I can see the REIC spin if the 2,210 weekly number drops back to a still insanely-high 1,900. . . FORECLOSURES ARE DROPPING! BUY NOW BEFORE PRICES RISE!

The problem with the graph you posted is that it was a snapshot in Jan 2007. Since roughly 80% of Option-ARM holders are making the minimum (neg-am) payment, they’ll reset much earlier, when the principal hits around 115-120% of the initial amount. Thus, the lull we should be in now is actually the beginning of the O-A collapse. IIRC, the numbers showed significantly rising defaults in the O-A world about 3 months ago, and they were tracking the initial stages of subprime almost exactly (same slope).

ps. That 80% number utterly floors me, but I hear it used everywhere. Mr Mortgage regularly gives numbers that support it as well.

ZOMBICONOMY: a situation in which nothing can be valued, but some transactions still take place as if things could be valued.

There are many examples of this now, and not only in housing. Soon it will simply be the only description of the world economy.

Cheers,John Ryskamp

Thanks for the insight. People (including my parents) think that home prices in the Phoenix area have stabilized. I do not think so. I agree with you about the bail-out.

There’s another, slightly updated chart of ARM resets, floating around. Says about the same thing.. The subprime thing peaked this past summer.
The next wave is the Option ARMS, which start rolling sometime this month, and peak in about a year and a half. This wave wipes out the middle class, because they’re the ones that bought 700k homes on an income of 60k per year. Option ARMS are what made McMansions possible.
I would feel better about the coming dissapearance/bulldozing/conversion to apartments of the McMansions, except for the wiping out of Americans.
And the bailout will not help. It’s just money down a rathole.

Thanks for the info. It sounds like things are going down fast.

I believe we are actually in a bit of a lull.  According to the now famous Credit Suisse reset chart, we have a lot more pain ahead:

This is going to be bad for awhile.

Is this the peak of the resets?? This is a lot of foreclosures.