Please keep your house.
Please don't walk away.
Please buy a Toll Brothers McMansion.
Please do a cash-out refi and go to Best Buy.
Sincerely,
The Bankers Who Run the United States
A Rush Into Refinancing as Mortgage Rates Fall
The housing market may finally be getting some relief, with lower mortgage rates already encouraging refinancing and Treasury officials considering ways to entice new buyers.
Last week, the Federal Reserve announced that it would buy $500 billion in mortgage-backed securities guaranteed by Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and Ginnie Mae. Mortgage rates immediately dropped, and that led to a surge in mortgage refinancing activity for the week — even with the Thanksgiving holiday.
On Wednesday, people close to the discussions said that the Treasury had been talking with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac about ways to drive down mortgage rates to as low as 4.5 percent. That rate is about a percentage point lower than the going rates for such loans.
Posts
53 comments:
This will turn out to be nothing more than a cruel hoax. They will make these loans more impossible to get than the last foreclosure refinance rescue ruse. There is no interest in helping the common people. This is only being done to manipulate rates. It is bluster designed to sway markets. There is no other way for the rich elites to make a buck off of this.
I give up. I think I'll just refi, go on a meth binge, and give my children to the State to raise.
Your blog would be a lot more interesting if you quit congratulating yourself.
There are many of us who saw this coming. Some of us, including myself, even left the U.S. (in 2002 in my case).
Let your record speak for itself. Stop the "i told you so" routine and you'll become a lot more interesting.
Last anon, I realize you're brilliant, and thank you for your kind words.
And please show me where anyone predicted the government would offer 4% 30-year loans to stop the crash
Seemed like a pretty nutty idea when I wrote it up
And now, it's here
Next step.. the $10 trillion money bomb
These loans are nothing more than a subsidy. With money-printing inflation somewhere between 6% to 9%, people are making money from taking out a mortgage.
What makes mortgages so sacred? I need a car to get to work. If I can't work I can't contribute to the economy. Why can't the Fed give a 4% loan for that? What about student loans, or hospital bills, or funds to buy stocks or bonds? These are all are more deserving then a housing "investment."
Housing deserves no subsidy. It deserves to die you punk ass bitch Bernanke.
Well, 4% would be nice, but it only really matters if you plan on staying in the same place for the rest of your life, something fewer and fewer choose or have the choice of doing. Besides, as a % it will not drastically change how much you can afford to spend.
I heard about this plan on the radio today, and the saddest thing is that the whole purpose is so that people will then use that "savings" to buy stuff! God forbid you take the difference and hang on to it, why would you need to do that? These people still don't get it...
Being in the loan business, I can tell you this will benefit a few but it will not help all of the homeowners "upside down" on equity. It will not help those who now have bad credit and behind on payments. It will not help sell houses unless these loans are offered at 0 to 3% down.
All this is going to do is temporarily reinflate the very bubble that caused all of this mess.
OT: Huge news out of Bloomberg, Geithner May Seek to Push Bair Out After Clashes During Crisis
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/ne....Qbg& refer=home
I think that Bair has done the best job in the admin. Her ideas are better then his and she should not be pushed out.
This is an insane move on his part.
ella
It's very nice and all that the treasury is trying to stop the crash, but wait for people to try refinancing that turd of house that they are upside down 300k on. If in fact we see those rates they will have very limited effect on the housing market. With prices where they are at, most people can't afford to sell either.
At 4% I'm a taker...
All I need to do is find someone wanting to sell a $30,000 shack for $300,000 with a mere 90% cash back at close.
I'll need an appraiser, who did Casey use?
Keith,
I do recall you calling a bottom in the stock market about 4-5 months ago, and recommending AAPL around $130, and talking about gold being a good buy when it was $975 per ounce...
In all honesty, it's a terrible time to buy a house. What do people think will happen to prices when interest rates rise in a few years?
Oh, the humanity.
keyser soze
Anon said: "Some of us, including myself, even left the U.S. (in 2002 in my case)."
