Relevant and even prescient commentary on news, politics and the economy.

Real Estate Insanity…working off the excess inventory?

by Tom aka Rusty Rustbelt Real Estate Insanity So my son and me are thinking about buying a intercoastal waterfront homes in Ohio and fixing it up this summer. He would live in half and we would rent the other side. Given the number of foreclosures this should be an easy deal, right? Wrong. The […]

Denial in the Mortgage Industrial Complex

Yves Smith provides a snapshot of her perception of at least public thoughts from mortgage industry conference participants. It is worth a read. Denial in the Mortgage Industrial Complex I just came back from the AmeriCatalyst conference in Austin, which was a packed two days focused on the state of the housing and securitization market. […]

Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.

As the title indicates, this will be a more than usually confused post.The stimulus was the now famous grief over elementary fairness which errupted when “[Judge] Scott Fairgrieve of Nassau County District Court, wrote that ‘swearing to false statements reflects poorly on the profession [of law] as a whole” and fined lawyer Steven J Baum […]

Make yourself heard on mortgage abuses

Naked Capitalism points us to a letter to ‘sign’ today in support of the FDIC and Congressman Brad Miller’s advocacy for servicer regulation: This time, though, there is a way to stand up against the banks. And the reason is because in this case, Sheila Bair at the FDIC actually wants to do the right […]

Who Committed Excess Borrowing?

With a hat tip to Rebecca’s post below, normalized borrowing growth in several sectors over the past 25 years. (Source: FRB Flow of Funds data) Yes, there are three very similar (shades of blue) lines—but they are all household and non-profit data. (The growth in “credit market instruments” is, presumably, primarily driven by the non-profit […]

A Look at the Evidence: Predatory Lending, Borrowing, and Jack Cashill

The opening chapter of Jack Cashill’s Popes and Bankers relates his version of the tale of Melonie Griffith-Evans, a woman who in 2004 borrowed her way to losing her house.  Ms. Griffith-Evans accepted loans in order to buy a house priced at $470,000 that resulted in her having to pay “roughly $3,500 a month.”  Of […]

FICO Scores and Mortgage Payment Performance

I had an informal discussion with a manager in an MBS IT area last month. Just a general conversation about the field and the data people check.  He mentioned FICO scores and I noted that I’m not fond of using them to evaluate a mortgage, especially for first-time homebuyers. Part of this is simple: it’s […]

As Goes GE, so goes Management

Henry Paulson’s book On the Brink is getting pilloried all over the place. David Wessel raises a point I’ve been hammering for a while: Jeff Imment, CEO of General Electric, frightened Paulson in early September by calling to say GE, which Paulson describes as “an American business icon,” was having trouble borrowing money by selling […]