Ocwen's success sounds fishy, I doubt they followed the rules well. i.e. I would love to see the documentation they developed to qualify the borrowers.
"“When HAMP is less successful than hoped, and the reality of the housing overhand hit the market – we would expect to see further governmental action,” the report said, noting the most likely course of action is a plan that contains principal forgiveness."
Yet another reason to default, wait it out, play the system, get free rent and maybe principal forgiveness at the end.
Nah. They can just continue to have optimistic revenue projections to fill in the hole left by the last set of revenue projections.
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Remember: The spoon bends because there is no spoon.
Remember that one firm in Long Island was responsible for most of the FHA refi program, whatever that was called, where you could refi into an FHA loan with principal forgiveness.
That same firm was eventually cut off from FHA lending.
Just saying. I get a little suspicious when a firm like Ocwen is the "most successful" at a program that gives them a financial incentive to modify loans.
Who is Ocwen's regulator to check on what they are doing? They don't own a bank anymore that I am aware of, they dissolved that charter years ago. How convenient.
Just saying. I get a little suspicious when a firm like Ocwen is the "most successful" at a program that gives them a financial incentive to modify loans.
Lighten up - they are just ahead of the curve... from CR's Huffer link:
More than 72 percent of Ocwen's 1,058 borrowers who went through the trial process received a permanent reduction in monthly mortgage payments, the company says. The average for all servicers stood at a paltry 1.26 percent, according to a recent Congressional watchdog's report. Ocwen noticed its high conversion rate after being contacted by the Huffington Post.
For a company that has been dogged by allegations of improper conduct towards borrowers, the news is one of the few bright spots to emerge from an otherwise dreary report by the Congressional Oversight Panel (COP), the Elizabeth Warren-led body created last year to watch over the bailout.
"The crisis has made them look good," says Alan White, a law professor at Valparaiso University who has written extensively on mortgages and foreclosures. "[Ocwen] seems to have gotten ahead of the curve."
Did the guy in the other night who mentioned the 'training tape' ever show up again?
Recap: the training tape pruported to train servicers in basically stalling modifications, losing paperwork etc. Pretty much as you'd expect if you look at the incentives.
Well, if the Fed eats most of the paper (MBS) I guess it could work. Old loans first to clear the forclosures, then new paper when the 0 down 3.5%s default. This is going to take a very long time.
Where is ghost? I thought he stated multiple times that the Fed is sitting on 80+% of the old paper and all of the new paper. It is why people are claiming that if the Fed gets out of the MBS market that the entire market will either dry up or completely seize up...
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Ghost: Am I off here?
FUBAR and WASS LLC has a patent pending on the business process of screwing up so badly that things are totally FUBAR and everyone involved cries WASS.
They are going to hear from our lawyers as soon as we straighten out our paperwork in the back office.
I could be off, but the average yearly chart I checked showed last CAD parity in 1976. About to dip under 1.02...talk about meaningful psychological round numbers.
Must be their health care.
> Note: On the demand side, the first-time homebuyer tax credit combined with loose FHA underwriting, is boosting demand. Restricted supply and more demand has created a buying frenzy and pushed up prices in some low end areas.........sounds like the start of a new bubble, have we been down this road before ? LMAO
And what's Ocwen's market share? BOA's performance is no surprise. Nearly every move they've made to improve efficiency has made them less so. AG's comments from the other night are perfectly in line with what I see every day. I watch them and wonder how any homeowner ever gets a mod on their own.
OT-Anyone in California who handles an LLC should be aware that scamsters are sending official looking notices demanding fees for LLC renewal filings with the California Secretary of State. We are aware of one LLC (not us since we don't need not paperwork) that has received three such demand letters in the past week.
If Jerry Brown ever takes a break from campaigning, maybe he will look into it.
I could be off, but the average yearly chart I checked showed last CAD parity in 1976. About to dip under 1.02...talk about meaningful psychological round numbers.
I think CAD was at parity a couple years ago briefly - then dived again.
The USD/JPY still has a 89 handle. Everytime they jack it north of 90 and comes back down to low 88 then they protect it 'til it jumps up to 90 again.
.
Discount the Nikkei movement if the Yen isn't rocking the
We should not be surprised that Ocwen is now the leader- they have done subprime forever, sometimes like total bastards, but they do have the experience. What Ocwen is doing is simply coming up with some metrics that actually work for borrowers, something that turkeys like BofA and others could do, if they bothered to get off their duffs.
One of the really well missed points is that modding a loan preserves and enriches the servicer!
Why? The gov gives them 1k, plus they now get a lot more servicer monthly income!!!!
Look at the minimal investment in labor time and a couple of printers and fax machines, for that you get much more income than a one and done foreclosure!!!
OT-Anyone in California who handles an LLC should be aware that scamsters are sending official looking notices demanding fees for LLC renewal filings with the California Secretary of State.
They have been doing that to corps all summer. We got several. And they just prosecuted a bunch of those scamsters operating out of San Diego last week.
CR writes: Much depends on the success of HAMP. If many of these modifications don't become permanent, there will be another flood of foreclosures on the market.
To be accurate, it would be the exact same flood, just breaching another line of sandbags.
In the fifth minute of injury time Jonathan Bornstein headed in a corner to shatter Costa Rica, who had their coach Ren Simoes sent off in the latter stages, and dash their hopes of joining the United States and Mexico in automatic qualification.
The lack of outrage over the US central bank exchanging dollars for MBS in secret transactions is mind-blowing.
If they were all public deals it would be outrageous.
Record Wall Street bonuses. This will get uglier.
I'll bet the greater of $200 or .2oz glod tip to CR that the Fed does not celebrate its 100th birthday with its name on the currency.
dryfly - good point. Ocwen isn't going to win any contests for 'who i wished serviced my mortgage' anytime soon, but we should give credit where credit is due. They've been administering HAMP the right way from the git-go.
In the fall of 2007 it went to 10% over parity for a brief spell, before falling back down.
I was working w/ a foundry just east of Toronto & man were they ever crying in their beer back then... never dawned on them they might someday be the rich cousins.
"The Making Home Affordable Modification Program (HAMP) adds another layer of uncertainty for private label securitization investors, making it more difficult to predict cash flows,"
Hmmmm....0 + or - 0 -(costs) = some negative number....
California Secretary of State charges $20 per renewal.
The scamsters are charging between $239 and $198, depending on which scamster is demanding the money.
Calling the Secretary of State's office to complain results in a 3 hour 20 minute wait on hold before being given a telephonic shrug and a referral to the California Attorney General's worthless website.
I wonder if California is going to see a fall off of fees paid by small businesses.
I also wonder who in the California government was the master of brilliance and sold they the mailing list of LLCs up for renewal?
Seems to be a good time for one of those late night polls.
Which fails next?
1) A DOW Jones Industrial Average Company.
2) A US State (hint: California.)
3) One of the countries between Germany and Russia, north of the former Yugoslavia.
4) Brad Pitt's marriage.
"
CRS calculates cost of U.S. troop presence in Afghanistan
By Roxana Tiron - 10/14/09 05:08 PM ET
The United States spends about $3.6 billion a month in Afghanistan, according to data provided by the Congressional Research Service....
The cost of sending one U.S. soldier in Afghanistan for one year is $1 million versus an estimated $12,000 for an Afghani soldier, according to Steve Daggett, a specialist with the Congressional Research Service. Those numbers fall within the calculations that the Obama administration has been using. The Obama administration is calculating $1 billion per 1,000 troops deployed to Afghanistan.
we have hundreds of military bases in europe and japan costing 10s of billions while two wars bleed us to death
binladen, may he die a slow death, is laughing in a cave as we self destruct
They've been administering HAMP the right way from the git-go.
Joe buys a house from Kathy, and agrees to pay her $500,000. Joe doesn't want to use his own money, so he pays the money by borrowing it from someone else, and Kathy walks away $500,000 richer. Joe then says he doesn't really want to pay the $500,000 after all. Ocwen says, "OK". And that's the right way to run a housing market.
I was working w/ a foundry just east of Toronto & man were they ever crying in their beer back then... never dawned on them they might someday be the rich cousins.
Yes everyone was crying then. But they have short memories, because now they're all planning their next shopping trip to the USA for Christmas.
How far east was this foundry? It would be a truly small world if it belonged to a relative of mine...
EDIT: Well, not really a foundry, more a custom steel fabrication company. But close enough
yep, for now that is. is the most f*ck up in the area asked. Sweden is holding most of hte mtgs going into foreclosure so latvia just decided to make them non recourse if htey are denominated in foreign currency. hungary is giong through the same thing but with austria's banks denominated in swiss francs.
What's the bottom line here, dollar crash? hyperinflation? ruin for savers?
My read is stagflation for seven to ten years, naive savers and pensioners get ripped off. No dollar crash as such, at least not all at once. Just a slow grind down that never seems to end. Xie's piece resonates with me, probably because I lived through the 1970s. So it's too simplistic to assume that the same script will be played out, but it sure looks like it's going to rhyme.
bank could eat the $200,000.00 plus forclosure costs, plus rehab after it is left vacant for a year, and the sales costs.
We've been through this too many times, but I'll give it one more spin. The banks aren't eating the losses any more. It's taxpayers. Probably not much current taxpayers, mostly the next generation of taxpayers. But I understand your sentiment - stick it to that next generation. It's a free ride, for some.
How is harvest time going for most people this year?
Crappy. Between the cold and the incessant rain, an awful lot of the guys I'm talking to are worried about getting their soybeans off so they can plant their winter wheat.
So today, Josap, Joe gets a mod that drops the rate 2.75% on his 30 year fixed and now is roughly even up with doing a replacement purchase on a long term basis. So, does Joe do the mod?
Glod equivalent in any Forex denomination left standing, of course. Is that a bet?
Paypal has been a huge step in the development of a reliable open source world currency. No one thought it would work. Ebay too. The Euro. The NIS. Linux beating Windows. Craigslist refusing ad revenue, dominating RE listings. Free CR more useful than WSJ...
I haven't done the research, but a hedge fund friend originally from S. Africa claims that currencies and banking operations reemerge very fast even after total collapse. You can only eat so much seed corn before you get too fat to hunt a The buildings don't fall when the house of cards does. It's just a matter of who gets what haircut-- or the occasional guillotine.
"Probably not much current taxpayers, mostly the next generation of taxpayers. "
how is the next generation gonna pay for it if it's being paid mostly by diluting hte currency? once the next generation is born, the dollar will be storing much less value already. the cost doesn't mean future high taxes necessarily. it's more an implicit tax on current savers that cannot take much risk (ie: old in fixed income imho)
J6P only sees that he is paying for more than the current value of the house. And he got a cut in pay.
J6P also thinks that the "bank" is the one taking the loss. He doesn't think that Granny's pention fund will be effected, or the note was sliced and diced long ago, or that the Fed is backing the loan.
The real estate industry and banks are trying to milk a few hundred thousand sales out of the market while they can. It's all going to come to a screeching halt once the foreclosure pace picks up again and the FHA decides to tighten up its standards.
Even if HAMP is a screaming success, the re-defaults go straight to foreclosure.... there will be a pickup regardless.
If J6P ever figured out how the top of society takes care of itself, he would revolt. He is still too concerned about his boss's boss's boss's welfare. To quote AllenM, "Someday this war is going to end."
Although hardly considered an optimist, Andy Xie's piece reflects is optimistic. Too much has to go right for those (admittedly still not pretty) economic circumstances to unfold, and the chances of that happening are slim to none (minus the slim).
I'm not sure I understand your point. There should be no lending at all?
In any case, Ocwen didn't lend 'Joe' a dime. They are paid a fee to service loans, which includes mitigating losses when necessary, which now includes availing any government relief programs (HAMP/HARP).
How far east was this foundry? It would be a truly small world if it belonged to a relative of mine...
EDIT: Well, not really a foundry, more a custom steel fabrication company. But close enough
Real foundry - about 30-40 minutes east of Toronto. Very well run group just not completely bought into what has to happen when doing business w/ big US based MNC OEMs. Their technology was good & they knew what they were doing - I'd work with them again if they didn't drive me crazy. They drove me absolutely crazy.
it's more an implicit tax on current savers that cannot take much risk (ie: old in fixed income imho)
Well, yes, you are correct. The pain will be split between the (mostly older) people who save and don't borrow much and will get crushed by inflation, and younger people who will be earning taxable income in the coming high-tax decades.
This is bullcrap! TARP, HARP, HAMP now HAFA nonsense. It's been over a year, in socal we just got off a state foreclosure moratorium and now they're moving them into 90 day oops now 150 trials WTF! Last year October was a nationwide moratorium because the didn't want to foreclose over the holidays. People have been sittin in their homes over a year not paying mortgages waiting for uncle sam to bail them out, it's bullshit. B of A is now working on owner to renter programs to save their sorry asses from recognizing their losses. Close the under capitalized banks, foreclose on the homes already, if after two years these loans haven't been fixed then they can't.
There should be no lending at all?
In any case, Ocwen didn't lend 'Joe' a dime.
There should be almost no lending of the type that leads to non-repayment. I know, this would be a revolution in thinking here in the US, but it works in other places.
I know that Ocwen didn't lend Ocwen's own money. They manage the servicing, so they made the decisions on loan mods. The losses on those loan mods will be picked up by the govt, and put on the tab for future taxpayers. Effectively, future taxpayers are paying the mods - the original loan never really went away. But those future taxpayers aren't getting to own and live in those houses in return for this payment they will have to make.
Real foundry - about 30-40 minutes east of Toronto. Very well run group just not completely bought into what has to happen when doing business w/ big US based MNC OEMs.
Well, if it was Bowmanville I know the town very well but not the foundry. I have a number of acquaintances involved in secondary and tertiary levels to that, such as fabricating, extrusion die creation (for aluminum), industrial design etc. All of them make their bread and butter from the auto and aerospace industries, and all of them will become insolvent if the currency doesn't settle at least around par. If we hit 20-30% over parity for an extended period of time, it'll be carnage.
OT and sorry if someone else has posted this:
Today, Massachusetts Land Court Judge Keith Long reaffirmed his controversial ruling made back in March 2009 that invalidated foreclosure proceedings involving two Springfield homes because the lenders did not hold clear titles to the properties at the time of sale. A copy of the decision can be found here.
7 million homeless families is a revolution. With guns.
Doesn't have to be any homeless - get them into rentals stat - no shortage of those right?
What gov't ought to be doing is helping people cope w/ the mess not trying to prop up the mess. Get out, into rentals then help them learn how to repair their credit & start over in homes they really can afford.
Of course that would do nothing for Goldman Sachs so it doesn't even get suggested.
Well, if it was Bowmanville I know the town very well but not the foundry.
Might be them. Maybe you should buy them - if the same owners are there they were looking for a young guy to come in, learn to run the place and do a sweat equity buy out. You said you wanted to be an entrepreneur.
U.S. Bank (in Ibanez) and Wells Fargo (in Larace) have now timely moved to vacate that judgment making, in essence, five arguments. First, they contend that the “present holder of the mortgage issue” came as a surprise to them and should not have been decided in connection with these cases. Second, they argue that had they known the issue was going to be addressed, they would have pled their case differently and either limited their request for relief to the “Boston Globe issue” or further supplemented their evidentiary offerings. Third, they insist that since the defendants had been defaulted, it was inappropriate for judgment to be entered against the plaintiffs and, at worst, their motion for default judgment should simply have been denied with leave for them to amend and try again. Fourth, based on new evidence and new arguments they have now submitted post-judgment, they maintain they were the “present holder of the mortgage” within the scope and meaning of G.L. c. 244, § 14 at the time of notice and sale. This is so, they say, because they possessed the note (endorsed in blank), an assignment of the mortgage in blank (i.e., without an identified assignee), and a contractual right to obtain the mortgage at those times. Fifth, in the event the court disagrees that their possession of the note, a mortgage assignment in blank, and a contractual right sufficed to make them “present holders of the mortgage,” they contend that the foreclosure sales were nonetheless valid because they were authorized by the last record holder of the mortgage and the plaintiffs acted as the “agent” of that holder.
