REAL ESTATE REALTORS' NATIONAL CONVENTION Economist links recovery, housing He says home sales will. ORLANDO, Fla. - The severity of the nation's economic downturn will hang on when the U.S. home market comes back, a top housing economist said Friday. "The depth of the recession will be dependent upon whether we have a housing market recovery," said Lawrence Yun, chief economist with the National Association of Realtors. "If we have a housing market recovery, that will begin to get the economy going." But if the nationwide home market continues to sputter, Mr. Yun fears, "we may be seeing a... Read More   Pending home sales decline Pending U.S. home sales fell more than expected in September, after posting a big jump in the previous month. The National Association of Realtors' seasonally adjusted index of pending sales for existing homes fell 4.6 percent Friday to a reading of 89.2. That's down from an upwardly revised August reading of 93.5. Read More   Banker touts mortgage plan A local banker is shopping a plan to politicians that would analyze all home mortgages nationwide, standardize the process of helping troubled homeowners and, it is hoped, stabilize home prices. The proposal by Anita Padilla-Fitzgerald, owner of MegaStar Financial, would put homeowners facing foreclosure on plans that could include reduced interest, a second mortgage or both. This plan does not include debt forgiveness or decreasing interest rates without analyzing a homeowner's situation. "We... Read More   MORTGAGES; A plan to slow home losses; Schwarzenegger seeks a 90-day freeze on pending... Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on Wednesday proposed a 90-day freeze in pending home foreclosures to give California's financially pinched homeowners more time to get new or more affordable loans. The governor unveiled a foreclosure relief and long-term mortgage reform initiative as part of an economic stimulus package that he plans to put before lawmakers in a special session of the Legislature scheduled to begin today. "The single most powerful action our state can take to shore up its economy... Read More   MORTGAGES; Relief program gets few takers The federal government's Hope for Homeowners program launched Oct. 1 was initially projected to help as many as 400,000 struggling borrowers avert foreclosure over the next three years. But fewer than 100 homeowners applied for the program in October, and the Federal Housing Administration now projects that just 13,300 will be helped in its first year. An FHA official said at a mortgage industry conference recently that one large lender had reported that in a group of 23,000 troubled borrowers... Read More   How Bad? How Long?; Neither reliable reports nor experts can predict the recovery, but it's likely. Whenever I talk with someone in the housing industry, it invariably boils down to two questions: How bad will this downturn get? How long will it last? There is part of me that doesn't want to know how bad it will get. I heard one reliable report that predicted we would have a couple of months in 2009 when we'll build houses at an annualized rate of 300,000 starts. I heard another reliable report that says this will last well into 2010. Those are the worst I've heard, but the best I've heard... Read More   Number Crunch 19M According to the U.S. Census Bureau, data from 2007 reveal that more than 7.5 million people, or 15 percent, of homeowners with mortgages are spending half their income or more on housing costs. But 38 percent of homeowners with mortgages are financially burdened, by the government's, definition because they spend 30 percent or more of their income on housing costs. That's 19 million homeowners strapped for cash. Read More   Why the Feds Rescue Banks, Not Homeowners The financial bailout is on, and so far the government has injected upwards of $150 billion in a variety of banks, not to mention a $120 billion loan for insurance giant AIG and $25 billion for the Detroit automakers. As for helping distressed homeowners, Washington is still thinking it over. On the surface, this might seem like the outrage of the century. The huge commitment of $700 billion in taxpayer money is supposed to help taxpayers, after all, and it's hard for many people to understand... Read More   Ex-subprime bank executive finances Obama; Customers who lost savings note he slams housing crisis John W. Courtney's world collapsed at dinnertime on a Friday in July 2001. That's when he learned from a television newscast that much of the $200,000 that he had saved from his construction job over a 30-year period was lost when his Chicago-area bank was shut down after pursuing a failed strategy of subprime loans. Seven years later, the Vietnam War veteran has yet to recoup $85,000 of his uninsured losses from Superior Bank's failure. And he watches in disbelief as one of the bank's former... Read More   On the edge; Unemployment, rising cost of living boost number of those losing homes Shoppers who are watching their wallets have led stores to cut back their orders and factories to trim production, a scenario that puts truck driver Charles Hayes in danger of losing his Goose Creek home. With fewer deliveries to make, the small company he works for switched to a four-day work week to keep all 16 drivers on the payroll. "The bottom man - he's got a family to feed, too," Hayes said of fellow drivers with less seniority. Read More

More... SURPRISE GAIN IN HOME SALES; NEW HOUSING: Builders say local inventory created by boom is largely.. SURPRISE GAIN IN HOME SALES; NEW HOUSING: Builders say local inventory created by boom is largely.. Florida home sales up in September, but is it a hiccup or a trend? Jump in existing-home sales a positive sign for market

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