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Bernanke on QE continuance and MBS Purchases:

(QE must continue … or else)  Bernanke signals Fed to maintain stimulus efforts – Bernanke warns that premature ending of Fed’s stimulus efforts would carry substantial risks - By Martin Crutsinger, AP – Yahoo Finance

and
Fed’s Dudley: Decision on QE Tapering Will Require Three to Four Months – MoneyNews.com – Federal Reserve Bank of New York President William C. Dudley said policy makers will know in three to four months whether the economy is healthy enough to overcome federal budget cuts and allow the central bank to begin reducing record stimulus.- Bloomberg Businessweek 
and
(including MBS) Hawkish comment from Bernanke hit stimulus-dependent asset valuations – Sober Look Blog – It took one sentence to send shockwaves through the financial markets.
Bernanke: – We’re trying to make an assessment of whether or not we have seen real and sustainable progress in the labor market outlook. If we see continued improvement and we have confidence that that is going to be sustained, then we could in — in the next few meetings — we could take a step down in our pace of purchases.
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OTHER NEWS:
Lender Processing Services Completes Its Rise From ‘Foreclosuregate’ – Dr. Duru – .. capped by news that Fidelity National (FNF) is joining with Thomas H. Lee to buy back LPS. LPS was spun off FNF just five years ago, so I find this M&A deal a bit surprising. I certainly was not anticipating anything like it. The buyout value for LPS is supposedly around $2.9B. That prices LPS shares around $34. That just happens to be the price of LPS right before “foreclosuregate” broke, an appropriately symbolic completion of the company’s rise from foreclosuregate: … – Seeking Alpha

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Loanowners are in no hurry to list and sell their houses – OC Housing News
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(just what we need) CFPB employees unionize (because they want to keep private offices) – By Barbara S. Mishkin – CFPB Monitor 
and
More on CFPB employee vote to unionize – By Mark J. Furletti – As we reported last week, the National Treasury Employees Union (NTU) won an election to represent over 800 of the CFPB’s 1,200 employees.  The vote was 378 in favor and 86 against.  … As someone with no labor law background, I am struck by how 378 employees can obligate over 422 other employees to be part of a union shop. … – CFPB Monitor 
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(settlements going slowly) Behind the mortgage settlements from the housing crisis - By Danielle Douglas – … “There’s a common misunderstanding that all this information is readily available and banks can just push a button and get the checks printed, and that’s not the case,” said Gilbert Schwartz, a banking lawyer at Schwartz & Ballen. “It requires thorough review, confirmation and validation that the amounts and the people receiving it are accurate.” … – Washington Post

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(the next challenge) Student Debt and the Crushing of the American Dream – By JOSEPH E. STIGLITZ – NY Times Blogs 
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CoreLogic Case-Shiller Forecasts Waning Price Appreciation – BY: KRISTA FRANKS BROCK – … After a 7.3 percent price gain in 2012, the nation’s housing prices will continue to rise over the next five years but at a slower pace, according to Case-Shiller. The indexes forecast a 3.9 percent annual increase through 2017. … – DS News 
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Report: Foreclosures Led to Loss of $192B in Wealth in 2012 - BY: ESTHER CHO – … foreclosures led to the loss of $192.6 billion in wealth for Americans in 2012, according to a report from the Alliance for a Just Society, a national coalition of eight state-based grassroots community organizations. On average, the estimated loss in wealth last year comes out to about $1,700 per household for … 114.7 million households in the nation, according to the coalition. … – DS News 
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Zillow: South Florida homebuyers break even in 2 years – By Paul Owers, Sun Sentinel – Buying a home in South Florida is more affordable than renting after only two years, according to Zillow.com. 
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It’s alive! Dexia’s $775 mln MBS case vs JPMorgan back from the dead – Alison Frankel’s On the Case  
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Home-buying frenzy: Strong demand collides with scarce inventory – BY MARTHA BRANNIGAN – MIAMIHERALD.COM