For the reasons more fully set forth below, each of these arguments fails. I thus DENY the motions to vacate. The plaintiffs cannot credibly claim surprise at the judgment that was entered and, having asked for (and received) a declaration on the issues they chose and on the facts exactly as they pled them, they have no right to a “do-over” because the declaration was not entirely as they wished. Moreover, their newly-presented facts do not lead to a different result. Instead, they show that the plaintiffs themselves recognized that they needed mortgage assignments in recordable form explicitly to them (not in blank) prior to their initiation of the foreclosure process, that the plaintiffs’ “authorized agent” argument fails both on its facts and as a matter of law, and reaffirm the correctness of the original judgment. They also show that the problem the plaintiffs face (the present title defect) is entirely of their own making as a result of their failure to comply with the statute and the directives in their own securitization documents. Simply put, the foreclosure sales were invalid because they failed to meet the requirements of G.L. c. 244, § 14. What the plaintiffs truly seek is a change in the foreclosure sale statute (G.L. c. 244, § 14), which can only come from the legislature.
Them bank boys better get themselves some better lawyers.
The losses on those loan mods will be picked up by the govt,
That's not accurate. The mod incentive payment is paid by the US Treasury, the losses are still absorbed by the trust (investors). Keep in mind that whatever losses may result - whether they are realized as a result of an immediate foreclosure or a foreclosure delayed by a ill-conceived loan modification which goes bad - are still taken by the investor no matter what.
On the other hand, - the 'gubbmint' will be shelling out ~$1000 per modification that successfully completes the trial period, whether that modified loan subsequently defaults or not.
The banks aren't eating the losses any more. It's taxpayers.
The invisible hand says if the taxpayer can't afford to pay what is owed on half the houses in the country, it doesn't matter who holds the note. We had 79% (applied only to J.D. Rockefeller) bracket once, and a wipe out of major banks several times.
The Jubilee year only wiped out debt after title to all assets was forfeited. If you were caught with buried glod, the penalty was more than its value. As for credit going forward, there was no free market ride. Shady deals got recorded for posterity. BAC forced to waive privilege today...Stanford and Madoff in prison fights... Trials are still public in the US even if the parties object.
Might be them. Maybe you should buy them - if the same owners are there they were looking for a young guy to come in, learn to run the place and do a sweat equity buy out. You said you wanted to be an entrepreneur.
While the idea is intriguing, is it a good idea for a complete neophyte to dive into a capital-intensive operation? Bringing me up to speed on their systems and clientèle is one thing, but I'd be coming in completely blind.
EDIT: Anyway, I gotta get some sleep. Thanks for planting the seed, dryfly. The time to crap or get off the pot is fast approaching, and I'm going to have to decide which iron to pull out of the fire and run with.
"Trials are still public in the US even if the parties object."
Unless there are national security issues and there sure does seem to be many national security issues lately. Or it concerns Blackwater. Close enough to count I guess.
"A US District Court judge has barred the public from attending -- or the media from reporting on -- hearings in the trial of five Blackwater employees charged over the killing of 14 Iraqi civilians in Baghdad's Nisoor Square in 2007." Judge closes Blackwater trial to public | Raw Story
Edit: The WAPO piece elaborates the reasoning. Fair trial issues and the secrecy of grand jury hearings preclude the rights of the public from reporting or attending.
I'm sad to report that a fold-up metal and cloth chair( f.o.b. China ex-Target $8.99), and a copy of John Toland's "The Great Dirigibles" were swept away @ my swimming hole on the river, and will likely never be seen again...
In lieu of sending flowers to the service, monetary donations to the charity of my choice are appreciated, for those that bereave me.
Daring has served me well so far, and I have no intention of giving up that personality trait.
My choice now is between two completely different paths; one daring, but risky, the other guaranteed, and boring. I'll end up choosing the former, but it's not as easy a choice as my previous ones have been.
C'mon, Shnaps. Are you telling me that non-repayment of home loans will be mostly absorbed by the private sector? The banks and other institutions to which the losses are first sent don't have enough equity to absorb all the losses from years of loose lending against overpriced RE. So each extra dollar of loss simply requires an extra dollar of govt support.
Thanks E.C. Of course that should dominate the news. Ironic that the case is one the Gov't apparently wants to lose, but irrelevant. Wonder if NYT or WAPO has any balls left...
There are extremely rare situations where I would support in camera testimony- never an entire trial. I can't see how a secret trial of Blackwater employees would ever be in the public interest.
The losses will be absorbed by the private sector. Fannie, Freddie and the Fed will buy up all the loans and take all the losses. They're the private sector - 100% owned and controlled by Goldman Sachs.
Now where the "private sector" gets its capital? that's a different question.
Now where the "private sector" gets its capital? that's a different question
I realize you're being facetious, but for any readers who may miss that, FNM and FRE losses, and most of the other losses, are being covered, in one way or another, directly or indirectly, by the govt.
The banks and other institutions to which the losses are first sent don't have enough equity to absorb all the losses from years of loose lending against overpriced RE. So each extra dollar of loss simply requires an extra dollar of govt support.
No, no, Wall Street has set aside record bonuses. JPM had a great Q, probably GS too.
Next bailout Congress can't claim a once-in-a-lifetime perfect storm which nobodycoodanode. I, for one, had no clue what MBS were 3 years ago. We all get a haircut, but the bonus baby bankers go first. If there is a bank that did nothing wrong, it can grow.
Plenty of banks out there with no FDIC connection.
Repugnant as the payment of bonuses by insolvent banks is, it is a gnat on the body of the solvency deficiency. All the bonuses this year might add up to 100 billion. The losses are trillions. So the loan losses are not capable of being covered in any meaningful way by cutting bonuses. (There are other good reasons to cut the bonuses and fire the bankers.) Those losses are being sent to the taxpayer, make no mistake.
LMAO - no no no, not half of Latvia, or half long the Lat, or any such nonsense. My mom is 100% Latvian, born there. (it was once a country that she and her mother were proud of. Now, not so much.)
With HEMAP, which was established in 1984, Pennsylvania state officials provide a two or three-year loan to a jobless homeowner, depending on the individual's finances and the economic situation. Using that program, homeowners are not responsible for repaying the vast majority of the principle or any of the interest on the loan until he or she finds a job.
Specifically, a struggling homeowner participating in the Pennsylvania program, which has depleted resources, requires jobless homeowners pay a token $25 a month until they get another job and their gross income surpasses 35% of their monthly housing costs, including mortgage and utility payments.
I know the losses will fall on the taxpayer, and China will have to eat some inflation or a reset. Juries don't need to be told who ultimately pays when they award millions to a plaintiff suing the Transit Authority after the train conductor fell asleep.
But I care a lot what Dick Fuld is allowed to own title to, and he should be watched for buried glod for at least 20 years. Even greater losses will continue to be foisted on the taxpayer until we force the TBTF banks to write them down publicly. As of today, they're writing bigger ponzi swaps and bonuses.
More than 72 percent of Ocwen's 1,058 borrowers who went through the trial process received a permanent reduction in monthly mortgage payments, the company says.
Now there is a "Travel Promotion Act"...............a $10 fee to be a US tourist...........GREAT idea........like all the rest of them.....What Idiots.
HAMP only had $75bn total. Getting money out of Congress at this point is like being asked to turn chicken sh.t into chicken soup. Debt ceiling, FDIC weeks past due, worry that they'll be caught announcing new programs while the recovery "is in full gear"... above all the power holders in the administration want to prevent Treasury yields from climbing
Could see a revival of the idea to lower principal payments, but retain capital appreciation rights until a certain amount more is paid. Then they could securitize the capital appreciation rights, mark some stupid value, and then the Fed could help out in a way that still loans more than the underlying collateral
"Fed could help out in a way that still loans more than the underlying collateral"
Elegant thought, but at this point they are better off to just keep buying the damn loans (or lending on bad collateral - same thing) rather than raise a red flag on what they are doing by creating a wacky new form of CDO on appreciation rights.
I harshed you the other night. My apologies. PLUS ONE on your last comment. Genius. And I sure hope you are right. And with that au revoir. I need my grey matter rested as I must try to help a client restructure some bad loans tomorrow (read: behind most bad commercial real estate deals there is at least one very good doctor).
"C'mon, Shnaps. Are you telling me that non-repayment of home loans will be mostly absorbed by the private sector? "
patientrenter, you are correct in most cases.
Ocwen just picked up a large portfolio from Freddie to service for them. Guess who the "investor" is on the credit risk for those loans? Hint, look in a mirror.
"Getting money out of Congress at this point is like being asked to turn chicken sh.t into chicken soup."
There's grant money for that in the stimbubblous package. Saying it's hard to get money out of congang is like saying it's hard to get manure out of a steaming pile of bullsh.t.
"worry that they'll be caught announcing new programs while the recovery "is in full gear""
Bah! They're more worried about getting caught while doing the page in the rear.
Hackman,
No worries, the internet wasn't made for grudges and if it were I can't remember the specifics of the disagreeableness.
Seriously, debt ceiling has to be done sometime inside a few weeks Government - Debt Subject to Limit Graph
Have $197bn to spare.
Will take some time before the spending bills can refill the pipeline. Any hope of a last minute boost to spur on a self-sustaining recovery or bubble of sorts has passed. The plans were readied, but businesses have not got their signals to go ahead. We relapse in Q4
Ocwen just picked up a large portfolio from Freddie to service for them. Guess who the "investor" is on the credit risk for those loans? Hint, look in a mirror.
How is it GSE portfolios work. They make sure the pool owners don't cheat them by selling properties under value, because they have the right to buy any property that goes for a guaranty claim? But they have little free cash to do so
Bah! They're more worried about getting caught while doing the page in the rear.
Misean, we're talking about politicians who approach these matters from known political history. Which is unanimous, recessions don't last this long so it must be over and time to get back to those defense contracts or whatever specific lobbyist field they plan to retire on
China bought agency RMBS, some of which was guaranteed by the full faith and credit of the US gov't, the rest of it guaranteed by Fannie and Freddie, who strangely enough don't have full faith and credit backing, but do have a fat checkbook thanks to the US taxpayer.
Servicers are only bound to follow HAMP for agency loans. In fact, FHA loans don't officially fall under HAMP, they have their own program (which is called FHA-HAMP).
If a Fannie/Freddie loan gets modified under HAMP, Fannie/Freddie buy it out of the MBS at par, as if it was a prepayment.
Bottom line - HAMP losses WILL be borne by the taxpayer.
Non-agency loans, where the holder of the credit risk is someone other than the government, are subject to whatever rules the servicer is allowed under the Pooling and Servicing Agreement, if in a securitized deal, or whatever the investor sees fit, if held as a whole loan.
There have been lawsuits around that issue, to be sure.
"Which is unanimous, recessions don't last this long so it must be over and time to get back to those defense contracts or whatever specific lobbyist field they plan to retire on"
You're suggesting the stimbubbulous packages did NOT have them in mind?
Land and home owners form a loose rank and file for the bank oligarchy, sometimes helping them sell the State on welfare checks like HEMAP. The State can pay the bank to keep the unemployed sheltered, but it can also pass special taxes on real property, then give a special break to resident occupants, or kill title holders with rent control less than inflation, depending on the political climate. All perfectly Constitutional, with precedent. Tax lien foreclosures will not require the State to produce any note.
Turns out labor mobility and outsourcing are wonderful for multi-national patent title owners but not so good for McMansion note holders or their alleged assignees. BAC can threaten that they'll take their ball to another State, but the house stays put.
I dare them to try to buy those MA and OH judges or their legislatures. No, I think there will be a race to cash the FDIC's last $500 BB, shock at the awful truth of the Fed's books, then attempts at capital flight in advance of an angry Congress and a race to find buried glod ahead of Executive Order. Just because all the banks fail doesn't mean the underwater notes get canceled, the taxpayer will have receivers ready. But the process will be massively reset according to political leverage, as always. Flippers and ponzis will not have Jubilee. Trump's name comes off the casino. GS will refer to Glass-Steagall 2.0.
"How is it GSE portfolios work. They make sure the pool owners don't cheat them by selling properties under value, because they have the right to buy any property that goes for a guaranty claim? But they have little free cash to do so"
Not sure I get the question exactly, but let me take a stab.
If you originate a loan that is Fannie/Freddie eligible (i.e. "conforming"), they pool the mortgages and sell them as MBS passthroughs, where the investor gets P&I payments from the bond. Fannie/Freddie guarantee P&I - they are on the hook for the entire credit risk of the loans (the MBS buyer is on the hook for Fannie/Freddie counterparty risk, which is why no one wants their MBS, except Bernanke).
The servicer collects the P&I on the mortgages for a servicing fee.
If the loan defaults, the servicer advances P&I, and does the workout according to the rulebook set up by the GSEs. The GSE has the right to transfer that servicing at any time, and they sometimes do when the loans are non-performing, because some servicers are not great at servicing those types of loans. Banks like WFC, Chase, etc are fine, but the small banks are not so great, and some do their own servicing.
That is where an Ocwen comes in - they are experts at dealing with delinquent loans.
If/when the loan is foreclosed, Fannie buys the loan out of the MBS at par, as if it were a prepayment, and they pay off the servicer's advance. They also have to do this with any modified loan under HAMP.
They then take the hit between par and the recovery.
They have plenty of money to do this, as the taxpayers have them covered (not officially of course).
ghostfaceinvestah,
thanks, I thought FNM/FRE just cut a check for whatever amount the servicer said was the difference between par and recovery and only exercised the option to buy the foreclosure to process themselves if they didn't trust the quoted figure
For the first time in more than 35 years, the U.S. military has met all of its annual recruiting goals, as hundreds of thousands of young people have enlisted despite the near-certainty that they will go to war.
...
The military has not seen such across-the-board successes since the all-volunteer force was established in 1973, after Congress ended the draft following the Vietnam War.
...
Overall, the Defense Department brought in 168,900 active-duty troops, or 103 percent of the goal for the fiscal year, officials said. It reached 104 percent of the goal for recruitment of National Guard and reserve forces.
The quality of recruits also improved, with about 95 percent reporting that they had received high school diplomas; last year, 83 percent of the Army's active-duty recruits had diplomas, short of the goal of 90 percent. The active-duty Army this year admitted only 1.5 percent of recruits who scored in the lowest acceptable category on the standard qualification test; in recent years, that figure had reached nearly 4 percent.
Yeah just like defense contracts, or road work....so what was your point again, then?
There are no more pieces of the existing cake to hand out. All further money has to come in the form of new cakes, pies, or ponies. Which can't be done until they increase the party planning committee budget, but no one wants to do that until they guarantee themselves a party individually, so it's taking longer than expected. By the time the PPC budget is approved, they'll be weeks-months behind on all the actual party planning work
"I thought FNM/FRE just cut a check for whatever amount the servicer said was the difference between par and recovery and only exercised the option to buy the foreclosure to process themselves if they didn't trust the quoted figure"
The main servicer usually handles the foreclosure and liquidation, so there is some trust element there (and of course some auditing), so they control the recovery amount, but for the big servicers, it usually isn't an issue (and I think three servicers have something like 70% of the loans? not sure, close to that). They are better at it than Fannie/Freddie for the most part, having experience with non-agency loans.
It is the small servicers who need help, it does take a special skill set to deal with a mass of foreclosures (like actually finding the borrower, investigating fraud, etc), that is where they will do it themselves or more commonly these days transfer servicing to an Ocwen or the like.
So the GSE will buy the mortgage out of the pool at par. So basically the remit the UPB to the MBS investor as a principal repayment. For recovery, they will get the recovery amount, less expenses (including servicer advances, servicer fees, legal, sales costs, etc). the net amount is their loss. (Par + Expenses - Recovery = loss).
That would be about 0.05% of the GDP (annual GDP ~$14T). So if half of that amount gets spent elswhere that's a 0.025% boost to GDP. Not as big as I suspected, barely out of the noise, so probably isn't a big deal. But it was worth the exercise.
"Full faith and credit" is paid in nominal dollars. Buyer beware: China should have negotiated a currency hedge in a basket of commodities. (Not in $ from AIG, either) TIPS are cute, but the US government defines "inflation", not Mish.
Every depositor got paid back every penny after the holiday in '32 (not with copper). The dollar was only reset to 35 from 20/oz in glod. You couldn't actually buy any metal, though, and raw materials were rationed. Gilded robber baron mansions (ridiculed as grotesque even when built) became museums. I doubt that China really got blindsided by counter-party risk. They got too many factories, we got too many houses. Hopefully we can work out a peaceful deal on who pays what for the remainder of the oil and who gets paid what for factory work.
