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It is official. State and federal governments have condoned forgery, perjury and fraud in what’s been called the “robo-signing” foreclosure debacle. Last week, the five biggest banks in America signed on to a $26 billion deal that, basically, lets them off with a slap on the wrist for fraudulently foreclosing on homes in the last few years. I am not going to go on and on about how unfair and unjust this deal was or how the rule of law has been thrown down the stairs. I am going to focus on the fallout of this morally corrupt deal. There...

<p>MADISON, Wis. (AP) -- Wisconsin homeowners are expected to receive $140 million as part of a national $25 billion settlement with the nation's biggest mortgage lenders over foreclosure abuses.</p> <p>Gov. Scott Walker and Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen announced the terms Thursday as part of the settlement with Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo, Citigroup and Ally Financial.</p>

What did the mortgage lenders and loan servicers agree to do? The banks and servicers have committed at least $17 billion to reduce principal for borrowers who 1) owe far more than their homes are worth 2) are behind on payments. The amount of principal reduction will average about $20,000 per borrower. Another $3 billion will go toward refinancing mortgages for borrowers who are current on their payments. This will enable them to take advantage of the historic low interest rates currently available. The banks will pay $5 billion directly to the states, the only hard money involved in the...

According to real estate data firm CoreLogic, about 11 million American homeowners are underwater, and half of all U.S. mortgages are owned by non-government lenders. On Wednesday, President Obama announced plans to help homeowners facing foreclosure. Obama is seeking to make interests rates for borrowers lower, and he plans to pay for the estimated $5 billion to $10 billion cost with a fee on the nation’s largest banks. “It is wrong for anyone to suggest that the only option for struggling, responsible homeowners is to sit and wait for the housing market to hit bottom,” Obama said. “I refuse to...

Here is why these investors will lose a lot of money. Currently, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and Ginnie Mae (FHA) MBS are selling at what is called a “premium” above par value of 100. Let’s start with GNMA MBS. Notice that GNMA MBS prices are trading at a premium to par and the higher the coupon rate, the larger the premium. For example, the GNMA 6.0% coupon is currently selling for 109-22. That is $9 -22 above par. Why? Premium prices occur when sufficient number of borrowers do not refinance, either due transactions costs or inability to refinance their mortgage....

New York Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman sued three of the nation's largest banks over a private national mortgage registry system, contending it has resulted in a wide range of deceptive and fraudulent foreclosure filings. The lawsuit, filed in New York State Supreme Court in Brooklyn, names units of Bank of America Corp., J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. and Wells Fargo Corp. as defendants, as well as MERSCorp., which owns and operates the Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems, known as MERS. In his complaint, Mr. Schneiderman alleges that MERS has effectively eliminated the public's ability to track property transfers because those...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The average rate on the 30-year fixed mortgage fell this week to a record low, the ninth time that has happened in the last year. Even with the cheapest rates in history, the housing market remains depressed. Mortgage buyer Freddie Mac said Thursday that the rate on the 30-year loan dropped to 3.87 percent this week. That below the previous record of 3.88 hit two weeks ago. The average on the 15-year fixed mortgage fell to 3.14 percent, also a record low. Records for mortgage rates date back to the 1950s. Mortgage rates tend to track the...

On December 29th, 2011, the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) acting director Edward Demarco released a statement detailing the increase to the guarantee fee charged by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, as part of the Temporary Payroll Tax Cut Continuation Act of 2011. As part of the legislation, FHFA is increasing the guarantee fee by no less than 10 basis points (bp), effective April 1st, 2012. This increase affects all single-family residential mortgages, and the additional 10 bp in fees will be remitted to the U.S. Treasury instead of being retained by the GSEs. Additionally, the minimum initial increase shall...

'Maybe you can start redeeming yourself by helping your fellow man' Kathleen Willey, the woman who courageously testified about being assaulted by President Clinton, is scheduled to lose her home in just three days in a bank auction – but, in a last-minute plea on behalf of millions of homeowners just like her, she has written to billionaire George Soros for help. Willey’s original home loan was issued by IndyMac Bank before the FDIC took receivership of the bank following the 2008 collapse. At the time of the FDIC takeover of IndyMac, it was the third-largest bank failure in U.S....

On Jan. 23, U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development Secretary Shaun L.S. Donovan met in Chicago with several Democratic state attorneys general (AGs) in an attempt to strong-arm them into signing up for an administration-backed agreement to settle the “robo-signing” scandal. Wall Street would pay what sounds like a large fine ($25 billion), and in exchange, the state AGs would relieve the bankers of all legal liabilities related to the fraudulent mortgage-lending practices that led directly to the 2008 financial meltdown and a 30 percent drop in U.S. home prices. The fraudulent practices of the mortgage servicers have injected...