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Eminent domain update from Sacramanto Bee – … Opponents in the mortgage industry call Mortgage Resolution Partners’ plan a scheme intended to profit its financiers and investors.  … “MRP sells themselves as a community advisory group but it is really a vulture fund that’s trying to take advantage of an opportunity in the marketplace to enrich themselves,” said Tim Cameron, an executive with the Security Industries and Financial Markets Association. … 
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Proposed Ginnie Mae policy may increase buyouts – By Christina Mlynski – This week Ginnie Mae proposed a change to its general buyout policy. … However, under the new proposal, the issuer can repurchase loans once the borrower misses three payments, but they do not have to be consecutive. Therefore, non-continuous 90-days delinquent loans, which are not eligible for buyouts under the current policy, would be eligible for repurchase by Ginnie Mae issuers under the new proposal,” the RBS report explained. … – Housingwire 
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Listed at $190 million, Greenwich estate is priciest home in the US – SF Chronicle

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(about my employer – hiring originators is what makes us different – ask me why) Fay Servicing Embarks in Hiring Spree of Originators – By Amilda Dymi – National Mortgage News

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(get bigger or go away?) Freddie Mac to charge mortgage servicers for low activity – Freddie Mac is telling mortgage servicers to expect a $7,500 fee for not selling at least $5 million in unpaid principal balance per year to the government-sponsored enterprise. … Freddie Mac mortgage servicers Freddie Mac with an aggregate UPB of less that $25 million will also be assessed the fee. The fee is new to Freddie Mac and far outstrips similar fees at Fannie Mae. … – Housingwire 
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(must read) Rand Paul Upsets Senate’s Apple Witch-Hunt – Posted by Tom Lindmark – But Then What 
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(milk that cow!) Federal government to keep juicing the GSEs: Compass Point – By Kerri Ann Panchuk – … As long as the housing agencies can turn considerable profit, analysts at Compass Point Research & Trading expect little political capital or incentive to enact large-scale GSE reforms … – Housingwire 
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(2 great charts) Housing Starts decline sharply in April to 853,000 SAAR – by Bill McBride – Calculated Risk 
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(GME = Global Monetary Easing – good things happen with everyone printing) MORGAN STANLEY: Here Are 6 Key Points To Remember About The Current Phase Of Global Monetary Easing – Sam Ro    – Business Insider
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Mortgage Applications Fall Under Weight of Lower Refi Demand – BY: TORY BARRINGER – The M Report 
and
Closing Rates Fall in April as Purchase Loans Gain Greater Share – BY: TORY BARRINGER – The M Report 

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Alabama Supreme Court MERS decision: Attorney guidepost – By Kerri Ann Panchuk – The highest court in Alabama upheld a lower court opinion that previously validated the ability of Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems to legally assign a mortgage. The decision creates precedent in Alabama, giving MERS a strong legal buffer in the state when similar challenges arise in foreclosure disputes. – Housingwire

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(look at charts, comments) Is the massive drop in lumber futures telling us something? - Sober Look blog
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From Brooklyn to California, Housing Bubble Threat Grows – By Prashant Gopal & Kathleen M. Howley – Bloomberg 
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U.S. Economy In Second Month Of Deflation Pressures Bernanke On QE – Agustino Fontevecchia, Forbes … - deflation is a central banker’s kryptonite, and Bernanke knows it.  – Housing has clearly recovered – Yet the American economy is stuck in second gear.  – …
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Loan Modification and the Failure to Mitigate Damages – thoughts on Freddie Mac Streamlined Modification and more – BY ANTHONY NARULA AND PHILIP R. STEIN – Mortgage Crisis Watch 
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(it’s a battle) LO Comp Bill a Subprime Effort? – By Brian Collins and Mark Fogarty – WE’RE HEARING that it is going to take a concerted industry effort to get a legislative fix for the QM rule on loan officer compensation. And consumer groups are already united in their opposition to a bill … The main thrust of the industry bill is to exclude certain fees and compensation from being counted toward the 3% points and fees cap in the qualified mortgage rule. ... – National Mortgage News

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Zillow: Buying Beats Renting in 64% of Metros After 3 Years - BY: ESTHER CHO – DS News

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(link to paper) MBA’s Attack Plan For The Return Of Private Capital To The Mortgage Industry - by MortgageOrb.com – … According to the MBA, one solution is to require Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to offer risk-sharing options to lenders at the point of sale, rather than at the back end with loans already on the balance sheets. Doing so would allow for “deeper private credit enhancement to the GSEs in exchange for lower fees charged to borrowers and lenders,” the MBA states in a new paper titled “Up-Front Risk Sharing: Ensuring Private Capital Delivers for Consumers.“ This, in turn, would shift the risk back to the private sector and away from taxpayers. …