I suggest a little clause in Treasury Bills tying the rate at least in part to a basket of commodities. Give us a chance to rebuild our credit. "Full faith" is puffery, of course. We don't have to remind China of the unhedgeable risk of a sudden reset of property titles in favor of local tax protesters. Cost of doing business. The value of a promise to pay is always discounted by the power to enforce collection in the event of default, no matter what collateral or currency is used.
The AHS referenced says the median cost is $843. I biased that upward to skew towards more recent higher purchases and housing ATM extraction, etc.
But you miss the point. This has never been about the economy. This is about the banks. Leveraged out the wazoo they cannot stand a 30% impairment of 10% of their portfolio. Actually that's a total wipeout. They cannot operate at far lower realized loses. Extend so thet can recapitalize and unwind over leverage. Pretend so they don't cause a panic. I mean for gawds sake; freakin' insolvent Wells Fargo is a 4 bagger since March.
From CR: Reuters reports that a record 7.58% of U.S. homeowners with mortgages were 30+ days delinquent in August ...
.. From Wiki: There are about 44.4 million mortgages on homes in the US.
... So about 3.4 million mortgages are at least 30 days late
From Wiki: The average national monthly mortgage payment in the United States was $1,687 in mid 2006.
Using these numbers, $5.7 billion/month is NOT being paid in mortgages, some portion of which is being spent in the consumer economy.
Edited to correct math.
Also adding: The purpose of this exercise is to estimate how much cash being diverted from mortgage payments is goosing the consumer segment of the economy. It appears it could be as much as 0.5% of the GDP, a significant number.
Wiki can be wrong. This is one of those egregious examples. There are at least twice that many homes with mortgages and the AHS referenced shows that $1687 is wildly high even for an average.
IMO wiki is in danger of collapsing under its own weight. They still haven't found a cure for their editorial policy on global warming.
I thought Libor was tamed by various central bank guarantees of interbank loans.
At 79%, you're getting into some kind of common law "unconscionability" I assume. The market should set rates for hard money, but the question is how much should the State intervene in the market to enforce collection, and who should pay for the service. Then there are the sham transactions like AIG selling $2 trillion in insurance to GS, JPM and pals, who knew they could never cover. Did the bank securitize that 79% and leverage it into a AAA Fed guarantee by any chance?
"Caveat Emptor" has two edges: the bank buys a promise to be paid 79% interest for cash.
Americans get screwed at every turn with easy credit. Even those of us with no balance or paying cash end up overcharged at the store to cover their charges and expenses. Legal yes, moral no.
I can see you don't get the pure genius of this offer,...You don't even have to wait to start up the delinquency collection machinery, it's baked in as soon as you send them the card.
The California Attorney General's office said there's nothing it can do about the cards since they are issued out of state and out of its jurisdiction.
A spokesman with the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) said interest rate limits on bank cards are set by the individual state and not on a federal level. According to information on the South Dakota Legislative Web site, there is "no maximum or usury restriction."
CA may not be able to prevent an SD bank from issuing the card at any rate, but that doesn't mean open season. CA can pass consumer protection measures and has plenty of Constitutional leeway in setting limits to common law damages and imposing court fees. How about a jury trial, SD Bank versus local deadbeat...
This is bullcrap! TARP, HARP, HAMP now HAFA nonsense. It's been over a year, in socal we just got off a state foreclosure moratorium and now they're moving them into 90 day oops now 150 trials WTF! Last year October was a nationwide moratorium because the didn't want to foreclose over the holidays.
True, but now that Obama's a bona fide Laureate, we'll need to wait another decent interval.
It's just so weird, I'm inclined to believe it's a CIA money laundering scheme,...to pay those Japanese tourists for their billion dollar bonds.
What reason would you have for pushing a money losing proposition?
Ooooh, maybe its Al Qaeda trying to subvert American debtors. No, no, it's a filtering scheme designed to pinpoint weak links in the FBI personnel,...those so far gone they're vulnerable to bribery.
The US can preempt regulation of national banks, BK law, and restrain States from hindering interstate commerce by applying local usury limits to out-of-state banks. But credit card default is an ordinary State contract matter. Only broad Due Process and Equal protection are required.
The national money center banks have a lot of paper claims to Americans' assets that Federal law can't enforce. Notes for titles in Ohio and MA, for instance. South Dakota thought it could game usury laws to get banks to run their ponzis with local talent. But Shiti is not worth what their books say. Good luck with the long-arm collection racket on your loan sharking. Never thought Mount Rushmore was worth the tax money. Citifield stays in Queens. Keep all the bankers...
Oct. 15 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. foreclosure filings climbed to a record in the third quarter as lenders seized more properties from delinquent borrowers, according to RealtyTrac Inc.
A total of 937,840 homes received a default or auction notice or were repossessed by banks, a 23 percent increase from a year earlier, the Irvine, California-based seller of default data said today in a report. One out of every 136 U.S. households received a filing, the highest quarterly rate in records dating to January 2005.
“The problem is prime loans going into foreclosure and people being underwater and losing their jobs,” Richard Green, director of the Lusk Center for Real Estate at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles, said in an interview. “It’s a really bad number.”
More than $400 billion in U.S. home mortgages that were packaged into securities and sold by companies other than government-supported Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are in default and may be foreclosed on, S&P said. Those defaults may depress home prices for years, the analysts said.
Not to worry, that $400 billion is insured for 500. The insurance payout is hedged by CDS for 600. The CDS are insured for 700. The Fed holds the paper as collateral for $900 billion... How could they toss around the "d" word like that?
Yogi: I wish my computer hadn't crashed some months ago, I lost the evidence and can't recall where I got it that Tier 1 capital statements of the Biggie Piggy brokerages and banks are so very cooked. No surprise but I wanted proof and found it. Dang. If the FSAB, SEC and other regulatory arms ever coordinated efforts and the so called Fed oversight was more than expensive wine and dines, then the naked truth would be revealed but we know it won't because these are 'systemically important'. The Fed's balance sheet is estimated to be north of 2 Trillion now.
Regarding HAMP etc. they will continue postponing because their balance sheets (including the fed) as I suspect they can't take much more in leverage/debt at least this year. I should say especially the fed. FHA is underwater, the FDIC is broke, realizing more RE losses from foreclosure would be disastrous to the 10K Wall Street party. Its really all about those GSEs sold to China I think, the biggest fear Bernanke has is deflation. But propping up of this big fat mess setup a negative feedback loop in the real economy and a conundrum I can't see the solution to myself; but, I'm not an economist, rocket scientist or genius. So the FDIC is not closing any regionals or larger banks, just small ones with small capital. It will be an eternal drip, drip, drip. I think perhaps the last nail in the coffin that can't be shunted off as easily will be CRE, but then again, I've been amazed at how easily debt can disappear for some while others suffer the ultimate price from the banksters. The Corus bank failure still bothers me as it sort of set a president with the FDIC taking on losses from RRE, CRE speculation.
Mark 2 makebelive continues, JW at Bloomberg has an oped piece about it this morning. The other little thing not paid much attention to is the fallout from the gamed Munimarket and the ARS (Auction Rate Securities) mess. People are not even getting their principle back well over a year later. Confidence in that market bound to be lost from that little fiasco. This is important as states and municipalities will suffer from that. This was another Phil Gramm wet dream realized. It was ruled illegal in courts but complex mechanisms left the buyers without legal recourse and the banks/brokers who sold these products free of liability because they can't be identified. Nice.
oh sorry for the length, I keep trying to figure this mess out only to discover new pieces to the puzzle that were hidden. It makes my itty bitty brain hurt. And someone please tell me why oil is so high all of a sudden (again)?. If that spike continues, then watch what is left of the economy on main street completely implode.
Pieter Lakeman, who has waged battles against companies such as Royal KPN NV, called for customers to withdraw money from DSB on national television after allegations that it overcharged mortgage holders. Consumers took out about 15 percent of DSB’s deposits in less than two weeks, causing the Dutch central bank to seize control on Oct. 12.
Are you paying attention, big 19? Smaller scale, but one man on TV killed a bank with 15% withdrawal. Time for US depositors to leverage up. Capitalism only works if consumers shop for value. Another bank is supposed to compete for those deposits with smaller bonuses. Forget Sheila, do not do business with a bank that pays big bonuses from fees.
53 percent of the income goes to the mortgage.
An 8.8 handle on price to income, we must have a lot more millionaires here.
Actually I think we are number one on that level. Though I still think half a million is kind of high for a postage size lot with an old house in a bad area.
I wonder how many people are thinking WTF am I doing, and contemplating just walking away and moving to Vegas. Maybe that is why the market is crazy there.
Goldman Sachs’s public-relations quandary -- the more money the firm generates, the more hostility it provokes -- has fueled speculation among Wall Street bankers about a charitable gift of $1 billion or more, to be announced by the end of the year when the company awards bonuses. Only a small group of senior executives at the bank is privy to the details and no decision has been reached, people with knowledge of the matter said.
Yogi, earlier today: [can't find the link] "Wall Street will divert one BILLION dollars to soup kitchens in a Thanksgiving PR stunt"
Charity is beautiful, but I hope I didn't give them the idea. Pure guess on my part.
Just a few more comments on the cracks awaiting a destructive collapse here.
Just for fun, I went out to Realitytrack and did a little math. I know their numbers are not perfect but they are better than the Realtor's, Kauai has not released numbers since July.
I use WTF a little too much, but this is the total of distressed properties compared to the number F/S (For Sale).
Goldman Sachs should be careful to make sure that any philanthropy comes primarily from employees’ compensation rather than from profits that would otherwise go to shareholders, Holland said.
“If it comes out of the shareholders’ pockets, they could have a losing proposition,” he said.
Oh those would be other dollars, like those they didn't pay in taxes.
The Government has CFC, which collects a lot for a basket of charities.
Why not for GS? Good tax write off for those mega million unplanned bonuses.
I think I would trust a charity to put the money to good use more than the Government. Of course there are always exceptions.
Nominal prices are controlled by whether the Fed will print a trillion or two more to buy MBS. Real prices are related to real income, supply and demand. "Distressed" is a subjective term.
Kauai: All real estate is local. Hawaii is a resort area of high value as property is very limited. You think correctly about it. Resort areas of high value (real value) also have highly distorted real estate valuations. I live in such an area but it isn't as profound as Hawaii, Hawaii is unique. Resort areas with limited property in the past were somewhat sheltered from other real estate pressures/recessions. Also smaller states who do not have real capacity in business productivity and taxation, rely heavily of property taxation for the state coffers. My state is insane with high property taxation, state income tax, 8-10% sales tax depending of items and location, high gas tax. As usual its the little guy who pays while the big fish gets a pass. Thank gawd Howard Dean never made it to the national level. His legacy here is still stinging everyone with education funded solely on property owners. 2/3's of my property taxes are for education and in the thousands of hard cold cash every year on a fixed income and modest older home. I never had any children so that makes it even harder for us to swallow.
Although this is long overdue, it is a mere drop in the pacific. There are 52K names still not revealed to the IRS at JUST UBS. I would bet the house there are some senior senators names there (perhaps aliases).
What strikes me however is there is no mention or movement to go after corporate tax evasion which likely goes into the TRILLIONS. I like to listen to what isn't said as much as what is said.
I think I would trust a charity to put the money to good use more than the Government.
I think you've been brainwashed. "Good use" for whose benefit, GS? So you think GS earned the right to allocate so much capital by producing economic value. From article:
‘Rescued by Taxpayers’
“There’s no question the government propped them up last fall,” said Heineman, a senior fellow at Harvard Law School and Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government in Cambridge, Massachusetts. A charitable gift from the compensation pool “would be the nod to the argument that they wouldn’t be where they are today if they hadn’t been rescued by taxpayers.”
I have no issue with GS employees contributing to charity as individuals. (I still would be disgusted by their compensation)
Nanoo-Nanoo -
By being a small state, and very susceptible to the ebb and flow of economies and tourism, Hawaii has always had a boom and bust real estate market.
The last real shake up was in the 80's, but somehow all that data is just removed from the current data.
I am happy that new technology is slowly breaking the strangle hold on the "super double secret" real estate data.
I am still shocked looking at the prices and statistics here, but after a couple of years some how half a million sounds normal, just like the Trillion is the new Billion.
I come here for my vaccine dosage or reality, doom, gloom, and I'm still waiting for the boom.
yogi -
I agree, my point was that to soften the disgusted blow back, giving donations to charity can serve multiple purposes.
There are some charities I like, some need to be shutdown by the non-existing consumer protection agency.
Even a cost to benefit check would make a lot of the cancer research look like ponzie schemes. But there lies the problem with how you define benefits and cost.
So should I disclose my positive balance tab at a bar in Thailand?
And should "goodwill" be considered in calculating overseas transactions?
I can not remember the exact quote, but some Chinese Emperor once complained that:
"The more strict I become as a ruler, the crafter the people become".
Maybe I should start to hoard honey. As a commodity that has been going insane.
I come here for a sanity check too. I've been happy to find such a wonderful resource in trying to understand the depth of this financial disaster for the majority of people living away from the beltway in DC or brokerage houses in NYC. Good thing I like puzzles because this is the biggest one I've ever encountered and I understand endocrinology...lol.
I am sad though because I know all the data, all the talk, all the delusions mean real hardship for increasing numbers innocent bystanders who are the COLLATERAL damage of this financial sham. I harken back to the '70s and how I nearly didn't get out of that with all my skin and teeth. This is way, way, worse.
To try and stay on topic here: After 9/11 this area's real estate was white hot with purchases of second homes, camps, property from the big NE metro areas. Housing prices soared, the biggest squeeze group of course the middle with little inventory. I suspect Hawaii is the same in that respect. The market here is secretive, I can't get a handle on what is really going on.
Vermont, we lived in Atlanta for 25 years before. I was a duck out of water in Atlanta as I'm a country mouse. I'm a lucky soul to live where I do even with the high cost, its a tradeoff.
Yogi, where are you? I find it interesting to see such a cross-section here. and Kauai, do I remember correctly that RRE is highly regulated as people merely rent-don't own the property, that the state owns the property??
Well, with all real estate, you hold the title. The State has sovereignty.
You don't pay your tax's, they take it back.
You don't pay your bills, the State can give it your creditors.
Hawaii still has a good number of Leasehold properties where some one else owns the land, while you own the improvements. (IE the house, etc).
You pay a lease fee per a contract for a set time, and the lease holder can change. When the contract is over, you loose out unless you can buy the lease.
Most of the big lease holders are selling them now, (I wonder why)
Just picture Krammer hitting the "sell, sell, sell, (Train crash sounds). etc.)
It's getting late, I'm beat, time to stop attempting to type and make some-what coherent sentences.
Manhattan. I follow the financial sector on my own, though.
I'm betting the Fed is dead by 2013 [above]. As you can see from from my conjecture on the billion dollar charity pr stunt, I don't advise betting against me.
Ken Langone resisting CNBC cheerleaders: "Don't go out and buy at Home Depot [he was founder] if you're on the edge financially and can't pay your debts."
Thanks both Yogi and Kauai. I just found this on Bloomberg-another little piece of the puzzle that forgives corporations for making bad bets. This time it is looser capital standards for Life insurers who played in the MBS's. Why does anyone pay attention to the rating agencies anymore?
Why does anyone pay attention to the rating agencies anymore?
Because they have been wrong sooo many times for sooo long?
They are paid by the companies to rate their products, which creates a culture of pumping and forgetting?
To heck with extend and pretend. We are doing a pump, dump, and pretend it never happened.
There is a serious problem brewing @ the North Pole. The people that use reason as their Baedeker, now claim that it will be ice-free during the summer, within 10 years...
If we don't build Santa Claus a floating factory asap, you can kiss xmas good bye~
Inflation makes the national debt more manageable because it can be repaid with cheaper dollars.
In a democracy full of personally indebted voters, the government will pursue monetary policies hospitable to debtors even as it accommodates the special interests that lend to them.
Inflation finances social programs that voters demand while allowing politicians to avoid the politically unpopular alternative of higher taxes, enabling Uncle Sam to play Santa Claus.
**Inflationary spending is confused with economic growth, which is confused with economic health. **(Of course, GDP numbers are theoretically adjusted for inflation but that doesn’t mean much if the inflation figures are misrepresented.)
Inflation causes nominal asset prices to rise, such as those of stocks and real estate, instilling in the minds of voters the illusion of wealth creation even as the real purchasing power of their assets falls.
