The Housing Bubble

The Pittsburg Tribune Review reports from Pennsylvania. “Teresa Hunt worries she’ll have to quit school if she doesn’t find ways to supplement her mortgage payments. She wants to offer discounted rent to someone who would watch her children a few days a week. Hunt, of Beechview lost her job in real estate a year ago and is taking night classes at Community College of Allegheny County to earn a paralegal degree. Hunt would convert part of her large downstairs family room into his or her living quarters.”

“‘It’s really just to help out,’ she said. ‘I need to do something to bring income into the house.’”

“A growing number of single parents and families such as Hunt are starting to take in boarders to help pay mortgages, prevent foreclosure and ease living costs, housing and financial experts say.”

“Randi Lowe, client relations manager for the Pittsburgh Community Reinvestment Group, cautions that what has happened with the real estate market — lower property values and a backlog of homes for sale — could continue ‘for another year or two,’ and she predicts, ‘A lot of people are going to get rolled over in the process.’”

The Associated Press on Pennsylvania. “During the housing boom, liar loans were especially popular among investors seeking to flip properties quickly. ‘Everybody drank the Kool-Aid’ said David Zugheri, co-founder of First Houston Mortgage. They knew if they didn’t give the borrower the loan they wanted, the borrower ‘could go down the street and get that loan somewhere else.’”

“While some borrowers were aware of their risky features and used them to gamble on their home’s value or pull out money for vacations, others like Salvatore Fucile insist they were victims of predatory lending.”

“Fucile, who is 82, and his wife, wound up in an option ARM from IndyMac after consolidating two mortgages on their suburban Philadelphia home. Fucile was attracted by the low monthly payments, but says the mortgage broker who signed him up for the loan didn’t tell him the principal balance could increase. It has risen about $24,000 to $276,000.”

“‘He put me in a bad position,’ said Fucile, who fears he will be forced into foreclosure. ‘He misled me.’”

The Pocono Record from Pennsylvania. “Current estimates show Monroe County’s population growth between 2000 and 2007, while slowing slightly, still increased by 19 percent to 164,722 residents. The median cost of a home in Monroe County in 2007 was $204,734. That was an increase of 95 percent since 2002, when the median cost was $105,125.”

“Nationally, median cost of a home in 2007 was $219,000. That’s 43 percent higher than 2002. The mortgage crisis this year hit the housing market hard. Prices in Monroe County fell by 9 percent to $186,541 through July.”

“Connie Foland’s been in the real estate business for 22 years. Foland thinks the growth over the past 20 years is partially a rebounding effect from a slowdown in 1988. ‘Our prices haven’t jumped up to the way New York and New Jersey have come up,’ she said.”

“And Foland said sellers know who their market is. ‘Every time I list a house, the seller would say, ‘Make sure you list the house in New York and New Jersey, because the people here wouldn’t buy our house.’ In 22 years, I’ve only sold one house to a local person. Everyone else is from New York and New Jersey.’”

“Foland warned that the influx has probably saved the local market. ‘Without the people here, we’d be in the crapper. There are not enough local people to buy houses,’ she said.”

The Frederick News Post from Maryland. “A new report shows 114 foreclosures in Frederick County in July, but another factor could double that number. Wayne Six, of Six and Associates, said Thursday that short sales, if accounted for in what he calls ‘desperation sales,’ could mean twice the number of homes sold under duress.”

“Six, an appraiser, said the foreclosure market affects neighborhoods differently. ‘It is the new subdivisions, those built in 2005 or since, that are being hammered,’ Six said.”

“That’s where buyers were lining up to purchase homes at soaring prices, many anticipating ‘flipping’ them in a few years — selling at a substantial profit. Now they find themselves owning homes worth less than what they owe on them.”

“Some neighborhoods are seeing as much as 80 percent of the homes facing foreclosure, Six said. ‘Right now, lenders are conservative. They want more down, higher credit scores. They realize now that they screwed up when the market was rolling. They were offering 100 percent financing, it was a feeding frenzy. If a bank didn’t offer 100 percent financing, another one would,’ Six said.”

