MBA - "Mortgage Applications Increase In Latest MBA Weekly Survey" (3-5-08)

"The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) today released its Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending February 29, 2008. The Market Composite Index, a measure of mortgage loan application volume, was 684.9, an increase of 3.0 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis from 665.1 one week earlier. On an unadjusted basis, the Index increased 15.3 percent compared with the previous President’s Day holiday shortened week and was up 1.1 percent compared with the same week one year earlier."

Yahoo - "Ratings Agencies Differ on Ambac Plan" (3-5-08)

"Credit rating agencies Standard & Poor's and Moody's said Wednesday Ambac Financial Group Inc.'s plan to raise $1.5 billion by selling stock would be enough to avert a downgrade, but competitor Fitch Ratings was less upbeat."

Washington Post - "The Housing Fix" (3-5-08)

"Even many economists -- who should know better -- describe the present situation as an oversupply of unsold homes. True, there is about 10 months' supply of existing homes as opposed to four months' a few years ago. But the real problem is insufficient demand. There aren't more homes than there are Americans who want homes; that would be a true surplus. There's so much supply because many prospective customers can't buy at today's prices."

Bloomberg - "Auction Bond Failures Near 70%; No Sign of Abating" (3-5-08)

"Auction-rate bond failures show no sign of abating after investors abandoned the market for variable-rate municipal securities. Almost 70 percent of the periodic auctions in the $330 billion market failed this week as investment banks stopped buying the securities investors didn't want. Yields on the debt averaged 6.52 percent as of Feb. 28, up from 3.63 percent before demand evaporated in January."

Yahoo - "WaMu protects exec bonuses from subprime fallout" (3-5-08)

"Washington Mutual Inc's board of directors approved a plan which helps protect its management's bonus targets from the impact of the subprime loan fallout, according to a filing with U.S. regulators. The board's human resources committee on February 26 approved bonus targets, some of which will be calculated to exclude expenses related to business re-sizing or restructuring, foreclosed real estate assets and loan loss provisions other than related to its credit card business."

Reuters - "Fraud compounds woes of housing crisis" (3-5-08)

"As the U.S. housing meltdown forces hundreds of thousands of Americans from their homes, the extent to which fraud was a factor in the crisis is just coming to light. Products such as stated-income loans -- known as 'liar loans' because no proof of income was needed -- led to widespread misrepresentation by borrowers about their earnings."

USA Today - "Realtors' spring marketing reflects market realities" (3-5-08)

"As housing prices continue to fall, real estate agencies are responding with a marketing onslaught to try to entice reluctant shoppers to get off the fence and buy. As the spring buying and selling season opens with a backlog of unsold homes, national franchisers RE/Max, Coldwell Banker and Century 21 and the industry's trade association have mounted TV ads, local messages and Web marketing."


Orange County Register - "HUD says LA/OC apartment market hit by rental houses" (3-5-08)

"The latest recap by the U.S. Housing and Urban Development Department suggests the so-called “shadow market” of home rentals appears to be hitting O.C. and L.A. apartment occupancy. HUD says vacancy rates in O.C. and L.A. increased to 4.5% in the fourth quarter of 2007 from 4% in the same period the year before."

Real Estate Journal - "Lenders Working to Help Homeowners Stay in Homes" (3-5-08)

"In a report released yesterday, the Hope Now Alliance, the group coordinating the mortgage industry's response to the nation's mounting wave of foreclosures, said its members helped work out 1.04 million mortgage loans between July 1 and Jan. 31. The methods ranged from rescheduling borrowers' payments to easing the terms of their loans."