bubbleinfo.com

Hat tip to kwaping for sending this along, from the U-T:

The developer of downtown San Diego’s largest residential highrise said today that it is giving up on trying to sell any of the 679 condos and is returning deposits to dozens of buyers who had been awaiting the close of escrow.

“We’re not able to meet the Fannie Mae or Freddie MAC or FHA requirements in this marketplace because we can’t get enough sales,” said Randy Klapstein, CEO of Pointe of View, developer of Vantage Pointe, which completed construction last year in the midst of the economic downturn.

“We’re not getting the traction we’d hoped for, and we don’t want our customers to stay in limbo, so it’s best to move on.”

It is now likely the East Village condo project will remain a rental complex for the foreseeable future, said Klapstein, noting that there are now roughly 200 renters, about a dozen of whom are buyers who were waiting for the sales contracts to be finalized.

“At this point, we’re going to continue renting,” Klapstein said.

Over the last several months, the Pointe of View loan has been marketed for sale, but no deal has been finalized yet. When asked whether it was possible that the condo project might be sold, Klapstein would only say, “It’s always a possibility.”

The developer is in the process of returning deposits to buyers, and purchasers who are living in the complex as renters have the option of remaining or working with the Pointe of View sales team to find a condo to purchase elsewhere in downtown, said Klapstein.

We noted how people still say that the banks are sitting on loads of shadow inventory, when, from the street view, it appears that servicers are getting them to market as fast as they can process ‘em.

Commentors pointed the shadow to those delinquent borrowers who haven’t been foreclosed yet. 

How many borrowers are in default, and where?

There are 9,666 SFRs and 3,975 condos on the NOD and NOT lists, for a total of 13,641 homes that are actively in the foreclosure process in San Diego County.  Here is a breakdown of the number of properties on the NOD and NOT lists, the number of homes with and without a mortgage (per city-data.com), and the percentage of defaults-per-mortgaged home in these areas:

According to the NY Fed, here are the 90-day mortgage delinquencies per county, as of 1Q10:

There are 362,087 homes that have a mortgage in San Diego County (per city-data.com), so roughly 30,053 haven’t been making their payment for at least 90 days.  If we subtract the 13,641 on the foreclosure lists, that makes 16,412 who are delinquent for 90 days or more, but not served yet. 

Sounds about right.

If you multiplied the current number in default in your area by 2.2, you’d have the approximate count of those that are 90-day delinquent. Let’s mention that the servicers insist that borrowers be delinquent to be considered for a short sale or loan mod, so I’m not surprised at the numbers.

Readers regularly send in articles for us to examine here – keep them coming!

Tom sent in an article from realestatechannel.com that was also referenced in a mortgage blogger’s post which Gordon sent in, looking for thoughts - thanks to the both of you! 

Both articles used this chart from RealtyTrac:

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

At first glance it appears that there must be a wide-spread conspiracy between banks to withhold their foreclosed properties from the open market, in order save the world from total collapse.  When you read the two articles linked above, that’s the impression the authors got from the chart.

COMMENTS:

1.  Two years ago I paid to advertise on RealtyTrac, hoping to cause their members to utilize my services.  As inquiries came in about properties marked as being in foreclosure on the RealtyTrac website, I noticed that there were many houses which had sold 6+ months prior, and others that had multiple entries. 

When asked, a RealtyTrac employee confirmed that they receive their data from multiple sources, and they don’t screen it for accuracy.  I quit advertising, and haven’t trusted their data since.

2.   Readers gravitate to the sky-is-falling, tabloid-style soundbites. People think that there are conspiracies in play, and they want the dirt on them.

Yet authors, bloggers, etc. are struggling to get the truth on what’s really happening with foreclosures, and the real estate market in general.  As a result, stories are written based on questionable data or theories/hunches hoping to appeal to the readers’ desires, but who knows how close they are?

3.  San Diego is not on this chart, and I don’t know anything about the markets that are mentioned.  But I did research on our bank-owned properties, based on the owners listed on the tax rolls for SFR and condo properties in San Diego County:

We know that California is a tenant-friendly state with regards to eviction, so I’m going to cut the banks some slack during the first three months of REO ownership.  Once they get the occupants out, it still takes time to assess the value, complete repairs, and general processing.

Let’s look at REOs owned since before May, 2010 that aren’t on the open market – if there are a bulk of those, then the conspiracy would be clearer.

A review of the individual properties owned by Bank of America revealed the following:

1. Nine of the 102 were owned in trust for an individual, not a foreclosure – leaving 93 REOs.

2. Twenty-five of the properties were former Barratt homes that BofA is in the process of selling.

3. That leaves only 68 individual BofA REOs in the county.  Of those, only seven had been foreclosed prior to May, 2010, and how many of those were probably tenant-occupied?  To me, it doesn’t look like BofA is trying to withhold properties.