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Fannie Mae Sees U.S. Economic Growth Accelerating – Dow Jones Newswires – FOX Business.com 
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(OCC guidance slows late stage foreclosures) Report: Wells Fargo, JPMorgan Chase and Citigroup “nearly halt foreclosure sales” – by Bill McBride – Calculated Risk 
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(has list) 14 American Housing Markets Struggling With Foreclosures – Mamta Badkar – One in every 905 U.S. homes received a foreclosure filing in April, according to the latest foreclosure data from RealtyTrac. Foreclosure filings were down 5% from March, and 23% from a year ago. – Business Insider 
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(Rex is back again) Investing in Home Equity Via Downpayments – Bonnie Sinnock – WE’RE HEARING some institutional investors like a home equity sharing product that serves as a partial downpayment for consumers in return for a share of the home’s appreciation over time. “There are limited capital market opportunities for exposure to single-family real estate” and “investors like the idea of buying residential real estate assets right now,” James Riccitelli, co-CEO of FirstREX, told this publication. – more – National Mortgage News
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Southland home prices surge in April as inventory tightens – Homes in Southern California sold at the fastest clip for April in seven years. The median price for the region reached its highest level since June 2008. – By Alejandro Lazo, Los Angeles Times

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Josh Rosner on How Dodd Frank Institutionalizes Too Big to Fail – Yves Smith – … testifies before a subcommittee of the House Financial Services committee today …, but (DF) also has managed to entrench the megafirms’ advantaged position. … Rosner has good company here; the BIS and the international bank lobbying group the IIF reached the same conclusion. Rosner stresses that he’s not advocating the repeal of Dodd Frank but describing what is flawed so it can be remedied or replaced,  – Naked Capitalism
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(timelines matter) Report: Long Cure, Foreclosure Timelines Cause High Delinquency Rate – BY: ESTHER CHO – … but the delinquency rate would actually reflect normal levels seen 10 years ago if cure or foreclosure timelines were shortened. According to TransUnion, the first quarter national mortgage delinquency rate (60-plus delinquencies) was 4.56 percent, which is more than double the pre-crisis norm. However, when aging, 180-plus delinquencies were taken out of the equation, a new TransUnion analysis found the delinquency rate would actually be around 1 percent. – more – DS News

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(introducing Trulia Bubble Watch) Trulia: Home Price Recovery Not Shaping into Another Bubble – BY: TORY BARRINGER – … Trulia reassures “bubble-phobes” that they can rest easy in its latest report. The company tossed its two cents into the bubble debate with the release of Trulia Bubble Watch, a report that compares various price indexes (including Trulia’s own Price Monitor) to per-capita income and rent data obtained from government releases. … – DS News 
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(feature) Borrowing Against The House, Once Again – Welcome back, home equity lending! – By Nora Caley – MortgageOrb

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(trust me) Cordray: Avoid lending fears, good underwriting is enough – Consumer Financial Protection Bureau director Richard Cordray continues to reassure lenders that they should continue to make traditional well-underwritten loans, an article in National Mortgage News reported. – Housingwire
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Distressed Market Has Peaked, but Opportunities Remain – George Yacik – If you’re looking to buy a distressed or real estate owned property at a cheap price, you better move quickly—and be prepared to pay a lot more than you did a year or so ago – National Mortgage News 
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(covered bonds) Former Freddie Mac Chief Economist Says Housing Finance Model Can Be Found Outside The U.S. – By Maureen Cavanaugh, Patty Lane, Amita Sharma – KPBS.org

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(making bets on what gov’t will do) Why the Fannie Bet Faces Long Odds – Hedge funds and other investors are betting on the recovery of Fannie Mae FNMA and Freddie Mac, but political analysts say that this investment faces long odds. Here’s a primer on what has to happen for these investors to see their bets redeemed – WSJ Moneybeat

