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Moving back home 2007-08-22 03:46:15 When Jeff Popham moved back to Victoria from Toronto, he — like a lot of adult children — ended up returning to his parent’s house. Fortunately, they had an extra lot next door. For Popham’s young family, high real-estate prices proved daunting in their search for a home. So, his parents offered their side yard as a site to build a new house. Jeff’s mother, Joan, can now look out her sunroom window to see her two granddaughters playing in their front yard. See article » ...

A letter from a man who gets it that we should all understand 2007-08-21 20:14:47 Kyle Bass is a hedge fund manager but not just a manager of any ol’ fund; he manages the Hayman Capital Subprime Credit Strategies Fund. What’s so special about this fund? Well in a market that is seeing hedge funds collapse and cave left and right Mr. Bass’s fund is up a tidy 300% this year alone. How has Mr. Bass’s fund defied the gravity currently slamming nearly every fund this side of Bear Stearns to the ground? Simple. The fund bet that the subprime market would collapse; and the bet was right on the money. With the proof clearly in the pudding, Mr. Bass issued an open letter to investors which has become known as “The Greatest Bait and Switch of ALL TIME” manifesto. You can read the full thing here; and I heartily suggest that you do if you value knowledge from people who have clearly found the upside to a market currently slaughtering the rest of the pack. In a rare move - I have decided to provide the entire text of the letter here, as ...

National City Warehouse Stops Approving Non-Agency Loans 2007-08-21 08:52:41 Update: A kind gentleman from National City informed me that the email received was for smaller-scale mortgage bankers only; and that their larger-scale bankers are still operating “business as usual.” The market for jumbo loans, pay-option loans and other non-agency mortgages just got a lot tighter… In a recent letter to correspondent lenders (no link sorry) National City announced that they will no longer be approving or funding any non-agency loans via their warehouse lines of credit. These credit lines are extended to their correspondent lenders as short-term financing allowing non-depository mortgage bankers to fund and close loans. The only loans now eligible for funding via National City’s warehouse facilities are those that meet Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac guidelines - also known as agency or conforming loans. National City is simply acknowledging the increased risk of getting stuck with loans that cannot be sold to investors on the secondary market. T ...

Updates on Life and CISSP 2007-08-21 07:58:52 Life:      Sorry I've been away for so long.  My full time career has been getting in the way of my blogging.  We're up for another re-compete of many positions we have filled around the United States and I've been working on seeing how they are going and writing proposals as needed.  I pulled an all-niter finishing one proposal only to hear of another that should be coming through sometime today.  I needed a stress release so I took a few minutes to browse the Internet, catch up on some news articles I've been putting off reading and figured I should update everyone on what is going on.     In addition to the re-compete I've been traveling quite a bit lately to prep the customers for what was coming.   I wanted to prepare them and do everything I could to help out before the positions were actually advertised.  Once they are advertised I am no longer allowed to speak to the decision makers.  These are government contracts and I would end up disqu ...

What is the longest place name in America? 2007-08-21 02:16:57 It’s Lake Chargoggagoggmanchauggauggagoggchaubunagungamaugg. The name, which has 17 g’s, is pronounced, naturally, as it’s spelled. There are two variant spellings. According to author Bill McLain, this Nipmuck Indian word means, “You fish on your side, I fish on my side, nobody fishes in the middle.” It’s also known as Lake Webster. Source: DO FISH DRINK WATER? By Bill McLain ... America

Bring on the lawsuits 2007-08-20 20:21:53 With homeowners upside down on their properties and the foreclosure boom kicking off in earnest; you knew it was only a matter of time before the lawsuit engine kicked in to high gear. CNN Money reports on the phenomenon picking up steam as individual home owners start suing the crap out of their mortgage broker, lender, and anyone else involved in the transaction that winds up costing them their home. It’s going to be a good time to be a real estate attorney. The ones I know are so busy they are turning down business left and right. The cases primarily revolve around the following: Violation of the Truth-In-Lending act for failure to provide clear and understandable disclosures. These will be popular in Option ARM lawsuits. Fraud or misrepresentation. These will be popular in cases surrounding stated income loans. Valuation and cash back schemes. Loan officers, appraisers and title/escrow units work together to provide extra cash at closing by over valuing the property. ...

Blowin’ Up - Some Updates 2007-08-20 19:09:05 It has been a wild ride around here lately; and I just want to thank every one that visits and reads this site on a regular basis for your generous decision to share a few minutes of your day with Blown Mortgage.  Thank you for making what we do here meaningful - it means everything. Blown Mortgage has certainly picked up steam over the last month.  There have been a few key press pieces that I thought I’d share with you all. Blown Mortgage gets covered in Computer World.  This is an article about corporate blogging and how it can and can’t be used effectively. Blown Mortgage gets interviewed by REMBEX Real Estate blogger profiles.   I’m interviewed by Todd Carpenter who takes the time to interview the top real estate bloggers around the country.  I am honored that he chose to profile me in his latest interview. I’ve been honored to be chosen as a regular contributor to the new Mortgage Mentor blog over at loan.com.  This blog offers honest mortgage advi ...

Countrywide Begins Layoffs in Earnest 2007-08-20 18:11:49 The Wall Street Journal reports that Countrywide has begun layoffs in its Full Spectrum lending division. Full Spectrum is Countrywide’s euphemism for its subprime and alt-a retail lending divisions. I can personally confirm it as well. Several of our friends have reported that sales team managers are being demoted and loan originators that are not performing near the top of the pile are either out the door or sweating in their seats. Countrywide, which may have faced a severe liquidity crisis or concerns last week when it tapped $11 billion in credit, acknowledged that they will be focusing more on agency products (conforming loans sold to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac). This strategy shift would necessitate the paring down of the alternative financing group as salaries, insurance and infastructure to support the nearly 6,000 originators has a heavy weight on the bottom line. From the report: The layoffs hit the company’s Full Spectrum unit, which handles “Alt-A&rd ...

