Despite Housing Help, Foreclosures Rise Foreclosure filings in February jumped nearly 6% from January, despite foreclosure moratoriums and prevention programs around the country. “The 6% was a little higher than expected,” says Joel Naroff with Naroff Economic Advisors. “It’s still very high, but it’s not overly surprising. While there are moratoriums that exist, not every […]

Mortgage Deductions Targeting the Wealthy The Obama administration hopes to tap the rich to help pay for its ambitious programs. Specifically, that would include slashing mortgage interest deductions for high-income taxpayers. The proposal would cap the tax break for itemized deductions at 28%. That would leave people in higher marginal tax brackets of 33% and […]

New Home Sales Sink Again Sales of newly constructed homes fell 10% in January, sinking to the lowest level on record. The U.S. Census Bureau reported that new home sales fell to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 309,000 in January from a revised 344,000 in December. It was the lowest level since the Census […]

FHA Raises Loan Limits The Federal Housing Administration (FHA) single-family loan limits have been revised as a result of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) and are now available online. The new loan limits, reflecting an increase from $625,500 to a maximum of $729,750, are effective for those loans for which credit […]

Housing Starts Plummet Construction of new homes fell nearly 17% last month to an all-time low, signaling no clear end to the housing market troubles. Starts fell to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 466,000 in January, according to the Commerce Department. That’s the lowest level since the government started keeping records in 1959. January […]

Housing Market: May Have Turned the Corner Yes, residential real estate remains in the throes of the worst downturn since the Great Depression. Yes, home prices are the lowest in six years and still falling. And yes, it still takes three quarters of a year to sell a house. Nevertheless, the market may have turned […]

Foreclosures: It May Be Worse Than We Think Banks are moving slowly to list repossessed homes for sale, which could mean that housing inventory is even more bloated than current statistics indicate. The volume of this so-called ‘ghost inventory’ could be substantial enough to depress already steeply falling prices when it does go on the […]

Foreclosures Up a Record 81% in 2008 According to a recent report, U.S. foreclosure filings spiked by more than 81% in 2008, a record, and they’re up 225% compared with 2006. A total of 861,664 families lost their homes to foreclosure last year, according to RealtyTrac in its year-end report. There were more than 3.1 […]

Consumer Confidence At All-Time Low Consumer confidence sank to a record low in December and is expected to stay depressed for months as news of layoffs, store closings and other economic doom and gloom will likely continue to weigh on Americans. The consumer confidence index fell to 38 in December, down from 44.7 in November […]

Home Prices Post Record Drop Home prices posted another record decline in October, falling 18% compared with a year earlier, according to the closely watched S&P Case-Shiller report. The 20-city index has posted losses for a staggering 27 months in a row. In October, 14 of the 20 cities set fresh price decline records. Many […]