In a nutshell, the Obama Administration wants to expand the already existing the Home Affordable Modification Program (or HAMP) to forgive debt to those who are “underwater.” The Administration would require mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the mortgage insurance giants in the DC area, to forgive mortgage debt. Bear in mind that the housing and credit bubble were put into motion by President Clinton and HUD Secretaries Henry Cisneros and Andrew Cuomo with their National Homeownership Strategy to encourage households to buy housing and accumulate debt. Here is the NHS document that was removed from HUD’s website: nhsdream1...

In a nutshell, the Obama Administration wants to expand the already existing the Home Affordable Modification Program (or HAMP) to forgive debt to those who are “underwater.” The Administration would require mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the mortgage insurance giants in the DC area, to forgive mortgage debt. Bear in mind that the housing and credit bubble were put into motion by President Clinton and HUD Secretaries Henry Cisneros and Andrew Cuomo with their National Homeownership Strategy to encourage households to buy housing and accumulate debt. Here is the NHS document that was removed from HUD’s website: nhsdream1...

First, this exchange from CNBC’s Kudlow Report last night: Kudlow: And also in terms of what President Obama said, he wants government action to close the inequality gap; that was a big part. Another thing he is going to do, he’s got this big mortgage plan where he would refi everybody’s mortgage that is not — they can be under water, but they have virtually no credit standards, probably a 4% interest rate. … Now is that vote-buying? Is that election year vote-buying? Is that something that is going to fix housing?Romney: Well, let’s see what the plan looks like....

Jim Pethokoukis thinks it might be, but I’m not so sure. As described by Barack Obama, the program is a significant expansion of a couple of programs that so far had been limited to Fannie/Freddie-backed mortgages. CNBC explains that the new initiative will now promote refinancing for mortgages no matter if backed by one of the two troubled GSEs or not, but with “precious few details� on hand, much of the program remains unclear: After several largely ineffective programs to help troubled borrowers and after fruitless attempts at budging the hard-line conservator of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, President Obama...

.S. Attorney General Eric Holder and Lanny Breuer, head of the Justice Department's criminal division, were partners for years at a Washington law firm that represented a Who's Who of big banks and other companies at the center of alleged foreclosure fraud, a Reuters inquiry shows. The firm, Covington & Burling, is one of Washington's biggest white shoe law firms. Law professors and other federal ethics experts said that federal conflict of interest rules required Holder and Breuer to recuse themselves from any Justice Department decisions relating to law firm clients they personally had done work for.

(Reuters) - The number of U.S. homes that received a foreclosure filing fell to a four-year low in 2011 as a slowdown in processing hit the market, RealtyTrac said in a report on Thursday. Foreclosure filings, which include default notices, scheduled auctions and bank repossessions, slid by 34 percent in 2011, the lowest level since 2007, just as the housing market was starting to crumble. RealtyTrac said there were filings on 1,887,777 homes last year. Bank seizures of homes fell to 804,423 from 1,050,500 in 2010, also marking the lowest level in four years. "A big part that is inflating...

Unemployed homeowners will be allowed to suspend or reduce mortgage payments for as long as a year under a new policy announced by mortgage finance firm Freddie Mac on Friday. The new rules take effect on Feb. 1. Freddie Mac will give mortgage servicers the authority to provide six months of forbearance to unemployed borrowers without prior approval, and the agency can approve an additional six months of forbearance after that. Homeowners are still responsible for paying off their full mortgage plus interest after the forbearance period ends. According to a Freddie Mac news release, unemployed borrowers can now avoid...

Media propagandists continue to advance the Democratic Party line. On December 21, Bloomberg News breathlessly reported, "The leading Republican candidates for president have embraced an explanation of the financial crisis that has been rejected by the chairman of the Federal Reserve, many economists and even three of the four Republicans on the government commission that investigated the meltdown." Reporter David J. Lynch further explained, "Both former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney lay much of the blame on U.S. government housing policies, saying they led to the real estate crash that almost brought down the banking...

We Stand for Principle Over Politicsand the Establishment Can't Stand It December 21, 2011 BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: "House Democrats tried Wednesday to force a vote on the Senate’s two-month extension of the payroll-tax cut, but Republicans gaveled the House closed to prevent them from having a chance, as top GOP leaders huddled down the hall to try to figure a way out of the mess. The House was set to hold a pro forma session, but two top Democrats, Reps. Steny H. Hoyer and Chris Van Hollen, demanded to be recognized to try to force a vote on the...