How about Fannie Mae?

I checked the first 50 properties from the alphabetical list of Fannie REOs that were foreclosed on prior to May, 2010.  Forty of the fifty had made it to the open market.  Not as proficient as BofA, but they are probably less nimble about the evictions too.

It makes for a sexy story to say that the banks have this huge shadow inventory of homes waiting off-market, but until somebody besides RealtyTrac verifies it without a doubt, I’m going to be skeptical, at least with bank-owned properties in San Diego County.

Today’s LPS report noted a rise in mortgage delinquencies, and once the mainstream media got ahold of it, you would have thought that the sky was falling.  They are drooling for bad housing news, and are quickly jump to many generalized conclusions.

Why is anybody surprised to hear that 7.3 million mortgages are delinquent when virtually every lender in the country tells you that you have to miss payments before they’ll talk to you about your options?  You never hear that mentioned on the TV news.

What happens to all of these delinquencies?

Let’s examine the actual events, and how they affect our area specifically.

Here are the trustee-sale results of the big three servicers, ReconTrust (BofA), California Recon (Chase), and Ndex of all property types around San Diego County over the last four weeks:

There have been 1,061 trustee sales that were resolved over the last four weeks, but when 79% of them are being cancelled, the threat of the foreclosure tsunami sure seems manageable.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The quarterly foreclosure stats are out for SD County:

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Cancellations have been soaring. If we saw a bunch of them being successfully short-sold on the MLS, it would give hope that the servicers might be getting more proficient in their processing. The cancelled trustee sales that weren’t on the MLS are probably the loan modifications.

Here is a review of 50 cancelled trustee sales of SFRs in the North SD County Coastal region only:

On MLS: 20

Not on MLS: 30

Only four of the 20 on the MLS were active listings, the rest had found buyers, and 12 had already closed escrow.  Don’t the other 30 have to be loan modders?  Why else would the servicer cancel the trustee sale? 

There are only 372 North SD County Coastal SFRs on the current foreclosure auction list (revised from yesterday). Over the last 30 days, there have been only 15 SFRs in NSDCC that have had their trustee sale actually happen, and 89 cancellations. Very frustrating for those ready, willing, and able to buy at the court house steps.

The point? When you hear any national housing news, make sure to cull it down to your local area.

From SFGate:

Want a read on the housing market’s future?  Ask a vulture investor.

So-called vultures – also known as distressed-asset investors – make money by buying distressed assets, such as soured mortgage loans, and predicting which way the wind will blow to decide when to liquidate.

That means Jon Daurio’s economic calculations provide as good a guide as any.

As CEO of Kondaur Capital Corp., which buys thousands of distressed mortgages at a discount and rehabilitates them for resale, Daurio tries to flip those mortgages as quickly as possible.  He has no desire to buy and hold, because he thinks homes are worth less and less as time goes by.

“I think housing prices nationally will drop 10 to 20 percent over the next three years,” he said. “We aim to be in and out of the loan in six months.”

Since its 2007 founding, Kondaur has grown to have $1 billion in capital, nearly 500 asset managers and a portfolio of about 4,000 loans at any given time. Daurio said it is profitable, but declined to give specifics.

“We are the nation’s largest and most frequent buyer of nonperforming loans secured by one- to four-family residences,” he said.

The Orange County company exemplifies an emerging class of investors seeking to make a profit from the real estate meltdown, from mom-and-pop speculators snapping up individual foreclosed homes for cash, to mid-size syndicates buying dozens of foreclosed homes to rent out until the market turns, to giant concerns like Kondaur.

Kondaur’s business model provides a right-now snapshot of some pertinent real estate fundamentals.

What it buys

Daurio refers to Kondaur’s acquisition targets as “scratch-and-dent mortgages.” That means home loans that are delinquent, usually by six months or more.

It buys in bulk, often several hundred loans at a time. The sellers are banks, other distressed-asset investors and Wall Street firms that prefer to quickly unload the troubled loans rather than having to foreclose or modify them. “Banks are hideously understaffed” to manage the loans themselves, Daurio said.

In recent months, Daurio has seen an increase in the number of distressed loans for sale.

“Banks are profitable again, so they can afford to take the losses to get these scratch-and-dent losses off their books,” he said. “Banks now are being truthful about the value of these loans because they can afford to take the hits.”

About $10 billion worth of distressed mortgages hit the market in the first quarter, he said, more than he’d seen at any one time during the previous couple of years.

