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The Obama administration Tuesday stepped up efforts to make it easier for struggling homeowners to renegotiate their mortgages, though it could be more than a year before such efforts pay off.
The way mortgage servicers — firms that collect loan payments on behalf of a loan’s owner — are paid is “broken and should be fixed,” Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and Housing and Urban Development Secretary Shaun Donovan said in a joint statement. Get the full story »
U.S. home-builder sentiment in January was flat at a low level for the third month in a row as the housing market struggled to recover from its collapse, a survey released Tuesday showed.
The National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index held steady at 16 from last month. Get the full story »
ELITE STREET | By Bob Goldsborough | Chicago Blackhawks left wing Bryan Bickell has paid $510,000 for a newly built, seven-room town home in Hamlin Park.
Bickell, 24, becomes the fifth current Blackhawk to own a home in a one-square-mile North Side area that encompasses parts of the Hamlin Park, West Lakeview and Roscoe Village neighborhoods, joining teammates Brent Seabrook, Troy Brouwer, Duncan Keith and Dave Bolland. Get the full story »
Federal Reserve officials worried in 2005 about the risks a housing bubble could pose to the U.S. economy but ended the year hopeful a steady round of interest-rate increases would keep the problem in check, transcripts released Friday showed.
The documents suggest the Fed, in hindsight, may have been too complacent about an overheated housing market that helped spark the worst U.S. financial crisis and deepest recession since the 1930s. Get the full story »
JPMorgan Chase & Co reported fourth-quarter earnings jumped, helped by narrowing losses on bad loans.
The bank said earnings climbed to $4.8 billion, or $1.12 a share, from $3.3 billion, or 74 cents a share, a year earlier. Analysts on average expected a profit of $1 a share, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S. Get the full story »
Rates on fixed mortgages dipped for the second straight week as Treasury yields fell. Freddie Mac says the average rate on the 30-year mortgage dropped to 4.71 percent this week from 4.77 percent the previous week. It hit a 40-year low of 4.17 percent in November. Get the full story »
A vacant home in Chicago Lawn, Feb. 16, 2009. (Antonio Perez/Chicago Tribune)
Bank repossessions of foreclosed homes in the Chicago region soared almost 20 percent, to more than 45,000 properties in 2010, despite various government and lender programs designed to keep people in their properties and a slowdown in fourth-quarter activity due to investigations of foreclosure procedures, new data show.
According to RealtyTrac, the online marketplace for foreclosure properties, 45,555 homes became bank-owned last year in the area between the Wisconsin border and northwest Indiana.
Also during the year, mortgage servicers filed 83,429 initial notices of default, the first step in the foreclosure process.
In the Chicago area last year, foreclosure filings totaled 80,618 in Cook County; 10,646 in DuPage; 9,041 in Kane; 2,612 in Kendall; 11,026 in Lake; 5,385 in McHenry; and 11,027 in Will. Get the full story »
Banks repossessed more than 1 million homes in 2010, marked the highest annual tally of properties lost to foreclosure on records dating back to 2005, RealtyTrac said.
And this year is expected to be even bleaker. “2011 is going to be the peak,” said Rick Sharga, a senior vice president at foreclosure tracker RealtyTrac Inc.
Lenders are poised to take back more homes this year than any other since the U.S. housing meltdown began in 2006. Get the full story »
Economic growth continued to expand moderately the last few weeks, the Federal Reserve said Wednesday.
In its latest snapshot of regional economic conditions, the Fed reported that manufacturing, retail and non-financial services sectors were strong in most regions. Get the full story »
Housing experts say U.S. home sales and construction should rise sharply this year, but the increases hinge on the economy adding more jobs.
Two economists delivered their forecast Wednesday at the International Builders’ Show in Orlando, Fla. Get the full story »
Lake Forest-based private equity firm Green Courte Partners LLC has acquired six age-restricted, manufactured housing communities in central Florida.
The firm, which targets niche real estate sectors, said the purchase includes more than 1,850 home sites that are nearly 100 percent occupied.
Green Courte now owns more than 18,000 home sites in 48 communities in 10 states. Get the full story »
Applications for U.S. home mortgages increased last week as lending rates eased from recent highs, an industry group said on Wednesday. The Mortgage Bankers Association said its seasonally adjusted index of mortgage application activity rose 2.2 percent in the week ended Jan. 7 to its highest level in about a month. Get the full story »
The town of Cicero unanimously voted Tuesday to approve Wirtz Beverage Illinois’ request to build a $70-million, 600,000-square-foot distribution center at a location that used to be a racetrack. Wirtz’ new center will incorporate the company’s other offices and warehouses in Schaumburg, Wood Dale, Bensenville and Elk Grove Village.
The company had said in a statement last week that most of its 1,000 employees would move to the new center. Get the full story »
Charles Schwab Corp. will pay $18 million to settle regulatory charges that it hid mortgage-related risks in a bond mutual fund from investors. Get the full story »