Evicted this week from his home of 40 years, retired Orange County firefighter Booker T. Perry and a new coalition added to the mounting criticisms against Florida Attorney General Bondi's handling of the foreclosure crisis. A teary-eyed Perry stood on the front steps of his white-brick home Wednesday and recounted that he received only one foreclosure notice before his eviction and the rest of the legal filings went to an attorney hired by his estranged wife. He never saw them. Flagstar Bank recently sold the house to an investor who purchased it for $17,000 and ordered the eviction, which occurred...

Pale afternoon light filled the small bedroom where Claire Findley lay immobile in a hospital bed, an intravenous line running into her arm. An orchid bloomed on the dresser, a gift from a friend who visited over the weekend. Nearby were her breathing machine and a suctioning device. Next to her bed was the cot where her husband, Luther, sleeps every night. She learned this past week that her last wish, to die in the modest Fair Oaks house where she and Luther have lived since 1996, will be possible. "I'm ready to die," said Claire, her voice strangled and...

The Securities and Exchange Commission has brought civil fraud charges against six former top executives at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, saying they misled the government and taxpayers about risky subprime mortgages the mortgage giants held during the housing bust. Those charged include the agencies' two former CEOs, Fannie's Daniel Mudd and Freddie's Richard Syron. They are the highest-profile individuals to be charged in connection with the 2008 financial crisis. Mudd, 53, and Syron, 68, led the mortgage giants when the housing bubble burst in late 2006 and 2007. The four other top executives also worked for the companies during...

Ex-Countrywide Exec Blows The Lid Off The Systemic Fraud At The Company Eileen Foster, a former senior executive at Countrywide Financial, told CBS's "60 Minutes" Steve Kroft that mortgage fraud was a way of business. "From what I saw, the types of things I saw, it was — it appeared systemic. It, it wasn't just one individual or two or three individuals, it was branches of individuals, it was regions of individuals," she told Kroft. Foster, an ex-senior vice president at the mortgage lender tasked with monitoring and investigating possible fraud, said she found evidence of widespread mortgage fraud during...

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: Laurie, who can't say where she is. Is that right? She's worried about lawsuits, so she can't say where she is. Laurie, welcome to the EIB Network. You're worried about the lawsuits from what you're going to say here? CALLER: Well, it's possible, Rush, and, by the way, it's an honor to speak to you. RUSH: Thank you. CALLER: I worked as both a packager and an advertising executive for a mortgage brokerage firm. I saw the rise and fall of the housing market and what infuriates me about when Obama speaks or Barney Frank or anyone...

Link only, per FR posting rules

Up until now, fraudclosure and robosigning were both merely civil offenses, and as such the banks were actively doing all they could to bury any and all pending litigation under a large settlement umbrella, wash their hands of the whole affair and move on, with nobody in danger of actually walking the plank and certainly not in danger of going to jail. That has all changed as of now, following a Nevada Grand Jury handing down criminal indictments against two title officers employed by Lender Processing Services Inc. for allegedly directing and supervising a robo-signing scheme, in which documents filed...

The collapse of MF Global Holdings gives Americans yet another reason not to trust Wall Street. The firm filed for bankruptcy as federal regulators were looking for $600 million missing from customer accounts. Its CEO, former Democratic New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine, had bet that European leaders would bail out smallish countries that were too big to fail. His bet did not pay off. The only good news out of this story is that Washington won't be bailing out MF Global. Corzine said he won't take a reported $12 million in severance. If he truly wants to atone, then Corzine...

With an election year coming with all the finger pointing, and lies that will be said, we must keep this going because the public has a very short memory!!! PLEASE SHARE BEFORE IT IS REMOVED... This video clearly shows that George Bush warned Congress way back in 2001, that this economic crisis was coming, if something was not done. But, the Congress refused to Listen, along with the arrogant Congressman, Barney Frank. This video says it all. The liberal media reportedly did not want this video on You Tube; it was taken off. This link is of the same video,...

t is the never ending bubble. Federal Reserve official, Daniel Tarullo, stated in a speech late last week that the Federal Reserve should begin to purchase long term mortgage backed securities as a way of driving down the interest rates, which are already at historic lows, even further. He said that it would have the added benefit of...

President Obama says the Occupy Wall Street protests show a "broad-based frustration" among Americans with the financial sector, which continues to kick against regulatory reforms three years after the financial crisis. "You're seeing some of the same folks who acted irresponsibly trying to fight efforts to crack down on the abusive practices that got us into this in the first place," he complained earlier this month. But what if government encouraged, even invented, those "abusive practices"?

