Defaults moving beyond sub-prime

Click on title link above for full LA Times article by E. Scott Reckard, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

Joan Olsen, a retired welfare worker, fears she’ll join the ranks of the delinquent. She said she didn’t fully understand the loan terms when she refinanced her San Diego condominium 15 months ago with an option ARM. “I have no one but myself to blame for signing off on something I didn’t understand.”
Delinquencies among holders of risky option ARMs are increasing as their minimum payments climb.

Thought the mortgage meltdown was just a sub-prime affair? Think again. There's another time bomb waiting to explode, experts say: risky loans made to people with good credit.

So-called pay-option adjustable-rate mortgages, or option ARMs, were the easiest and most profitable home loans for lenders and brokers to make for much of this decade. Last year, they accounted for about 9% of the volume of all mortgages made in the U.S. and were especially popular in California, Florida and Nevada -- states where home prices rose the most during the housing boom and are now falling most sharply.

Fence Painting Project

Please, Please someone tell me that the fence has some kind of primer only....because it sure does look pink to me! anyone know if thats the final color?
thanks,
#125

New year looks to be good for buying a home

Let's dub 2008 the "Year of the Home Buying Opportunity."

That's my glass-half-full take on what's going to happen with the residential real estate market.

But the extent of the opportunity will materialize over time.

Perhaps market tracker DataQuick Information Systems and the California Association of Realtors provided a glimpse last week with sales and price statistics for November.

DataQuick noted that the median price across the Southern California region stretching from Ventura to San Diego fell a record 10.3 percent from a year earlier, to $435,000. (DataQuick's stats include new and previously owned houses and condominiums.)

The price drop was bigger - 12percent across California and in Los Angeles County - in the state association's report, which focused just on previously owned single-family houses.

Both reports noted that prices have dropped to early 2005 levels.

Robert Kleinhenz, the association's deputy chief economist, recalled that during the market slump of the 1990s, the biggest price decline statewide was 7.2 percent in May 1993.

Los Angeles County's biggest drop was 11.6 percent in March 1993.

Price drops back then for the state generally didn't exceed 5percent annually, he noted.