Peter Schiff vs. rabid realtor- I thought this was pretty funny:   Edit: Restored video access. It may take a few minutes to become available. Enjoy.  

I track a number of things fairly faithfully, but I’ll confess I don’t track Phoenix area rentals on a regular basis.  Every now and again though, L will humor me and look up the current number.  Here’s what he sent me yesterday: Total number of properties found: 8845  Active for rent on MLS   Total number of properties found: 57876 Active for sale on MLS   Total number of properties found: 24699 Active for sale show vacant on MLS  43%   It seemed that the number of actives was rising faster than it had earlier in the year, so I…
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We know that inflation is hitting us in the pocketbook, and that government-backed GSEs and lender bailouts could come back to bite taxpayers,  but did you know about the $1.15 trillion that we could end up on the hook for? [Hat tip G!] Oct. 30 (Bloomberg) — Banks shut out of the market for short-term loans are finding salvation in a government lending program set up to revive housing during the Great Depression. Countrywide Financial Corp., Washington Mutual Inc., Hudson City Bancorp Inc. and hundreds of other lenders borrowed a record $163 billion from the 12 Federal Home Loan Banks…
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We haven’t talked about the ABX in a while, but it’s been heading south again: Lenders were giving out loans like candy at this time last year. As a result, this Halloween will be no treat for anyone whose fortune is tied to the housing market. Lenders, investors, builders and borrowers have lost billions of dollars from spiking foreclosures of loans made to borrowers with poor credit. The losses look set to keep rising. "The reality is that what’s going on in subprime isn’t going to end anytime soon," said Andrew Lahde, managing partner of Lahde Capital Management, which bets…
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It’s a story we’ve seen time and again here in Phoenix- small investors decided to purchase homes at the top of the market, the market cooled, and now the investors can’t sell or rent out their property. We knew Phoenix wasn’t alone in it’s misery- you can hear the same story in Las Vegas, Miami, and other cities across the nation.  The story is not a uniquely American one however.  How familiar does this story sound from across the pond in Manchester, England? [Hat tip to our Liverpool reader for the link!] Like so many young professionals hoping to cash…
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Congressional leaders want President Bush to do something done about the subprime mortgage crisis:   Congress’ top Democrats demanded quick action on the subprime mortgage crisis, saying President Bush has been slow to address a situation that could cost millions of people their homes. "This is a national crisis. Too bad it’s taken so long to realize that we have a crisis," Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada said at a joint news conference with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California. President Bush wants Congress to do something about the crisis: Bush said Congress also has yet to act…
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I was about to log off late Friday evening when G forwarded me a Bloomberg article by Bob Willis that was just too funny not to share. [A lot of our sidebar comes to us courtesy of G, who's efforts are always much appreciated]  The headline was U.S. Homeownership Falls in Longest Slide Since 1981: Homeownership in the U.S. dropped for a fourth consecutive quarter, the longest decline since at least 1981, suggesting more Americans will miss their best chance of building wealth.   With home values dropping across the country, there are a number of us who are currently…
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A Yahoo Finance Board post attributed to Dan Jones of E-Bluewater caught my eye yesterday.  Jones asked What’s the number, Fannie? and he’s asking an important question: "What’s the Number, Fannie?" I’m going to put that at the top of my blog everyday until we find out just what "The Number" is. What number, you may ask!? The number I’m looking for is the actual drawdown in value that the $4 trillion portfolio of mortgage securities managed and/or guaranteed by Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae that has occurred as a result of this sub-prime, Alt-A, SIV-LITE debacle that we’ve come…
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It’s Op-Ed Friday, and I have to share this from Ambrose Evans-Pritchard: Over the last three months we have seen a rolling collapse of speculative debt and real estate across half the global economy, yet friends still come over to my desk at the Telegraph, with that maddening look of commiseration on their faces, and jab: “so when is the sky going to fall then, eh”? Well, excuse me. The sky has fallen.   The rest of the article is a good read, and it looks like the Chicken Littles of the world have a strong case. We’d love to…
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Ah, once again we play dueling numbers with the New Home Sales Report.  Reuters reports: WASHINGTON, Oct 25 (Reuters) – Sales of new single-family U.S. homes rose 4.8 percent in September but sales in August were revised down sharply according to a government report on Thursday that painted a mixed picture of the battered housing sector. According to the Department of Commerce: Sales of new one-family houses in September 2007 were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 770,000, according toestimates released jointly today by the U.S. Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development. This is 4.8…
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It’s hard to say which has reached a lower low in September- Existing Home Sales or Lawrence Yun’s excuses.  According to Yahoo Finance this morning: Sales of existing homes plunged by a record amount in September as turmoil in mortgage markets added more problems to a housing industry in its worst slump in 16 years. The National Association of Realtors reported Wednesday that sales of existing homes fell 8 percent in September, the largest decline to show up in records dating to 1999. The seasonally adjusted annual sales rate of 5.04 million existing homes was also the slowest pace on…
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At the request of the sender, I am not mentioning the source, but according to this update dated 10/22/07, there were 610 properties foreclosed on in the previous week.  Here’s the breakdown by city: *Cave Creek, Fountain Hills, New River, Queen Creek, Sun City, Tempe , Tolleson, Waddell, Whittmann, Youngtown

Hat tip to ClarenceBeeks, who gave us a lead on this story: Neumann Homes, one of Chicago’s largest homebuilders, announced on Monday that it intends to file for bankruptcy. The company said in a press release at 5 p.m. that it had been "unable to procure adequate funding" to operate its business. Marketing director Jean Neumann said that despite other published reports, the bankruptcy had not been filed, though "it will be done shortly." The company, ranked among the top 10 in Chicago, also builds in Wisconsin and Colorado. Company CEO Kenneth P. Neumann said in the statement that "significant…
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Not all states are created equal.  According to today’s Wall Street Journal: Some of the lenders are reducing the maximum combined loan-to-value ratio, a measure of how much of a home’s value a borrower can finance using a mortgage and a home-equity loan. In August, J.P. Morgan Chase’s home-equity division cut the maximum amount borrowers in Nevada can finance to 85% of the home’s value. The unit won’t let borrowers finance more than 90% of their home’s value in seven other states — Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Michigan, New Jersey and New York. That compares to a maximum combined loan-to-value…
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Thanks to L for this very comforting comment from the Fed this morning.  According to Yahoo Finance: WASHINGTON (AP) — The Federal Reserve will do whatever is necessary to prevent damage to the economy from the credit crunch that has gripped Wall Street, a Fed official said Monday, warning it will take time for financial markets to fully recover from the strains. There are a number of factors however, that would appear to be beyond the control of the Fed- housing oversupply, toxic loans in the system, falling prices, banks witn mark-to-market issues, etc.- problems that would be difficult for…
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