Freddie Mac offers incentives on REOs

Freddie Mac has come up with a summer sales promotion to promote its inventory of foreclosed homes. This is being done through Freddie Mac’s real estate sales unit, HomeSteps.


The promotion, which is an extension of Freddie Mac’s First Look Initiative program, hopes to boost sales of foreclosed homes by offering up to 3.5 percent in closing cost assistance to homebuyers. The promotion also offers a $1,200 signing bonus to buyer’s agents for offers received between May 16, 2011 – July 31, 2011 and escrow closings no later than September 30, 2011.

Fannie Mae, which offered a similar closing-cost incentive this past spring on its HomePath properties, requires escrows to close before June 30, 2011. Fannie Mae has also advised that offers submitted after May 15, 2011 may not meet the June 30 deadline.

Similar closing-cost incentives offered by Fannie Mae on HomePath properties this spring require escrow to close by June 30, with Fannie Mae advising that offers submitted after May 15 may not meet that deadline.

The HomeSteps summer sales promotion is not available for investors. This offer is valid only on HomeSteps homes sold to owner-occupant buyers. People taking advantage of this promotion don’t need to be first time homebuyers to be eligible, but they must buy the home as their primary residence.

As an example of savings through this offer, if the purchase price of your home is $150,000, HomeSteps will pay up to $5,250 towards your closing costs. However, it must be noted that HomeSteps will only pay up to 3.5% of your purchase price in closing costs, not to exceed the total closing costs. For example, if your purchase price is $125,000, and your closing costs are $4,250, HomeSteps will only pay $4,250, an amount equal to 3.5% of your purchase price. In any event, HomeSteps will not be obligated to pay any closing costs if you do not pursue and obtain financing for a qualifying home. You will pay all closing costs not covered by HomeSteps.

To make the offer even more enticing to buyers, HomeSteps is throwing in warranty benefits through SmartBuy. Since the home is a foreclosure property, it may have had damaged or missing appliances and systems prior to closing, Home Protect provides discounts of up to 30% on repairs for these instances. It also provides discounts of up to 30 percent on the purchase of appliances. This gives buyers some peace-of-mind, knowing that their home and budget are protected. The two-year Home Protect limited home warranty covers electrical, plumbing, air conditioning, heating and other major systems and appliances.

According to Fannie Mae, its REO inventory was up 39 percent to 153, 224 homes from March 2010. Fannie Mae reported 65,159 single-family homes in its REO inventory at the end of March, which was up 21 percent from March 2010.

Homes in foreclosure may sell more quickly this summer due to the HomeSteps summer sales promotion. To take advantage of this great offer, contact one of our real estate agents to show you HomeSteps homes in your area.

Draft bill would hike FHA loan down payments to 5%, slash loan limits...

A bill has been drafted by Republicans in the House Financial Services Committee which would raise the minimum down payment for FHA mortgages to 5 percent, reduce FHA loan limits in most markets and transfer the Agriculture Department’s rural housing program to U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), FHA’s parent agency.


Although the draft bill has not been introduced, it is likely to be formalized and rushed through subcommittee and committee votes and forwarded to the full House for action. It appears that the draft bill is a partial response by the House Republicans to the Obama administration’s call for reducing the size of federal government in housing.

The bill is expected to shrink the FHA loan volume in the country by lowering the maximum FHA loan limits in large numbers of local areas, which is well below the limits that are currently scheduled to apply on October 1. This will eliminate a resource for some home buyers who find it difficult to obtain a conventional mortgage.

Here’s an example of the current FHA loan ceiling, how it is scheduled to change in October, and where it would end up under the proposed draft bill. Monroe County in Florida would see maximum FHA loan limits go from $729,750 to $425,000. Under the scheduled Oct. 1 statutory decrease, the county which comprises the Florida Keys would have a $529,000 maximum. Sarasota would see a $261,250 drop under the bill, Miami-Dade a decrease of $161,250, and Orange County (Orlando) limits would decline by $128,750.

The FHA loan limit formula under the proposed draft legislation would be revised to 125 percent of the median home sale price in the local county, and the current $271,050 floor for loan limits nationwide would be eliminated.

Many industry groups are criticizing the bill’s call for a 5 percent minimum down payment on FHA loans. The National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) and the National Association of Realtors have opposed such legislation in the past, stating the lack of statistical evidence that adding 1.5 percent to the current 3.5 percent minimum would drastically affect default probabilities of new FHA homes.

It is expected that the higher down payment requirements along with the bill’s exclusion of financing closing costs, would make it difficult to purchase a home for a large number of home buyers. Analysts estimate about 40 percent of FHA borrowers to fail because they will not be able to afford the transaction.