Will Work For Food: Why I Left Microsoft for a Startup 2007-08-20 17:13:54 I’ve been asked by many of my friends and family why I decided to leave my position at Microsoft, where I was appreciated and rewarded, for more work, more responsibility, and more stress. Well, the decision was mainly a result of three factors. First, someday I may start my own company, and transitioning from a startup makes that much easier. Second, I didn’t agree with many of Microsoft’s decisions and direction. Third, I wanted to build a product that would really cater to consumers and could stand on its own. Almost all the top engineers I know talk ad nauseum about starting their own company, with the caveat of, “I’ll stay at big company XYZ for 2-3 years, then I’ll go out on my own.” Well, it never made sense to me how they thought that they could make the transition from being so removed from the business and the end to end process of creating and shipping a product. Working at a startup, you’re about as close as you can be to run ... Microsoft

GreenPoint closed by Capital One, Thornburg Hammered 2007-08-20 14:55:49 Sorry for the information black out today folks.  My company is busy moving offices so I have been burried in computers, moving boxes and dust for the last 3 days.  I finally have a desk and internet. Thanks to everyone who sent me alerts about Greenpoint and Capital One.  I saw it on the news but couldn’t get to a computer - very frustrating.  Here is the update from Market Watch: The company also said it will close GreenPoint’s California-based headquarters along with 31 locations across 19 states. That will mean the elimination of roughly 1,900 jobs, most by the end of 2007… “Current conditions in the secondary mortgage markets create significant near-term profitability challenges,” Capital One said in a statement. “Further, recent and continuing developments in the mortgage markets reduce the long-term outlook for profitability in the business, as the company expects markets for prime, non-conforming mortgage products are likely to remain ch ...

Stinson’s Tower Crumbles 2007-08-20 09:59:45 Forced sale ends Stinson’s condo tower An Ontario judge ordered the sale of a downtown Toronto site to pay off creditors, ending developer Harry Stinson’s bid to build the city’s tallest residential tower and surpass a similar project by billionaire Donald Trump. Ontario Superior Court Judge Peter Cumming, at a hearing in Toronto, named BDO Dunwoody as the interim receiver for the property at 66 Temperance Street in Toronto’s financial district. He issued his order after Stinson failed to sell the land to Dubai-based Tulip Business Developers for about $30 million. Stinson proposed to build twin towers at the site, the taller at 81 stories, challenging Trump’s plan to build the tallest residential tower a city block away with a 70-storey condominium and hotel. The Toronto developer’s plan collapsed when Graphic Arts Building Corp., which sold him the site, demanded full payment on a $10.5-million mortgage in default. Mr. Stinson is resigned to the fa ...

ByTheOwner.com Reaches 5,000 Active For-Sale-By-Owner Properties For Sale 2007-08-20 09:36:20 ByTheOwner.com, Canada’s largest For-Sale-By-Owner website, recently reached 5,000 active homes for sale. This is a feat that we are very proud of, especially considering we passed 4,000 homes for sale only a few months ago on June 8, 2007. We pride ourselves on being the best and the biggest FSBO website in Canada. We know that having thousands of homes for sale, as well thousands of new listings, will results in more buyers searching on our site for their next home for sale. Our 5,000 active listings include approximately 4100 activate properties for sale put online by our ByTheOwner.com staff, another 400 properties provided by our British Columbia partner (OKhomeseller.com) and and additional 500 properties provided by our Saskatchewan partner (Saskhouses.com). Thank you to everyone selling privately across Canada! www.bytheowner.com ...

MLS sales forecast revised upward 2007-08-20 08:24:21 Fueled by record activity levels during the first half of the year, national MLS® home sales activity is expected to reach record levels again in 2007, according to a new residential forecast prepared by The Canadian Real Estate Association. National home sales are forecast to rise by 8.1 per cent to 523,100 units in 2007, and will set new annual records in most provinces. Activity is forecast to edge slightly lower in 2008, but will reach the second highest annual level on record in almost all provinces. Prices are forecast to set new records in every province this year and in 2008, but price increases will be smaller next year. Resale housing markets will continue to become more balanced in British Columbia and Alberta. Even so, markets will remain tightest in the Western provinces where annual price increases will be greatest. In other provinces, the resale housing market is forecast to be tighter in 2007 than it was last year, but it will become more balanced as housing prices in ...

Tricked by staging? Save $5,645? 2007-08-20 07:43:23 NAEBA has posted an article, “How to not get tricked by staging - and potentially save $5,645 when you buy your home”?. I read the article and decided that they have done the home staging industry a service. How so? The following is a blog I posted on Active Rain and decided to share with the CSP community. THANK YOU NAEBA! As both a home stager and a realtor I WISH TO EXPRESS MY SINCERE THANKS TO YOUR ORGANIZATION FOR THIS ARTICLE. Given my choice of careers, you might well ask why I would thank-you when clearly your intent was to denigrate home staging services to promote your organization. Well, let’s take a closer look at the different elements of your article. Firstly, you have defined home staging as occurring on two different levels. 1) Basic Staging - your summarized list and the fact that you have pointed out that these practices have been around for years is a testament to the value of home staging even before it became an industry. 2) Emot ...

Home Inspection Nightmares 2007-08-20 05:31:25 This bathroom outlet is not a GFCI. Thanks providence, this homeowner had the presence of mind to leave all of the tags on, advising of potential shock hazard. ...