Masters of the Universe category archive

New way for foreclosures set to hit the market.

Foreclosure filings picked up in Hampton Roads for the third consecutive month in February as lenders repossessed and auctioned an increasing number of homes with delinquent loans, according to a report to be released today.

Lenders issued 929 foreclosure-related notices last month, up 12 percent from the 826 issued in January but down 19 percent from the 1,149 reported in February 2011, according to RealtyTrac, a foreclosure-monitoring service based in Irvine, Calif.

Meanwhile, on the nation stage, a small setback for the foreclosers, but a rebound is predicted:

U.S. banks slowed foreclosures for more than a year as attorneys general in all 50 states investigated charges of shoddy and incomplete paperwork used to repossess homes. A $25 billion settlement with the five largest lenders, announced Feb. 9, removed some barriers to property seizures and provided a “clear road map” for future actions, Brandon Moore, RealtyTrac’s chief executive officer, said in the statement.

“February’s numbers point to a gradually rising foreclosure tide,” Moore said. “That should result in more states posting annual increases in the coming months.”

Wall Street’s wizardy continues to weave its spell:

Yet prices continued their downward march. The median price was $170,000 in February, up slightly from January but 8.1 percent lower than a year earlier, the local listing service reported.

Last month marked the 15th consecutive month of year-over-year declines in median existing home prices.

Increases in the sales volume can be attributed in part to distressed sales, which have played a major role in Hampton Roads in the past year. Last month, foreclosures and sales by homeowners whose homes were worth less than their mortgage balances – known as short sales – accounted for 36 percent of all sales.

One would think that the supply of failed banks would eventually dry up, wouldn’t one?

One would be in error:

New City Bank, Chicago, Illinois

And the digit counters fall. Tonight’s list of banks no more:

Home Savings of America, Little Falls, Minnesota

Central Bank of Georgia, Ellaville, Georgia

Follow the money:

Aside:

In the case of Mitt the Flip, it not only talks, it bores.

Via Bob Cesca’s Awesome Blog.

It would appear that it’s not a crime if a bank does it. Earl Blumenauer considers this at sfgate dot com (emphasis added):

It’s a curious and unfair system that homeowners face, with those in debt expected to meet the original terms of their mortgage loan even as we’re seeing a cavalcade of misdeeds, shortcuts and in some cases outright fraud by their lenders. Nowhere is this pattern clearer than in Thursday’s report from San Francisco auditors that 84 percent of foreclosures examined contained at least one violation of the law by the foreclosing party.

The report is only the latest in a series of incidents involving bad actors in the foreclosure crisis. Last year, I called for a moratorium on home foreclosures after Bank of America, JP Morgan Chase and Wells Fargo signed affidavits initiating foreclosure against borrowers without verifying the information they contained. In fact, problems have been so rampant that banks now require many buyers of foreclosed homes to sign contracts absolving the bank of liability should irregularities appear with the original foreclosure.

How is this not indemnifying themselves against being charged with fraud?

Atrios points out the obvious, so obvious it hardly ever gets mentioned.

The Greece bailout is not a bailout of Greece, it is a bailout of the banks who lent them money.

Bankstering is never having to say you’re sorry.

Charlie Booker wonders what bankster bonus babies actually do for all that money. A nugget:

. . . it may be tasteless when a rapper pops up on MTV wearing so much bling he might as well have dipped himself in glue and jumped into a treasure chest full of vajazzling crystals, but at least you understand how he earned it.

RBS boss Stephen Hester, meanwhile, earns more than a million pounds for performing enigmatic actions behind the scenes at a publicly owned bank. And on top of his huge wage, he was in line for a massive bonus. To most people, that’s downright cheeky: like a man getting a (serviced–ed.) from your spouse while asking you to make him a cup of tea.

Foreclosures help you get back in touch with nature:

Like many of their neighbors, Barbara and Julio de Jesus say they’re sick of walking past the enormous excavation that’s filled with trash, abandoned rebar, and pools of stagnant water so huge they’re home to schools of fish.

(snip)

The property, which is under foreclosure, is perhaps one of the most spectacular examples of blight caused by the collapse of Miami’s real estate market. But it’s not the only one.

Foreclosures still going strong:

January marked the 14th consecutive month of year-over-year declines in median home prices (in My Local Area–ed.), and it was the lowest since May 2004, when the median price was $155,000, according to the report and figures compiled by economists at Old Dominion University.

“Prices are falling not just at the lower end, but prices have decreased in almost all price ranges,” said Vinod Agarwal, an economist at the university.

Despite the steadily declining number of homes on the market, sales of foreclosures and distressed properties are driving prices down across the region, Agarwal said. Such sales accounted for 37 percent of all sales across Hampton Roads last month.

If I had sold (in)securities that were made up out of thin air liberally mixed with whole cloth, or if I had had unnamed third parties sign my name to applications for mortgages, loans, and other legal papers, then failed to have them legally filed, I would be in the pokey.

We’ve gone from “Too big to fail” to “Too big to jail.”

From the website:

In 2008, Arturo de los Santos, a former Marine who lives with his wife and four children in Riverside, CA, fell victim to the economic crash caused by the greed of those on Wall Street. Like millions of Americans, he faced the prospect of mortgage default. Arturo was then encouraged by JPMorgan Chase & Co. to deliberately fall behind on his payments in order to modify his loan.

Then, natch, the bank foreclosed.

It’s the best catch there is.

MarketWatch explains why banks are starting to embrace short sales, after resisting them since the bottom fell out of their mortgage Ponzi scheme:

But the changing economics of the mortgage market has made banks such as Citigroup Inc., J.P. Morgan Chase & Co., and Wells Fargo & Co. impatient. Eager to clear inventory off their books, banks are agreeing to short sales, but offering incentives to borrowers, according to Bloomberg.

And it’s about time. After all, the economics of short sales work. Bank losses on such deals are 15% lower than on typical foreclosures and short sales are quicker, according to Moody’s. Now, one out of every three homes facing foreclosure is in a short sale process, up from one in four a year ago.

It takes financial geniuses with MBAs four years to realize that some money is better than no money.

Thom Hartmann demonstrates:

True colors.

From Bloomberg (hardly a font of leftie propaganda):

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s statement that the “very poor” don’t concern him comes at a time when the portion of Americans living in deep poverty is the highest in more than a generation while assistance varies widely and is often inadequate.

Click to read the rest.

Der Spiegel reports that the current killer cold wave in Europe has a corporate sponsor–the manufacturers of the German version of the Mini Cooper:

It’s a simple process — you can go online and sponsor a high for €299 ($394) or a low for €199 ($262), with the difference in price due to the fact that high pressure systems stay on the weather map for longer. The sponsor puts forward a name which must be acknowledged by the German registry office as an acceptable first name. Hyphenated names and special characters (barring German umlauts) are banned. That means company or product names are only accepted if they are also first names, as is the case with Minnie and Cooper. The sponsor also receives detailed material, including weather maps, charting the “life story” of the weather system.

Now that’s cold.

Via Political Prof.

Via Bob Cesca’s Awesome Blog.

Thom Hartmann discusses Bank of America’s gag response. From the blurb:

According to BusinessWeek, Bank of America is pushing back when offering loan modifications to people who are complaining publicly. The catch is the borrower must stay quiet and remove any previous criticisms of the bank from public records, like tweets or facebook.