The sponsoring members of the bill said the move to transfer the Agriculture Department’s rural housing program to HUD makes sense because it already has the housing responsibility and the expertise.

The proposed bill has a good chance of passage in the full House because it is controlled by Republicans, but it is definitely a tough sell in the Democrat controlled Senate, where the support for continuing FHA’s role in the market is much stronger, and any drastic cuts in loan limits in expensive housing markets is not likely to happen.

NAR Study finds Americans favor Smart-Growth communities

The National Association of Realtors’ (NAR) Smart Growth program conducts various surveys to gauge public opinion on land use, growth and community issues.


Smart Growth is an urban planning and transportation concept that concentrates growth in dense urban areas to minimize sprawl and advocates compact, transit-oriented, walk-able, bicycle-friendly land use, including neighborhood schools, complete streets, and mixed-use development with a range of housing choices.

NAR’S 2011 Community Preference Survey explores Americans' wants regarding neighborhood characteristics such as proximity to parks and shopping, walk-ability, and commuting time, and the trade-offs in home type and size that people may be willing to accept in order to obtain those neighborhood preferences. Walk-able communities are defined as those where shops, restaurants and local businesses are within walking distance from homes.

Interestingly, the survey reveals that most Americans would like to live in “live, work and play” planned communities where shops, restaurants, and local business are within a short commute (by walk or other means) from their homes, as long as those communities can provide detached single-family homes.

According to the survey, 56% of respondents prefer smart growth neighborhoods over neighborhoods that require more driving between home, work and recreation. The survey also shows that most Americans would choose a smaller home and smaller lot if it would keep their commute time to 20 minutes or less.

When considering a home purchase, 77% of respondents said they would look for neighborhoods with abundant sidewalks and other pedestrian-friendly features, and 50% would like to see improvements to existing public transportation rather than initiatives to build new roads and developments.

The survey also revealed that while space is important to home buyers, many are willing to sacrifice square footage for less driving. Eighty percent of those surveyed would prefer to live in a single-family, detached home as long as it didn’t require a longer commute, but nearly three out of five of those surveyed—59%—would choose a smaller home if it meant a commute time of 20 minutes or less.

Community characteristics are very important to most people according to the survey. When considering a home purchase, 88% of respondents placed more value on the quality of the neighborhood than the size of the home, and 77% of those surveyed want communities with high-quality schools.

So what does all this mean? Is the pendulum slowly swinging back to smaller houses, or is this a reaction to rising energy prices and the push to reduce America’s consumption habits? It could also be due to the aging baby boomers who’ve been tired of long commutes to the ever-sprawling suburbs in metro areas for decades. There are no clear answers and only time will tell if this trend is here to stay.

NAR’s President Ron Phipps said “Realtors care about improving communities through smart growth initiatives. Our members don’t just sell homes, they sell neighborhoods. Realtors understand that different home buyers are looking for all kinds of neighborhood settings and that many home buyers want walkable, transit-accessible communities.”

Regulators, Banks Reach Deal to Correct Foreclosure Flaws

Complaints about the foreclosure process being unfair to delinquent borrowers who have been trying to keep their homes were finally addressed in the second week of April, when the country’s largest mortgage lenders reached agreements with federal banking regulators.


Consumer advocates had been raising red flags for a long time about what they considered to be fundamental flaws in the foreclosure process. These flaws are expected be corrected by the settlement that was reached with the largest banks. In a related development, the attorneys general from all 50 states as well as the Department of Justice and other federal agencies are also seeking to settle with lenders.

The Federal Reserve and other enforcers of bank regulations launched a review of banking practices last year, which unveiled many violations of foreclosure processes and unsound practices. Rules were allegedly bent to hastily process applications, with an emphasis on quantity rather than quality and accuracy. The newly reached agreement is expected to fix the problems unearthed during the investigation, as well as improve governance, and the loan-modification process.

The agreements require the mortgage servicers to improve their communications with borrowers and to limit the extent to which they can pursue foreclosure during the loan-modification process.

Lenders are also required to ensure foreclosures are not pursued once a mortgage has been approved for modification. It also requires a single point of contact for borrowers throughout the loan-modification and repossession processes.



The agreements mandate lenders to establish systems to govern external companies that conduct foreclosures and related services on their behalf, including outside law firms. Banks must hire an independent company to conduct a review of all foreclosures conducted between Jan. 1, 2009, and December 31, 2010.



Banks are also required to establish a process for providing financial remedies to homeowners that believe they have been improperly foreclosed on by the institutions.



