New FHA Rules! (How Does This Affect Portland?)
Posted On: January 20th, 2010 by James Posted In: Government Actions • Mortgage Insurance • Mortgage Programs • Portland Real Estate
I’ve been hearing rumors about the FHA needing to increase its cash position and lower their risk profile for about a year now. I heard rumors that the down payment would increase from 3.5% to 5% down. All of these things make sense because the FHA is just being pushed beyond the brink of fiscal sanity right now. Now that the subprime mortgage universe has been sucked into a black hole, the only “low down payment” mortgage option, or “relaxed credit” mortgage option for borrowers has been the FHA mortgage.
Now, the FHA is not a bank, they are merely an insurance provider for banks. Other banks make the mortgage with knowledge that the FHA will cover a certain amount of possible loss incurred, thus alleviating a lot of the risk associated with making that loan to begin with. So, now that FHA loans make up over 30% of all mortgages being currently written, this pool of insurance is being massively stressed by all of the poor performance of mortgages of late.
Continue Reading – New FHA Rules! (How Does This Affect Portland?)
Attention Facebook Followers!
Posted On: January 9th, 2010 by James Posted In: Local Interest • Portland Real Estate
Hello and Happy new year to those of you who connect with Pdxhomeloan via the facebook “networked blog” feature. I am re-organizing my whole communications platform for the new decade!
What will be happening is, this website: Pdxhomeloan.com will be repurposed, and its blog functionality will be greatly reduced. I will be transferring all future blog posts to my new mortgage blog: www.oregonmortgageblog.com
Please get connected to me in this same way that you’ve come accustomed to by clicking this link to the networked blogs fan page, and following this rss feed.
I really value your willingness to communicate with me, and I’m always looking to deepen our conversation. Please give me any feedback good or bad, and I’ll do my best to make you guys the most informed real estate enthusiasts in Portland!
2010 Mortgage Rates Prediction
Posted On: January 9th, 2010 by James Posted In: Mortgage Rates • Portland Real Estate
Ok, I’m just going to go out there and do it. This is what the internet is all about right? People getting out there and putting out opinion and information and hoping that it gets read. Perhaps I could drive more traffic to my site if my views were more extreme! Well, I will start by saying that I am 35 years old, and have been in the mortgage business and a personal real estate investor (they happened at the same time) since 2003. I have 6 full years of experience under my belt for whatever its worth. I have spent many hours and thousands of dollars educating myself about exactly what influences our mortgage market.
What I have come to understand is that mortgage rates are directly influenced by yields on Mortgage Bonds. When the economy is doing well, most investors want to buy stocks because they are going up. When the economy is doing poorly, most investors sell their stocks and wait for improvement. When these stock sales happen, it is VERY common for the proceeds of these sales to be “parked” (invested) into the bond market. Bonds have much less risk associated as the returns are kind of guaranteed by the backer of the bond.
Continue Reading – 2010 Mortgage Rates Prediction
Two Portland Mortgage Success Stories
Posted On: September 28th, 2009 by James Posted In: Financial Health • Mortgage Programs • Portland Real Estate
It has been a very busy time for us at Mortgage Trust. Rates are super low and holding steady, and the window for that $8,000.00 tax credit is fast closing. Affordability is rising across the board, and the annual end of summer real estate frenzy/climax is upon us.
I wanted to take a moment to highlight a couple of my Portland mortgage clients whom I am particularly proud of. To share how powerful their real estate mortgage management is and will be for their lives, one purchase, and one refinance story.
First the purchase: I have a great client who is a nurse with a local Portland hospital. She is a first time buyer and qualifies for a VA mortgage. She was nervous about the jump from her low rent payment to the higher mortgage payment, so she decided to buy a duplex to have some rental income to offset that payment.
Continue Reading – Two Portland Mortgage Success Stories
Time is “Of the Essence”
Posted On: September 15th, 2009 by James Posted In: Government Actions • Mortgage Rates • Portland Real Estate
We have all heard about the eight thousand dollar tax credit for first time buyers. Let me also be clear when I describe this tax credit as literally a CHECK FROM THE IRS IN THE AMOUNT OF $8,000.00 made out to YOU. In Portland, 99.99% of all properties will qualify for the full amount. Time is quickly running out on this program, the sun is setting! I have been hammering this all summer in my blog, but this will be the last time. The credit expires at the end of November 2009. That means escrow needs to be closed, and the transaction must be complete by the end of November. If we reverse engineer the timeline of getting from mutual acceptance to closed transaction, this would mean that you should be under contract by October 15th. This is exactly 30 days from today.
So if you are a first time buyer reading this, understand that you have 30 days to find and make an offer on your house. The sooner you do this the better off you’ll be.
