Friday, February 27, 2009

How do you feel about the economy?


The president 75 billion dollar mortgage rescue plan is on the books officially. Some believe this plan will not only fight foreclosure but will save the market form going into a much deeper recession or worse depression. Over the few weeks the president stated that the worst is yet to come. However, this week he changed his outlook completely by viewing the future with more a optimistic view.

However, what did see or discovered that made him went from seeing the worse case scenario to seeing the end of the housing crisis and massive job loss? The market is truly saying something else when you look at the news about the housing marketing which lost some more grounds this week. Also this week more jobs lost send additional workers to the unemployment line.

Economist sees these problems going continue into 2012 with additional failure of mortgages coming in 2010 and slowing down by 2012. There are commercial mortgages that is to unwind or completely blown up. Also what about the residential mortgages that the $75 million stimulus package will not help because the homeowner can not refinance or take advantage of the loan modification due the new qualifying criteria.

Today banks are increasing their credit scores requirement making it even more difficult for borrowers to meet. Also mortgage companies that usually did 85 percent of the loans in America are now going out of business or they just don’t have the line of credit to lend as normal. On the other hand government loans are increasing in their loans amount they willing to insure, which can reach $410,000 for a single family.

The greatest enemy to any single loan is Job lost or health care. Why healthcare? Well when a homeowner becomes sick and over time loose income due to taking off with no sick pay this is devastating to the family and the mortgage can easily fall behind. This is one of the concerns that the new administration is looking to solve the issue of healthcare.


So what will the verdict be when it comes to fighting foreclosure we will see. The date to focus on now is March the 4th if you are fighting foreclosure. On that day lenders will be inundated with calls for this new loan modification. Apparently the mortgage companies will be compensating by the government to process the loan modification. Also those homeowners who stay current each year will get up to a thousand dollars each year for paying their mortgage on time.

Thursday, February 26, 2009

Fighting foreclosure with 31 precent of your income

Written By: George Haughton

Fighting foreclosure just became interesting for many home owners. I have taken one paragraph out of the president Obamba's speech to analyzes it some more for my understanding and to be able to write or blog about it. The flowing is the paragraph regarding how the government will work with the those in foreclosure:

"If lenders and home buyers work together, and the lender agrees to offer rates that the borrower can afford, we'll make up part of the gap between what the old payments were and what the new payments will be. And under this plan, lenders who participate will be required to reduce those payments to no more than 31 percent of a borrower's income. This will enable as many as three to four million homeowners to modify the terms of their mortgages to avoid foreclosure."

After reading the speech I got to wondering if this new payment was based on a new rate and current monthly income with a subsidy from the government for the difference? For example if the home owner makes $1000.00 per month then my monthly payments would be about $310 per month. However, what if my original monthly payment was $2000.00, which included my taxes and my income went from $2800.00 to the current $1000.00 will the government pay the difference? I really doubt this could actually be the case but that is how it sounds to some home owner fighting foreclosure. Other say this $310 is based not a traditional 30 mortgage but more like a 500 year mortgage. Fighting foreclosure just got easier.

This is what one reporter wrote quoting the president: "In prepared remarks today in Phoenix, the president said, “Let’s say you earn about $30,000 per year and you find a house that costs $232,500. 31 percent of your monthly income would be about $775, which puts you in a nice comfortable 443-year mortgage at an interest rate of 4.0%, which is fair for someone like you. You win, the banks win, and most importantly, the economy wins."

Again fighting foreclosure not only just got easier but if you can't stop foreclosure with this plan then you don't need to own a home right now.

How do I know if I qualify for this plan? Check the White House Web Site

Tuesday, February 3, 2009

Can you legally stop foreclosure

Fighting Foreclosure

Author: george Haughton

Fighting foreclosure in the last two years has been the number one issue for homeowners. Homeowners are losing their homes in record numbers. Therefore, how can homeowners survive foreclosure? What are the foreclosure time line and the reasons for foreclosure?



