Consumers Union, the nonprofit, nonpartisan group has come out with 9 key provisions that should be in the "bailout" of out financial markets. They sound proper to me so here they are: (read the full details under "NEWS ARTICLES" elsewhere on my website)

1 Help people ar t risk of foreclosure

2. Give bankruptcy courts power to prevent foreclosures

3. Protect neighborhoods hit by foreclosures

4. Stop excessive executive compensation

5. Prevent bailout abuse

6. Require greater transparency

7. Be sure the problem is solved, not postponed

8. Make everyone who profits responsible

9. Curb abusive credit card practices

What do you think???

I'm certainly no economist but I think I have a basic understanding of this situation. When you listen to Paulson, Bernacke and our congressmen you could have a difficult time understanding any of it. The troubles all revolve around valuing these mortgage backed securities. Banks, insurance companies, investors, mutual funds all own these securities and many of them contain what is being called "sub-prime loans" which are being forced into foreclosure at an astounding rate. That being the case, no one wants to buy these securities at any price. Obviously they are not worthless but with no buyers, what value do they have? This is the problem the financial institutions face now. They must value them for their books to be legal, but what do you value them at, and does anyone believe your value? Look at it this way and perhaps you will better understand. Say you live in a small town and work for one of the automakers. Two years ago you and many of your neighbors bought new homes in a new subdivision. You were in good shape and the future looked bright. Now the automaker shuts down the factory where you and your neighbors work. Suddenly, most of the homes in your sub go on the market because you can no longer make the payments, there are no buyers because their are no jobs. Is your home suddenly worth nothing, zero, nada?? Because their are no buyers? Of course not, but with no buyers you cannot value your home. If a new corporation buys the factory and work is again plentiful, your home could be worth what you paid for it, but until this happens, your home has an unknown value. Uncle Sam is going to try to be that corporation who buys the automaker and restores jobs and income to the neighborhood so your home once again has a distinct value. Make sense?? Any easier to understand?? Just my way of making some sense of the situation and obviously it is way more complicated than this.   

 The news for buyers is very good and not so good. The very good news is, the interest rates are again under 6% which is absolutely great. The rate was 6.35% just 2 weeks ago. This may not sound big but it really makes a difference in the payments on your new home. This means about $33.00 per month less payment per $100,000. On a new home purchase for $150,000 you would be paying about $48.00 less per month than just 2 weeks ago. The not so good news is, loans are no easier to get and in a couple of weeks you will no longer be able to get 100% financing. 100% financing expires Oct 1st and who knows when, of if, it will ever return. For a while, at least, buyers will have to come up with 3-3.5% down payment.    

According to a recent survey......not very good at all!!!! The most popular consumer search engines offer home buyers only a small fraction of the actual homes available and many of the listings shown are inaccurate or out of date! Wow, not what you would expect, it sure surprised me. The survey, taken in 3 major metro markets, failed to provide 92% of the available listings. The search engines used included Zillow, Trulia, Google and Yahoo. You would expect better from these BIG DOGS. Google actually came out best and still achieved only 69% accuracy. What is the answer for buyers looking for good info?? Use a local MLS search engine to get the best results. In the Atlanta area I suggest you use  http://www.gamlshomes.com/. They have a direct tie to the MLS system all us agents use. This site should get you the very best listings available plus a great deal of additional info. Try it, you will like it!!

According to Zillow Home Value Index, we have seen the largest year-over-year decline in home values in the past 12 yrs. Leaving 29.1% of all homeowners who purchased homes since the fall of 2004 with negative equity. Places in California have lost 38.2% of their home value, Las Vegas has lost 27.4% and Miami area has lost 20.8% in just the last year. This doesn't take into account the loss from '06 to '07. Wow! can you just imagine what it must be like to live in one of those areas. Some areas are still doing well, take Pittsburg, Oklahoma City, and Austin for example, they have all increased in value. None of those are places I want to live, but they must be celebrating that they are not losing home value. As bad as this sounds, consider that 90% of all homes sitll have a value higher than 5 years ago, and 100% have a higher value than 10 years ago.

Foreclosure rates are still rising and some economist are predicting two more waves of foreclosures to come over the next few years. Foreclosures were up another 8% in July from June and up 55% from July '07. RealtyTrac is showing more than 750,000 active foreclosed properties available for sale. Nevada, California and Florida continue to rank tops in foreclosures with Arizona, Ohio, Georgia, Michigan, Colorado, Utah, and Virginia rounding out the top 10. And some economist are predicting another wave late this year and into 2009 and a third wave in 2010-2011 as those interest only loans made in 2005-2007 come to an end. This means more homes sitting on the market, falling home prices and builders not putting up new homes will continue for some time 

Fannie and Freddie are trying to make it better and quicker for lenders to work out something with borrowers in trouble. This only helps those with goverment insured loans, but certainly better than nothing. The quasi-goverment entities and paying the lenders to work out foreclosures as quickly as possible. The lenders can get a $400 payment for arranging a repayment program on loans more than 60 days delinquent. They can get up to $700 for each borrower who takes out a HomeSaver Advance loan and can get $1000 to $1500 for facilitating a short sale. They also will get $1000 for each deed-in-lieu of foreclosure. With these things in place it should help borrowers in trouble get out from under some of those housing debts.