Kuai-the more I think about RRE and CRE, massive job losses and the party on Wall Street that enjoys the suffering of others for their profit, the more I realize we are in GDII and probably just the 3rd inning.
There is deflation in discretionary items of want vs inflation in basic needs along with a total credit crunch for Main Street. Wall Street is in its own alternate dimension with different physics. When the two collide...BOOM. My bad analogy is matter/antimatter. What matters on Main Street is antimatter to Wall Street.
Nanoo-Nanoo -
Just don't bet on it happening in any time frame that you want to picture.
I am convinced that society is much better at taking my money away from me than I am at understanding "What the F..." just happened.
"Hello officer, I would like to report that %30 of my money got stolen by the FED in the last 10 years."
"Let me connect you with the MIB, please do not try to run, it will just be harder on you".
Congress finally audits Fed, feigns shock at trillions of toxic junk on books. Turns Fed into bad bank, denies Constitutional responsibility for its obligations, but agrees to redeem its notes at face value, with "real" dollars 2.0 printed by the Treasury itself with a public accounting. A one-time massive print to reset, of course.
It's more extend and pretend Ponzi, but with populist appeal. BRIC and the rest of the world slink away from the dollar with Euros and Yuan. Inflation hits US hard. A more "transparent" Fed 2.0 tries to do discount window oligarchy business as usual, but that collapses eventually.
If you're asking what I dream will happen:
Open-source world currency becomes obvious tool to reduce transaction costs and asymmetric information. Fed balance sheet is repaired by extreme claw back of bonuses. US rebuilds its credit by consuming less, saving and investing more, and paying down debt and deficit. Public option for basic banking replaces FDIC/Fed scam.
Private gambling is legalized but losses not publicly shared.
If the Fed is ever audited there will be outrage for sure. However thinking Congress will do anything to change the system is doubtfull from my point of view. Although they may have to just to show other countries we will pay our debts. What a mess, in a mess.
In January I heard an economic forecast by an economist that the stock market was going up, "just throw darts" , he said. Furthermore, he thought banks would start lending again around the end of this year. He did wonder about the effects of the CRE problem. If this happens and banks start lending again , I wonder how the economy will respond.
Been through it many times: a weighted index of liquid tangibles, denominated in numbers tracked by millions of linked computers sharing all transaction data and algorithm code (Mozilla/Linux, e.g.). Pegged arbitrarily to Forex basket then floating free. Backed only by mutual faith of honest brokers, as are all currencies.
No restrictions on exchange (not for tax dodge), no commission for currency traders, privacy concerns built back in. Every commodity priced in every other commodity in real time, with every bar-coded trade entered into database. Hard copy back-up in every corner of the world.
Nasty virus has gotten our family... confirmed in my son... wife and I feeling affects but haven't seen drs....
Barofsky was in front of House oversight committee yesterday. The man is sharp. Focus was on AIG bonuses, however next month an audit on counterparty payments is going to be released. Lots of Congressional anger at Geithner who failed to oversee this both at NYFED and Treasury Sec. Interesting back and forth regarding the honoring of contracts at AIG vs. auto industry contracts... ie AIG contracts treated as unbreakable whereas auto dealer contracts broken. Also interesting discussion regarding bonus payments made same time as $30B came from govt.... and failure of govt to use leverage to negotiate... whereas concessions were wrung out of auto industry when they needed payments. COP has touched on this as well.
Computers have shown to be the way to commit fraud on a scale unimaginable in 1929, but in the future all the honest people in charge won't figure out new ways to cheat, using those very same computers?
YLSP: So sorry your family is sick. Take care of yourselves and stay home if you can. I hope you caught my last post on this nasty bug a couple of days ago on when to seek attention. Since your son is confirmed, and now the rest of the family is symptomatic, you could get TamiFlu called in to lessen the effects. The sooner you start it, the better the results.
Inevitable and possible tomorrow, as I see it. Is there anyone left who refuses to trust E-Bay, Pay-Pal, and Mozilla? If there is, I suggest he ask JPM to show him how much cash is in the vault against deposits.
Use of the open-source currency is completely voluntary, a private option to central banks. Contracts and local commercial law govern disputes.
Doctor didn't confirm it as swine flu; simply "viral infection".... it was observed in my son's ear. We called yesterday to ask him if it was swine flu as my son's school asked us. However the literature and posters he had on the wall referred to the flu as a "viral infection"... so I had originally just assumed we had the swine flu. Perhaps Dr. is just trying not to scare us...
I didn't realize the number of foreclosures were up to such an extent thru 3rd quarter....up 23%....the highest increase dating back to 2005....these are prime loans, no jobs no mods.
During yesterday's meeting Kucinich was sabre-rattling regarding auditing the Fed. He mentioned that there was a bill in Congress to give the Fed more power and how Congress might need to take back authority ceded to the Fed, given how they've failed to manage properly the AIG bonuses. I think all of the members on this committee on both sides were aware... there was even one member trying to figure out how Dodd got the provision in regarding no modification of contracts prior to February 2009...
Of course this is the House... not sure how much oversight the Senate has given and when the SIGTARP will be in front of them again...
The honest people won't be "in charge", because millions of people will share the data. No currency system can stop cheating. But your credit gets shut off around the world. If your order of herbal tea from China doesn't get sent, you have the same prospects for legal enforcement whether you send them dollars or electrons representing dollars tracked by a bank, or electrons representing an open-source currency recognized around the world.. The relevant question is not will there be cheating but will it be an improvement over the opaque central bank ponzi in place now.
Nasty virus has gotten our family... confirmed in my son... wife and I feeling affects but haven't seen drs....
YLSP hope all is well, do yourself and your family a favor stay away from the doctors, or better yet go and guaranteed you will get the N1H1 Speech...try it just for curiosity purposes. None the less hope you get l better soon.
H1N1 is supplanting normal seasonal viral infections. There is a lot of hyperbole over the flu, vaccines and antivirals. The antiviral agents (2 different ones) are successful in minimizing symptoms and shortening of the infection, it is effective on most viruses H1N1 and seasonal normal viruses too. So, if there isn't a contraindication (like underlying illnesses, allergies or medications) you can ask your physician if Tamiflu could be prescribed and helpful. I suspect it would be. Otherwise follow guidance, your son's ear infection might be a secondary infection from the virus and can be treated with antibiotics since it is bacterial rather than viral. Hope this helps and do not worry. As viral infections go, the vast majority of people who get H1N1 have a normal response of mild to moderate symptoms similar to other viral infections that normally occur; without the need for hospitalization due to severe illness.
My wife and I just had some kind of virus. But it was just mild head cold symptoms, rather than anything super scary, no fever in either of us, but mine threatened to go pheumonic, but I seem to have it beaten off now.
Are there still random bugs flying around, or is this likely to be flu?
Jonathan, likely the flu as that is the predominant illness and supplanting other viruses. Sometimes seasonal allergies are confused with the flu as the symptoms are the same, with H1N1 you can have a mild illness without fever present (which is rather unusual). Sometimes seasonal allergies setup an environment that is friendly towards bacteria and viruses and a secondary infection occurs.
There is a lot of scary information about H1N1 out there, pandemics can be managed much better than historically since we have advanced in the ability to prevent and treat illnesses. By and large, this so far is a very stable virus that is responsive to vaccine and antiviral. Viruses are scary because they are unpredictable; H1N1 has been remarkably stable. That is good news.
Looks like SheBair is now in the "extend and pretend" column on commercial real estate loan workouts (from Damian Paletta's blog at WSJ):
"There was a nugget of news buried in Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. Chairman Sheila Bair’s testimony Wednesday before a Senate subcommittee about the state of the banking industry. According to prepared remarks, she will say at the afternoon hearing that federal regulators 'will soon issue guidance on [commercial real estate] loan workouts.'
Commercial real estate is seen widely as one of the biggest dangers facing the banking industry, as heavy losses in this area are crushing many community banks and eating into bank capital. These loans often prove more difficult for banks to work out than residential mortgages.
'The agencies recognize that lenders are borrowers face challenging credit conditions due to the economic downturn, and are frequently dealing with diminished cash flows and depreciating collateral values,' Ms. Bair will say. 'Prudent loan workouts are often in the best interest of financial institutions and borrowers, particularly during difficult economic circumstances and constrained credit availability. This guidance reflects that reality, and supports prudent and pragmatic credit and business decision-making within the framework of financial accuracy, transparency, and timely loss recognition.'"
Thanks N^2. My wife's doctor told her not to worry unless her fever spiked, or other symptoms got worse, and we both seem to be ok. Just plenty of fluids and rest and vitamins.
And sorry about your problems YLSP. Sicks kids always make you sad.
Manufacturing activity in the New York rose to its highest level in five years in October, the New York Federal Reserve Bank said Thursday. The bank's Empire State Manufacturing index rose to 34.6 in October from 18.9 in September. The new orders index climbed in October, while shipments shot up 30 points.
I feel like I need an IV. Even with a humidifier going to sleep for 5-6 hours will dry me out. We've been all pumping fluids for like 3 days straight. Its a bit amusing as my son is recently potty trained and even when its obvious he has to go he won't dissengage until the very last moment. I'm one who tries to cough and spit up any garbage I feel in my throat... oddly my wife thinks this is disgusting and I'm worried since she doesn't seem to try and cough up any of the garbage in her lungs.
We are more concerned with 1 year old; but I think she could've caught something about a month ago...she had runny nose and bad symptoms for a week. She's shown some mild symptoms of runny nose but isn't having problems sleeping/coughin yet. Son has been feeling this since Thursday/Friday, wife and I over the weekend.
Looks like SheBair is now in the "extend and pretend" column on commercial real estate loan workouts
Since 'extend and pretend' is a negative label, I'm not sure how it applies to that story. Some regulatory guidance on CRE workouts would be a good thing.
Building owners (borrowers) are in fact dealing with diminished cash flows and depreciating collateral values. The biggest problem they face, though, seems to be that the banks are unwilling to rewrite loans at maturity. If regulatory guidelines can get banks to rollover more loans, that will be a good thing, not just for them and for their borrowers, but for the economy as a whole.
Maybe I nees more coffee. How do just under 10 million people collect unemployment from 7.2 million job losses?
Continuing claims fell by 75,000 in the week ended Oct. 3 to 5.99 million, the fewest since March. The number of people who have used up their benefits and are now collecting extended payments increased to 3.8 million in the week ended Sept. 26 from 3.79 million the prior week.
The U.S. has lost 7.2 million jobs since the recession began
What the?????
" The biggest problem they face are banks unwilling to rewrite loans at maturity"????
If the owner (borrower) brings a truck load of cash to the refinancing to bring the Loan to Value back in line, he should have no problem refinancing.
Nemo?
Ocwen's success sounds fishy, I doubt they followed the rules well. i.e. I would love to see the documentation they developed to qualify the borrowers.
First
Just because the program is a failure does not mean it is not policy,
B. Frank
you didn't quote a key part of the article.
"“When HAMP is less successful than hoped, and the reality of the housing overhand hit the market – we would expect to see further governmental action,” the report said, noting the most likely course of action is a plan that contains principal forgiveness."
Yet another reason to default, wait it out, play the system, get free rent and maybe principal forgiveness at the end.
Getting used to iPhone... a bit slower than normal
In other news, "Sun Rises in the Morning", according to a new report from .......
The trouble with kicking the can:
"As if on cue, [California] state Controller John Chiang is providing new evidence that the 2009-10 budget is leaking red ink. During the first quarter of the fiscal year, state revenues came in more than a billion dollars under the budget's forecast."
ghostfaceinvestah wrote:
Yes. Agreed. There is no punishment just like there is no spoon.
Speed wrote:
Nah. They can just continue to have optimistic revenue projections to fill in the hole left by the last set of revenue projections.
.
Remember: The spoon bends because there is no spoon.
Where is JD? I miss his juvenal wit.
Re: Ocwen.
Remember that one firm in Long Island was responsible for most of the FHA refi program, whatever that was called, where you could refi into an FHA loan with principal forgiveness.
That same firm was eventually cut off from FHA lending.
Just saying. I get a little suspicious when a firm like Ocwen is the "most successful" at a program that gives them a financial incentive to modify loans.
Who is Ocwen's regulator to check on what they are doing? They don't own a bank anymore that I am aware of, they dissolved that charter years ago. How convenient.
Blackwaterwannabe wrote:
Yeah, my Grey Mare tank is getting low too.
How are they going to get the lenders to agree?
josap wrote:
Umm. Doesn't the Fed already own most of the MBS market and most/all of the new paper?
forced to watch hannity last night. most of the hour was devoted to ZIRP, IMF SDRs, and the Obama dollar... 2010 gonna be interesting.
ghostfaceinvestah wrote:
Lighten up - they are just ahead of the curve... from CR's Huffer link:
Did the guy in the other night who mentioned the 'training tape' ever show up again?
Recap: the training tape pruported to train servicers in basically stalling modifications, losing paperwork etc. Pretty much as you'd expect if you look at the incentives.
Basel Too wrote:
Was it structured in any sort of informative way, or was it mostly more Egg On The Teabaggers sort of way?
Was it structured in any sort of informative way, or was it mostly more Egg On The Teabaggers sort of way?
this was Hannity, so of course not. it was all about Obama selling out America.
Basel Too wrote:
That is what I was afraid of...
that I don't enjoy. Demagoguery is a bad thing, m'kay?
.
That is the kind of
yagij
Well, if the Fed eats most of the paper (MBS) I guess it could work. Old loans first to clear the forclosures, then new paper when the 0 down 3.5%s default. This is going to take a very long time.
,rads
I spent the day watching the river artificially get up to just over 10,000 cfc, thanks to a typhoon of buying on the Eastern Front...
josap wrote:
Where is ghost? I thought he stated multiple times that the Fed is sitting on 80+% of the old paper and all of the new paper. It is why people are claiming that if the Fed gets out of the MBS market that the entire market will either dry up or completely seize up...
.
Ghost: Am I off here?
They have to stop screwing up.
FUBAR and WASS LLC has a patent pending on the business process of screwing up so badly that things are totally FUBAR and everyone involved cries WASS.
They are going to hear from our lawyers as soon as we straighten out our paperwork in the back office.
FW
All the more reason to keep buying, my friend.
Green shoots! Ahhh...
For those who need a laugh tonite:
Sheriff: Drunk Ga. Man Passes Out After Burglary - News Story - WSB Atlanta
+100.
I could be off, but the average yearly chart I checked showed last CAD parity in 1976. About to dip under 1.02...talk about meaningful psychological round numbers.
Must be their health care.
> Note: On the demand side, the first-time homebuyer tax credit combined with loose FHA underwriting, is boosting demand. Restricted supply and more demand has created a buying frenzy and pushed up prices in some low end areas.........sounds like the start of a new bubble, have we been down this road before ? LMAO
OT: tomorrow is last day for all the late tax filers/extenders... sent mine in today ... - for Fed, + for state
So, you did get the memo.
And what's Ocwen's market share? BOA's performance is no surprise. Nearly every move they've made to improve efficiency has made them less so. AG's comments from the other night are perfectly in line with what I see every day. I watch them and wonder how any homeowner ever gets a mod on their own.
Those "pushed up prices" are still 30%+ lower than at the hight of the bubble.
deleted..
mp wrote:
I still refuse to buy into this clusterf**k, but all I'm getting out of my position is the ability to snark on CR and sleep relatively well at night.
Nikkei ~2% ; euphoria everywhere.
OT-Anyone in California who handles an LLC should be aware that scamsters are sending official looking notices demanding fees for LLC renewal filings with the California Secretary of State. We are aware of one LLC (not us since we don't need not paperwork) that has received three such demand letters in the past week.
If Jerry Brown ever takes a break from campaigning, maybe he will look into it.
FW
Hey, all I'm saying is: that's what they're trying to do.
Whether or not they'll succeed, well, that's another matter entirely.
1 currency now -yogi wrote:
I think CAD was at parity a couple years ago briefly - then dived again.
Juvenal Delinquent wrote:
Uh-Oh. JD is turning into a trader on us. Watch out now.
"start of a new bubble"
If that's what they're trying to do, then the "official" numbers are suspect, IMO
"scamsters are sending official looking notices demanding fees for LLC renewal filings with the California Secretary of State"
how much in fees are they asking? got a fake one from ny asking for $120
SNAFU wrote:
The USD/JPY still has a 89 handle. Everytime they jack it north of 90 and comes back down to low 88 then they protect it 'til it jumps up to 90 again.