I left the US in 98. I was planning on going back in 09-- no longer the case for me. Not now!
In another thread there was talk about produce. Well, where I live now (Morocco), I just came back from the grocery store. Here's what I got for under $5:
- 1 kg of potatoes
- 1.5 kg of fresh tomatos
- 1 Kg of fresh bell peppers (red)
- .5 kg of fresh carrots
- 1 kg of onions
- 1 kg of juicy and sweet Moroccan oranges
- fresh mint, parsley, and corriander
1kg = approx 2.2 pounds
Where else can you beat this? Those food products are as fresh as in the farm and are mostly organic.
Need I go back home? What do you think?
Anonymous Anonymous said...
Your blog would be a lot more interesting if you quit congratulating yourself.
There are many of us who saw this coming. Some of us, including myself, even left the U.S. (in 2002 in my case).
Let your record speak for itself. Stop the "i told you so" routine and you'll become a lot more interesting.
December 4, 2008 10:29 AM
Sure Keith and a whole lot of people saw this coming. But we have a right to pat ourselves on the back every once in a while. I think the government will do even more crazy stuff to keep home prices way too high. But in the end a collapse is coming and deflation is heading our way. The longer we fight it, the worse it will get. There is no way we can inflate ourselves out of this bubble.
More paper on aisle 13, that printing press has run out of paper, that's aisle 13, hurry...
America is DOOMED.
DIE
Keith, please keep reminding me how right you have been. Due to being brought up in the baby boomer created age of information technology, I have the attention span of a 6 month old.
I'm also currently in the process of buying all my food for the next 50 years from Roccman, but I can't seem to find anywhere on his site to buy dehydrated and flash frozen granite countertops to eat all this stuff off of.
Sorry troll, never called bottom on the stock market
Did say go do your own research, stay away from the indexes, look for dividends, and if you have a 5-year plus time horizon, get buying
And I stick by that 100000%
And yes, I've picked up more AAPL
Never buy an over priced asset with cheap money.
It's ALWAYS better to buy an under priced asset with expensive money.
I will wait for the asset price to fall. I don't give a damn about interest rates - CASH IS KING!
Arent the Eurotards doing the same?
Why cant they be original, how come they copy every single thing we do?
What a bunch losers!
Why in the heck (excuse my French) are they talking about getting us back to the housing mania days and not the REAL economy!?!? How bout we stop outsourcing of highpaying white collar jobs to third world terrorist ridden nations? Hows that for starters? Then we can plug that giant sucking hole where our manuf jobs have been going for the last umpteen years? How bout that to "kickstart" the economy and not look back on our shameful ventures into bubble building which got us here in the first place?? How bout THAT, huh???
JDF
"It will not help those who now have bad credit and behind on payments. "
Good, exactly what I need to hear more of.
And what's going to happen when inflation gets out of control due to all the dollars floating around from this and the 20 other bailouts we've had this year? Interest rates will be like they were in the early 80's, and crash housing further.
Downward spiral
POST OF THE MONTH (So Far)
Ohio Loan Guy said...
Being in the loan business, I can tell you this will benefit a few but it will not help all of the homeowners "upside down" on equity. It will not help those who now have bad credit and behind on payments. It will not help sell houses unless these loans are offered at 0 to 3% down.
All this is going to do is temporarily reinflate the very bubble that caused all of this mess.
December 4, 2008 2:10 PM
Thank you for your post.
DIE U PIGS
Let your record speak for itself. Stop the "i told you so" routine and you'll become a lot more interesting.
At least this week he hasn't given himself credit for calling the Obama victory after it became obvious to everyone. At least not yet.
Anyway. What more do you want? This is what you might describe as a 'pretty good site'. `
4% interest will not save me at 35%underwater. So I am still walking. At zero down, no harm, no foul.
Why didn't the Government just open up a new lending operation 2 years ago ? The Feds/Government could of
put out loans at 4 % and stimulated
the buying of foreclosures . The government should of just let banks
and investors loan -modify if they wanted to and not get involved .