“‘We knew it was coming. It was like watching a storm on the Weather Channel moving your way,’ he said.”

The Washington Independent. “At The Barber’s Chair, in the small, quiet community of Accokeek at the far end of Prince George’s County, Md., the talk often turns to the foreclosure crisis. With locals constantly in and out, Leo Harrington, the owner, hears it all.”

“How people who bought homes once valued at $800,000 down the the road at upscale subdivisions like The Preserves or at the one- and two-acre homesites of St. James have friends and relatives living in their basements to help pay the mortgage.”

“‘A lot of people moved out here from the District because they wanted to be in the ‘burbs and raise their kids here,” said Harrington. ‘You find you can get a bigger house that’s in pretty close, and a yard. But there were all these predatory loans. That’s all it was. They didn’t realize how the loans worked because when folks are lying to you, you don’t know any better. Then, when they find out they are in trouble, they start to panic, and they end up losing their homes.’”

The Loudon Times from Virginia. “Loudoun in July saw a 54 percent increase in foreclosure filings from the same month in 2007, according to RealtyTrac. The county had the second highest rate of foreclosure filings in Virginia last month.”

“In July, according to a report by the Virginia Association of Realtors, the number of homes sold in Loudoun rose 7 percent during the second quarter of 2008 from the same period last year. The average sale price, however, was down 20 percent.”

“‘The sheer number of foreclosures continues to put downward pressure on prices,’ authors of the study wrote, ‘but they also bring new home buyers into the market.’”

The Times Dispatch from Virginia. “About 630 people, mostly from the Richmond area, are transferring with Wachovia Securities to St. Louis. Hundreds of extra houses have been put up for sale in an already slow real estate market, adding to inventory levels and pushing prices down.”

“‘We’re spoiled a little bit, because we haven’t had many corporations move out,’ said Bill White, ormer president of the Richmond Association of Realtors.”

“Houses for sale by Wachovia employees range from the $200,000s to more than $1 million, agents said. The company is aggressive about pricing and moving houses, sending relocation specialists to meet with homeowners and requiring price reductions periodically.”

“If a house doesn’t sell within 120 days, the company will buy it back at a predetermined price and try to move it as fast as possible.”

“One house in Wachovia’s corporate inventory, at 6104 Warbler Way in Wyndham, was listed in mid-March for $725,000. ‘I thought it was a competitive price when we put it on the market,’ said Will Hamnett, an agent who listed the property.”

“The buyout — what the owner received — was $674,500. The corporate-owned house is on the market now for $595,000.”

“‘It’s an unbiased eye to the market — exactly what the market is telling us,’ said Adrienne Chappell, (who) is the agent on four corporate-owned properties, primarily in the West End. ‘You go by facts and figures, pure data on what a house would sell for.’”

The Chesterfield Observer from Virginia. “Local real estate guru Cecil Sears, was part of a panel discussion put on by the Home Building Association of Richmond last Wednesday. Compared to the other panel members, he was uplifting, though he chided builders for creating part of their problem.”

“Pointing to the hefty prices for new homes, he said, ‘The builders have left the buyers.’”

“Several on the panel referred to the national media, laying some of the blame at the feet of the Richmond Times-Dispatch, other daily newspapers and television news. The media, they indicated, reported the worst declines in Nevada, California and Florida, leaving the impression that Richmond also suffered from much lower sale prices and high foreclosure rates.”

“‘All real estate is local with national influences,’ offered Bill White, owner of Joyner Fine Properties. ‘Richmond didn’t have the run-up [in sales prices as other markets did] - particularly second home markets.’”

“But the rebound here and nationwide is likely to be held back by tightening regulatory scrutiny. ‘They want us to provide more equity in our loans [to builders] and properly assess our risk rating of our loan portfolios,’ Bonnie Agee, who handles single-family home construction loans for Fulton Bank, told the group. ‘Regulators are strictly adhering to regulation guidelines.’”