.
Discount the Nikkei movement if the Yen isn't rocking the
We should not be surprised that Ocwen is now the leader- they have done subprime forever, sometimes like total bastards, but they do have the experience. What Ocwen is doing is simply coming up with some metrics that actually work for borrowers, something that turkeys like BofA and others could do, if they bothered to get off their duffs.
One of the really well missed points is that modding a loan preserves and enriches the servicer!
Why? The gov gives them 1k, plus they now get a lot more servicer monthly income!!!!
Look at the minimal investment in labor time and a couple of printers and fax machines, for that you get much more income than a one and done foreclosure!!!
The tail baby, look at the tail!
Someday this war's gonna end...
mp wrote:
Agreed with you. They are succeeding so far, but I think they will eventually lose traction and slide back down. Banana peels suck that way.
We got the same "official" notice in Az.
had to read it twice. It looks very official.
FUBAR and WASS LLC wrote:
They have been doing that to corps all summer. We got several. And they just prosecuted a bunch of those scamsters operating out of San Diego last week.
Man, was I confused for a minute. I thought this was a hemp thread.
josap wrote:
They are pretty good. But my henchpeople are well-trained.
That was good.
dryfly wrote:
Does this mean we cannot look down on Canadians any more?
Bummer. Canuck trashing was about to be made an Olympic event.
FW
CR writes: Much depends on the success of HAMP. If many of these modifications don't become permanent, there will be another flood of foreclosures on the market.
To be accurate, it would be the exact same flood, just breaching another line of sandbags.
dryfly wrote:
In the fall of 2007 it went to 10% over parity for a brief spell, before falling back down.
Shnaps wrote:
Not really. It would be water that was thought to be already under the bridge, coming back for another soaking.
SNAFU wrote:
We are winning at soccer? Now the final horse of the Ocrapalypse had joined the herd.
The lack of outrage over the US central bank exchanging dollars for MBS in secret transactions is mind-blowing.
If they were all public deals it would be outrageous.
Record Wall Street bonuses. This will get uglier.
I'll bet the greater of $200 or .2oz glod tip to CR that the Fed does not celebrate its 100th birthday with its name on the currency.
dryfly - good point. Ocwen isn't going to win any contests for 'who i wished serviced my mortgage' anytime soon, but we should give credit where credit is due. They've been administering HAMP the right way from the git-go.
I finally got to read the whole Andy Xie piece that was linked several threads ago:
For Economic Stimuli, a Revolving Exit Door
Now I must find a way to mentally leave the planet, so that I might sleep.
noob goldberg wrote:
I was working w/ a foundry just east of Toronto & man were they ever crying in their beer back then... never dawned on them they might someday be the rich cousins.
1 currency now -yogi wrote:
How does one send glod via Paypal?
"The Making Home Affordable Modification Program (HAMP) adds another layer of uncertainty for private label securitization investors, making it more difficult to predict cash flows,"
Hmmmm....0 + or - 0 -(costs) = some negative number....
Yep, that's a tough one.
"How does one send glod via Paypal? "
Why, I happen to run just a service. Send me the Glod, it'll get there....
California Secretary of State charges $20 per renewal.
The scamsters are charging between $239 and $198, depending on which scamster is demanding the money.
Calling the Secretary of State's office to complain results in a 3 hour 20 minute wait on hold before being given a telephonic shrug and a referral to the California Attorney General's worthless website.
I wonder if California is going to see a fall off of fees paid by small businesses.
I also wonder who in the California government was the master of brilliance and sold they the mailing list of LLCs up for renewal?
FW
Comrade Misean is Dope wrote:
Who would that be, exactly? Suicidal ex-capitalists looking to out in a blaze of debt default?
FUBAR and WASS LLC wrote:
Yes.
But seriously, our usually worthless AG is actually going after a few of them. I know, I was amazed as well.
I got one of those, oh wait, I really am supposed to file my corporate annual report online, nevermind.
Someday this war's gonna end...
The lack of outrage over the US central bank exchanging dollars for MBS in secret transactions is mind-blowing.
How many J6Ps know what MBS are? Even if they have heard the term, they don't have any idea what it is, how it works or who buys - sells them.
Seems to be a good time for one of those late night polls.
Which fails next?
1) A DOW Jones Industrial Average Company.
2) A US State (hint: California.)
3) One of the countries between Germany and Russia, north of the former Yugoslavia.
4) Brad Pitt's marriage.
Door number 3.
psssssst...
I heard from a wise guy that California is gonna take a dive in the 12th round~
Jerry Brown is actually doing something.
Picks self off the floor.
Maybe I'll send him a campaign contribution for actual activity in addition to being "Not Newsom".
another source of hemorrhaging
"
CRS calculates cost of U.S. troop presence in Afghanistan
By Roxana Tiron - 10/14/09 05:08 PM ET
The United States spends about $3.6 billion a month in Afghanistan, according to data provided by the Congressional Research Service....
The cost of sending one U.S. soldier in Afghanistan for one year is $1 million versus an estimated $12,000 for an Afghani soldier, according to Steve Daggett, a specialist with the Congressional Research Service. Those numbers fall within the calculations that the Obama administration has been using. The Obama administration is calculating $1 billion per 1,000 troops deployed to Afghanistan.
we have hundreds of military bases in europe and japan costing 10s of billions while two wars bleed us to death
binladen, may he die a slow death, is laughing in a cave as we self destruct
i weep for my country
U.S. spending $3.6 billion a month in Afghanistan according to CRS report - The Hill's Blog Briefing Room
FUBAR and WASS LLC wrote:
Well, at least some of his staff is.
He's too busy planning his next campaign. But he may have hired one or two actual functionaries. Must have been a slip.
"3) One of the countries between Germany and Russia, north of the former Yugoslavia."
Silly, that's Poland. Never happen.
Shnaps wrote:
Joe buys a house from Kathy, and agrees to pay her $500,000. Joe doesn't want to use his own money, so he pays the money by borrowing it from someone else, and Kathy walks away $500,000 richer. Joe then says he doesn't really want to pay the $500,000 after all. Ocwen says, "OK". And that's the right way to run a housing market.
3) latvia
I'd just ignore the Ocwen stuff. The total number modified isn't much different than zero (less than 2000) - so it isn't significant.
I was just referring to that article as a source that the loans are suspended for 150 days now ...
best to all
sm_landlord
What's the bottom line here, dollar crash? hyperinflation? ruin for savers? Care to comment?
Latvia is a country?
but mock t, the day we bring them all home, is the day we give up the passive american empire, and like the Brits, sail off into quiet decrepitude.
That will be very interesting when the day dawns.
Someday this war's gonna end...
dryfly wrote:
Yes everyone was crying then. But they have short memories, because now they're all planning their next shopping trip to the USA for Christmas.
How far east was this foundry? It would be a truly small world if it belonged to a relative of mine...
EDIT: Well, not really a foundry, more a custom steel fabrication company. But close enough
Well, Joe said he would walk if he had to continue to pay on a $500,000.00 debt when the asset is now worth $300,000.00
And the bank could eat the $200,000.00 plus forclosure costs, plus rehab after it is left vacant for a year, and the sales costs.
Common sense sometimes wins.
" Latvia is a country? "
yep, for now that is. is the most f*ck up in the area asked. Sweden is holding most of hte mtgs going into foreclosure so latvia just decided to make them non recourse if htey are denominated in foreign currency. hungary is giong through the same thing but with austria's banks denominated in swiss francs.
How is harvest time going for most people this year?
This story from Illinois:
Cold Weather is Hurting Farmers
SNAFU wrote:
My read is stagflation for seven to ten years, naive savers and pensioners get ripped off. No dollar crash as such, at least not all at once. Just a slow grind down that never seems to end. Xie's piece resonates with me, probably because I lived through the 1970s. So it's too simplistic to assume that the same script will be played out, but it sure looks like it's going to rhyme.
josap wrote:
We've been through this too many times, but I'll give it one more spin. The banks aren't eating the losses any more. It's taxpayers. Probably not much current taxpayers, mostly the next generation of taxpayers. But I understand your sentiment - stick it to that next generation. It's a free ride, for some.
Old Million Dollar Wound: Injury that sent you home.
New Million Dollar Wound: Money that you sent overseas.
Yep, that's right, ~$76,000/soldier/month; even so few die each week.
Vonbek777 wrote:
Crappy. Between the cold and the incessant rain, an awful lot of the guys I'm talking to are worried about getting their soybeans off so they can plant their winter wheat.
So today, Josap, Joe gets a mod that drops the rate 2.75% on his 30 year fixed and now is roughly even up with doing a replacement purchase on a long term basis. So, does Joe do the mod?
Someday this war's gonna end...
mock turtle wrote:
They must be missing a digit - I can't believe its a mere $3B/month.
Glod equivalent in any Forex denomination left standing, of course. Is that a bet?
Paypal has been a huge step in the development of a reliable open source world currency. No one thought it would work. Ebay too. The Euro. The NIS. Linux beating Windows. Craigslist refusing ad revenue, dominating RE listings. Free CR more useful than WSJ...
I haven't done the research, but a hedge fund friend originally from S. Africa claims that currencies and banking operations reemerge very fast even after total collapse. You can only eat so much seed corn before you get too fat to hunt a
The buildings don't fall when the house of cards does. It's just a matter of who gets what haircut-- or the occasional guillotine.
"Probably not much current taxpayers, mostly the next generation of taxpayers. "
how is the next generation gonna pay for it if it's being paid mostly by diluting hte currency? once the next generation is born, the dollar will be storing much less value already. the cost doesn't mean future high taxes necessarily. it's more an implicit tax on current savers that cannot take much risk (ie: old in fixed income imho)
J6P only sees that he is paying for more than the current value of the house. And he got a cut in pay.
J6P also thinks that the "bank" is the one taking the loss. He doesn't think that Granny's pention fund will be effected, or the note was sliced and diced long ago, or that the Fed is backing the loan.
And now for something completely different: from Drudge...
Lottery hoax causes riot at Ohio coat store
Bizarre
dryfly wrote:
I can't believe it's that much. But what do I know. See you all tomorrow.
The real estate industry and banks are trying to milk a few hundred thousand sales out of the market while they can. It's all going to come to a screeching halt once the foreclosure pace picks up again and the FHA decides to tighten up its standards.
Even if HAMP is a screaming success, the re-defaults go straight to foreclosure.... there will be a pickup regardless.
If J6P ever figured out how the top of society takes care of itself, he would revolt. He is still too concerned about his boss's boss's boss's welfare. To quote AllenM, "Someday this war is going to end."
Although hardly considered an optimist, Andy Xie's piece reflects is optimistic. Too much has to go right for those (admittedly still not pretty) economic circumstances to unfold, and the chances of that happening are slim to none (minus the slim).
Patientrenter ,
I'm not sure I understand your point. There should be no lending at all?
In any case, Ocwen didn't lend 'Joe' a dime. They are paid a fee to service loans, which includes mitigating losses when necessary, which now includes availing any government relief programs (HAMP/HARP).
If Joe is under 40, maybe he does the mod.
Over 50, no way. People over 50 have it in their heads that the house will give them equity for retirement.
noob goldberg wrote:
Real foundry - about 30-40 minutes east of Toronto. Very well run group just not completely bought into what has to happen when doing business w/ big US based MNC OEMs. Their technology was good & they knew what they were doing - I'd work with them again if they didn't drive me crazy. They drove me absolutely crazy.
sm_landlord,
You might be being a bit optimistic. We weren't borrowing $1.5+ trillion a year in the 70's.
renterinNYC wrote:
Well, yes, you are correct. The pain will be split between the (mostly older) people who save and don't borrow much and will get crushed by inflation, and younger people who will be earning taxable income in the coming high-tax decades.
Okay, got my 20 month to sleep, so it is time for Daddy to go nighty-night. Sweet dreams everyone.
This is bullcrap! TARP, HARP, HAMP now HAFA nonsense. It's been over a year, in socal we just got off a state foreclosure moratorium and now they're moving them into 90 day oops now 150 trials WTF! Last year October was a nationwide moratorium because the didn't want to foreclose over the holidays. People have been sittin in their homes over a year not paying mortgages waiting for uncle sam to bail them out, it's bullshit. B of A is now working on owner to renter programs to save their sorry asses from recognizing their losses. Close the under capitalized banks, foreclose on the homes already, if after two years these loans haven't been fixed then they can't.
Shnaps wrote:
There should be almost no lending of the type that leads to non-repayment. I know, this would be a revolution in thinking here in the US, but it works in other places.
I know that Ocwen didn't lend Ocwen's own money. They manage the servicing, so they made the decisions on loan mods. The losses on those loan mods will be picked up by the govt, and put on the tab for future taxpayers. Effectively, future taxpayers are paying the mods - the original loan never really went away. But those future taxpayers aren't getting to own and live in those houses in return for this payment they will have to make.
Close the under capitalized banks, foreclose on the homes already, if after two years these loans haven't been fixed then they can't.
7 million homeless families is a revolution. With guns.
dryfly wrote:
Well, if it was Bowmanville I know the town very well but not the foundry. I have a number of acquaintances involved in secondary and tertiary levels to that, such as fabricating, extrusion die creation (for aluminum), industrial design etc. All of them make their bread and butter from the auto and aerospace industries, and all of them will become insolvent if the currency doesn't settle at least around par. If we hit 20-30% over parity for an extended period of time, it'll be carnage.
OT and sorry if someone else has posted this:
Today, Massachusetts Land Court Judge Keith Long reaffirmed his controversial ruling made back in March 2009 that invalidated foreclosure proceedings involving two Springfield homes because the lenders did not hold clear titles to the properties at the time of sale. A copy of the decision can be found here.
Massachusetts Land Court Reaffirms Controversial Ibanez Ruling Invalidating Thousands Of Foreclosures | The Massachusetts Real Estate Law Blog
http://www.massrealestatelawblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/ibanezruling.doc
now to read the ruling
bing bing bing 43 and 48- so yes we do the mod- the offer is for the remaining 26 years of the mortgage!
Done!
Houses are homes for living.
If I want to invest, I will be buying commercial in three or four years.
I can hardly wait for inflation in five or six years to start ripping. Then I look smart again.
Someday this war's gonna end...
josap wrote:
foreclosing on seven million homes leaves seven million homes still available... for rent.
Dryfly
yeah iraq that is the more expensive war... about 1/2 billion per day in direct costs
we spent far less per day in afghanistan
priorities
Citizen AllenM
closing down empire now may indeed send us, as you say, into quiet decrepitude like britain...
but failure to act soon will more likely send us into the bowels of destruction, like rome
josap wrote:
Doesn't have to be any homeless - get them into rentals stat - no shortage of those right?
What gov't ought to be doing is helping people cope w/ the mess not trying to prop up the mess. Get out, into rentals then help them learn how to repair their credit & start over in homes they really can afford.
Of course that would do nothing for Goldman Sachs so it doesn't even get suggested.
Mud Camping?
I would prefer the dreams of lost empire and slow decay of Britain, just avoid the mess of the Troubles, thank you.
Seriously, let us give China the baton of world currency and domination and go home.
I find I really don't care much for most of the world that hates our guts anyway.
Let us have our quiet old age, like Japan.
Someday this war's gonna end...
noob goldberg wrote:
Might be them. Maybe you should buy them - if the same owners are there they were looking for a young guy to come in, learn to run the place and do a sweat equity buy out. You said you wanted to be an entrepreneur.
As long as there are enough investors to buy the REOs and get them rent ready it could be done.
**> just avoid the mess of the Troubles,* *
That wasn't a mess; it was "Celebrating diversity"
josap wrote:
Agreed. But the prices that make that work are not acceptable to the many people, high and low, who are invested in maintaining high home prices.
from the Mass. mortgage case judgment.
