially been listed - but we've been doing research.

Realtors tell us it is VERY slow right now... and not due to loans processing though that might become an issue if they start closing offers in the volumes they saw a few years ago. Its off that pace quite a bit.

The realtor we talked to specializes in homes like the one we are trying to sell... he said last fall the home should sell for about $500-500K... lotsa comparables to this in the region.

This winter he backtracked saying maybe a listing at $490 makes more sense.

Recently he said he doubted he could bring an offer better than $450. They just aren't out there.

Its not that the house has changed... its that the realtor & market perception & all associated biases have changed... from one of up, up, up... to now its dropping, where is it?

Until a lower base is established with realistic comps people can point to - no one knows where the market is - so nothing much is moving.

We are all in 'discovery'.

New on CNN - The blame game:

Subprime blame game | More | CNNMoney.com

who is missing ?

Yal, to an appraiser, "marketing time" is my estimate today of how long a property would likely have to be on the market in order to command a given price range. Inventory is only one variable considered in marketing time. It is a very difficult calculation to make intelligently in a market undergoing such rapid change in financing availability and cost as well as inventory levels. You could easily find an appraiser estimating marketing time as two months on an appraisal done today, but estimating it at six months for an appraisal done next month for an identical property.

A crucial variable (see the end of my post below on FC and REO) is "type of buyer" in the market. As CR has said many times, a first-time homebuyer or incoming relocation buyer adds demand but not supply to an existing home market. A move-up buyer takes one property out of inventory and adds another one, unless that buyer refuses to close until its current home has sold. Out-migration adds supply without adding demand.

"Marketing time" has to take all of that into account.

Charlie, that Business Week article is just exactly the kind of jumbled-up mess of terms and issues and rhetorical questions I've come to expect from most articles on the GSEs. If you can tell me what the point is after you straighten out loans versus securities versus GSE issues versus GSE security purchases versus pool quality versus tranche rating versus GSE outstandings versus last year's industry issues, you win the prize.

I tend to think that if the reporter knew what all that meant, he might have shared it with us. An article with a question mark in the title usually doesn't disappoint me, but then again whenever I see that, my expectations are pretty low.

Dryfly, this is more than slightly off topic, but if you would be interested in some field research, Minnesota Public Radio is sponsoring a "Policy and a Pint" evening on Thursday, April 19 with Government Accountability Office Comptroller General David Walker in downtown Minneapolis.

As I recall, Walker’s unusual in that he's on record for some outspoken takes on the government borrowing and spending practices. It might be interesting to see if he has any input on the current state of the economy and banking/lending regulation.

Events Calendar | Minnesota Public Radio

BTW, Tanta, your personal story is very similar to a friend of mine currently on "sabatical" .... studying massage, seminary, etc.

'Massage Seminary'? I thought the church was trying to put that behind them?

Sorry, guys. Mortgage lending is enough Blind Faith for me. You'll have to get someone else who doesn't already have enough sure and certain hope of the resurrection of the Collateral to go study theology . . .