Like we have always said on this blog, "We'll smile about housing when either Ivy Zelman or www.housingdoom.com tells us it is time to smile." They are not smiling at Housing Doom.
There's a whole lot of foreclosures in the pipeline. Banks and servicers are simply holding them back and praying that Glinda The Good Witch of the North shows up and makes serious delinquent borrowers current again. Yesterday, it was brought to light by Fitch (via Clusterstock , via Calculated Risk) that cure rates for prime mortgage loans (curing is when a delinquent borrower is able to bring himself current) has fallen from 45% during the period 2000-2006, to 6%!!!! Prime mortgage delinquencies clocked a rate of approximately 5% in the second quarter. I have a strong feeling that that percentage has only increased in the third quarter.
Anyway, here's the piece from Housing Doom. Case-Shiller Not Looking As Dismal - For Now
Jesus Glen!
Posted by: Eric | August 26, 2009 at 09:44 PM
yikes glenn
Posted by: fletch | August 26, 2009 at 09:22 PM
Fannie and Freddie are trying a trial in FL where they are skipping the foreclosure process, no credit hit in exchange for people releasing the property.
Here is the hitch though. The homeowner can stay in the house for as long as it take them to sell it but...they are going to enter the homes in the MLS at the BPO but not as a short sale.
Can you say drop all legitimate real estate value another 20%...nice and oh yeah they won't have to report the foreclosures...
aye yi yi...
Posted by: glenn | August 26, 2009 at 09:07 PM
Trader Mortgage is right. Anyone looking at a loan transition matrix sees the pipe-line backing up. Also a large number of sales are distressed sales of one form or another if not outright foreclosure. And the jumbo market is still frozen. These stories of housing coming back are premature. Someday yes, but not now...
Posted by: anon | August 25, 2009 at 06:03 PM
"Like we have always said on this blog, "We'll smile about housing when either Ivy Zelman or www.housingdoom.com tells us it is time to smile." They are not smiling at Housing Doom."
They will never smile at housing doom. They have never even HINTED at the idea this or any other data point MAY be a sign of a turnaround. Instead, every bit of good news is either ignored or explained as a temporary thing on our way to a new even lower level of hell.
When the turnaround occurrrs, (either now or 10 years from now) housing doom will not call it. A 10, 15, or 20% move up will always be a dead cat bounce or a false bottom. By the time they call it, the bottom will be long gone, and they will have no one to blame for their willful blindness but themselves.
Posted by: Liar Loan | August 25, 2009 at 05:16 PM
I think I compared it last week to shoveling the driveway in the middle of a blizzard.
Posted by: eric | August 25, 2009 at 03:22 PM
As a trader of mortgage securities I could have told you that the pipeline is HUGE and in no way has it been paired down. Not only that, these loans have become more and more adversely selected.
Posted by: S-dog | August 25, 2009 at 02:54 PM
We claim Santa Claus as our own, but I don't know about Glinda. On the other hand, the Governor of the Bank of Canada is an old Goldman Sachs type. Maybe he can send down some of the munchkins from from BMO or RBC.
http://www.bank-banque-canada.ca/en/bios/carney.html
Posted by: John McLeod | August 25, 2009 at 02:14 PM