U.S. Bank (in Ibanez) and Wells Fargo (in Larace) have now timely moved to vacate that judgment making, in essence, five arguments. First, they contend that the “present holder of the mortgage issue” came as a surprise to them and should not have been decided in connection with these cases. Second, they argue that had they known the issue was going to be addressed, they would have pled their case differently and either limited their request for relief to the “Boston Globe issue” or further supplemented their evidentiary offerings. Third, they insist that since the defendants had been defaulted, it was inappropriate for judgment to be entered against the plaintiffs and, at worst, their motion for default judgment should simply have been denied with leave for them to amend and try again. Fourth, based on new evidence and new arguments they have now submitted post-judgment, they maintain they were the “present holder of the mortgage” within the scope and meaning of G.L. c. 244, § 14 at the time of notice and sale. This is so, they say, because they possessed the note (endorsed in blank), an assignment of the mortgage in blank (i.e., without an identified assignee), and a contractual right to obtain the mortgage at those times. Fifth, in the event the court disagrees that their possession of the note, a mortgage assignment in blank, and a contractual right sufficed to make them “present holders of the mortgage,” they contend that the foreclosure sales were nonetheless valid because they were authorized by the last record holder of the mortgage and the plaintiffs acted as the “agent” of that holder.
For the reasons more fully set forth below, each of these arguments fails. I thus DENY the motions to vacate. The plaintiffs cannot credibly claim surprise at the judgment that was entered and, having asked for (and received) a declaration on the issues they chose and on the facts exactly as they pled them, they have no right to a “do-over” because the declaration was not entirely as they wished. Moreover, their newly-presented facts do not lead to a different result. Instead, they show that the plaintiffs themselves recognized that they needed mortgage assignments in recordable form explicitly to them (not in blank) prior to their initiation of the foreclosure process, that the plaintiffs’ “authorized agent” argument fails both on its facts and as a matter of law, and reaffirm the correctness of the original judgment. They also show that the problem the plaintiffs face (the present title defect) is entirely of their own making as a result of their failure to comply with the statute and the directives in their own securitization documents. Simply put, the foreclosure sales were invalid because they failed to meet the requirements of G.L. c. 244, § 14. What the plaintiffs truly seek is a change in the foreclosure sale statute (G.L. c. 244, § 14), which can only come from the legislature.
Them bank boys better get themselves some better lawyers.
patientrenter wrote:
That's not accurate. The mod incentive payment is paid by the US Treasury, the losses are still absorbed by the trust (investors). Keep in mind that whatever losses may result - whether they are realized as a result of an immediate foreclosure or a foreclosure delayed by a ill-conceived loan modification which goes bad - are still taken by the investor no matter what.
On the other hand, - the 'gubbmint' will be shelling out ~$1000 per modification that successfully completes the trial period, whether that modified loan subsequently defaults or not.
The invisible hand says if the taxpayer can't afford to pay what is owed on half the houses in the country, it doesn't matter who holds the note. We had 79% (applied only to J.D. Rockefeller) bracket once, and a wipe out of major banks several times.
The Jubilee year only wiped out debt after title to all assets was forfeited. If you were caught with buried glod, the penalty was more than its value. As for credit going forward, there was no free market ride. Shady deals got recorded for posterity. BAC forced to waive privilege today...Stanford and Madoff in prison fights... Trials are still public in the US even if the parties object.
Annual cost per deployed soldier is $393,000. Total cost of GWOT, Iraq, Afghanistan is $864 billion since 9/11(as of April,2009).
http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/natsec/RL33110.pdf
dryfly wrote:
While the idea is intriguing, is it a good idea for a complete neophyte to dive into a capital-intensive operation? Bringing me up to speed on their systems and clientèle is one thing, but I'd be coming in completely blind.
EDIT: Anyway, I gotta get some sleep. Thanks for planting the seed, dryfly. The time to crap or get off the pot is fast approaching, and I'm going to have to decide which iron to pull out of the fire and run with.
patientrenter
I agree with that.
Quien no se atreve, no pasaran El Mar.
You only live twice!
Someday this war's gonna end...
"Trials are still public in the US even if the parties object."
Unless there are national security issues and there sure does seem to be many national security issues lately. Or it concerns Blackwater. Close enough to count I guess.
"A US District Court judge has barred the public from attending -- or the media from reporting on -- hearings in the trial of five Blackwater employees charged over the killing of 14 Iraqi civilians in Baghdad's Nisoor Square in 2007."
Judge closes Blackwater trial to public | Raw Story
Edit: The WAPO piece elaborates the reasoning. Fair trial issues and the secrecy of grand jury hearings preclude the rights of the public from reporting or attending.
I'm sad to report that a fold-up metal and cloth chair( f.o.b. China ex-Target $8.99), and a copy of John Toland's "The Great Dirigibles" were swept away @ my swimming hole on the river, and will likely never be seen again...
In lieu of sending flowers to the service, monetary donations to the charity of my choice are appreciated, for those that bereave me.
Citizen AllenM wrote:
Daring has served me well so far, and I have no intention of giving up that personality trait.
My choice now is between two completely different paths; one daring, but risky, the other guaranteed, and boring. I'll end up choosing the former, but it's not as easy a choice as my previous ones have been.
noob goldberg wrote:
They would probably prefer that...
Talk again...
dryfly wrote:
Always a pleasure.
Shnaps wrote:
C'mon, Shnaps. Are you telling me that non-repayment of home loans will be mostly absorbed by the private sector? The banks and other institutions to which the losses are first sent don't have enough equity to absorb all the losses from years of loose lending against overpriced RE. So each extra dollar of loss simply requires an extra dollar of govt support.
Thanks E.C. Of course that should dominate the news. Ironic that the case is one the Gov't apparently wants to lose, but irrelevant. Wonder if NYT or WAPO has any balls left...
There are extremely rare situations where I would support in camera testimony- never an entire trial. I can't see how a secret trial of Blackwater employees would ever be in the public interest.
The losses will be absorbed by the private sector. Fannie, Freddie and the Fed will buy up all the loans and take all the losses. They're the private sector - 100% owned and controlled by Goldman Sachs.
Now where the "private sector" gets its capital? that's a different question.
We sold a buttload of RMBS to China.
watch it buddy, Im half Latvian! but sveiks, for noticing!
albrt wrote:
I realize you're being facetious, but for any readers who may miss that, FNM and FRE losses, and most of the other losses, are being covered, in one way or another, directly or indirectly, by the govt.
Shnaps wrote:
Most of China's holding are Treasuries and GSE debt - with all losses due to non-repayment 100% covered by the US govt.
"Im half Latvian!"
Given the country's size, it's kinda hard not to be. They need to open up a can of Pluto on that country....
No, no, Wall Street has set aside record bonuses. JPM had a great Q, probably GS too.
Next bailout Congress can't claim a once-in-a-lifetime perfect storm which nobodycoodanode. I, for one, had no clue what MBS were 3 years ago. We all get a haircut, but the bonus baby bankers go first. If there is a bank that did nothing wrong, it can grow.
Plenty of banks out there with no FDIC connection.
"with all losses due to non-repayment 100% covered by the US govt. "
So long as the Chinese extend us the credit....kinda makes your head hurt if you think about it too much.
1 currency now -yogi wrote:
Repugnant as the payment of bonuses by insolvent banks is, it is a gnat on the body of the solvency deficiency. All the bonuses this year might add up to 100 billion. The losses are trillions. So the loan losses are not capable of being covered in any meaningful way by cutting bonuses. (There are other good reasons to cut the bonuses and fire the bankers.) Those losses are being sent to the taxpayer, make no mistake.
All this has been making my head hurt for years.
Big bowl of worms, all squrmy and ickky. Some have several heads connected to one body. Uck.
LMAO - no no no, not half of Latvia, or half long the Lat, or any such nonsense. My mom is 100% Latvian, born there. (it was once a country that she and her mother were proud of. Now, not so much.)
Latvia -- isn't that where you get gold-pressed latinum?
No job? Can't make the house payment? Here ya go.
With HEMAP, which was established in 1984, Pennsylvania state officials provide a two or three-year loan to a jobless homeowner, depending on the individual's finances and the economic situation. Using that program, homeowners are not responsible for repaying the vast majority of the principle or any of the interest on the loan until he or she finds a job.
Specifically, a struggling homeowner participating in the Pennsylvania program, which has depleted resources, requires jobless homeowners pay a token $25 a month until they get another job and their gross income surpasses 35% of their monthly housing costs, including mortgage and utility payments.
Focus growing on helping jobless homeowners Capitol Report - MarketWatch
I know the losses will fall on the taxpayer, and China will have to eat some inflation or a reset. Juries don't need to be told who ultimately pays when they award millions to a plaintiff suing the Transit Authority after the train conductor fell asleep.
But I care a lot what Dick Fuld is allowed to own title to, and he should be watched for buried glod for at least 20 years. Even greater losses will continue to be foisted on the taxpayer until we force the TBTF banks to write them down publicly. As of today, they're writing bigger ponzi swaps and bonuses.
dryfly wrote:
0.72 x 1058 = 761.76 ≈ 761 modifications
Total HAMP modifications approved
HAMP w/o Ocwen
950 modifications, 0.7% success after 3 month trial phase
Two good reads for the day
1. Macro Man: There Is No Divine Right To A Trade Surplus
2. FT Alphaville » Blog Archive » Majority of current RMBS borrowers underwater, Fitch says
CalculatedRisk wrote:
They only made 44.5% of all HAMP approved modifications
/me ???
The Treasury is also private sector. Goldman Sachs owns that too. I read it in the Onion.
I wonder if Alan Turing had this in mind when devising the Turing test
I resemble that remark.
" most likely course of action is a plan that contains principal forgiveness."
How are they going to get the lenders to agree? "
Why wouldn't the lenders agree, if they don't have to pay for the principal forgiveness?
I can see the speech now, with BHO going on TV in primetime explaining why your taxdollars are needed to write down mortgage principal balances...
Now there is a "Travel Promotion Act"...............a $10 fee to be a US tourist...........GREAT idea........like all the rest of them.....What Idiots.
HAMP only had $75bn total. Getting money out of Congress at this point is like being asked to turn chicken sh.t into chicken soup. Debt ceiling, FDIC weeks past due, worry that they'll be caught announcing new programs while the recovery "is in full gear"... above all the power holders in the administration want to prevent Treasury yields from climbing
Could see a revival of the idea to lower principal payments, but retain capital appreciation rights until a certain amount more is paid. Then they could securitize the capital appreciation rights, mark some stupid value, and then the Fed could help out in a way that still loans more than the underlying collateral
"Fed could help out in a way that still loans more than the underlying collateral"
Elegant thought, but at this point they are better off to just keep buying the damn loans (or lending on bad collateral - same thing) rather than raise a red flag on what they are doing by creating a wacky new form of CDO on appreciation rights.
EHP,
I harshed you the other night. My apologies. PLUS ONE on your last comment. Genius. And I sure hope you are right. And with that au revoir. I need my grey matter rested as I must try to help a client restructure some bad loans tomorrow (read: behind most bad commercial real estate deals there is at least one very good doctor).
Hack
"C'mon, Shnaps. Are you telling me that non-repayment of home loans will be mostly absorbed by the private sector? "
patientrenter, you are correct in most cases.
Ocwen just picked up a large portfolio from Freddie to service for them. Guess who the "investor" is on the credit risk for those loans? Hint, look in a mirror.
"Getting money out of Congress at this point is like being asked to turn chicken sh.t into chicken soup."
There's grant money for that in the stimbubblous package. Saying it's hard to get money out of congang is like saying it's hard to get manure out of a steaming pile of bullsh.t.
"worry that they'll be caught announcing new programs while the recovery "is in full gear""
Bah! They're more worried about getting caught while doing the page in the rear.
Hackman,
No worries, the internet wasn't made for grudges and if it were I can't remember the specifics of the disagreeableness.
Seriously, debt ceiling has to be done sometime inside a few weeks
Government - Debt Subject to Limit Graph
Have $197bn to spare.
Will take some time before the spending bills can refill the pipeline. Any hope of a last minute boost to spur on a self-sustaining recovery or bubble of sorts has passed. The plans were readied, but businesses have not got their signals to go ahead. We relapse in Q4
agreed on all points
ghostfaceinvestah wrote:
How is it GSE portfolios work. They make sure the pool owners don't cheat them by selling properties under value, because they have the right to buy any property that goes for a guaranty claim? But they have little free cash to do so
Comrade Misean is Dope wrote:
Misean, we're talking about politicians who approach these matters from known political history. Which is unanimous, recessions don't last this long so it must be over and time to get back to those defense contracts or whatever specific lobbyist field they plan to retire on
"We sold a buttload of RMBS to China. "
China bought agency RMBS, some of which was guaranteed by the full faith and credit of the US gov't, the rest of it guaranteed by Fannie and Freddie, who strangely enough don't have full faith and credit backing, but do have a fat checkbook thanks to the US taxpayer.
Servicers are only bound to follow HAMP for agency loans. In fact, FHA loans don't officially fall under HAMP, they have their own program (which is called FHA-HAMP).
If a Fannie/Freddie loan gets modified under HAMP, Fannie/Freddie buy it out of the MBS at par, as if it was a prepayment.
Bottom line - HAMP losses WILL be borne by the taxpayer.
Non-agency loans, where the holder of the credit risk is someone other than the government, are subject to whatever rules the servicer is allowed under the Pooling and Servicing Agreement, if in a securitized deal, or whatever the investor sees fit, if held as a whole loan.
There have been lawsuits around that issue, to be sure.
Countrywide Sued by Fund Over $8.4 Billion Loan Deal (Update2) - Bloomberg.com
Bank of America Loses Bid for U.S. Trial in Countrywide Lawsuit - Bloomberg.com
"Seriously, debt ceiling has to be done sometime inside a few weeks"
I've know few crack heads who have trouble finding a flame...
"Which is unanimous, recessions don't last this long so it must be over and time to get back to those defense contracts or whatever specific lobbyist field they plan to retire on"
You're suggesting the stimbubbulous packages did NOT have them in mind?
Misean,
I thought the stimulus cake was already divided by all parties. Allocations fixed by federal department, and by state.
Land and home owners form a loose rank and file for the bank oligarchy, sometimes helping them sell the State on welfare checks like HEMAP. The State can pay the bank to keep the unemployed sheltered, but it can also pass special taxes on real property, then give a special break to resident occupants, or kill title holders with rent control less than inflation, depending on the political climate. All perfectly Constitutional, with precedent. Tax lien foreclosures will not require the State to produce any note.
Turns out labor mobility and outsourcing are wonderful for multi-national patent title owners but not so good for McMansion note holders or their alleged assignees. BAC can threaten that they'll take their ball to another State, but the house stays put.
I dare them to try to buy those MA and OH judges or their legislatures. No, I think there will be a race to cash the FDIC's last $500 BB, shock at the awful truth of the Fed's books, then attempts at capital flight in advance of an angry Congress and a race to find buried glod ahead of Executive Order. Just because all the banks fail doesn't mean the underwater notes get canceled, the taxpayer will have receivers ready. But the process will be massively reset according to political leverage, as always. Flippers and ponzis will not have Jubilee. Trump's name comes off the casino. GS will refer to Glass-Steagall 2.0.
"How is it GSE portfolios work. They make sure the pool owners don't cheat them by selling properties under value, because they have the right to buy any property that goes for a guaranty claim? But they have little free cash to do so"
Not sure I get the question exactly, but let me take a stab.
If you originate a loan that is Fannie/Freddie eligible (i.e. "conforming"), they pool the mortgages and sell them as MBS passthroughs, where the investor gets P&I payments from the bond. Fannie/Freddie guarantee P&I - they are on the hook for the entire credit risk of the loans (the MBS buyer is on the hook for Fannie/Freddie counterparty risk, which is why no one wants their MBS, except Bernanke).
The servicer collects the P&I on the mortgages for a servicing fee.
If the loan defaults, the servicer advances P&I, and does the workout according to the rulebook set up by the GSEs. The GSE has the right to transfer that servicing at any time, and they sometimes do when the loans are non-performing, because some servicers are not great at servicing those types of loans. Banks like WFC, Chase, etc are fine, but the small banks are not so great, and some do their own servicing.
That is where an Ocwen comes in - they are experts at dealing with delinquent loans.
If/when the loan is foreclosed, Fannie buys the loan out of the MBS at par, as if it were a prepayment, and they pay off the servicer's advance. They also have to do this with any modified loan under HAMP.
They then take the hit between par and the recovery.
They have plenty of money to do this, as the taxpayers have them covered (not officially of course).
"I thought the stimulus cake was already divided by all parties. Allocations fixed by federal department, and by state. "
Yeah just like defense contracts, or road work....so what was your point again, then?