He pays about 70 percent of the value of the underlying home. For instance, he’d pay $210,000 to buy a $400,000 mortgage on a home now worth $300,000. Obviously, that means the seller is taking a huge loss. Figuring out the homes’ values involves a proprietary formula, and takes into account demographic and sociologic data, as well as price opinions from local real estate brokers.

About a quarter of the loans were previously modified by banks to make them more affordable, but the homeowners couldn’t make the revised payments and redefaulted.

The greatest share of its mortgages are in Florida and California, followed by the Rust Belt states of Michigan, Ohio, Illinois and Indiana.

How it ‘fixes’ them

About 80 percent of the time Kondaur takes back title to houses, usually by paying the delinquent homeowners to sign them over as a deed in lieu of foreclosure, but also by foreclosing itself if that is more expedient.

“If I’m right that prices will keep dropping, getting that property today (as opposed to down the road) is worth a great deal,” he said.

Its asset managers then find local contractors to rehab the houses and local real estate agents to sell them. It puts the houses in turn-key condition – ready to move in – and tries to have them sold within 30 days of hitting the market.

About 10 percent of the time, it will sell individual loans “as is.” The remaining 10 percent of the time it will modify payments to keep the current homeowner in place. He’s not enthusiastic about that approach.

“Our experience is that modified loans are worth considerably less than what would be left if the house were foreclosed,” he said.

He’s clear that he’s not running a charity. Told of a Clovis (Fresno County) couple whose home was foreclosed upon by Kondaur last month, he said: “They should have bought a house they could afford.”

We’ve heard the rumblings about Bank of America stepping up their foreclosures, and low and behold, I got another REO listing assigned to me today. 

I promptly rejected it, which I figured would secure my spot at the bottom of their list, and boom, they sent me another one, which means 2-3 in the last week when I’ve only been getting one a month.  Does it mean something is cooking?

Here are the overall results from the last 12 weeks for all trustees:

Cancellations are due to short sales closing, and loan modifications becoming permanent. There have been 2,623 cancellations over the last 60 days, and in the same period there were 925 short sales that closed on the MLS, or 35% of the total cancellations. Can we say that about 2/3’s of the cancellations are due to loan modifications becoming permanent?

Yes, the loan modders might make their way back to market over the next few years, but for now the extend-and-pretend program is working nicely.

Here is the REO assigned to me today:

Hat tip to shadash, who is fuming:

Bank of America wants to give struggling mortgage customers who are collecting unemployment benefits up to nine months with no mortgage payment.

That’s right. Zero payment.

Customers would have to agree that, if they haven’t found a job within the nine months, they will sign over their house to the bank. The Charlotte bank would give them at least $2,000 to help with moving expenses.

The proposal needs regulatory approval, and the bank doesn’t know when, or if, that will happen.

Some experts say the plan could become an industry model and is the most substantial, creative approach yet to addressing the fallout from stubbornly high unemployment, which is driving mortgage delinquencies and foreclosures.

The plan also could provide families with faster relief, allow them to save money and provide a timetable for making decisions. The bank could avoid millions in collection and foreclosure expenses.

“It’s an innovative way for Bank of America to demonstrate it’s working with its customers,” said Mark Williams, a former Federal Reserve bank examiner. “Regulators should view this as a positive step as well.”

Read the rest of this entry »

Eric at the North County Times mentioned the increase in Bank of America notices of trustee sale being sent out.  Click here for link to full article. 

The notices went to 230 homeowners in North San Diego County, a 69 percent increase from February.

Wow, will there will be more SFR short sales or REOs in North SD County Coastal?

There were 22 new notices sent out in February, and 23 in March to SFR borrowers from Carlsbad to La Jolla – not quite a meltdown yet.  There are also some familiar faces on the lists as well, and we won’t count those as new meat.

Here are the lists:

February 2010 Recon NOTS NSDCC

March 2010 Recon NOTS NSDCC

We could all use some more inventory – keep ‘em coming!

Added later, the chart from Effective Demand, click on it twice for clarity:

If you’re trying to gauge your chances of finding a seller who is distressed, here are the number of detached properties that have listed on the MLS as short sales (SS), bank-owneds (REO) or regular sellers (Reg.), plus the number of SFR trustee sales completed that either went back-to-bene (BTB) or were bought at the steps by a 3rd party – since March 1st:

This year has seen a relatively big increase in short-sale and REO listings compared to 2009, but they’re still only 12% of the total listings that have been coming on the market recently in San Diego’s North County Coastal region. With only 1-2 properties being sold at the trustee sales per day, there isn’t much to look forward to this summer. The regular sellers won’t be feeling much pressure from distressed neighbors, and likely to hang around waiting…..for something.