Want a Truly Healthy Housing Market? Here Are the Five Essential StepsThe housing market will remain crippled until we eliminate perverse incentives to financialization and speculation, Fed/Federal intervention and all subsidies/giveaways.If there is one goal that the financial cartels, their politico apparatchiks and the public might actually agree upon, it would be restoring the housing market to health. This is because the financial cartel, their politico lackeys and homeowners would all benefit from the stabilization of housing values at current levels:1. SDI (systemically dangerous institutions) a.k.a. too big to fail banks, would avoid insolvency by keeping all their mortgage assets...

I've been checking the fdic website routinely since 2008 when everything tanked. There were about 8100 banks around at that time, according to the fdic. Since 2007, 433 banks have failed. That's over 5% of the total, or, 1 in 20. Here's the breakdown by year: 2007=3, 2008=25, 2009=140, 2010=157, 2011=84 The 2011 number includes what we have so far in October. There's no other point to this story. I just thought it was an interesting factoid. The FDIC link for the complete list is: http://www.fdic.gov/bank/individual/failed/banklist.html

President Obama’s message to spur the economy has changed from “pass this bill” to “we can’t wait.” And mortgage rates are the impatient administration’s first target. Rather than waiting for congressional action to improve the outlook for homeowners, the White House is making it easier to refinance loans backed by the Home Affordable Refinance Program. Though the executive branch can’t legally reach into the practices of private lenders, here is a look at a list of changes (and nudges) the administration plans to implement beginning on Nov. 15:

Pres. Obama offers mortgage relief, says he can't wait for 'dysfunctional' CongressPosted at: 10/25/2011 2:51 AM (AP) President Barack Obama is offering mortgage relief to struggling homeowners in hard-hit Nevada and around the country - saying he can't wait for an "increasingly dysfunctional Congress" to act. The president said Monday that "where they won't act, I will." He made the comments in remarks prepared for a stop in Las Vegas as he began a three-day Western trip.

Today's adjustment to the government's HARP program to get anything with a pulse as close to the discount window as possible was not the only proposal to revive the moribund US housing market. According to a new proposal by HUD, beginning this month and continuing for a year, anyone with a just $100 will be allowed to buy a HUD-owned REO home. In essence: the new buyer is merely taking over the mortgage payments in a repeat of what happened in 1970s New York along the Central Park West corridor. Granted for now it is stricly limited to only... 28...

At the top of Monday's NBC Today, co-host Matt Lauer touted a new plan to address the housing crisis: "After a series of foreign policy victories, President Obama is hitting the road to sell his plan to help turn around the struggling economy and today the focus is on the housing market." Lauer later wondered to chief White House correspondent Chuck Todd if the plan would, "help politically?" Todd declared: "Well, it could....emphasize the fact that they can't get anything done through Congress, right? That Republicans won't do anything....Mitt Romney said of the housing crisis, 'You know what? We're not...

For over a year I have been warning that the Obama Administration plans to use Fannie Mae to nationalize a significant portion of America’s real estate market. Today the President announced plans to utilize executive orders to side-step Congress, usurp the Constitution, and allow the government owned mortgage giant Fannie Mae, to start gobbling up mortgages. The President’s plan will implement sweeping new rules that will allow the nationalized mortgage behemoth to refinance mortgages. Once Fannie Mae owns the mortgage, there’s nothing to stop the Obama Administration from using the Making Home Affordable Plan to allow people to exit their...

Mortgage help for unemployed disappears Tami Luhby, On Monday October 3, 2011, 5:44 am EDT The federal government can't even give money away to help the unemployed pay their mortgage. A $1 billion program to assist the jobless will likely end up spending only half the funds, at most, because so few people met the strict criteria. The Housing Department, which had to approve the applications for the Emergency Homeowners' Loan Program by Friday, expects that only 10,000 to 15,000 people will qualify. That's only a small sliver of the roughly 100,000 who applied. "No one could have anticipated how...

<p>WASHINGTON — Fixed mortgage rates have fallen to historic new lows for a fourth straight week and are likely to fall further.</p> <p>The average on a 30-year fixed mortgage fell to 4.01 percent this week, Freddie Mac said Thursday. That's the lowest rate since the mortgage buyer began keeping records in 1971. The last time long-term rates were lower was in 1951, when most long-term home loans lasted just 20 or 25.</p>

Less than 10 days after the Federal Reserve announced a reprise of the “Operation Twist“ strategy it first used half a century ago, mortgage rates are at all-time lows. Operation Twist is the Fed’s plan to squeeze the long end of the yield curve by buying long-term Treasurys instead of short-term ones — in other words, increasing demand and lowering the rates for long-term borrowing.

