What is the best way to get the US real estate market / economy going? A) lower interest rates to 4.5% for new / first-time homebuyers (Ben Bernanke’s plan) B) lower interest rates to 3.0% for those facing foreclosure (at least three-months behind in payments) (Sheila Blair’s plan) C) wait until home prices drop enough [...]

You might think that the foreclosure crisis is mainly hitting innocent people taken advantage of by unscrupulous lenders. Truth is, the reality is a lot more complex. in an article in this week’s Dorchester Reporter, Chris Lovett reports that many homes in Boston’s Dorchester and Roxbury neighborhoods appear to have been bought by speculators and [...]

How do you help a homeowner who can’t keep up his or her payments on a home loan? You find him or her another loan, is what you do. So that the borrower can default on that loan, too. At least that’s what pessimists are saying will happen following Congressional approval of the new “housing [...]

The Senate and the House of Representatives appear close to approving a $300 billion government rescue plan to help homeowners facing foreclosure. Lou Barnes seems a bit skeptical about it: Then there is this week’s housing bill. Barney Frank and Chris Dodd’s egomaniacal dream is going to fall flatter than Phoenix vacant land, so flat [...]

Great news! Foreclosure activity in Massachusetts has ground to a halt! Petitions to foreclose in the Bay State dropped precipitously in May after 28 months of steady increases. Massachusetts Land Court recorded 390 foreclosure petitions in May, about one-tenth of the 3,327 petitions filed the month before, according to statistics from The Warren Group, Banker [...]

The Federal Reserve Bank of Boston has put together a fantastic interactive map of foreclosures and subprime loan information covering each city and town in the Commonwealth over the past two decades (thanks to the Boston.com real estate blog for the heads-up). I transferred the data for Boston to a table, below. Fascinating information. Compare [...]

The Boston Fed has released details of a study where it found that the majority of homeowners who are entering into foreclosure had “prime” loans, but encountered difficulty only after refinancing their homes, sometimes more than once, increasing their loan balances over the past several years. When they couldn’t pay their loans anymore, they had [...]

Jiminy Cricket! No doubt, a victim of predatory lending? The Sacramento home of Rep. Laura Richardson was sold in a public auction two weeks ago for $388,000. The Southern California Democrat bought the house for $535,000 with no money down in January 2007 and owed nearly $575,000 to Washington Mutual when the mortgage was sold [...]

I don’t know if this is apocryphal and/or anecdotal, but disturbing, nonetheless. Squatters are moving into foreclosed homes and posing as tenants so they can live in comfort until the bank either goes through the eviction process or bribes them to leave. In a process known as “cash for key,” the squatters call the bank [...]

A story that will at times bring you to tears of sympathy while also leading you to shout out in anger. From the Journal: The Borrowers: Sherrie Floyd, 44, a clerical assistant at the Kaiser Foundation, and her husband, Kevin Floyd, 45, a truck driver in Vallejo, Calif. The House: In June 1995, the Floyds [...]