A report from Bloomberg. "It turns out that even the well-off need help in a housing market as crazy as the one in the San Francisco Bay area, and lenders are elbowing each other in a rush to provide it. They’re courting Silicon Valley workers with tailored loans, guaranteed 24-hour approval and financial-planning services. Social Finance Inc. has deals with Google and other top technology companies that allow it to market to new hires. First Republic Bank -- which gave Facebook Inc. billionaire Mark Zuckerberg a 1.05 percent interest-rate mortgage -- has opened branches in Facebook and Twitter Inc. headquarters. San Francisco Federal Credit Union will finance 100 percent of houses costing up to $2 million."

"For many, it’s not home values that keep them in rentals but alarming down payments, which can be more than the cost of the average U.S. house: $187,000. That’s where San Francisco Federal Credit Union comes in. It started offering zero-down loans in December to people who work in San Francisco or San Mateo County. The credit union has more than $100 million pre-approved for 30-year adjustable-rate mortgages in what’s called the Proud Ownership Purchase Program for You."

"As the tech boom starts to show signs of cracks, there’s some concern that high loan-to-value mortgages are dangerous. Silicon Valley venture-capital funding fell 20 percent in the second quarter from a year earlier, according to a report by PricewaterhouseCoopers and the National Venture Capital Association. New companies are staying private longer, leaving fewer options for shareholders to cash out."

"The median San Francisco condo price rose less than 1 percent in the second quarter after an 18 percent increase a year earlier, data from Paragon Real Estate Group show. Inventories of condos listed at $2 million or more jumped 44 percent -- but the number sold fell 30 percent."

"'Lenders get so caught up trying to stay competitive and finding a market edge, they basically allow greed to overcome common sense,' says Terry Wakefield, a mortgage consultant who co-founded one of the first online direct lenders in 1998. 'Easy money does fuel and accelerate the inevitable bubble.'"

"And the notion of 100-percent financing makes some in the industry nervous. 'Given what we went through in 2008, zero-down financing is suicidal for our country,' says Chuck Green, CEO of Bay Area Captial Funding Inc., a mortgage brokerage that offers loans from about 40 different companies. 'We have to learn from our mistakes.'"