For a long time, federal regulators had been accused and criticized for not doing anything about the unsafe lending practices that were responsible for the housing bubble and its lingering after effects. Many consumer groups have expressed their displeasure with the new agreements because they believe regulators have not gone far enough to correct the flawed foreclosure process.



These groups criticized the proposed agreements to be dilute and toothless. The main bone of contention is the fact that banks are free to come up with their own internally developed plans for correcting and fixing problems. Banks get 60 days to create their plans.



“While homeowners and communities continue to face breached contracts, obstruction and misrepresentations from servicers, the proposed consent orders provide no new directions or standards to the financial institutions subject to your supervision,” a coalition of advocates, including the National Consumer Law Center and the Center for Responsible Lending, wrote in a letter to the federal regulators. “Rather, the proposal permits the perpetrators of these abuses to design a plan to comply with existing laws and contracts. This is insufficient to halt the abuses.”

Foreclosure Rates Retreat from Record Highs

Foreclosure rates in the U.S. have been falling since the beginning of this year. According to RealtyTrac’s U.S. Foreclosure Market Report, foreclosure filings in the first quarter of 2011 decreased 15 percent from the previous quarter and 27 percent from the first quarter of 2010.


Foreclosure filings were made on 239,795 properties in March, which is a 35 percent decline from March 2010, when 367,056 homeowners received a foreclosure notice. About 215,000 properties were foreclosed on in the first quarter, which is a 17 percent decrease when compared to the first quarter of the previous year. 269,000 properties were scheduled for foreclosure auction in the first quarter, a 27 percent reduction from the first quarter of 2010.

Nevada, Arizona, California, Utah and Idaho were the top five states with the highest foreclosure rates. Despite seeing a ten percent reduction from the previous quarter, Nevada led the way with foreclosure filings on one in every 35 households. Arizona had the second highest rate with one in every 60 homes receiving a foreclosure filing during the first quarter. But these numbers were down 17 percent from the first quarter of 2010. California came in third with a foreclosure filing on one in every 80 houses.

Utah had the fourth highest rate, where one in 98 households was in foreclosure. Idaho posted the fifth highest foreclosure rate, with one in every 106 homes having a foreclosure filing during the first quarter. Georgia, Michigan, Florida, Colorado and Illinois were the other five that made up the top ten states that had 10 percent foreclosure filings in the first quarter. Florida accounted for nearly 9 percent of U.S. foreclosure activity, documenting 58,322 properties with a foreclosure filing during the quarter.

Some of these foreclosure numbers were artificially low because of processing delays, particularly in states where a judicial foreclosure process is utilized. This was attributed to the ongoing federal investigation of the foreclosure process in these states. States where non-judicial foreclosure process is employed had the 20 highest first quarter foreclosure rates among metropolitan areas. Las Vegas continued to remain in the number one position with the country’s highest metro foreclosure rate, where one in every 31 households had a foreclosure filing in the first quarter.

According to the Mortgage Bankers Association’s quarterly National Delinquency Survey, the percentage of homeowners with mortgages that were in foreclosure or seriously delinquent fell during the first quarter of 2010, and improvement in the performance of loans taken out from 2005-07 suggests a sustainable trend.

The serious delinquency rate -- the percentage of loans in foreclosure or delinquent by 90 days or more, was 8.1 percent during the first quarter, down from 8.6 percent during the first quarter of 2010 and 9.54 percent a year ago.

The percentage of mortgages in foreclosure was 4.52 percent, down from a record high of 4.64 percent in the fourth quarter, and the percentage of loans behind by 90 days or more dropped for the fifth consecutive quarter, to 3.58 percent.

Analysts predict a steep increase in foreclosure rates when the federal investigation is completed. When this happens, it will reveal a realistic U.S. foreclosure rate. Real estate pundits predict the market would stabilize when we get an accurate picture of foreclosure filings, and this will help determine the housing market trend for the rest of 2011.

New Bill introduced to speed Short Sales

A bill named the “Prompt Decision for Qualification for Short Sale Act of 2011” was introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives in April which would require mortgage lenders to respond to short sale requests within 45 days from the time they receive it. Short sales represent about 13% of recent home sales. This bill may be a boon to thousands of home owners who are unable to keep their home and hope to avoid foreclosure. The short sale process is currently inefficient and time consuming and many potential buyers end up walking away from the sale because of long delays, which invariably causes properties to be foreclosed.