Average rates on fixed-rate mortgages hit record lows this week, with the 30-year fixed-rate mortgage averaging 4.01%, according to Freddie Mac’s weekly survey of conforming mortgage rates. “Fixed mortgage rates fell to all-time record lows this week following the Federal Reserve’s announcement of its Maturity Extension Program and additional purchases of mortgage-backed securities,” said Frank Nothaft, vice president and chief economist of Freddie Mac, in a statement.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The home-buying season was a bust. March through August are typically the peak buying months. But this time, Americans bought fewer new homes in that stretch than in any other six-month period since record-keeping began a half-century ago. And sales of previously occupied homes didn't fare much better. They nearly matched 2009's total for the peak buying months. And that was the worst since 1997. Combined, total sales this spring and summer were the weakest on records dating to 1963. The figures underscore how badly the housing market is faring and suggest that a recovery is years...

Most Americans still don’t believe the government should help those who can’t afford to make their mortgage payments. A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 65% of American Adults think if someone can’t afford to make increased mortgage payments, they should sell their home and find a less expensive one. Twenty-two percent (22%) feel the government should assist them in making their payments, while another 13% are not sure. (To see survey question wording, click here.) These findings have changed little in surveys for several years. The percentage of U.S. homeowners whose home is worth less than what...

Worries about the European debt markets pushed U.S. Treasury bond yields lower — and that helped drive interest rates on fixed-rate mortgages to record lows this week, according to a weekly survey of conforming loan rates released Thursday by Freddie Mac. The average rate on a 30-year fixed mortgage dropped to 4.09% in the week ending Thursday, down from 4.12% a week ago and 4.37% a year ago.

Tonight, President Obama will speak to the nation about ways in which he believes Washington can inject some adrenaline into the languishing economic recovery. It isn't hard to figure out why: job growth has been trending down and may have ceased altogether in August. With unemployment still near double digits, that's a big problem. Some reports indicate that he'll announce one stimulus measure that purports to cost taxpayers nothing. The administration may push Fannie and Freddie to allow more homeowners to refinance at current very low mortgage interest rates. The measure might sound good in theory but will ultimately amount...

Washington -- Ending tax breaks for oil, corporate jets and hedge fund managers is nearly every Democrat's favorite way to reduce the federal debt. But one of the biggest tax breaks of all is heavily skewed to wealthy residents of San Francisco, San Jose and California's other upscale coastal cities. It's the mortgage interest deduction, and its benefits are heavily concentrated in a handful of pricey cities, none of which votes Republican. As the new super committee of Congress sets about finding another $1.5 trillion in deficit reduction by Thanksgiving, tax breaks of all kinds, including the interest deduction, are...

“Forgiving the student loan debt of all Americans will have an immediate stimulative effect on our economy. With the stroke of the President's pen, millions of Americans would suddenly have hundreds, or in some cases, thousands of extra dollars in their pockets each and every month with which to spend on ailing sectors of the economy. As consumer spending increases, businesses will begin to hire, jobs will be created and a new era of innovation, entrepreneurship and prosperity will be ushered in for all. A rising tide does, in fact, lift all boats - forgiving student loan debt, rather than...

The government on Friday sued 17 financial firms, including the largest U.S. banks, for selling Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac billions of dollars worth of mortgage-backed securities that turned toxic when the housing market collapsed. Among those targeted by the lawsuits were Bank of America Corp., Citigroup Inc., JP Morgan Chase & Co., and Goldman Sachs Group Inc. Large European banks including The Royal Bank of Scotland, Barclays Bank and Credit Suisse were also sued. The lawsuits were filed by the Federal Housing Finance Agency. It oversees Fannie and Freddie, the two agencies that buy mortgages loans and mortgage securities...

Is the Housing Crisis Making Americans Sicker? 8/30/2011 1:43:42 PM Is the housing crisis making Americans sicker? New economic research suggests just that. The research found a direct correlation between foreclosure rates and the health of residents. Mitra Kalita explains on Lunch Break

It sounds like an easy way to stimulate the economy: The government, working through mortgage finance companies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, could refinance millions of American homeowners’ loans at today’s rock-bottom interest rates and put more money in Americans’ pockets at a time when the economy is staggering. But doing so is more complicated than it sounds. Some economists have argued that the Obama administration should launch a massive refinance program, benefiting even those who aren’t actually applying. But that option appears to be impractical, analysts say, partly because investors in mortgage-backed securities could challenge the government’s right to...