Aug 21, 2009
Foreclosures hit record high
WASHINGTON - WITH the recession throwing thousands of people out of work daily, more than 13 per cent of American homeowners with a mortgage have fallen behind on their payments or are in foreclosure.
BUYING UP
AS BANKS unload foreclosed properties at deep discounts, they are attracting homebuyers back into the market.
On Friday, the National Association of Realtors will release July home sales data, and economists expect it to show the fourth-straight monthly sales increase.
... more
The record-high numbers released Thursday by the Mortgage Bankers Association are being driven by borrowers with traditional fixed-rate mortgages, rather than the shady subprime loans with adjustable rates that kicked off the mortgage crisis.
As of June, more than 4 per cent of all borrowers were in foreclosure, while about 9 per cent had missed at least one payment.
And the layoffs keep coming. Lockheed Martin Corp said this week it's handing out about 800 pink slips in its space systems division, and audio conferencing company Polycom Inc. said it will cut about 80 positions.
New jobless claims rose last week to a seasonally adjusted 576,000, the Labour Department said on Thursday. While the recession, measured by the nation's total economic output, is likely over, most economists expect layoffs and foreclosures to keep rising for many months as companies remain in cost-cutting mode.
'Their confidence has been shattered,' said Brian Bethune, chief US financial economist at IHS Global Insight. 'They are going to be very conservative. They don't want to be blind-sided by a false dawn economy.' Nee Salam, 56, lost his engineering job at an automotive electronics supplier south of Atlanta more than a year ago.
At the time, he said, 'I was thinking the job market was going to change right away.' But it hasn't.
Since then, he's been working as a consultant, earning less than half his old salary of US$115,000 (S$165,600). His wife has been cleaning houses to keep the family afloat.
But after draining their savings and retirement accounts, the couple have missed four payments on their US$636,000 mortgage. Their request for a loan modification from OneWest Bank (formerly failed IndyMac Bank) was denied because the couple's income was too low. A OneWest representative declined comment. -- AP
Foreclosures hit record high
WASHINGTON - WITH the recession throwing thousands of people out of work daily, more than 13 per cent of American homeowners with a mortgage have fallen behind on their payments or are in foreclosure.
BUYING UP
AS BANKS unload foreclosed properties at deep discounts, they are attracting homebuyers back into the market.
On Friday, the National Association of Realtors will release July home sales data, and economists expect it to show the fourth-straight monthly sales increase.
... more
The record-high numbers released Thursday by the Mortgage Bankers Association are being driven by borrowers with traditional fixed-rate mortgages, rather than the shady subprime loans with adjustable rates that kicked off the mortgage crisis.
As of June, more than 4 per cent of all borrowers were in foreclosure, while about 9 per cent had missed at least one payment.
And the layoffs keep coming. Lockheed Martin Corp said this week it's handing out about 800 pink slips in its space systems division, and audio conferencing company Polycom Inc. said it will cut about 80 positions.
New jobless claims rose last week to a seasonally adjusted 576,000, the Labour Department said on Thursday. While the recession, measured by the nation's total economic output, is likely over, most economists expect layoffs and foreclosures to keep rising for many months as companies remain in cost-cutting mode.
'Their confidence has been shattered,' said Brian Bethune, chief US financial economist at IHS Global Insight. 'They are going to be very conservative. They don't want to be blind-sided by a false dawn economy.' Nee Salam, 56, lost his engineering job at an automotive electronics supplier south of Atlanta more than a year ago.
At the time, he said, 'I was thinking the job market was going to change right away.' But it hasn't.
Since then, he's been working as a consultant, earning less than half his old salary of US$115,000 (S$165,600). His wife has been cleaning houses to keep the family afloat.
But after draining their savings and retirement accounts, the couple have missed four payments on their US$636,000 mortgage. Their request for a loan modification from OneWest Bank (formerly failed IndyMac Bank) was denied because the couple's income was too low. A OneWest representative declined comment. -- AP