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David H. Stevens For President? – BY PHIL HALL – Progress in Lending 
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Fed hawks call for retreat from mortgage stimulus – By Kristen Hays and Francesca Landini – (Reuters) – A trio of hawkish regional Federal Reserve officials are calling for the U.S. central bank to stop buying mortgage-backed bonds, citing the recent improvement in the housing market 
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Report: Foreclosure Timelines Lengthen with Higher Loan Amounts – BY: KRISTA FRANKS BROCK – … This appears to be a relatively recent anomaly, according to ForeclosureRadar’s findings. … Perhaps the difference lies in the fact that more affluent homeowners have the means to tap into resources to help delay foreclosure, or that larger loans on expensive homes are more complex and take longer to disentangle,” ForeclosureRadar stated in its report. … – DS News

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(2000 more pages waters down swaps regulation?) Regulators issue more than 2,000 pages of Dodd-Frank rules – by Megan R. Wilson – The Commodity Futures Trading Commission on Thursday moved forward on more than 2,000 pages of Dodd-Frank rules. Federal regulators voted to approve regulations that aim to increase transparency around swap transactions, which trade risk from one entity to another in the estimated $700 trillion derivatives market. – The Hill 

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After Bernanke’s QE Sent Stocks To Record Highs, Will Fed Tapering Collapse The Market? – Agustino Fontevecchia, Forbes

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Sam Zell says sell – By Stephen Gandel – Fortune.com

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Freddie Mac speeds up availability of streamlined loan mods – By Kerri Ann Panchuk – … Loans also must be at least 12 months old and satisfy all eligibility criteria. … – Housingwire 
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New FHFA head pick increases odds of HARP date change - By Christina Mlynski – Housingwire 
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Freddie Mac: Financial Assets Can Be Used as Qualifying Income – BY: KRISTA FRANKS BROCK – Freddie Mac is hoping to spread information about a rule that allows people to leverage financial assets such as retirement accounts as qualifying income when applying for mortgage loans. Individual Retirement Accounts (IRAs), 401(k)s, distributions from retirement accounts, and funds acquired from the sale of a business can all contribute to a potential borrower’s qualifying income, according to Freddie Mac. – DS News

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TransUnion: Credit quality of mortgage borrowers nationwide has improved -  Study shows that at end of March, 2 percent of loans in Chicago area written in 2009 and later were delinquent – By Mary Ellen Podmolik, Chicago Tribune

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Private Equity Residential Landlords Rushing to Cash Out via IPOs – Yves Smith – Naked Capitalism 
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(nice graph) Fannie, Freddie, FHA REO inventory declines in Q1 2013 – by Bill McBride – The combined Real Estate Owned (REO) by Fannie, Freddie and the FHA declined to 189,5291 at the end of Q1 2013, down from 192,720 in Q4 2012, and down 9% from 209,077 in Q1 2012. The peak for the combined REO of the F’s was 295,307 in Q4 2010. – Calculated Risk

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(Legacy loans) 62% of delinquent loans are more than 90 days past due - OC Housing News 
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(getting a leg up on rental buyers) Owner occupants get first crack at buying Fannie, Freddie, HUD foreclosures - Kathleen Pender – .. “People looking for foreclosed homes are having to compete heavily both with investors and other owner occupants,” says Eric Will, senior REO sales director with Freddie Mac. “This gives them an opportunity to get in and compete without competition from investors.” He adds that Freddie is “getting at or above list price for most of our homes.” Potential buyers can search for homes in these programs at www.hudhomestore.com, www.homepath.com (Fannie Mae) and www.homesteps.com (Freddie Mac). … – SF Chronicle 
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(Bernanke will speak this week) Bulls Will Be Driving Market, But Bernanke Is Steering in Week Ahead – By: Patti Domm – CNBC 
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Defaulting on your home now includes automatic enrollment into a loan modification program – OC Housing News 
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What Will The U.S. Do With Fannie And Freddie? Take Their Money, Of Course - by Nick Gwiazda – International Business Times 
vs.
Senators want to move forward with Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac reform – By Vicki Needham -  A bipartisan group of senators want to largely eliminate Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac as part of an overhaul of the mortgage finance market. … A more likely outcome would see Fannie and Freddie replaced with a new entity that is smaller and more contained, but that would still allow government guarantees on some loans. A few different plans being discussed on Capitol Hill move in that general direction. … – The Hill

