mortgage

Given that President Obama’s recently announced mortgage assistance program is only 2 percent of what he gave to banks for the mostly unsuccessful mortgage modification program, one might be forgiven for thinking that the housing market is on an upward trajectory. If JPMorgan Chase’s recent SEC filing is any guide, that assumption is just plain [...]

Obama’s new mortgage assistance program looks great, until you realize that it’s 2 percent of the money he unsuccessfully gave banks to fix the same problem.

A plan to update the Community Reinvestment Act comes amid charges that the legislation was responsible for the subprime crisis and the collapse of the residential real estate market.

While private lenders completed 120,000 permanent modifications monthly in early 2009, only about 10,000 were completed through October under the government initiative.

The PBS star attracted crowds to what appeared on the surface as a way to help black borrowers build wealth, but a lawsuit alleges it was actually just the opposite.

The Home Valuation Code of Conduct makes getting an appraisal costlier and more time-consuming for would-be buyers — and the added time can prevent purchasers from getting the best possible mortgage on their new home.

Are we really going to go through this again? Immediately after the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development finished putting the final touches on a controversial plan to allow first-time homebuyers to use an $8,000 tax credit as a downpayment on a new home, some in the  Senate are proposing nearly doubling the credit [...]

Among the many housing policy disappointments sustained during the bust, the Hope for Homeowners mortgage refinancing program has to rank as the disappointing-est. Originally estimated as having the potential to aid nearly half a million struggling borrowers, the program has resulted in just one successful loan refinancing to date. Quite the batting average. But the [...]

My friend J.P. Freire, the managing editor of The American Spectator, is the brains behind NewAmericanTeaParty.com. When I saw him today after Grover Norquist’s meeting, he was driven, intense — gripping his MacBook like a life raft in the Arctic Ocean, updating the group’s Facebook page and list of sponsors.
Freire’s site is only one node [...]

With the financial crisis deepening, the FHA must be revitalized immediately — and there’s no Plan B.