Mortgages Blog

Want to know when interest rates will rise? The Fed will let you know beforehand. From now on, each member of the Federal Open Market Committee will tell us his or her rate forecast for the fourth quarter of the year and for the next few calendar years, when the Fed publishes its economic projections.

If you’re still waiting to refinance, now may the time to snag the best deals. Not only are mortgage rates at near-30-year lows, but applications for refinances are down, prompting some banks to seek ways to encourage homeowners to get off the fence. The Wall Street Journal reports that many smaller and regional banks are

Should the banks that helped create the foreclosure crisis now be allowed to profit from it by renting out foreclosed homes? That’s the question being asked in response to a Bloomberg report last week that several major financial and investment companies have proposed just such a solution to the Federal Housing Finance Agency. The FHFA

Fasten your seatbelts for another “bumpy ride” in the housing market next year, says Freddie Mac’s chief economist Frank Nothaft. The mortgage company, now administered by the government along with Fannie Mae, published its outlook for 2012. While mortgage rates are projected to remain at record lows at least through the middle of the year,

Retirees planning to move into continuing care communities are getting some help selling their existing home from an unexpected ally. Retirement communities eager to attract residents have come up with a variety of solutions in the sluggish housing market, according to the Wall Street Journal. Communities are offering home-staging services, no interest bridge loans, reduced

The overstatement of existing home sales by the National Association of Realtors, NAR, may have caused a setback to the speed of a housing recovery. Errors that began in 2007 and accumulated through the housing bust mean that home sales were actually 14.3 percent worse than reported by the NAR. Builders rely on the data

Is now the time to buy a home? Most prospective homebuyers think so, according to a recent study conducted by Gary V. Engelhardt, a professor at Syracuse University. Despite high unemployment and slow economic growth, about 80 percent of Americans believe now is a good time to buy a home, shows the study, titled “The

Finally someone is feeling optimistic about home sales. Builder sentiment rose for the third straight month, according to the December survey by National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo. It’s the first consecutive, three-month upswing since 2009 and is considered a “legitimate, though slowly emerging upward trend,” according to David Crowe, chief economist at National Association

Forget for the time being all the Three Stooges document-fumbling surrounding the housing collapse. Set aside the obvious malfeasance of robosigning and rocket dockets. The question on the table now is, were America’s largest mortgage lenders stealing homes? The recent lawsuit filed by Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley against five of the nation’s largest banks

Troubles continue to plague Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the giant mortgage companies that were taken over by the government in 2008 and bailed out by taxpayers. The Securities and Exchange Commission, or SEC, sued three former executives at each of the two companies, including the former CEOs, charging them with misrepresenting the amount of