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Bankers: College debt bubble mimics housing bubble – Meghan Foley, Wall St. Cheat Sheet – USA Today 
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(Schneiderman does not like DeMarco?) Obama’s underwater rescue – A single bureaucrat stands in the way of widespread foreclosure relief – BY ERIC T. SCHNEIDERMAN / NEW YORK DAILY NEWS 
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INVESTMENT CUBISM: Here’s The Awesome Presentation Jeff Gundlach Gave To The Exclusive Sohn Conference - Sam Ro – Business Insider 
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(HAMP) On the House: Too many defaults on modified mortgages – By Alan J. Heavens- Considering the hoops that too many borrowers have to go through to obtain mortgage modifications, the news from the Treasury Department wasn’t encouraging. In an April 24 report to Congress, the Office of the Special Inspector General for the Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP, reported that homeowners whose mortgages had been modified under the federal Home Affordable Mortgage Program were defaulting “at an alarming rate.” – Philadelphia Inquirer 
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Is the Fed Afraid to Regulate the Big Banks? – By Simon Johnson – … Ahead is a great battle over the future of our financial system that could have more profound consequences than the Dodd-Frank legislation of 2010. The battleground is the hearts and minds — and fears — of the seven people who make up the board of governors of the Federal Reserve System. The critical contest will be about bank capital and how large financial institutions should fund themselves. The fog of war has masked the terrain … -  Bloomberg 
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REO, Short Sale Fraud Continue to Evolve – BY: KRISTA FRANKS BROCK – Most mortgage fraud takes place in the short sales and REO space, according to Rob Hagberg, associate director of fraud investigations at Freddie Mac. “This area is ripe with fraud,” he said during a webinar hosted by CoreLogic. – DS Report 
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(kinder, gentler) The Mellowing of Maxine Waters - Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif., has been an outspoken critic of the financial industry over her more than two decades in Congress. However, after she became the ranking Democrat on the influential House Financial Services Committee, Waters’ stance toward the industry appears to have softened. – The New York Times  
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House prices nearing affordability limits in many markets – OC Housing News

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10 Misconceptions About Your Mortgage – Alison Paoli, Zillow

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BILL GROSS: Bonds May Never Enter A Bear Market – Matthew Boesler – Business Insider

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Why Not Just Leave Fannie And Freddie Alone? - by Michael Bates – MortgageOrb

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Can a housing market rally by sustained with fewer homeowners? – OC Housing News

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(gov’t guarantee for borrower stupidity?) AARP: HUD Should Repay Reverse Mortgages for Non-Borrowing Spouses – by Alyssa Gerace – AARP is renewing its challenge against the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) for failing to protect surviving spouses who are not named on a reverse mortgage loan, supporting an appeals court’s suggestion that HUD should take the loss on those loans. – Reverse Mortgage Daily 
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Hope Now: 245,000 loan mods completed in 1Q – By Kerri Ann Panchuk – … Of those completed mods, 42,157 involved borrowers who went through the government’s (HAMP). Since 2007, Hope Now has documented 6.32 million loan modifications, with more than 5 million of those mortgages handled through servicers’ proprietary programs. Another 1.2 million loans went through the government’s HAMP program over the course of the past six years. … – Housingwire
and
(HOPE NOW data) Loan Mods, Short Sales Outpace Foreclosure Sales 2-to-1 in Q1 – BY: ESTHER CHO – DS News 
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Failing the Mortgage SATs – WE’RE HEARING there is a discipline that is completely lacking in the mortgage industry—we have no test to answer the most critical question that any service business can ask—“How satisfied are the customers?” – National Mortgage News

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Newark’s Terrible New Foreclosure Fix Idea – Activists in the city think eminent domain can save their neighborhoods – BY DAVID DAYEN – The New Republic

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DeMarco targets two approaches for luring private capital – By Christina Mlynski – Housingwire 
1. The issuer-based approach is associated with a financial institution guaranteeing principal and interest repayment to investors.
2. In the securities-based approach — as opposed to credit risk being absorbed by the equity of the securities issuer — credit risk would be absorbed through capital markets, DeMarco stated.
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Lower credit scores disappear from housing market: Fed governor – by Brena Swanson – Originations for borrowers with credit scores below 620 mostly disappeared in recent years, eliminating low credit scores from the housing market, Elizabeth Duke, member of the Board of Governors for the Federal Reserve System, said while speaking at the Housing Policy Executive Council -Housingwire