The National Association of Realtors® (NAR) is fully supportive of this new bill. NAR had been actively pushing the mortgage industry to revamp the short sales approval process. Short sales are beneficial to lenders because they cost less than foreclosures and it also reduces the negative financial impact on borrowers. Ron Phipps, the president of NAR said “as the leading advocate for home ownership and housing issues, Realtors® want to help more homeowners avoid foreclosure by facilitating a short sale when a family is absolutely unable to keep their home; however, that can only happen if lenders and servicers approve short sale offers in a reasonable amount of time.”

Here’s the problem with the current situation. There are many decision-makers involved in the short sale process including buyers, sellers, investors, servicers, insurers and lenders. All of them must agree to approve or reject each sale. Lenders find it difficult to decide if they must approve or deny a sale. Sometimes this could cause several months of status quo, resulting in potential buyers getting frustrated and canceling their contracts due to a lack of response from lenders, and this results in properties being foreclosed.

According to the proposed bill, the servicer must notify the borrower about the status of their sale within the 45-day deadline. The notification may include approval or denial of the sale process, or a request for additional information and paperwork.

Phipps also stated that “streamlining short sales transactions will reduce the amount of time it takes to sell the property, improve the likelihood that the transaction will close and reduce the overall number of foreclosures. This benefits sellers, lenders, buyers and the entire community.”

This bill has the potential to dramatically reduce the inventory of foreclosed homes across the country. However, it has not yet been assigned to a committee. A similar bill with the same title was introduced in September 2010, but it did not make it to a House committee for debate before the end of the legislative session. NAR has urged Congress to pass this new bill quickly. When passed, the bill would provide much needed relief to millions of home owners by helping them prevent foreclosures. It will also reduce the financial hit on lenders and servicers.

Is Homeowners Insurance difficult to obtain in Florida?

The sunshine state is often called the Pensioners’ paradise for good reason. It is the number one destination in the U.S. for retirees because of its balmy weather, low income and property taxes, active lifestyle opportunities, and its proximity to myriads of beaches and theme parks. For many infamous reasons, it is also one of the toughest states to get homeowners insurance, and that’s the topic of today’s blog.


Florida is home to six of the ten named home insurance perils including hurricanes, tornadoes, thunderstorms, floods, extreme heat and wildfires. When you add sinkholes, mold and termites to that mix, it is easy to figure out why it is so hard to obtain homeowners insurance in the state.

Florida’s homeowners insurance covers many types of losses. Every type of coverage is not available to all homeowners because of geography and location. The type and cost of insurance depends on which part of the state a home is located in. The state’s population is densely packed around the peninsula’s coasts and these are the areas that bear the highest risks. This means it is difficult to obtain insurance for oceanfront homes and homes located in hurricane zones. Homes located in areas prone to sinkholes may not get coverage for this type of loss. Since risks are lower for homes located in the central and northern part of the state, geography is less of a concern in these areas.

Florida laws protect insurance companies by allowing them to not accept applications in any part of the state for new or increase in existing coverage when the National Weather Service issues a warning or watch for hurricanes or tropical storms. Florida’s homeowner’s insurance does not cover flood damage, including water damage from a storm surge. Buying flood insurance may be impossible or prohibitively expensive for homes located in FEMA designated flood zones.

To remain competitive, insurance companies are expected to maintain top financial ratings from rating services firms like AM Best. If insurance companies’ issue too many policies to Florida homeowners, their financial ratings could be downgraded which in turn would make them less attractive compared to their competitors. Given Florida’s population growth, large numbers of applications are submitted to insurance companies annually and the underwriters selectively issue policies to low-risk homeowners with top credit ratings.

Due to historic and unprecedented number of natural disasters in recent years, insurance companies in Florida have issued billions of dollars to homeowners during this past decade. Unable to recover and remain profitable after such huge losses, many insurance companies pulled out of Florida, a couple of them were ordered to liquidate and three were taken over by the state government. For all these reasons it has become very difficult to get homeowners insurance in the state.
To ease the insurance crisis, the Florida legislature created a state insurance fund called the Citizens Property Insurance Corporation in 2002. It is now Florida’s largest home insurer. For many years, this was the only option for Floridians. However, due to calmer storm and hurricane seasons since the past couple of years, eight global insurance carriers have cautiously entered or re-entered the homeowner insurance market in the sunshine state.
While new homeowners continue to relocate to Florida to enjoy beautiful beaches, abundant sunny days, low taxes and other benefits, there aren’t a lot of companies left in the sunshine state that offer homeowners insurance.
Here are a few homeowner insurance resources for Florida residents:
The Florida Office of Insurance Regulation (FLOIR): http://www.floir.com/
Citizens Property Insurance Corporation: https://www.citizensfla.com/index.cfm
Florida Market Assistance Plan (FMAP): http://www.fmap.org/