BBC News: Bradford & Bingley announces loss Bradford & Bingley (B&B), a buy-to-let loans specialist, has reported a loss of £26.7m in the six months to 30 June, with impairment charges up sharply.
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Original post by renting2
It’s Friday, and if the housing market isn’t that hot, we have the assurance of Realty Times that we can blame it on the negative press.
Realty Times asks, "Is all this negative press affecting your business?" The big question this video raised in my mind though was, "Is that pig at 0:34 in fact Tanta’s [Calculated Risk] Mortgage Pig™?"[Try and ignore annoying background music.]
Any questions on your mind today? Any great links, stories, ideas we should know about? This is an open thread, so grab a soapbox and let us know what is on your mind.
On another note- I’m headed out of town for the weekend- the California beaches are calling me. I don’t want sand in my laptop, so I probably won’t be around much. I’ll be checking in from time to time though.
Igor- if you want me to bring you back a souvenir, I suggest you don’t give […]
Original post by twist
Yesterday Reuters reported [1] that foreign central banks have been net sellers of agency debt, the senior debt of GSEs like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, for the sixth straight week. In order to get a better handle on the context for this story, Doom went to The NY Fed’s H.4.1 table [2] and extracted their weekly statistics on the holdings by foreign central banks of US treasuries and agencies. We collected [3] the data back to the start of the series on Wednesday Feb 9, 2000.
When Twist performed her chart magic on the data some interesting trends emerged. From the start of 2007 to the present, agencies as compared to treasuries held by cenbanks increased smoothly from 52 to 74 percent, then fell off noticeably over the last few weeks. It is possible that the present GSE crisis is affecting the appetite for agency debt among foreign central bankers.
If […]
Original post by John M.
Bloomberg: Boeing Payrises 38% pay increase. Nice if you can get it.
Original post by yoss
Some readers harbor doubts that homes in Los Angeles County have actually been falling by 40 percent on a year over year basis. NASCAR has nothing on the speed in which housing prices are falling in Southern California so it is understandable that people would be skeptical about prices crashing. Many of the bottom callers or housing bears really have little sense beyond what they read in the newspapers regarding many niches in the Southern California markets. Growing up in Southern California especially in Los Angeles and Orange counties, I’ve had the unique ability to visit the majority of cities (and still visit them today). We do live in an extremely diverse metropolis. Yet this perspective has also allowed me to become a more entrenched housing bear since some neighborhoods that boomed up to $500,000 were selling for $150,000 a few years prior. This would to a certain extent make […]
Original post by drhousingbubble
Times: Mortgage rescue at the ready as property slump gets even worse Alistair Darling, the Chancellor, and Caroline Flint, the Housing Minister, are planning to announce an emergency “mortgage rescue” package next week.
Under the plans councils will be encouraged to offer low-income families at risk of repossession the chance to sell a stake of their houses in return for financial help. First-time buyers will also be given council-backed assistance with deposits and town halls will be given extra money to buy up empty unsold new-build properties from developers.
A more radical proposal under which councils would have competed as mortgage lenders has been vetoed by Darling.
Original post by little professor
FT: Stocks rally on surprise US GDP boost Woes of the US sub-prime meltdown have been with us for the best part of 18-24 months but the US is still resolute in not tipping into a technical recession. It’s fair to say that the US is certainly not out of the woods yet but this data will provide a much needed boost to an economy that many doomsayers proclaim as being on its knees.
Original post by denzil
A new California bill has passed the assembly and is being considered in Senate. Assembly bill 2586 addresses the situation of renters facing foreclosure due to the financial problems of their landlords. Bob Hunt in Realty Times cites a study that indicates 20%-25% of residential foreclosures involve rental properties. Renters now frequently find themselves without their security deposits and scrambling to find another place to live. Here’s some of the key points of AB 2586:
Under existing law a landlord may not attempt to terminate a tenancy by taking such actions as changing the locks or stopping utility services. By making it clear that a successor in interest who acquires a rental property through foreclosure is a landlord for purposes of the law, AB 2586 would provide a legal basis for preventing such harassment activities and/or for collecting damages should they occur.
If a landlord […]
Original post by twist
CNN: Gulf oil braces for Gustav With Tropical Storm Gustav setting its sights on the Gulf of Mexico, oil facilities in the region are facing their first major threat since 2005, when Hurricanes Rita and Katrina knocked out nearly every barrel of oil production and sent prices soaring to then-record levels.
Original post by mark
CNN: Lehman to lay off 1,500 The troubled investment bank’s plans to shed up to 6% of its workforce amid a slumping stock price, concerns about its future.
Original post by mark
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