February 22, 2010—As a first-time home buyer, Jessica Garcia was excited last April to officially begin her home search. She found a home within her price range, completed the lengthy paperwork and paid for the appraisals, only to later be told after four months that the deal would not close.Out of luck and out of […]
Archive for February, 2010
February 26, 2010—(MCT)—Sales of new U.S. homes plunged 11.2% in January 2010 to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 309,000, the lowest rate on record dating back to 1963, the Commerce Department recently reported.The third-straight drop in sales on a month-to-month basis was unexpected. “The housing market remains very, very distressed,” wrote Dan Greenhaus, chief […]
February 25, 2010—(MCT)—Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke told Congress recently that he expected the U.S. economic recovery to continue at a moderate pace,
February 20, 2010—Nationwide housing affordability, bolstered by favorable interest rates and low house prices, closed out the year near its highest level since the series was first compiled 18 years ago, according to the National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo Housing Opportunity Index (HOI).The HOI showed that 70.8% of all new and existing homes sold […]
February 18, 2010—American homeowners’ confidence in their own home’s value during the fourth quarter fell to the lowest level in seven quarters, with just one in five (20%) believing their own home’s value increased during 2009, according to the Zillow Q4 Homeowner Confidence Survey. In reality, 28% of homes increased in value during the year, […]
February 13, 2010—(MCT)-In a move that could speed the sale of massive numbers of distressed properties on the market, Miami-Dade County recently launched online bidding
February 11, 2010—RealtyTrac, one of the leading online marketplaces for foreclosure properties, released its January 2010 U.S. Foreclosure Market Report, which shows foreclosure filings—default notices, scheduled auctions and bank repossessions—were reported on 315,716 U.S. properties during the month, a decrease of nearly 10% from the previous month but still 15% above the level reported in […]
February 10, 2010—The Treasury Department and the Federal Reserve Board have been purchasing mortgage-back securities from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac for a little over a year now. Their efforts, along with the Home Buyer Tax Credit have helped bring down long-term interest rates and provide the housing industry with some much-needed price stabilization. In […]
Amid high unemployment and sliding home prices, a growing number of struggling consumers are doing what was once considered unthinkable: paying their credit card bills instead of their mortgages. A recent study developed by TransUnion found the percentage of Americans who were current on their credit cards but behind on their mortgage increased to 6.6 […]
February 8, 2010—The numbers don’t lie. The facts are clear, people are just not communicating verbally as frequently as they once did. Text messaging, e-mail, Internet and social networking sites are all so readily available to us through our beloved mobile devices that we don’t need to either. We can communicate with five people, in […]