Yes of course the government should of shored up FDIC .
The government should of taken over Banks and either sold them or operate them until they can be sold . All the laws were already in place as to how to handle any kind of market contraction . The Bail-outs have created the log-jam in the market and now only the government will buy equities . Now the taxpayer is the buyer of low rated mortgages and junk paper as the Feds puts us into debt of 10 trillion when it all could of been done for about 2 trillion total .
why stop at 4%? I'm holding out for 2%
I don't see how 4% is cheaper than a neg-am. If you are underwater stop paying and hide your cash in the mattress.
Uh, I said Obama would win on a post on feb 10, 2007, when it seemed crazy that some young black guy could beat the clinton machine, and got beaten up for it pretty good for nearly two years.
Man, some of you are weird. That Obama pick was ballsy.
Oh, I won a nice chunk of change on Obama too. 100 to 1 longshots are fun when they hit. I'd like a few more of those. But I don't see the 49'ers winning the superbowl this year.
4% 30-year fixed, record inventory, prices down 50%
Come on... they're BEGGING us to buy homes!
Anyone tempted yet?
All this band-aid stuff won't work. I know that people have a short memory, but this meltdown will have a lasting impression and only crazy folks would want to buy anything for which they'd have to borrow money.
In a way, I am glad Dems won't have their filibuster-proof Senate. It's nauseating to see all those Dems in Congress on a stampede to show their eagerness to fork out taxpayers' money to failed corporations.
The majority of Americans is saying "let the Big Three go under," and even the MSM is now calling for a hands-off policy towards housing prices. But no one seems to be listening. Hello Obama! Hello Pelosi, Reid, Dodd and Frank! Anybody home?
Unfortunately, prices are not down 50% where I live. People continue to hold on to delusional prices.
(Desirable areas of southern ca.)
I would buy now if they were at 50% off, but they're not.
This reminds me of a slimey car dealer, who wants to sell you an overpriced crapmobiile, as long as you can afford the payment. The depreciations starts as soon as you drive it off the lot. There would be lots of takers, like there were when GM offered zero interest on the latest SUVs a few years ago.
Keith said: "Uh, I said Obama would win on a post on feb 10, 2007, when it seemed crazy that some young black guy could beat the clinton machine, and got beaten up for it pretty good for nearly two years".
Remember when I predicted that Keith would take credit for calling the Obama victory before the week ended? Well, right on schedule, it happened.
Further proof of builders giving a house away..go to this weekend's Eagles-Giants game, win a 300K house.. http://tinyurl.com/5c882k
I dunno, but it seems like it might be time to buy a house. (Don't hit me, Keith!)
Minimal interest rates, low home prices (made even lower by extreme lowball offers), lower heating costs, deflating dollar, worthless stock and 401k investments. It just seems like real estate might actually (dare I say it here?) be a good investment.....
It is in our best interest the home debtors stay in their homes. The government will try everything available to keep them from walking in masses. Can you imagine the consequences.
Sorry. This is the last straw for me. I've lost it.
Three points:
1) We've already committed $8 trillion to the bailouts and we are only getting started. At the end of the day, all of this money goes to bail out failed investors at public expense. This is not only the biggest theft in the history of mankind, but it is probably greater than the sum of all theft that has ever occured on this planet. Just think of it - in a few short months, these guys have stolen more money than has ever been stolen by all the criminals in history put together. Isn't it absolutely mind-boggling?
2) Considering almost all of this money in the end goes to bail out wealthy investors, shouldn't it end, FOR ALL TIME, complaints about liberal giveaways, welfare, unions, FDR's new deal, socialism, etc? All of that stuff is bad, but put it all together and it's still just a fart in a hurricane compared to this incomprehensibly large theft. The liberal crap isn't even worth a footnote in history anymore.