“A year ago, homebuyers with a credit score of 740 could get a 100 percent loan, but that’s not likely today, according to Steve Mills with Wells Fargo Home Mortgage. ‘We all have to pay for Nevada, California and Florida.’”

“The ability to get a mortgage loan will be influenced by where you live. There have been fewer foreclosures in Chesterfield County compared to Richmond and Henrico County, so that helps. Northern Virginia and Virginia Beach are problem areas, and Fredericksburg is rated as ‘declining and depressed.’”

“‘The underwriters of loans are making few exceptions,’ said Mills.”

The Journal Now from North Carolina. “The Triad has been spared the worst of the national housing crisis. But there’s little doubt these days that a credit crunch has taken up residence in the region and that financial institutions, real-estate developers and consumers are increasingly feeling the pinch.’

“The most visible sign can be found in most communities — new residential neighborhoods stuck in neutral or worse for months, with empty lots outnumbering newly built homes.”

“Most banks serving the Triad raised their provision for loan losses during the second quarter, reflecting that late payments and delinquencies are chipping away at their profits. At some banks, the higher provision contributed to a quarterly loss.”

“‘There are challenges that our company and our industry are facing which are new to us all,’ said Swope Montgomery Jr., CEO of BNC Bancorp, the holding company for Bank of North Carolina.”

“‘My fear is that the entire economy is broken, particularly at the national level, but it’s affecting us in the Carolinas, too,’ said Tony Plath, a finance professor at UNC Charlotte. ‘We’re seeing a more significant impact on commercial-loan quality and local real-estate values than I’d originally hoped we’d see.’”

“Real-estate developers are having trouble selling homes they’ve already built, and some have fallen significantly behind on loan payments.”

“Pierce Homes of Carolina Inc. is the biggest example to date. The company announced earlier this month that it was shutting down ‘as a direct result of the ongoing crisis in the housing and financial industries.’ The company had been a major land developer and home builder in the Triad.”

“Among those affected by Pierce’s decision is BNC Bancorp. The bank said in its second-quarter earnings report that it had to place ‘one large residential construction and development relationship of $4.5 million’ as a nonperforming asset.”

“‘They took out a considerable amount of loans, not just with us, to buy a lot of land in recent years at what they thought was a good price. They put in sewer and utilities and prepared the lots to develop for themselves or sell to other developers,’ Montgomery said. ‘When the slowdown hit, they had little maneuvering room left.’”

“Bank of the Carolinas said that its nonperforming assets reached $14.4 million on June 30 — representing about 3.6 percent of its outstanding loans, or what the bank called ‘a historically high level.’”

“A decision by Southern Community to raise its provision for loan losses to $3.5 million from $600,000 represented 7 cents of the 8-cent decline in diluted earnings to 3 cents. Its nonperforming assets were at $14.2 million, compared with $2.2 million a year ago.”

“‘In the majority of these cases, these real-estate loans were good loans when they were written,’ said Scott Bauer, CEO of Southern Community. ‘They became negative loans because good home builders are having a rough time in the economic slowdown.’”

“‘There’s no question that we had too much residential expansion from 2002 to 2006, with mortgages being given to homeowners who didn’t have the financial resources to maintain the loan when their adjustable-rate mortgage rose,’ said Michael Clapp, a local commercial real-estate analyst. ‘The local housing market is paying the price for that lending binge that’s likely to carry into 2010, and likely lead to more home builders going out of business.’”

“Plath, the UNC Charlotte finance professor, cautioned that the local banking market is likely to get worse before it gets better. ‘I hope it’s idiosyncratic (one or two loans) rather than systemic — a slowing economy that diminishes overall credit quality,’ Plath said. ‘It is a lot easier to fix a few problem loans than it is to fix the entire economy.’”