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Canada’s Housing Market: The Next Big Short? – By: Matt Clinch – CNBC.com http://www.cnbc.com/id/100726168
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Foreclosure Filings Drop to 74-Month Low, Judicial State Auctions Rise – BY: KRISTA FRANKS BROCK – DS News 
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NAR: National Median Price Posts Greatest Increase Since 2005 – BY: TORY BARRINGER – The latest quarterly report from the National Association of Realtors (NAR) shows home purchasing power remained high in the first quarter even as median prices continued their upward trend. Nationally, the median existing single-family home price was $176,600, up 11.3 percent year-over-year—the strongest yearly price increase since the fourth quarter of 2005, … – The M Report 
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(has 6) Reasons for the latest US dollar rally – Sober Look Blog

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The renting generation – homeownership rate for those 35 and younger continues to decline. Overall homeownership falls in spite of rising affordability. – Dr. Housing Bubble 
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2 excellent examples of ZIRP consequences from Sober Look Blog
1. Bernanke signals the Fed is uneasy with “reaching for yield” 
2. Americans are giving up on certificates of deposit
ZIRP is Zero Interest Rate Policy at the Fed.
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(grow the FHLBs) DeMarco: FHLBanks should grow involvement in secondary market – By Christina Mlynski – … “Importantly, these programs demonstrate one approach to lender risk retention in mortgage lending and the credit performance of these loans was better than most other segments of the market the past several years,” DeMarco explained. He added, “Several FHLBanks participate in the MPF Xtra program aggregating loans from originators and passing them on to Fannie Mae for securitization.” … – more – Housingwire

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(securitizing servicing) Ocwen-backed HLSS bundles up new Homeward Residential assets – By Jacob Gaffney – Home Loan Servicing Solutions, which purchases some mortgage business from sister company Ocwen Financial, is bringing a mortgage servicer advance receivable to the market. The asset-backed securitization will be collateralized by Ocwen serviced mortgages, comprised of former Homeward Residential Holdings paper. – Housingwire 
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UH-OH – this better not happen in the US!!
(look at charts QE not working in Japan) JGB yields spike in spite of all the BOJ bond buying – Sober Look Blog 
and
(despite buying 70% on new issuance) Stress Indicators: Is Japan showing us the end of Bernanke’s put? - Steen Jakobsen, Chief Economist & CIO, Saxo Bank – TradingFloor.com
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(look at the chart) Core PCE measure gives the Fed green light to proceed with its program – Sober Look Blog – (DB) The relative importance of “core” components of CPI inflation has dropped by about 2 percentage points since 2010, while remaining steady in PCE inflation. This has the effect of increasing the relative importance of housing prices in core CPI. 
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Quelle Surprise! Banks Whining About Cost of Breaking New California Homeowner Bill of Rights – Yves Smith – During the protracted negotiations over what was to become the 49 state/Federal mortgage settlement, New York attorney general Eric Schneiderman was hailed as a progressive leader and California’s Kamala Harris was characterized as an opportunist. Turns out the opportunist cut a much better deal for her constituents than the supposed true believer. – Naked Capitalism

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Failing the Mortgage SATs – WE’RE HEARING there is a discipline that is completely lacking in the mortgage industry—we have no test to answer the most critical question that any service business can ask—“How satisfied are the customers?” – National Mortgage News
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(favorable light) Who is Mel Watt? – posted by Jean Braucher – …  So who is this eleven-term congressman and what does he care about most? … – Credit Slips Blog

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Mortgage lending standards remain prudently restrictive – OC Housing News
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(commentary and charts) MBA: Mortgage Delinquency Rates increase in Q1, Foreclosure Inventory Down Sharply – by Bill McBride – Calculated Risk

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Speech: A View from the Federal Reserve Board: The Mortgage Market and Housing Conditions – Governor Elizabeth A. Duke – FR Board of Governors

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Reverse Jumbo Mortgages Are on the Rise for Seniors – By ANYA MARTIN – Some seniors with high-dollar homes are using reverse jumbo mortgages to raise cash without having to sell their property. … One New Jersey couple, both retired doctors in their early 80s, use their $5,000 monthly reverse-mortgage payments to cover home health-care costs, said Ms. Masucci, who works for Security One Lending. … – WSJ.com