3) Isn't this the end of morality as we know it? Theft on a mind-boggling scale, millions involved in mortgage fraud, nothing but lies from all leaders, willful intent to wipe out savers and destroy savings (screw the elderly), and on and on. How can anyone feel even the slightest remorse at being dishonest anymore?
I'm sorry, my bad, I told you Obama would win in January 2007, before he even announced.
When are you people going to finally realize that I am from the future?
Looking back at this, pretty spooky I'd say...
http://housingpanic.blogspot.com/2007/01/ladies-and-gentlemen-next-president-of.html
January 16, 2007
Ladies and Gentlemen, the next President of the United States, Barack Obama
Like him or not, listen to this speech by Obama 'cause I think HP'ers have had enough too. Poor guy though, he'll have one hell of a mess on his hands in January 2009.
Hey, I'm just tellin' ya how it's gonna be.
Blogger keith said...
Sorry troll, never called bottom on the stock market
Did say go do your own research, stay away from the indexes, look for dividends, and if you have a 5-year plus time horizon, get buying
And I stick by that 100000%
And yes, I've picked up more AAPL
-------------
Keith, you still don't get it! There is no market, this phony economy is doomed. Stop preaching buy and wait 5 years, it isn't going to happen buddy, your lost on the fact that you thought the housing bubble would bring you a great buying opportunity. What you did not realize was how serious it was all going to turn out even for you!
Regarding the Obama call in January---Pretty God damn impressive Keith!
Keith said:
"When are you people going to finally realize that I am from the future?"
----
Seer! can you please help me find my f*cking specks?
Keith! Honestly, yo thuh man!
"What makes mortgages so sacred? I need a car to get to work. If I can't work I can't contribute to the economy. Why can't the Fed give a 4% loan for that? What about student loans, or hospital bills, or funds to buy stocks or bonds? These are all are more deserving then a housing "investment."
Housing deserves no subsidy. It deserves to die you punk ass bitch Bernanke."
Hey idiot, apparently you must live under a bridge, because the last time I checked you may need a garage or land to park that car, the college needs a campus to locate on, and the Hospital needs a place to build - the hospital.
Real Estate is the foundation of this economy - like it or not. If you kill Real Estate you are killing everything else. Or has the last two years not been a clear enough indication of that.
This is a psycological war now. The confidence has to return, and as long as the deflationary spiral continues in Real Estate, then the rest of the economy - including your job and livelihood are at risk. This program would be a subsidy to get the momentum to slow to the downside and STABILIZE the system. It is not a permanent price control. There has to be something to equalize the fear of purchase and fear of lending. This is just as much of a bubble as the boom was, just in the opposite direction. Emotion is causing improper pricing to the downside as an opposite reaction to emotional improper pricing to the upside. Get a clue before making a stupid statement like that. YOU are EXACTLY the problem with America, too much emotional ignorance, not enough education.
The government is hell-bent on keeping the bubble game going. The US needs bubbles because it's in bubble cycles that the powerful makes money and the sucker loses.Invariably, bubbles help propel the rich and drown the poor.
The 4% mortgage interest is the right recipe for more bubbles to form. It was GreenSpam who created the previous bubbles by discouraging Americans from saving and pushing them to leveraging in order to buy and buy and buy again.
The excess liquidity that we'll have due to bailout money and low interest rates will kill whatever hope we have in saving money. It will instead push consumers' debt to the roof. Investment opportunities will become scarce again and prices of anything of value will skyrocket, creating more and more artificially inflated assets and ultimately newer bubbles.
Makes you want to spend the rest of your life inside a bubble!
Dr. Hux (loved the show by the way) - mind you that that was January 2007, not 2008
How did I know Obama was going to win?
Because I knew how bad it would be by November 2008, that the housing crash would be the #1 issue far and away, and not Iraq that every tom dick and harry was running on.
And that Americans would be ready for a candidate selling hope again.
Obama took a page out of Reagan's playbook and won with it.
Now let's see if he can deliver the goods
I believe he will.
First step - restore confidence. How do you do that?
