housing rescue plan

Mortgage Insider tells the sad tale of an 85-year-old widow, living alone with no surviving family members to turn to, who is about to lose her home. Rita Gillam lived in her Orange County, Calif., home for 50 years. It is scheduled for a foreclosure auction sale today.
Gillam, a widow, said she has owned hair [...]

Here’s another interesting tidbit from The Wall Street Journal: The Obama Administration is expected to unveil new incentives today to encourage servicers to modify loans — particularly second mortgages. The failure to address the problem of second mortgages in the initial housing rescue plan launched in March was a glaring weakness, and the new monetary [...]

At The Big Picture, Barry Ritholtz spares few words regarding his view of voluntary foreclosure freezes. Ritholtz says he never thought much of the idea in the first place, and he dismisses other “gimmicks” by banks to temporarily avoid foreclosures. Now that foreclosures are on the increase, he says, it proves his point that eventually, [...]

Chadi Moussa is a man in trouble, The New York Times reports today. He is unable to afford the mortgage on his $2.24 California mansion – and yet ineligible for help under the Obama administration’s new housing plan.
From The Times:
“You give $25 billion to a bank, at least they should help people stay in their [...]

The Obama administration unveiled the details of its new housing rescue plan today, and Bloomberg has some of the specifics:

Over at Economist’s View, Christopher Thornberg offers some ideas for stemming the foreclosure crisis – and while you may not agree with them, I’d rate them all much higher on the scale than having former subprime lending executives make new fortunes buying up distressed assets.
From Thornberg, a California real estate economist:

The administration’s rescue plan for housing is taking shape. But as Calculated Risk notes, one thing it apparently won’t include is a proposal – once under serious consideration – to pay mortgage companies to lower interest rates.
Instead, as we discussed Thursday, Obama officials are looking at ways to standardize loan modifications to lower homeowners’ monthly [...]