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(Apps up) Mortgage Borrowers Are Finally Playing A Bigger Role In The Housing Recovery – Mamta Badkar – The early leg of the housing recovery has been credited to declining shadow inventory and strong demand from institutional investors. … Mortgage applications in April were up 4.6% month-over-month, rising in seven of the past eight months. In fact, “over the past year applications for home purchase have risen by 11.5% to stand at a three-year high,” writes Paul Diggle Capital Economics. … – Business Insider 
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(resentment?) Germans Splurge on Italian Homes Locals Can’t Afford – By Alessandra Migliaccio, Chiara Vasarri & Dalia Fahmy – Bloomberg 
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Bernanke’s Neofeudal Rentier Economy - Charles Hugh Smith – The Fed has directly created a neofeudal rentier economy and society. Federal Reserve Chairman Bernanke is a Reverse Robin Hood, robbing from the lower 95% and giving to the financier class. – Of Two Minds 
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The Fed knows best? This is a follow up to a previous post:

Federal Reserve Stress-Testing Model Error–Nom de Plumber’s Thought of the Day
http://mortgagenewsclips.com/2013/03/11/federal-reserve-stress-testing-model-errornom-de-plumbers-thought-of-the-day/

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There seems a fundamental conundrum about regulatory expectations for
the management validation of CCAR stress models, market inputs, and
loss projections.

Stress scenarios inherently mean unexpectedly anomalous model breakdowns,
market behaviors, and asset losses, far surpassing historical experience or
plausible projections.  

This implies that those ex-ante validations conferred an overwhelmingly false sense of security—thereby questioning the very robustness of stress-testing infrastructures.

How can one model what cannot be modeled, and prove so in advance?
Nonetheless, new regulatory directives still require that to be done:
http://www.federalreserve.gov/bankinforeg/srletters/sr1107.htm
http://www.occ.treas.gov/news-issuances/bulletins/2011/bulletin-2011-12a.pdf

Yes, we have no bananas.

Thank you. 

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Flippers playing role in South Florida’s housing recovery – Flipping homes making a comeback in Florida – By Paul Owers, Sun Sentinel – Home flippers got a bad name during the housing boom. They sold properties for big profits in days or weeks, and the rapid price appreciation created a frenzy that led to the eventual bust. But today’s flippers are getting credit for helping the market recover. They’re taking time to add value, sprucing up the landscaping and putting in new floors and appliances.   
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Private sales of homes, known as ‘pocket listings,’ are surging – By Kenneth R. Harney – Top brokers in some highly competitive markets say pocket listings are becoming a significant factor in the business. – LA Times

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Fannie Mae Launches New Servicing Management Default Underwriter Tool – Fannie Mae has introduced its Servicing Management Default Underwriter (SMDU), a tool to help mortgage servicers work faster and more consistently with homeowners to prevent foreclosure.  This technology, a counterpart to Fannie Mae’s Desktop Underwriter for mortgage originations, breaks new ground by evaluating a homeowner’s financial situation and determining what options are available to prevent foreclosure. – more – National Mortgage Professional 
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Report: Homebuilding Employment Unlikely to Return to Boom Levels – BY: TORY BARRINGER – While Fannie Mae’s Economic and Strategic Research (ESR) Group … In the latest in its Transition to “Normal” series, … Even though housing starts are expected to double over the next four years as the recovery brings us back to even keel, the group is doubtful that employment in the industry will see the same rebound. … – The M Report

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Home Prices Are Climbing At The Fastest Pace Since March 2006 - Mamta Badkar – Nationwide home prices including distressed sales were up 10.5% year-over-year in March, according to CoreLogic’s latest home price report. On a monthly basis home prices were up 1.9%. This was the thirteenth straight monthly rise, and the fastest pace of increase since March 2006. Ex-distressed sales, home prices were up 10.7% year-over-year and 2.4% on the month – Business Insider  
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(shakedown) California Homeowner Bill of Rights blocks BofA foreclosure - By Kerri Ann Panchuk – A California man successfully halted a foreclosure sale on his property using the newly minted California Homeowner Bill of Rights to obtain a court injunction … For simply obtaining the HBOR injunction, the homeowner’s attorney is requesting $20,255 in legal fees and costs – a compensation request that is permissible under HBOR since the legislation allots borrowers reasonable attorneys fees and expenses for successfully obtaining an injunction. … – Housingwire 
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The last to the party: Investors and flippers competing for small amount of inventory. Home prices increasing at fastest rate since 2006. A case analysis of a Burbank investment property. – Dr. Housing Bubble