Arrest Angelo Mozilo.
They want to entice new buyers? Three words:
LOWER THE PRICES!!!!!!!!!!!
Until ordinary workers can buy homes the system is stuck.
"Why didn't the Government just open up a new lending operation 2 years ago ? The Feds/Government could of
put out loans at 4 % and stimulated
the buying of foreclosures . The government should of just let banks
and investors loan -modify if they wanted to and not get involved .
Yes of course the government should of shored up FDIC .
The government should of taken over Banks and either sold them or operate them until they can be sold . All the laws were already in place as to how to handle any kind of market contraction . The Bail-outs have created the log-jam in the market and now only the government will buy equities . Now the taxpayer is the buyer of low rated mortgages and junk paper as the Feds puts us into debt of 10 trillion when it all could of been done for about 2 trillion total ."
Well, the answer hear is simple - Bush and his stupid ideological cronies. They want free markets until they see the free market is out of "their" control. 4 years ago, when everyone saw the slackened regulations - the GOP slackened - were causing a bubble in housing, these idiots told people to get adjustable rate suicide mortgages to afford the home instead of regulating the banks' use of derivatives, leverage and packaging mortgages. That was the "free market" to these fools. God forbid housing prices come back down to the levels of a 30 year mortgage with 20% down.
Then 1 year ago, when they saw that their mistake was causing havoc, they talked about "moral hazard" of helping homeowners and modifying mortgages to keep people from foreclosing. Forget the fact that would have saved us taxpayors 4 Trillion in stupid bailouts - but we had no "moral hazard" so the "free market" was working for these idiots. Now that the whole system is in complete free fall, NOW they have thrown all that "free market" and "moral hazard" crap to the wind anyway, and it is now costing us 10X as much - with limited results. Years late, 7 Trillion and counting short. Back then the "moral hazard" would have been necessary for maybe 500000 people. Big problem, but contained. Now you have so much job loss and wealth destruction, that even the people that could afford their mortgage are losing their jobs and defaulting anyway. What you refer to above would be considered thinking ahead, leadership and damage control. As was clearly the case with Katrina, Iraq, Afghanistan, Enron and now this mess, that is something this group of morons has never subscribed to.
Keith, since you can obviously see very clearly into the future, can you tell us what gas prices will do next year? Rise, fall, fluctuate wildly?
I want to get a mortgage this year, but I have some funky stuff on my credit report and am not that great on paper. Will all of this 'mortgage help' actually improve my chances of getting a mortgage this year?
Blogger keith said...
Dr. Hux (loved the show by the way) - mind you that that was January 2007, not 2008
How did I know Obama was going to win?
Because I knew how bad it would be by November 2008, that the housing crash would be the #1 issue far and away, and not Iraq that every tom dick and harry was running on.
And that Americans would be ready for a candidate selling hope again.
Obama took a page out of Reagan's playbook and won with it.
Now let's see if he can deliver the goods
I believe he will.
First step - restore confidence. How do you do that?
Arrest Angelo Mozilo.
--------
Deliver the goods? Are you joking? He will deliver more tax and spending, Obama is a pleaser not a leader!
Anonymous Anonymous said...
They want to entice new buyers? Three words:
LOWER THE PRICES!!!!!!!!!!!
-------------------
NO WAY!
I'm gonna buy me a pony!
Helo Ben is out to drive all savers into spending ever last cent to increase velocity. At the expense of the middle class, the milking of America is complete. This plays like the Robocop movie where the govt is run by business.
Incredible
.
I don't care about the low interest rate!
It could be 0% for all I care!
When the purchase price is 3 times what it should be...the interest rate becomes an incentive?
LOWER THE F**KING PRICE!
.
If the down payment needs to be 20%, the lower rate will do next to nothing. There just aren't enough people who can put 20% down to make much of an impact ... even if they all jumped off the fence at the same time. When these idiots get around to figuring this out are they going to try to loosen the lending standards and down payment amount as well?
Post a Comment