Foreclosure is a legal solution to a contract breach by the homeowner. To cure the problem both parties (bank and the homeowner) must decided upon a solution. If there is no agreement reached between the homeowner and their lender then the lender is forced to act on their own with foreclosure being the end result. Federal government has regulations in place to protect the homeowner by requiring the lender to prove that they have tried to work with the homeowner. This can come in the form of loan programs or loan modification. Disclosures in the form of written notices will be mailed to you the homeowner regarding a possible foreclosure. .



The lender sometime use a loan servicer to help as a go between to help move the foreclosure process along. This could be a benefit as well a problem. The servicer really could stand in the way of the homeowner not getting the best deal from their lender. So if you find yourself in this position you must be careful when negotiating with your Loan Servicer. The servicers are the ones who move the file to the attorney. Recently some home owners fighting foreclosure have challenged their law suit under the legal question: has to who really own their mortgages? What they found in over 80 percent of the case the lender the mortgage note is not the one filing law suit against them. In fact in some case the note can not be established, that is why fighting foreclosure make sence for the homeowner.






What some of the reasons motivating homeowners to continue fighting foreclosure ? Well consider this : you might come out of it with a lower mortgage rate and lower payment. This fight could protect your equity or the investment that you made into the home when you purchased it and over the years.



About the Author:

My blog will be mostly about mortgage information.I have been in the mortgage business close to 20 years. Working with government loans and now as an additional service, i am now counseling homeowners on how to Fight foreclosure http://www.squidoo.com/stopsforeclosures or http://360.yahoo.com/ghaughtons

Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/mortgage-articles/fighting-foreclosure-686439.html

Sunday, February 1, 2009

Foreclosure real estate

Foreclosure real estate Attorneys experienced their bankruptcy business slow down after the bankruptcy laws were changed by the government in favor of the credit card companies and most creditors in general. In other words the laws were now stacked against the borrower. Due to the current home foreclosure crisis the government is now amending the bankruptcy laws to allow the trustee to get some principle reduction or restructuring for the homeowner.

After this brief slow period the attorneys is experiencing once again a boom in bankruptcy filing, but now the attorneys have added the filing of a possible loan modification. Loan modification is needed because homeowners are dealing with mortgages that were created in good times with weird guidelines.

When these mortgages went bust in early part of the recession lenders counting on the increase of the equity to cover any lost sustain in a home foreclosure. However, when the housing bubble burst the opposite occurred, property values fell hard and foreclosures increased.

Real estate as always been a sure bet in the past and banks did not consider that they would take such a nose dive. Typically in normal economic environment homeowner could have use a mortgage refinance to get themselves out of trouble. However, these toxic loans pushed homeowners in foreclosure instead . Meanwhile the lenders made a plead for a bailout from the government hoping to survive this wave of foreclosures ; which they did not see this coming.

Bankruptcy was all ways an option in the past for homeowners facing foreclosure. However, now we are dealing with a different type of loans that when went bad were difficult for homeowner to handle. For example the sub prime loans came with adjustable rates that would push payments out of the reach of the homeowner. Bankruptcy could not stop that. Most of these borrowers could not refinance into a prime rate mortgage because of their credit or income data.

Another type of loans that went bust was the option arm loan which was structured with an introductory rate as low as 2.9% with a potential increase of additional 6 percent over the life of the loan. Therefore if you started with a rate of 2.9 with an index of 4.5, your effective rate would be 7.40 but you were only require to pay each month the 2.9 interest only. These option arms created a negative amount each month because the borrower was not paying the fully indexed mortgage rate each month based on the 7.40. Therefore, under the prefect conditions these loans could work but with the Libor and Treasure index going creating a run away mortgage.

Attorney’s across this country is now in demand working with homeowners fighting foreclosure using not only bankruptcy but loan modification. Filing bankruptcy has its limitation, with home equity falling. Loan modification would not only create a fix rate but increase the numbers of years to pay off the loan. Hopefully the new bankruptcy laws will allow the bankruptcy trustee to obtain such restructuring.