Nytol
ghostfaceinvestah,
thanks, I thought FNM/FRE just cut a check for whatever amount the servicer said was the difference between par and recovery and only exercised the option to buy the foreclosure to process themselves if they didn't trust the quoted figure
In Downturn, Military Reports Historic Recruiting Success - washingtonpost.com
Comrade Misean is Dope wrote:
There are no more pieces of the existing cake to hand out. All further money has to come in the form of new cakes, pies, or ponies. Which can't be done until they increase the party planning committee budget, but no one wants to do that until they guarantee themselves a party individually, so it's taking longer than expected. By the time the PPC budget is approved, they'll be weeks-months behind on all the actual party planning work
"I thought FNM/FRE just cut a check for whatever amount the servicer said was the difference between par and recovery and only exercised the option to buy the foreclosure to process themselves if they didn't trust the quoted figure"
The main servicer usually handles the foreclosure and liquidation, so there is some trust element there (and of course some auditing), so they control the recovery amount, but for the big servicers, it usually isn't an issue (and I think three servicers have something like 70% of the loans? not sure, close to that). They are better at it than Fannie/Freddie for the most part, having experience with non-agency loans.
It is the small servicers who need help, it does take a special skill set to deal with a mass of foreclosures (like actually finding the borrower, investigating fraud, etc), that is where they will do it themselves or more commonly these days transfer servicing to an Ocwen or the like.
So the GSE will buy the mortgage out of the pool at par. So basically the remit the UPB to the MBS investor as a principal repayment. For recovery, they will get the recovery amount, less expenses (including servicer advances, servicer fees, legal, sales costs, etc). the net amount is their loss. (Par + Expenses - Recovery = loss).
OK, a math quiz...
How much in mortgage payments is NOT being made each month by defauters, ruthless or otherwise?
Any back-of-the-envelope estimates out there?
OK, since either no one is awake or the gears are turning, I'll set up the problem...
(No. Mortgages 30+ days) * (Ave. Mortgage Payment) = Mortgage amount not being paid
This is money that may be (if the borrower in fact has income) available to be spent elsewhere
Some fraction of mortgages not being paid is going into the economy through other paths, and wouldn't be available if the mortgage was current.
Thus losses in one part of the economy (mortgages) are supporting expenditures in other parts of the economy.
Bank of America Loses Bid for U.S. Trial in Countrywide Lawsuit - Bloomberg.com
I hope BofA is enjoying their possession of Countrywide's slick servicing software, that's why they bought it, right?
WAG: $600 million per month. 4m not paying $1200 mortgages. Use this: http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/housing/ahs/ahs07/tab1a-7.pdf
I was guessing $2,000/mo., thinking that perhaps the higher priced places would be disproportionately represented. WAG to be sure.
Thanks Rob.
That would be about 0.05% of the GDP (annual GDP ~$14T). So if half of that amount gets spent elswhere that's a 0.025% boost to GDP. Not as big as I suspected, barely out of the noise, so probably isn't a big deal. But it was worth the exercise.
Thanks to you as well sdtfs. Still sounds like a relatively small factor.
BTW- last thread 1c yogi mentioned the lack of usury laws,...did you catch the NBC.com link about the 79.9 percent credit card?
Well, that was only for the cash advances. But I wonder if it was linked to LIBOR or FFR, 'cause you know that LIBOR is more volatile.
"Full faith and credit" is paid in nominal dollars. Buyer beware: China should have negotiated a currency hedge in a basket of commodities. (Not in $ from AIG, either) TIPS are cute, but the US government defines "inflation", not Mish.
Every depositor got paid back every penny after the holiday in '32 (not with copper). The dollar was only reset to 35 from 20/oz in glod. You couldn't actually buy any metal, though, and raw materials were rationed. Gilded robber baron mansions (ridiculed as grotesque even when built) became museums. I doubt that China really got blindsided by counter-party risk. They got too many factories, we got too many houses. Hopefully we can work out a peaceful deal on who pays what for the remainder of the oil and who gets paid what for factory work.
I suggest a little clause in Treasury Bills tying the rate at least in part to a basket of commodities. Give us a chance to rebuild our credit. "Full faith" is puffery, of course. We don't have to remind China of the unhedgeable risk of a sudden reset of property titles in favor of local tax protesters. Cost of doing business. The value of a promise to pay is always discounted by the power to enforce collection in the event of default, no matter what collateral or currency is used.
yagij wrote:
The AHS referenced says the median cost is $843. I biased that upward to skew towards more recent higher purchases and housing ATM extraction, etc.
But you miss the point. This has never been about the economy. This is about the banks. Leveraged out the wazoo they cannot stand a 30% impairment of 10% of their portfolio. Actually that's a total wipeout. They cannot operate at far lower realized loses. Extend so thet can recapitalize and unwind over leverage. Pretend so they don't cause a panic. I mean for gawds sake; freakin' insolvent Wells Fargo is a 4 bagger since March.
Refinement:
From CR: Reuters reports that a record 7.58% of U.S. homeowners with mortgages were 30+ days delinquent in August ...
.. From Wiki: There are about 44.4 million mortgages on homes in the US.
... So about 3.4 million mortgages are at least 30 days late
From Wiki: The average national monthly mortgage payment in the United States was $1,687 in mid 2006.
Using these numbers, $5.7 billion/month is NOT being paid in mortgages, some portion of which is being spent in the consumer economy.
Edited to correct math.
Also adding: The purpose of this exercise is to estimate how much cash being diverted from mortgage payments is goosing the consumer segment of the economy. It appears it could be as much as 0.5% of the GDP, a significant number.
ocwen is 'newco' backwards.
Just sayin.
Wiki can be wrong. This is one of those egregious examples. There are at least twice that many homes with mortgages and the AHS referenced shows that $1687 is wildly high even for an average.
IMO wiki is in danger of collapsing under its own weight. They still haven't found a cure for their editorial policy on global warming.
1 currency now -yogi wrote:
There is no US central bank, doubt there ever was.
It's the GS central bank.
Rob-
In either event, using your initial numbers I think you multiplied wrong. I get $4.8B/month using your numbers.
I thought Libor was tamed by various central bank guarantees of interbank loans.
At 79%, you're getting into some kind of common law "unconscionability" I assume. The market should set rates for hard money, but the question is how much should the State intervene in the market to enforce collection, and who should pay for the service. Then there are the sham transactions like AIG selling $2 trillion in insurance to GS, JPM and pals, who knew they could never cover. Did the bank securitize that 79% and leverage it into a AAA Fed guarantee by any chance?
"Caveat Emptor" has two edges: the bank buys a promise to be paid 79% interest for cash.
Yeah, math error. I am on a stupid PC, the Macs are all recharging. Blame it on not having a RPN calculator on this laptop.
$5b sounds better.
No, You're Reading That Right |
NBC San Diego
79.9
Sorry for the repost, but I just get a kick out of that number.,...it's the same as the government's ownership of AIG?
Rob-
I am not hindered by ever having mastered RPN. I went straight from slide rule to "normal" calculator.
Thanks for your input.
Americans get screwed at every turn with easy credit. Even those of us with no balance or paying cash end up overcharged at the store to cover their charges and expenses. Legal yes, moral no.
I can see you don't get the pure genius of this offer,...You don't even have to wait to start up the delinquency collection machinery, it's baked in as soon as you send them the card.
I wonder if you used the ccard to buy gold if you could break even.
CA may not be able to prevent an SD bank from issuing the card at any rate, but that doesn't mean open season. CA can pass consumer protection measures and has plenty of Constitutional leeway in setting limits to common law damages and imposing court fees. How about a jury trial, SD Bank versus local deadbeat...
Digalert wrote:
This is bullcrap! TARP, HARP, HAMP now HAFA nonsense. It's been over a year, in socal we just got off a state foreclosure moratorium and now they're moving them into 90 day oops now 150 trials WTF! Last year October was a nationwide moratorium because the didn't want to foreclose over the holidays.
True, but now that Obama's a bona fide Laureate, we'll need to wait another decent interval.
Sorry: you just can't plan for these things.
It's just so weird, I'm inclined to believe it's a CIA money laundering scheme,...to pay those Japanese tourists for their billion dollar bonds.
What reason would you have for pushing a money losing proposition?
Ooooh, maybe its Al Qaeda trying to subvert American debtors. No, no, it's a filtering scheme designed to pinpoint weak links in the FBI personnel,...those so far gone they're vulnerable to bribery.
Off to dream up some more lunatic ideas.
The US can preempt regulation of national banks, BK law, and restrain States from hindering interstate commerce by applying local usury limits to out-of-state banks. But credit card default is an ordinary State contract matter. Only broad Due Process and Equal protection are required.
The national money center banks have a lot of paper claims to Americans' assets that Federal law can't enforce. Notes for titles in Ohio and MA, for instance. South Dakota thought it could game usury laws to get banks to run their ponzis with local talent. But Shiti is not worth what their books say. Good luck with the long-arm collection racket on your loan sharking. Never thought Mount Rushmore was worth the tax money. Citifield stays in Queens. Keep all the bankers...
Not to worry, that $400 billion is insured for 500. The insurance payout is hedged by CDS for 600. The CDS are insured for 700. The Fed holds the paper as collateral for $900 billion... How could they toss around the "d" word like that?
Chinese rich getting richer
China Surprise Trade data
China lending picks up<a/>
US Retail sales trend
Dubai sits on a time bomb
India Debt funds performance
Yogi: I wish my computer hadn't crashed some months ago, I lost the evidence and can't recall where I got it that Tier 1 capital statements of the Biggie Piggy brokerages and banks are so very cooked. No surprise but I wanted proof and found it. Dang. If the FSAB, SEC and other regulatory arms ever coordinated efforts and the so called Fed oversight was more than expensive wine and dines, then the naked truth would be revealed but we know it won't because these are 'systemically important'. The Fed's balance sheet is estimated to be north of 2 Trillion now.
Regarding HAMP etc. they will continue postponing because their balance sheets (including the fed) as I suspect they can't take much more in leverage/debt at least this year. I should say especially the fed. FHA is underwater, the FDIC is broke, realizing more RE losses from foreclosure would be disastrous to the 10K Wall Street party. Its really all about those GSEs sold to China I think, the biggest fear Bernanke has is deflation. But propping up of this big fat mess setup a negative feedback loop in the real economy and a conundrum I can't see the solution to myself; but, I'm not an economist, rocket scientist or genius. So the FDIC is not closing any regionals or larger banks, just small ones with small capital. It will be an eternal drip, drip, drip. I think perhaps the last nail in the coffin that can't be shunted off as easily will be CRE, but then again, I've been amazed at how easily debt can disappear for some while others suffer the ultimate price from the banksters. The Corus bank failure still bothers me as it sort of set a president with the FDIC taking on losses from RRE, CRE speculation.
Mark 2 makebelive continues, JW at Bloomberg has an oped piece about it this morning. The other little thing not paid much attention to is the fallout from the gamed Munimarket and the ARS (Auction Rate Securities) mess. People are not even getting their principle back well over a year later. Confidence in that market bound to be lost from that little fiasco. This is important as states and municipalities will suffer from that. This was another Phil Gramm wet dream realized. It was ruled illegal in courts but complex mechanisms left the buyers without legal recourse and the banks/brokers who sold these products free of liability because they can't be identified. Nice.
oh sorry for the length, I keep trying to figure this mess out only to discover new pieces to the puzzle that were hidden. It makes my itty bitty brain hurt. And someone please tell me why oil is so high all of a sudden (again)?. If that spike continues, then watch what is left of the economy on main street completely implode.
Bberg:
Are you paying attention, big 19? Smaller scale, but one man on TV killed a bank with 15% withdrawal. Time for US depositors to leverage up. Capitalism only works if consumers shop for value. Another bank is supposed to compete for those deposits with smaller bonuses. Forget Sheila, do not do business with a bank that pays big bonuses from fees.
Someone one the last thread pointed out the website of:
HousingTracker.net | Residential Real Estate Listing Statistics by City
I am looking at Honolulu, and scratching my head, I will admit I'm not the sharpest tool in the shed but I just don't understand how this works:
2009-10-12 Month/Month Year/Year
Median Listing Price $449,000 -2.2% -9.7%
Number of Listings 4,353 -2.4% -18.9%
Their Affordability index is way out of date, but it still makes me wonder.
Year-Quarter Percent Income Mortgage/Rent Price/Income Price/Rent
2007-3Q 53.9% 1.77 8.8 348.5
53 percent of the income goes to the mortgage.
An 8.8 handle on price to income, we must have a lot more millionaires here.
Actually I think we are number one on that level. Though I still think half a million is kind of high for a postage size lot with an old house in a bad area.
I wonder how many people are thinking WTF am I doing, and contemplating just walking away and moving to Vegas. Maybe that is why the market is crazy there.
Bberg, 5AM:
Yogi, earlier today: [can't find the link] "Wall Street will divert one BILLION dollars to soup kitchens in a Thanksgiving PR stunt"
Charity is beautiful, but I hope I didn't give them the idea. Pure guess on my part.
Just a few more comments on the cracks awaiting a destructive collapse here.
Just for fun, I went out to Realitytrack and did a little math. I know their numbers are not perfect but they are better than the Realtor's, Kauai has not released numbers since July.
I use WTF a little too much, but this is the total of distressed properties compared to the number F/S (For Sale).
Date Default Auction REO F/S DIS WTF
20091014 602 636 504 3274 1742 53.21% Oahu.
121 127 213 402 461 114.68% Kauai.
263 471 166 726 900 123.97% Maui.
252 414 262 543 928 170.90% Hawaii.
So I just have to ask, is this normal?
Please let me know if there is a flaw in my thinking that prices should be coming down a little.
Man, I thought I had that formatted well, Oh, well the percentages say all I need to say about that.
Oh those would be other dollars, like those they didn't pay in taxes.
The Government has CFC, which collects a lot for a basket of charities.
bonuses.
Why not for GS? Good tax write off for those mega million unplanned
I think I would trust a charity to put the money to good use more than the Government. Of course there are always exceptions.
Nominal prices are controlled by whether the Fed will print a trillion or two more to buy MBS. Real prices are related to real income, supply and demand. "Distressed" is a subjective term.
Kauai: All real estate is local. Hawaii is a resort area of high value as property is very limited. You think correctly about it. Resort areas of high value (real value) also have highly distorted real estate valuations. I live in such an area but it isn't as profound as Hawaii, Hawaii is unique. Resort areas with limited property in the past were somewhat sheltered from other real estate pressures/recessions. Also smaller states who do not have real capacity in business productivity and taxation, rely heavily of property taxation for the state coffers. My state is insane with high property taxation, state income tax, 8-10% sales tax depending of items and location, high gas tax. As usual its the little guy who pays while the big fish gets a pass. Thank gawd Howard Dean never made it to the national level. His legacy here is still stinging everyone with education funded solely on property owners. 2/3's of my property taxes are for education and in the thousands of hard cold cash every year on a fixed income and modest older home. I never had any children so that makes it even harder for us to swallow.
You mean these people? http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20603037&sid=abSen_erXmTk
Although this is long overdue, it is a mere drop in the pacific. There are 52K names still not revealed to the IRS at JUST UBS. I would bet the house there are some senior senators names there (perhaps aliases).
What strikes me however is there is no mention or movement to go after corporate tax evasion which likely goes into the TRILLIONS. I like to listen to what isn't said as much as what is said.
In many areas the "the pools of real estate owned (REO) property" has all but dried up. The HAMP program is restricting supply.
And so the precise intent of HAMP is exposed for all to see.
[haven't attempted to read comments - probably this has been said already.]
I think you've been brainwashed. "Good use" for whose benefit, GS? So you think GS earned the right to allocate so much capital by producing economic value. From article:
I have no issue with GS employees contributing to charity as individuals. (I still would be disgusted by their compensation)
Nanoo-Nanoo -
By being a small state, and very susceptible to the ebb and flow of economies and tourism, Hawaii has always had a boom and bust real estate market.
The last real shake up was in the 80's, but somehow all that data is just removed from the current data.
I am happy that new technology is slowly breaking the strangle hold on the "super double secret" real estate data.
I am still shocked looking at the prices and statistics here, but after a couple of years some how half a million sounds normal, just like the Trillion is the new Billion.
I come here for my vaccine dosage or reality, doom, gloom, and I'm still waiting for the boom.
OT: tuned in FBN this morning so I could catch Imus.
One word for FBN: vacuous.
Glad to see Imus back, he got screwed. He said today that it was 'all about getting even'.
yogi -
I agree, my point was that to soften the disgusted blow back, giving donations to charity can serve multiple purposes.
