Mortgage refinancing applications are down 75% from May of last year. No more increase in disposable income. BULLISH!!!!
Mortgage applications to purchase a home are DOWN 19% over last year. Did you read that correctly? The National Association of Realtors and the captured MSM keep telling you we are in the midst of a housing recovery. How the fuck can it be a housing recovery when mortgage applications are down 19% over last year????
It can’t. The housing market recovery was a sham and a swindle. It has rolled over and is going down fast. Look at the fucking chart. Mortgage applications to buy a house are at 20 year lows. BULLISH!!!!
WASHINGTON, D.C. (April 9, 2014) — Mortgage applications decreased 1.6 percent from one week earlier, according to data from the Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending April 4, 2014.
The Market Composite Index, a measure of mortgage loan application volume, decreased 1.6 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis from one week earlier. On an unadjusted basis, the Index decreased 1 percent compared with the previous week. The Refinance Index decreased 5 percent from the previous week and is at its lowest level since the end of 2013.
Read more at http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/#3id1yckRuZIiU0db.99
I’m sure the reason mortgage apps are down is the tremendous boom in employment. People are simply paying cash.
It’s that whole polar vortex thing. When in doubt, blame the weather.
Nonsense, all of it. I work in real estate, and am still seeing most folks unable to sell because they are underwater, and a majority of buyers unable or unwilling to buy. The ones that do are using either FHA or local banks with only 5% down and private PMI. And still cash investors.
What’s changed? Well, the banks are holding back a lot of inventory. I see vacant, foreclosed homes sitting for a long time, sometimes a year or more, before being put back on the market. Why? There is no feasible reason for this other than to control pricing. They are only prolonging the pain.
What is also happening is over-valuation of these same foreclosed properties. I work primarily in REO (bank owned) and short sales.
The banks are starting to fight the agents on value, and insisting on higher list prices even for properties with damage.
They are ordering 3 and sometimes 4 additional valuations because they don’t like the numbers they are seeing.
Damaged properties are almost impossible to finance. There are only 2 options for someone who does not have the cash to buy:
Construction loan from a local lender (usually requires at least 10% down and has a higher interest rate)
FHA 203K loan (3.5% down and anything with over $30,000 in repairs has more costs associated with the loan and uses a “consultant”)
What’s happening with the 203K loans is the purchase price plus the lender required repairs is not being supported by the “repaired” appraisal. The values are JUST NOT THERE.
Yes, last year saw a fairly brisk summer market. People believed the hype that there was a “shortage” of homes for sale. And, true to form, buyers get caught up in the fever and went crazy.
So the banks are screwing themselves in the long run (and us too). By letting these properties sit vacant they are rotting away, and in a lot of instances, getting vandalized and sustaining freeze damage. So, they wait a year, pay real estate taxes on this thing, and when they finally get around to selling it it’s worth 30-40K less due to damages or vandalism. Maybe they spend the money to fix it. Maybe not. It’s just ridiculous.
AND…..
Most banks have decided to change the way the do short sales. Some of them are waiving the hardship requirement. I guess now you just have to not want to live in your underwater home anymore and you can do a short sale.
Sigh.
Crazy,
@Realestatepup
Interesting. Where is your market? What City and State?
“I work primarily in REO (bank owned) and short sales.” ——- Realestatepup
Could you please answer a question regarding REOs if you have the time, Realestatepup?
From the BUYER’S perspective, what is the most important thing they can do to get the bank to approve the buyer’s offer. Maybe there’s more than just one thing?
Thanks in advance.
Aren’t there still several million homes in foreclosure? That haven’t even been put on the market? The banksters didn’t want to collapse the market, so they kept them off the market, and now the hedges are out of the game, there are no bids. Kids can’t buy homes, they can’t afford to get out of mom and dad’s basement. Another housing bubble to collapse. Thank goodness the stock market will go up forever, otherwise it might hurt a bit more when everyone’s under water on their mortgage.
Another sign of decline: http://www.forbes.com/sites/sageworks/2014/04/07/highway-and-bridge-construction-firms-profitability-declining/
“This is part of the downward spiral that characterizes the slow death of the industrial world. Expensive energy leads to less money for construction, which leads to fewer contracting jobs, which leads to less infrastructure construction and maintenance, which leads to crumbling infrastructure and even more stuff that needs fixing. Economic and energy experts like to point out that when economies mature, they will achieve GDP growth even as their energy demand declines. What they are overlooking is that much energy would normally be used to rebuild decrepit infrastructure, but this isn’t happening because energy is now far more expensive than when much existing infrastructure was built. “Mature” economies aren’t using as much energy mainly because they are skimping on the necessities of industrial society, not because they’ve gotten so incredibly efficient.
Buildings are falling apart, roads are full of potholes, pipelines are leaking, bridges are collapsing, and everything is just going to hell faster than it can be fixed. Imagine our energy cost if governments avoided austerity and fixed everything that needs fixing. Infrastructure will just keep deteriorating because we can’t afford to do anything about it. But economists and energy experts will continue telling us how efficient we’re getting, even though much of the energy efficiency they are talking about is actually an illusion created by cutting corners.”
Weren’t the bridges, roads and infrastructure jobs the “shovel-ready” jobs our Stumbler in Chief told us about to squeeze $700 billion out of us? Seems most, if not all, of the money is gone and the problem still exists. Go figure.
Easy money is still flowing……my mom just sold her house in L.A. County for 3 k below the asking price………..it was on the market 4 days……..I don’t disagree that the market is due for a correction, I will say this, the as long as the fed is keeping interest rates at an abnormally low levels they continue to pump salt water into this dead-chicken market……….at some point the skin will break and thing will get “real” until that time…..I’m glad my mom got out when she could…….
Suburban St Louis. St.Peters Mo. is on the lists of really good cities in which to live. Retail space is available all over the place . Very much like Admin reports about suburban areas in Pennsylvania.
These retail spaces are remaining empty for long periods of time. Looks as if the Mac Jobs are going to dry up soon. “This ain`t Good”
The real estate people have really been talking up how great the market is doing. They have been known to be wrong in the past. (Read LIE)
It don’t matter… Most US citizens can’t find Ukraine on a map, think Dumbocrats VS. Decepticons is a choice, don’t care about the encroaching Police State, have no clue about our rigged financial system
Realestatepup, you haven’t said yet where you are from.
I’m seeing the same in Michigan, with a twist. Many of the suburban Detroit cities followed the original crisis of empty houses with a new crisis, impossible city codes.
You see, if I buy a house that has been vacant, I HAVE to bring it 100% up to modern code. Even if it means tearing out every wire in the house that is still working. Thousands and thousands and thousands of dollars in upgrades on an overpriced home in a market with minimal opportunities unless already a union member.
Craziness. There are literally homes falling down because cities refuse to let young owners move in and fix them up without facing dozens of expenses, laws, regulations, inspections and dickhead, union, bureaucrats.
It is just starting, and only seems to be headed to worse.
Unicorns and lollypops for all, surely that is right around the corner now.
“Realestatepup, you haven’t said yet where you are from.” —— TeresaE
fyi ………. he RARELY, if ever, responds to questions or other dialogue ….. he likes to come here to show how smart he is and then runs
he said some amazingly stupid shit about mortgages a while ago …….. and I called me a dumbass and other mean things, and he didn’t even respond to that. Yup, a real pussyboy.