"Dude, the last thing I need is another refinance."

I don't know if this woman can win the game at this point, but I'm rooting for her. Frankly, I'd like to hire her as a consultant to the mortgage industry.

After all the hoo-ha about those mercedes-drivin' folks getting their unfair modifications from the servicers, it's nice to see the LAT get past that to discover folks who have learned the painful lesson, and who are trying to get out from under it as best they can, by cutting sales prices and trying to plan for a way to avoid a short sale. But then, you see, these people may have been deluded about which direction home prices can go, but it's clear that what they thought they were buying was, underneath it all, a home they wanted to live in and raise children in. Those are always your best borrowers, and those are the ones I, personally, do mods for when I can. It's really not that hard to tell them apart from the speculators and keeping-up-with-the-Joneses crowd. That said, of course, I'd probably end up counseling them that a mod is hopeless, not because they'd necessarily just get behind again, but because their neighborhood is too far gone for further sacrifices on their part to be worth it. If as a lender I had to lose money on these folks, I'd be inclined to start talking short sale. While there might still be time.

Dear All,

Random comments:

Bush Admin.’s bizarre touting of ethanol from corn causing corn and soybean futures to soar. These two used in many foods and in feed. Inflation rising.

Ever single page of the give-away paper, The Red Eye, here in Chicago targeted at young folks had an ad for a condo development this morning. But the one that caught my eye…an auction of condos at River City…values going up to 749,000 starting bids at 200,000s.

Average “home owner” has average debt of $191,000 (reference: an article in the Economist).

Total Consumer Credit outstanding in Jan. 2007 in billions: $2411.4

Take the LA Times anecdotes with a grain of salt. Have a look at some work ocrenter has been doing, following up on a recent article (featured on this blog, as well as many others.

Thank You Los Angeles Times 
I have to laugh to keep from reporting you to the Feds

See my comments above:

By the way, across the street from River City are three new condo towers going up. So, auctioning units in one building and 1000s going in across the street…bizarre!

We might have been better off investing in tulips…rather than Condomania.

--
It is fascinating to watch American People not coming to terms with the reality -- The US econo-political system is fully controlled by bankers and financiers, aka Bankrupters and Fraudsters, of New York City. Why do you suppose Paulsen came to the White House? To assume the Presidency of the economy. Cheney is the President of foreign policy, including war. Baby Bush is just a front man who could get elected by acting as a good Christian, when in fact he is anything but a follower of Jesus.

Only liars at the top of the American Establishment. That is the sad truth. And there isn’t a damn thing that American People can do! The mortgage fraud was fully predicted four years ago. The regulators were sleeping at the wheel. Now, various groups want the govt. “to help.”

BTW, the economy is in recession right now. Bernanke and Paulsen are managing the Economic Crisis Center. They were fully expecting the crisis and here we are.

Jas

Ed - about your friend in Loudoun Cty:

If you pull reports from MRIS, you'll see that Loudoun's average sales price is down 7.80% YoY, and its median is down 11.60% YoY.

It's a real decline, too. You can go back and pull a report for Feb 2006 for Loudoun, and compare the SFR listed in various price brackets.

The entire distribution has shifted down. The total number of SFR listed has gone down 100 to 2,559, but in 2006 there were 48 houses listed betw. $300,000 - $349,999; in 2007 there are 125. For the next bracket of $349,000 to $399,000, the number of listing has increased from 147 to 235, etc.

Loudoun Cty is bad housing juju.

"We might have been better off investing in tulips…rather than Condomania."

Big tulip beds would look a lot nicer than most of the new construction I have seen, and be easier to get rid of if somebody wants the land for something useful.

Big kudos to OCRenter. Go back and read those LA times links if you haven't already.

Just saw Thomas Lawler on CNBC, saying home prices will go down.

But I do agree that the economy has already slipped into recession.

Based on what?

What we need to be asking ourselves is (1)What will the govt do? and (2)How much will it cost? There will soon be no question as to whether or not SOMETHING will be done.

New thread

From realist's link on NYMT:

Steven B. Schnall, Chairman, President and Co-Chief Executive Officer, commented, "Our 2006 operating results are reflective of a continued deterioration in the mortgage lending environment. Despite the fact that we have virtually no sub-prime credit exposure, we have experienced a marked increase in the number of early payment defaults of the Alt-A loans originated in our mortgage lending segment. This has resulted in an unprecedented high level of loan repurchases and credit losses totaling $7.4 million over the second half of 2006. This pressure, compounded by our lack of sufficient scale to achieve profitability in this very challenging market, further validates our decision to exit the mortgage lending business.

locally, i am just not seeing any of this in dc proper.

trust me, i'm looking hard for it.

i email my mortgage broker guys all the time. i email my builder friends, developer friends, brokers everyone.

title companies are busy.

mortgage broker guy said only change for him thus far (and i say thus far) is that he can't do 100% stated sub 640 any more.

my construction business is doubling in volume this year.

odd. so very odd.

which part requires explanation my dearest nemesis calmo?

Not to launch a revolution or anything, but if the public knew how much people who work in DC make (particularly fed jobs on the hill), they would understand why there is a permanent bubble in that venue. I imagine you need to pay that level of salary to retain them. Probably a vicious circle. Or vicious bubble.

In the January issue of the Acoustical Society of America less formal publication "Acoustics Today" consultant Marshall Long writes about condo acoustics:

"... even with a $700,000 price tag, the noise problems were considerable. Movements of people upstairs ... were loud enough to wake them in the morning. When toilets were flushed upstairs, it sounded like a waterfall running through their walls. The closing of doors, cabinets, and drawers could all be clearly heard. ..."

"Situations such as these are increasingly common in Los Angeles, where the city building department and elected officials refuse to enforce the State's building codes on noise. Even if they were were enforced, they are so anemic that minimum code compliance does not yield a quiet living environment. [the problem building complied, though barely]"