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- Talk of a Greek Exit Gets Louder
- Doug Casey on Taxes and Freedom, Part II
- Is Facebook the Rusty Hinge of the Stock Market?
- Fitch Downgrades Japan
- Doug Casey on Taxes and Freedom
- Greeks Run on Banks as Euro-Confidence Wanes
- To the Class of 2012
- Hedge Funds Bail On Euro Now
- Expatriation in the Wake of the Facebook IPO
Delaying Foreclosure: 62 Years to Repossess New York Homes at Current Pace
More troubling data on real estate and foreclosures as a whole from the NYT:
In New York State, it would take lenders 62 years at their current pace, the longest time frame in the nation, to repossess the 213,000 houses now in severe default or foreclosure, according to calculations by LPS Applied Analytics, a prominent real estate data firm.
Clearing the pipeline in New Jersey, which like New York handles foreclosures through the courts, would take 49 years. In Florida, Massachusetts and Illinois, it would take a decade.
In the 27 states where the courts play no role in foreclosures, the pace is much more brisk — three years in California, two years in Nevada and Colorado — but the dynamic is the same: the foreclosure system is bogged down by the volume of cases, borrowers are fighting to keep their houses and many lenders seem to be in no hurry to add repossessed houses to their books.
“If you were in foreclosure four years ago, you were biting your nails, asking yourself, ‘When is the sheriff going to show up and put me on the street?’ ” said Herb Blecher, an LPS senior vice president. “Now you’re probably not losing any sleep.”
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Banks foreclosing on churches in record numbers
(Reuters) – Banks are foreclosing on America’s churches in record numbers as lenders increasingly lose patience with religious facilities that have defaulted on their mortgages, according to new data.
The surge in church foreclosures represents a new wave of distressed property seizures triggered by the 2008 financial crash, analysts say, with many banks no longer willing to grant struggling religious organizations forbearance.
Since 2010, 270 churches have been sold after defaulting on their loans, with 90 percent of those sales coming after a lender-triggered foreclosure, according to the real estate information company CoStar Group.
In 2011, 138 churches were sold by banks, an annual record, with no sign that these religious foreclosures are abating, according to CoStar. That compares to just 24 sales in 2008 and only a handful in the decade before.
The church foreclosures have hit all denominations across America, black and white, but with small to medium size houses of worship the worst. Most of these institutions have ended up being purchased by other churches.
The highest percentage have occurred in some of the states hardest hit by the home foreclosure crisis: California, Georgia, Florida and Michigan.
“Churches are among the final institutions to get foreclosed upon because banks have not wanted to look like they are being heavy handed with the churches,” said Scott Rolfs, managing director of Religious and Education finance at the investment bank Ziegler.
Church defaults differ from residential foreclosures. Most of the loans in question are not 30-year mortgages but rather commercial loans that typically mature after just five years when the full balance becomes due immediately.
David Stockman’s Viewpoint on the Obama Budget
Passing a Federal Budget is a rarity, especially under the administration of a committed Marxist. The Democratic Senate’s strangle hold on bringing up legislation, particularly a budget, goes without saying. What makes this new budget for 2013 any different? This time the day of reckoning hits hard the first of the next year. The recent interview with David Stockman on the Fox Business channel with Neil Cavuto is an extraordinary analysis why the economy will absorb a frightful tax increase all at one time. The fallout to commerce could become the real end of the world scenario. Take the time and watch the insightful observations from a courageous number cruncher who served this nation with distinction during the Reagan Presidency.
Bob Jennings in a written article from the same Fox News presents a written list that coincides with the risks that Stockman outlines.
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The Biggest City Bankruptcy May Be Days Away
STOCKTON – The City Council on Tuesday is expected to take its first step toward filing for bankruptcy in a dramatic move to remedy Stockton’s crippling finances.
If bankruptcy ultimately happens, Stockton would be the nation’s largest city to fall into Chapter 9 protection.
While city administrators remained silent on any plans, it became an open secret Wednesday. The Downtown Stockton Alliance board of directors in a public meeting discussed the city’s bankruptcy timetable.
Also Wednesday, the San Joaquin and Calaveras counties Central Labor Council distributed an email, alerting its members that Stockton plans to begin the process at next week’s council meeting. The email also invites its members to a meeting Monday to map their strategy for opposing bankruptcy. They won’t be alone.
Councilman Dale Fritchen said he’s ready to mount an outright opposition because, he said, bankruptcy would cost the city millions in legal fees, drive down property values and discourage new businesses.
“I truly believe this is not the right path at this time for Stockton,” Fritchen said. “We’re starting to come out of the economic rut we’ve been in. We’re starting to see some light.”
Before successfully filing, city leaders must make a series of key moves.
They have to decide if they will engage the city’s major creditors in a 60-day mediation period required by a new, labor-backed California law that is designed to help cities dodge bankruptcy.
Uncle Sam’s Fire Sale. Minimum Investment: $1 Billion
The federal government is about to dump millions of the foreclosed homes at fire-sale prices to hedge funds and private-equity firms with government connections. If you’re an individual investor who might like to get in on the action, forget it! You’re shut out of this deal.
Homeowners who might be interested in buying the foreclosure property next door? Out of luck. And retirees hoping for a return on their money more than 1.8% on a five-year CD find another avenue closed off.
Prior to the calamity of 2008, we might have thought the deal we’re profiling today unthinkable. But now we’re becoming as immune to new instances of blatant cronyism as American babies are to diphtheria.
If you’ve got the hammer for it, we may as well get down to brass tacks: As many as 10,000 properties might be unloaded in a single transaction during the first quarter of 2012 — thanks to a government program so new it doesn’t have a catchy name yet, only the working title “Enterprise/FHA REO Asset Disposition.”
Roger Arnold, chief economist for Pasadena, Calif.-based ALM Advisors, has a different name for it — “the largest transfer of wealth from the public to the private sector.”
As of last September, there were about 800,000 “real estate owned” or REO homes in the United States — homes repossessed and on the market. Close to one-third of these — 250,000 — sit on the books of Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and the Federal Housing Administration. That is, 250,000 homes are owned by you and me, the US taxpayers.
Judicial Watch Sues Obama Administration for Documents Detailing Secret Settlement Negotiations with Mortgage Lenders Accused of Faulty Mortgage Practices
Obama DOJ and HUD Ignore Freedom of Information Act Requests on Effort to Extract $20 Billion from Banking Industry
(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch, the organization that investigates and fights government corruption, announced today that it filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit on January 3, 2012, against the Obama Department of Justice (DOJ) and U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) to obtain documents pertaining to accusations of fraud against the nation’s five largest mortgage companies and the creation of “federal accounts” to settle probes into faulty mortgage practices (Judicial Watch v. HUD and DOJ (No. 1:12-cv-0002)). The Obama administration has reportedly been engaged in settlement negotiations behind closed doors with mortgage companies that would result in at least $20 billion in payments from the nation’s major banks.
Pursuant to a Judicial Watch FOIA request filed with the DOJ and HUD on May 17, 2011, Judicial Watch seeks the following records:
- A set of government audits used to support allegations that the nation’s five largest mortgage companies of defrauding taxpayers in the handling of foreclosures on homes purchased with government-backed loans.
- A term sheet which outlined the Obama administration’s settlement offer to the mortgage companies accused of fraud. The terms described on this document allegedly included the creation of a federal account funded by the nation’s largest mortgage firms to help distressed borrowers avoid foreclosure and settle state and federal probes into alleged faulty mortgages practices.