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Help the Fed Get Out of the Mortgage Business – Veteran Washington banking lawyer Jeremiah Buckley makes the case for a national housing finance commission. Such a body would serve as a “credible, galvanizing force to start the process in motion” of creating a new housing finance system that would not depend on the Fed’s swelling balance sheet. – American Banker Bankthink

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(on 620 and 680 FICO) Loan officers, banks tighten FICO standards – By Brena Swanson  – HousingWire 
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(on risk sharing and more) mREITs could boost the secondary market -by Christina Mlynski – Housingwire
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Ocwen: Untapped Reverse Mortgages Could be $1.9 Trillion Market – by Elizabeth Ecker – Upon reporting record quarterly earnings this month that more than doubled first quarter earnings in 2012, mortgage giant Ocwen Financial (NYSE: OCN) noted more reverse mortgage opportunity is still on the horizon. – Reverse Mortgage Daily

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A Legislative Lobbying Primer – by Phil Hall – MortgageOrb

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Lawmakers draft bill to extend foreclosure protections to more soldiers – Housingwire – …  introduced a bill Tuesday that would extend foreclosure protections to servicemembers who acquired homes after entering active duty. … rolled out H.R. 1842 – the Military Family Home Protection Act –on Tuesday. The bill picks up where the longstanding Servicemembers Civil Relief Act leaves off. – more details

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What Happens When The Investors Go? – BY MIKE WHEATLEY – Realty Biz News

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Bernanke’s Transparent Communication Policy Apparently Includes Leaking Info To The WSJ – Bruce Krasting – Business Insider
and
Everyone Will Be Debating The WSJ Story About The Fed Considering Ways To End QE
Is it for real this time? – Joe Weisenthal – Business Insider

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(quotes Ted Tozer) Secondary Market Preparing for Potential Volume Shift – By Bonnie Sinnock – … many housing finance indicators and forecasts suggesting a downshift in refinancing and a modest pickup in purchases on the way, market participants do not want to be caught unprepared. … This is among the reasons why Ginnie Mae is looking into whether it would be a good idea to … combine Ginnie Mae I and Ginnie Mae II securities programs. … – National Mortgage News 
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MBIA Settles Five-Year Fight Over Mortgages With Bank of America – Mary Childs, David McLaughlin and Chris Dolmetsch, Bloomberg News – … in a deal that will pay MBIA the equivalent of $1.7 billion and give the bank a 5 percent stake in the bond insurer. MBIA shares surged as much as 57 percent, the biggest intraday jump ever. – SF Chronicle 

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Larger Market Participants Still Elusive in Jumbo Securitization – Big players remain largely absent from the re-emerging private-label residential mortgage-backed securities market, RBS managing director Trez Moore told attendees at an industry meeting Monday. – National Mortgage News 
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U.S. News: Reverse Mortgages Turn Homes into “Pensions” – by Jason Oliva – Reverse Mortgage Daily 
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Dodd-Frank is finally being implemented. Will that be enough? – Posted by Mike Konczal – Washington Post 
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Warren Buffett: Federal Reserve Helped Stock Market Soar – By JOSH FUNK – Huffington Post 
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LPS: Homeowner Bill of Rights slows California foreclosure sales – by Kerri Ann Panchuk – The California Homeowner Bill of Rights is slowing the movement of distressed properties in the West Coast state, Lender Processing Services said in a report. – Housingwire
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(after unemployment benefits run out) 10,962,532: U.S. Disability Beneficiaries Exceed Population of Greece – By Terence P. Jeffrey – CNSNews.com

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Miami area home prices up 8.6 percent in March from year earlier - BY MARTHA BRANNIGAN –  … according to CoreLogic … Excluding distressed sales, home prices jumped 15.6 percent year over year in the metro area including Miami, Miami Beach and Kendall.   – Miami Herald
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(chart, of course) First Time In 7 Years: Both CoreLogic Home Price Indexes Had Double-Digit Annual Gains In March – Mark J. Perry – Carpe Diem Blog

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(partisan) House Moves To Gut Derivatives Regulations Again – By: DSWright  – FireDogLake