[Hat tip to John, our resident Mr. Universe for locating this- I had a terrible time finding this paper!]Earlier this week the Chicago Fed released a letter entitled, "Comparing the prime and subprime mortgage markets," by Sumit Agarwal and Calvin Ho.  The thesis of this paper was: We believe that the subprime mortgage problems are not likely to spill over to the rest of the mortgage market or the broader economy. That’s a line we’ve been hearing a lot, from a number of sources, so I was curious to see how they would substantiate it.  It did not appear to…
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According to The Independent, Bear Stearns boss took refuge in blogging as hedge funds imploded:  The sub-prime mortgage market meltdown threatens to become the first giant financial crisis of the 21st century. And it will be blogged. They’ve got that one right.  We’re here to blog about the sub-prime mortgage market meltdown, or just about anything else housing related.  Doomers have company- Bear Stearn’s exec Rich Marin has also been blogging:  Mr Marin – "age: 53; astrological sign: Aquarius; interests: motorcycling, skiing; favourite music: Billy Joel, Meatloaf" – has been the head of asset management at Bear Stearns for four…
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According to Realtor.com: NeighborWorks America, a national nonprofit group, is launching a new ad campaign in conjunction with the Ad Council to warn home owners that inaction is the worst possible response to mortgage troubles. The campaign seeks to prevent foreclosures by urging home owners in financial trouble to call the Homeownership Preservation Foundation HOPE hotline, at 888/995-HOPE. “Homeowners are facing foreclosure at record rates. This issue reaches into every social and economic demographic out there," says Colleen Hernandez, president and executive director of the Homeownership Preservation Foundation. The National Ad Council produced the public service announcements, which are set…
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Anthem is a nice master-planned community northwest of Phoenix. M noticed that there was a "price adjustment " out there by Engle Homes this past weekend.  Here’s one example.  Can anyone spot the trend? On this particular model, the base price has dropped 23% this year, and is below it’s Feb 2005 price.  Other model’s have had similar drops.

1st-time buyers must conquer their fears! was the headline on the real estate section of the June 24th Arizona Republic. [No link available]  The Ellen James Martin article addressed buyer fears and "how to surmount them." The article dismisses such concerns as Fear of making a big mistake and Fear of having insufficient cash: Novice buyers are well advised to explore these [low-to-no-down-payment mortgage program] options as soon as they decide to make a purchase, rather than waiting until their savings accounts are brimming with funds. The mantra seems to have shifted from "It is always a good time to…
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The Commerce Department has released the new home sales figures for May: Sales of new one-family houses in May 2007 were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 915,000, according to estimates released jointly today by the U.S. Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development. This is 1.6 percent (±10.8%)* below the revised April rate of 930,000 and is 15.8 percent (±9.0%) below the May 2006 estimate of 1,087,000. [The UNREVISED April rate was at 981,000 by the way- April was revised down 5.2%] The commerce department does not figure cancellations into their sales figures.  As cancellations…
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This was a post from yesterday’s Mortgage Fraud Blog: [Hat tip to Broker Outpost, who have a great discussion going on the topic here.] eAppraiseIT, LLC filed a civil lawsuit in the Circuit Court of Brevard County Florida against Pamela Crowley, an appraiser that runs a website at www.mortgagefraudwatchlist.org and acts as a moderator on Appraiser’s Forum (www.AppraisersForum.com) The lawsuit includes causes of action for defamation per se and tortuous interference with advantageous business relations and seeks injunctive relief and damages.  The lawsuit alleges that Crowley publishes a website that contains ‘false, injurious and defamatory statements’ about eAppraiseIT’s business practices….
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The National Existing Home Sales Report has been released by the National Association of Realtors, (NAR) and by any measure, the numbers are lousy.  According to the NAR: Total existing-home sales- including single-family, townhomes, condominiums and co-ops- eased by 0.3% to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 5.99 million units in May from an upwardly revised pace of 6.01 million in April, and are 10.3% below the 6.68 million-unit level in May 2006. This is the third straight month of "easing," as sales have fallen steadily since February- bringing home sales to its lowest point since June 2003: ‘

To be fair, Bloomberg’s Will Edwards managed to bury the happy-talk of the first story down in the body of the second, but we ended up with a couple of pretty clashing narratives coming out of Bank of America on Wednesday [1] and Friday.[2] Full marks to cynicalgirl at Friday’s Ben’s Bits for picking up the wildly opposing spins. Should Housing Wire ever decide to run a "best dig" contest, this deserves a nomination. Below you’ll find a snapshot of the Bits thread as it looked shortly before 6AM.

This past weekend saw some big homebuilder promotions.  I decided to take a little field trip to check out the "hot" deals at a few of them-  Beazer Homes, Pulte, and Shea Homes. And it was hot here in Phoenix- fortunately all the builders were giving out water bottles, and Beazer had ice cream.  I made it to a couple of Beazer developments, another by Pulte and one by Shea. By far the most impressive list of specials was at Beazer’s Vilaggio at Montelena in Queen Creek- here’s what was on their list of inventory homes: However, before you run…
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AEI’s March 28, 2007 Subprime Seminar – IX This is an unofficial transcript of the few minutes that occurred during AEI’s March 28th seminar on the Subprime Mortgage Crisis [1] between the conclusion of the speakers’ presentations and the beginning of the Question & Answer session. Desmond Lachman made a brief comment about Tom Zimmerman’s talk, which had just concluded. Then Nouriel Roubini returned to a theme of his earlier presentation, enumerating the channels by which housing inventory was coming onto the market, and the significance of rising inventory for the housing market and the broader economy.

Long time readers are used to seeing my warning when I report on median price appreciation trends.  It’s generally similar to this one from my last Tucson post: The median can also be affected by the mix of homes sold and incentives offered by sellers. But how much are these deals affecting prices, anyway?  According to MSN Money:  [Hat tip L!] The practice, which popped up last year as a way for builders to move unsold inventory, has now spread aggressively to the existing-home market, which accounts for 85% of all sales. And it’s not just furniture being used to…
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It’s Op-Ed Friday, and it’s been quite a week.  The Doom sidebar has been living up to our name, with depressing news ranging from the builder confidence report to our new favorite soap opera, As Bear Stearns Turns. We turn then for a little comic relief to Blanche Evans of Realty Times. I loved this quote from her article When should homebuyers jump in? If you’re a buyer, you sadly realize that to get the home you want at the price you want and the interest rate you want to pay will be nearly impossible. If you’re lucky, you’ll get…
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I have to say that in the course of any given day, I seem to read a lot of bad statistics and questionable conclusions.  Consequently, when my oldest daughter [A huge fan of "The Onion"] shared the following with me, once my sides stopped hurting, I knew I had to post it.

                               Cue the happy twittering birds and the singing, smiling Mr. Sunshine- We’ve got Bank of America’s CEO Kenneth Lewis and none other than the Treasury Secretary himself, Henry Paulson, assuring us that after a long hard road, the housing slump is nearly over: From Bloomberg today: [Hat tip Tanta!] The worst U.S. housing slump in 16 years will begin to ease in the next month or two, and job growth will lift home prices and spur construction early next year, Bank of America Corp. Chief Executive Officer Kenneth Lewis said….
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