Thursday, July 15, 2010

foreclosure help

Two years into the housing crash, Fannie Mae just now announced a war on strategic defaulters:


WASHINGTON, DC — Fannie Mae (FNM/NYSE) announced today policy changes designed to encourage borrowers to work with their servicers and pursue alternatives to foreclosure. Defaulting borrowers who walk-away and had the capacity to pay or did not complete a workout alternative in good faith will be ineligible for a new Fannie Mae-backed mortgage loan for a period of seven years from the date of foreclosure. Borrowers who have extenuating circumstances may be eligible for new loan in a shorter timeframe.


Fannie Mae will also take legal action to recoup the outstanding mortgage debt from borrowers who strategically default on their loans in jurisdictions that allow for deficiency judgments. In an announcement next month, the company will be instructing its servicers to monitor delinquent loans facing foreclosure and put forth recommendations for cases that warrant the pursuit of deficiency judgments.


Troubled borrowers who work with their servicers, and provide information to help the servicer assess their situation, can be considered for foreclosure alternatives, such as a loan modification, a short sale, or a deed-in-lieu of foreclosure. A borrower with extenuating circumstances who works out one of these options with their servicer could be eligible for a new mortgage loan in three years and in as little as two years depending on the circumstances.


It's an dramatic move for the much-maligned company. But first of all, the plan sounds too vague to result in many prosecutions.


Second, the war on default is a terrible market indicator. Fannie Mae is worried about an increase in strategic defaults, which is caused by and contributes to a fall in prices. Indeed, that's what's been happening all spring, as home values keep dropping in many markets.


Don't miss: 14 Reasons To Fear The Growing Mortgage Bubble


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The day after the 2008 election, when jubilant progressives elsewhere prematurely celebrated the election of a young, dynamic Democratic president and LGBT Californians sat stunned and demoralized at our civil rights stripped away, Jane Hamsher sent me an email saying, “We will not rest until this injustice is undone, Teddy.”


This isn’t Firedoglake’s issue: we’re not a ‘gay blog’ and most of us aren’t ‘gay bloggers.’


But amidst my tears on Election Day Plus One, Jane’s email presaged the work FDL has done the last 18 months. FDL is not an LGBT blog nor are we LGBT bloggers, many of us. But the expert team assembled to liveblog from Judge Vaughn Walker’s courtroom — David Dayen, Marcy Wheeler, and Emptywheel’s bmaz — lifted me up. They provided me with the will to continue as my fingers cramped and my back cried out. As I wept in the courtroom while brave plaintiffs described the simple human rights they were daily denied as a gay couple and a lesbian couple, I had the power of FDL with me and behind me.


And you knew where to look for this coverage, because FDL’s tremendous backstage crew had provided a Hub where all our coverage lived — and will always live as long as there’s a federal trial underway on our right to marry.


I knew I could not rest until we’d seen that trial through — and there’s plenty more to come, you know very well, no matter the decision Judge Vaughn Walker renders.


There were plenty of LGBT bloggers covering the trial, twitterers and texters too. But if you wanted the core coverage, the word-for-word explication, the sense of the courtroom, the attitude from the bench, the despair and confusion among the Counsel for Defendant-Intervenors — here’s where you tuned in. The activist organizations and LGBT organizers and bloggers provided plenty of fine background, flavor, color, and perspective.


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kamloops


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