There are some charities I like, some need to be shutdown by the non-existing consumer protection agency.
Even a cost to benefit check would make a lot of the cancer research look like ponzie schemes. But there lies the problem with how you define benefits and cost.
So should I disclose my positive balance tab at a bar in Thailand?
And should "goodwill" be considered in calculating overseas transactions?
I can not remember the exact quote, but some Chinese Emperor once complained that:
"The more strict I become as a ruler, the crafter the people become".
Maybe I should start to hoard honey. As a commodity that has been going insane.
I come here for a sanity check too. I've been happy to find such a wonderful resource in trying to understand the depth of this financial disaster for the majority of people living away from the beltway in DC or brokerage houses in NYC. Good thing I like puzzles because this is the biggest one I've ever encountered and I understand endocrinology...lol.
I am sad though because I know all the data, all the talk, all the delusions mean real hardship for increasing numbers innocent bystanders who are the COLLATERAL damage of this financial sham. I harken back to the '70s and how I nearly didn't get out of that with all my skin and teeth. This is way, way, worse.
To try and stay on topic here: After 9/11 this area's real estate was white hot with purchases of second homes, camps, property from the big NE metro areas. Housing prices soared, the biggest squeeze group of course the middle with little inventory. I suspect Hawaii is the same in that respect. The market here is secretive, I can't get a handle on what is really going on.
Where are you?
Yogi -
Not sure who you asked, I live on Oahu, my handle is from growing up on Kauai which I still consider my home.
Vermont, we lived in Atlanta for 25 years before. I was a duck out of water in Atlanta as I'm a country mouse. I'm a lucky soul to live where I do even with the high cost, its a tradeoff.
Yogi, where are you? I find it interesting to see such a cross-section here. and Kauai, do I remember correctly that RRE is highly regulated as people merely rent-don't own the property, that the state owns the property??
Well, with all real estate, you hold the title. The State has sovereignty.
You don't pay your tax's, they take it back.
You don't pay your bills, the State can give it your creditors.
Hawaii still has a good number of Leasehold properties where some one else owns the land, while you own the improvements. (IE the house, etc).
You pay a lease fee per a contract for a set time, and the lease holder can change. When the contract is over, you loose out unless you can buy the lease.
Most of the big lease holders are selling them now, (I wonder why)
Just picture Krammer hitting the "sell, sell, sell, (Train crash sounds). etc.)
It's getting late, I'm beat, time to stop attempting to type and make some-what coherent sentences.
Manhattan. I follow the financial sector on my own, though.
I'm betting the Fed is dead by 2013 [above]. As you can see from from my conjecture on the billion dollar charity pr stunt, I don't advise betting against me.
How do we / they get rid of the Fed?
What replaces it, what does that look like?
Ken Langone resisting CNBC cheerleaders: "Don't go out and buy at Home Depot [he was founder] if you're on the edge financially and can't pay your debts."
Thanks both Yogi and Kauai. I just found this on Bloomberg-another little piece of the puzzle that forgives corporations for making bad bets. This time it is looser capital standards for Life insurers who played in the MBS's. Why does anyone pay attention to the rating agencies anymore?
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601203&sid=aaguRNDa23Qs
-yogi
I was watching the same thing while I was degassing and testing a batch of Malbec. I almost choked.
On what he said and not on the malbec.
Nanoo-Nanoo -
Why does anyone pay attention to the rating agencies anymore?
Because they have been wrong sooo many times for sooo long?
They are paid by the companies to rate their products, which creates a culture of pumping and forgetting?
To heck with extend and pretend. We are doing a pump, dump, and pretend it never happened.
,rads,
There is a serious problem brewing @ the North Pole. The people that use reason as their Baedeker, now claim that it will be ice-free during the summer, within 10 years...
If we don't build Santa Claus a floating factory asap, you can kiss xmas good bye~
**Inflationary spending is confused with economic growth, which is confused with economic health. **(Of course, GDP numbers are theoretically adjusted for inflation but that doesn’t mean much if the inflation figures are misrepresented.)
Investor Sounds Alarm on Hyperinflation
Investor Sounds Alarm on Hyperinflation
Goldman Sachs Q3 EPS $5.25 vs $1.81
Stabilization blah blah blah blah....
Kuai-the more I think about RRE and CRE, massive job losses and the party on Wall Street that enjoys the suffering of others for their profit, the more I realize we are in GDII and probably just the 3rd inning.
There is deflation in discretionary items of want vs inflation in basic needs along with a total credit crunch for Main Street. Wall Street is in its own alternate dimension with different physics. When the two collide...BOOM. My bad analogy is matter/antimatter. What matters on Main Street is antimatter to Wall Street.
I dig the early hours of the ante meridian, when dark is about to be put to bed.
Nanoo-Nanoo -
Just don't bet on it happening in any time frame that you want to picture.
I am convinced that society is much better at taking my money away from me than I am at understanding "What the F..." just happened.
"Hello officer, I would like to report that %30 of my money got stolen by the FED in the last 10 years."
"Let me connect you with the MIB, please do not try to run, it will just be harder on you".
If you're asking what I think might happen:
Congress finally audits Fed, feigns shock at trillions of toxic junk on books. Turns Fed into bad bank, denies Constitutional responsibility for its obligations, but agrees to redeem its notes at face value, with "real" dollars 2.0 printed by the Treasury itself with a public accounting. A one-time massive print to reset, of course.
It's more extend and pretend Ponzi, but with populist appeal. BRIC and the rest of the world slink away from the dollar with Euros and Yuan. Inflation hits US hard. A more "transparent" Fed 2.0 tries to do discount window oligarchy business as usual, but that collapses eventually.
If you're asking what I dream will happen:
Open-source world currency becomes obvious tool to reduce transaction costs and asymmetric information. Fed balance sheet is repaired by extreme claw back of bonuses. US rebuilds its credit by consuming less, saving and investing more, and paying down debt and deficit. Public option for basic banking replaces FDIC/Fed scam.
Private gambling is legalized but losses not publicly shared.
Juvenal Delinquent -
Good morning, speaking of bed. Goodnight.
Oh, where is my manners. Good night one and all.
Also good morning, and if it's your good evening have a drink on me.
What pray tell did you have in mind, specifically?
Like shifts passing in the night...
sleep well Kanaka~
Thanks yogi
If the Fed is ever audited there will be outrage for sure. However thinking Congress will do anything to change the system is doubtfull from my point of view. Although they may have to just to show other countries we will pay our debts. What a mess, in a mess.
In January I heard an economic forecast by an economist that the stock market was going up, "just throw darts" , he said. Furthermore, he thought banks would start lending again around the end of this year. He did wonder about the effects of the CRE problem. If this happens and banks start lending again , I wonder how the economy will respond.
,rads
Ok, so we've become Trump, the country version.
If we can last as long as the Donald (and maybe get a game-show or 2 out of it) has milked insolvency, i'd be cool with that.
Been through it many times: a weighted index of liquid tangibles, denominated in numbers tracked by millions of linked computers sharing all transaction data and algorithm code (Mozilla/Linux, e.g.). Pegged arbitrarily to Forex basket then floating free. Backed only by mutual faith of honest brokers, as are all currencies.
No restrictions on exchange (not for tax dodge), no commission for currency traders, privacy concerns built back in. Every commodity priced in every other commodity in real time, with every bar-coded trade entered into database. Hard copy back-up in every corner of the world.
Nasty virus has gotten our family... confirmed in my son... wife and I feeling affects but haven't seen drs....
Barofsky was in front of House oversight committee yesterday. The man is sharp. Focus was on AIG bonuses, however next month an audit on counterparty payments is going to be released. Lots of Congressional anger at Geithner who failed to oversee this both at NYFED and Treasury Sec. Interesting back and forth regarding the honoring of contracts at AIG vs. auto industry contracts... ie AIG contracts treated as unbreakable whereas auto dealer contracts broken. Also interesting discussion regarding bonus payments made same time as $30B came from govt.... and failure of govt to use leverage to negotiate... whereas concessions were wrung out of auto industry when they needed payments. COP has touched on this as well.
Computers have shown to be the way to commit fraud on a scale unimaginable in 1929, but in the future all the honest people in charge won't figure out new ways to cheat, using those very same computers?
YLSP: So sorry your family is sick. Take care of yourselves and stay home if you can. I hope you caught my last post on this nasty bug a couple of days ago on when to seek attention. Since your son is confirmed, and now the rest of the family is symptomatic, you could get TamiFlu called in to lessen the effects. The sooner you start it, the better the results.
Inevitable and possible tomorrow, as I see it. Is there anyone left who refuses to trust E-Bay, Pay-Pal, and Mozilla? If there is, I suggest he ask JPM to show him how much cash is in the vault against deposits.
Use of the open-source currency is completely voluntary, a private option to central banks. Contracts and local commercial law govern disputes.
Doctor didn't confirm it as swine flu; simply "viral infection".... it was observed in my son's ear. We called yesterday to ask him if it was swine flu as my son's school asked us. However the literature and posters he had on the wall referred to the flu as a "viral infection"... so I had originally just assumed we had the swine flu. Perhaps Dr. is just trying not to scare us...
I didn't realize the number of foreclosures were up to such an extent thru 3rd quarter....up 23%....the highest increase dating back to 2005....these are prime loans, no jobs no mods.
During yesterday's meeting Kucinich was sabre-rattling regarding auditing the Fed. He mentioned that there was a bill in Congress to give the Fed more power and how Congress might need to take back authority ceded to the Fed, given how they've failed to manage properly the AIG bonuses. I think all of the members on this committee on both sides were aware... there was even one member trying to figure out how Dodd got the provision in regarding no modification of contracts prior to February 2009...
Of course this is the House... not sure how much oversight the Senate has given and when the SIGTARP will be in front of them again...
,rad BSR,
I think 'prime' only meant you could take more manna out of it, especially so in HELOCalifornia.
Morning all,
The USD fightback is on. I can hear the Rocky music. 90.25 Yen. Stock futures
.
The honest people won't be "in charge", because millions of people will share the data. No currency system can stop cheating. But your credit gets shut off around the world. If your order of herbal tea from China doesn't get sent, you have the same prospects for legal enforcement whether you send them dollars or electrons representing dollars tracked by a bank, or electrons representing an open-source currency recognized around the world.. The relevant question is not will there be cheating but will it be an improvement over the opaque central bank ponzi in place now.
YLSP hope all is well, do yourself and your family a favor stay away from the doctors, or better yet go and guaranteed you will get the N1H1 Speech...try it just for curiosity purposes. None the less hope you get l better soon.
H1N1 is supplanting normal seasonal viral infections. There is a lot of hyperbole over the flu, vaccines and antivirals. The antiviral agents (2 different ones) are successful in minimizing symptoms and shortening of the infection, it is effective on most viruses H1N1 and seasonal normal viruses too. So, if there isn't a contraindication (like underlying illnesses, allergies or medications) you can ask your physician if Tamiflu could be prescribed and helpful. I suspect it would be. Otherwise follow guidance, your son's ear infection might be a secondary infection from the virus and can be treated with antibiotics since it is bacterial rather than viral. Hope this helps and do not worry. As viral infections go, the vast majority of people who get H1N1 have a normal response of mild to moderate symptoms similar to other viral infections that normally occur; without the need for hospitalization due to severe illness.
Lot of Hyperbole, I blame the MSM, amazing I never realized how many dumb people there are in this world. Way to much BS.
HELOCalifornia = An ATM in every house, a debtris field in every garage.
Nanoo^2,
My wife and I just had some kind of virus. But it was just mild head cold symptoms, rather than anything super scary, no fever in either of us, but mine threatened to go pheumonic, but I seem to have it beaten off now.
Are there still random bugs flying around, or is this likely to be flu?
YLSP,
Sorry to hear about influenzal goings on in your family...
One play per click:
YouTube - Fever - Eva Cassidy
Jonathan, likely the flu as that is the predominant illness and supplanting other viruses. Sometimes seasonal allergies are confused with the flu as the symptoms are the same, with H1N1 you can have a mild illness without fever present (which is rather unusual). Sometimes seasonal allergies setup an environment that is friendly towards bacteria and viruses and a secondary infection occurs.
There is a lot of scary information about H1N1 out there, pandemics can be managed much better than historically since we have advanced in the ability to prevent and treat illnesses. By and large, this so far is a very stable virus that is responsive to vaccine and antiviral. Viruses are scary because they are unpredictable; H1N1 has been remarkably stable. That is good news.
Looks like SheBair is now in the "extend and pretend" column on commercial real estate loan workouts (from Damian Paletta's blog at WSJ):
"There was a nugget of news buried in Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. Chairman Sheila Bair’s testimony Wednesday before a Senate subcommittee about the state of the banking industry. According to prepared remarks, she will say at the afternoon hearing that federal regulators 'will soon issue guidance on [commercial real estate] loan workouts.'
Commercial real estate is seen widely as one of the biggest dangers facing the banking industry, as heavy losses in this area are crushing many community banks and eating into bank capital. These loans often prove more difficult for banks to work out than residential mortgages.
'The agencies recognize that lenders are borrowers face challenging credit conditions due to the economic downturn, and are frequently dealing with diminished cash flows and depreciating collateral values,' Ms. Bair will say. 'Prudent loan workouts are often in the best interest of financial institutions and borrowers, particularly during difficult economic circumstances and constrained credit availability. This guidance reflects that reality, and supports prudent and pragmatic credit and business decision-making within the framework of financial accuracy, transparency, and timely loss recognition.'"
Thanks N^2. My wife's doctor told her not to worry unless her fever spiked, or other symptoms got worse, and we both seem to be ok. Just plenty of fluids and rest and vitamins.
And sorry about your problems YLSP. Sicks kids always make you sad.
Manufacturing activity in the New York rose to its highest level in five years in October, the New York Federal Reserve Bank said Thursday. The bank's Empire State Manufacturing index rose to 34.6 in October from 18.9 in September. The new orders index climbed in October, while shipments shot up 30 points.
I feel like I need an IV. Even with a humidifier going to sleep for 5-6 hours will dry me out. We've been all pumping fluids for like 3 days straight. Its a bit amusing as my son is recently potty trained and even when its obvious he has to go he won't dissengage until the very last moment. I'm one who tries to cough and spit up any garbage I feel in my throat... oddly my wife thinks this is disgusting and I'm worried since she doesn't seem to try and cough up any of the garbage in her lungs.
We are more concerned with 1 year old; but I think she could've caught something about a month ago...she had runny nose and bad symptoms for a week. She's shown some mild symptoms of runny nose but isn't having problems sleeping/coughin yet. Son has been feeling this since Thursday/Friday, wife and I over the weekend.
Good morning all
Sorry to hear of some illness circulating within the commentariat, but I expect all will work out well.
Just got over a fever-less head-pounding infection of some sort. Lost 3-4 days in the process, but it ended.
Rest, liquids and vitamins eventually worked it through.
Hahaha GS down big after "surprise" upside. They just can't help themselves...
The thing about trying to cover up lies with other lies, is eventually you get tangled up in them.
Caveat Wall*Street
Terry wrote:
Since 'extend and pretend' is a negative label, I'm not sure how it applies to that story. Some regulatory guidance on CRE workouts would be a good thing.
Building owners (borrowers) are in fact dealing with diminished cash flows and depreciating collateral values. The biggest problem they face, though, seems to be that the banks are unwilling to rewrite loans at maturity. If regulatory guidelines can get banks to rollover more loans, that will be a good thing, not just for them and for their borrowers, but for the economy as a whole.
ac: Does it breakdown MFG data to industry specific?
"only" 514K initial jobless claims.....
BSR, you got 60 seconds on the
Good show
Maybe I nees more coffee. How do just under 10 million people collect unemployment from 7.2 million job losses?
Continuing claims fell by 75,000 in the week ended Oct. 3 to 5.99 million, the fewest since March. The number of people who have used up their benefits and are now collecting extended payments increased to 3.8 million in the week ended Sept. 26 from 3.79 million the prior week.
The U.S. has lost 7.2 million jobs since the recession began
U.S. Initial Jobless Claims Fall More Than Forecast (Update1) - Bloomberg.com
What the?????
" The biggest problem they face are banks unwilling to rewrite loans at maturity"????
If the owner (borrower) brings a truck load of cash to the refinancing to bring the Loan to Value back in line, he should have no problem refinancing.