Europe still pretty much sucks, Quantitative Easing v2.0 is coming to a conclusion in June which kicks a support leg out from under our economy, pending home sales are trash, home prices are down last month, we’re not making NEARLY enough jobs, 10-year Treasuries are selling right at 3% yield, Re-publicans refuse to raise the national debt ceiling and Democrats have declared we will freight train ourselves into the side of a debt building (owned mostly by China) if we don’t, and a bunch of other stuff that I am too lazy/sad to report.
Whew. Cathartic to just hammer it all out at once like that. You depressed yet? Well, back away from that ledge and read on. I actually have something that inspires optimism. The following is reprinted right from Yahoo Finance used without permission. Please don’t sue me, Yahoo.
“Everyone else is bearish. You cannot find a real-estate bull anywhere. No one wants to own this asset. No one wants to talk about it. No one wants to hear about it. Everyone seems to agree it's just going down, down, down — forever. They said much the same about stocks in 1987, 2002 and 2009; Treas-ury bonds in 1982; and gold in 2000. I cannot prove this is capitulation, but it sure smells something like it.
As ever, if you aren't disciplined and patient, this probably isn't for you. I have absolutely no idea when real estate is going to hit rock bottom. It may take several years. I suspect it will do so in different markets at different times. But there are good homes out there going really cheap. If you hunt down the bargains, you're disciplined about price, you get the right financing, and you hold on for five years or more, you'll probably do pretty well from here.”
A shocking yet disturbingly logical and down-to-earth assessment from the macroeconomic perspec-tive. So, think what you will amidst this round of blistering economic data, but this soldier marches on. But outside of indifferent national statistics, how is the market that YOU are involved in going?
Want to know how mortgage finance is going on the ground floor? It’s a whole lot of rebalancing all happening at the same time. Multiple regulatory changes come through on a monthly basis, over 80% of the sales (and consequently support) force has been wiped out since the height of the housing melee eliminating a lot of long-standing relationships people used to leverage to get things done. No lender wants to run the risk of “misinterpreting what Uncle Sam wants” amidst these shifting sands so much that they have become insufferable hardasses on what would in the past have been considered to be trivial situations. I can’t say I’d blame them; I’d probably do the same thing in their shoes.
It’s to the point that the National Association of Realtors recently called upon banks to ‘loosen their purse-strings’. Eloquent in its brevity. One of those “It is what it is” kind of situations right now, at least from this broker’s perspective. I could be wrong. I’m not, though. Demand is starting to pick back up. Lenders have gone a long way towards adapting to the ‘government-mandated mortgage market of tomorrow.’
I hear Walt Disney is already developing a theme park ride with that exact title. Crazy old dead Walt.
Moral of the story is that it pays dividends to have a scrappy broker. You’ve got choices as far as your mortgage finance goes. I get that. But I fight, kiddos and kiddettes. I fight like a champ. And if recent history is any indication, I win.
Not like Charlie Sheen. Like someone who ACTUALLY wins. Okay, blatant self-promotion over.
Oh, you’ll notice I took the high road and didn’t mention Sarah Palin’s knock-you-over dumbness sur-rounding Paul Revere’s ride or Rep. Anthony Weiner’s appropriately named mishap on Twitter (if you don’t get the joke, please don’t ask). Yup. Me and the high road, not mentioning that stuff. ...yup.
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