Landlords. when renting a unit/property do you provide and document an EPA lead paint disclosure pamphlet? If you don’t you are placing yourself at serious risk.
The EPA is on a crusade, and you are the target.
The EPA has levied fines of as much as $40,000 for failure to kneel at their altar.
Read the story.
When Reuters finally figures something out we should all sit up and take notice.
Reuters has discovered that the blizzard of foreclosure laws, which were intended to solve the foreclosure problem actually caused more harm than they did good.
Nevada’s AB 284 is the case in point. When AB 284 went into effect foreclosure action ground to a halt. The banks were fearful of doing what needed to be done. Consequently, the needed cure was delayed and the crisis was prolonged.
Notice of Default Filings
The government caused the foreclosure crisis. And now the government set out to fix the crisis. And whenever the government gets involved we can be sure that the government’s solution will be much worse than the original government induce problem.
When legislators attempt to protect the homeowner who hadn’t paid his bills they actually harm the lender and anyone that may want to get a loan in the future. Why would a lender make a loan where the legislature could just declare that the loan never needs to be repaid?
“Many state laws that stretch out the period for legitimate foreclosures result in no added benefit for the homeowner and produce harm to the housing finance system and to neighborhoods,” said Alfred Pollard, general counsel to the Federal Housing Finance Agency, at a House of Representatives oversight hearing in March.
Ricky Beach, a Reno real estate agent thinks the law killed the market in the Reno-Sparks area.
Ricky Beach, a real estate agent in Reno, Nevada, said the new law, AB 284, “has pretty much killed the market here.” The lack of foreclosure activity has led to a dearth of inventory, he said, with the number of homes for sale in the area down to 778 today from more than 1,700 in September.
And,
“The bill did nothing to solve the crisis – it’s just prolonged it,” Beach said. “Sooner or later the banks will work out how to deal with the law. And then foreclosures will hit the market, and prices will crash back down.”
Malik Ahmad, a Las Vegas attorney agrees:
Malik Ahmad, a Las Vegas foreclosure defense lawyer who has spent the last six years trying to help vulnerable borrowers deal with unscrupulous banks, said the law had completely changed his view of the nature of the crisis.
“This law has become a mockery,” Ahmad said. “I am now turning down clients every day who I know have no intention of ever trying to pay their mortgage. They just want to stay in their homes for free. And that is a bad situation for everyone, lenders and homeowners.”
Read more here.
If you ever bought or even tried to buy a short sale you are aware of the problems and difficulty in completing the transaction. You might have wondered, “how could the banks be so obstinate?”
We now learn that even though the banks may have been difficult to work with, much of the problem came from the government in the name of Freddie Mac. “But, I thought the government wanted to help us,” you say.
Freddie went out of their way to paint the investors as the enemy. They issued policy letters describing potential mortgage fraud with the intention of making the investor out to be the criminal. The only problem was that Freddie itself was the real fraudster.
The truth is that Freddie Mac actually placed their bets against the housing crisis actually ever getting solved. Freddie made money whenever they were able to stop a short sale. Freddie benefited whenever the rest of us lost.
For more than a year, Freddie Mac has adopted numerous policies designed to prevent the private purchase of toxic assets and forced servicers to enforce these policies. Demands for unreasonable offers on short sales, delays in processing short sales, affidavits preventing resale of their properties after being rehabbed and deed restrictions on real-estate-owned properties restricting resale price are among the myriad obstacles private buyers face in trying to buy Freddie’s inventory.
Besides delaying the unwinding of the troubled entity, several of these policies may in fact be illegal. Restricting the ability of private buyers to resell their properties and attempting to dictate resale value constitute unreasonable restraint on alienation. In plain English, once Freddie sells one of its toxic assets, it has no standing in future transactions related to the property.
Freddie has attempted to justify these policies through a taxpayer-funded media campaign arguing that the act of buying, rehabbing and reselling a property constitutes a crime and is inherently an act of fraud. Both Freddie and Fannie Mae have worked with enforcement officials to convince them of this lie. To the embarrassment of these enforcement officials, Freddie left out one important detail: Every time it stopped a short sale, Freddie made money.
We can expect a large increase on foreclosure activity this year. At least, that’s what the LA Times thinks. Foreclosure activity has been suppressed because the lenders have been focusing on getting their act together. Here in Nevada they face an added burden of AB 284 which forces them to certify that all their paperwork is in order.
But, they are beginning to work through their backlog so we can expect an increase in activity.
The state’s difficulties were reflected in RealtyTrac’s report, which showed California with the third-highest incidence of foreclosure filings in 2011, behind only Nevada and Arizona.
Analysts also expect CA to stabilize quickly due to their fairly fast timeline. Nevada, on the other hand, is hampered by the effect of AB-284.
Here’s another “best of”, “worst of” list and Reno wins another prize. It may not be the prize that Reno would like on its resume although it’s not necessarily our fault. It is not just a story about Reno or Northern Nevada. This is an American problem, and I believe it was completely caused by politicians.
This is a list from 24/7 Wall St. of 9 cities that the article claims were nearly destroyed by the recession. Reno was scored in second place.
2. Reno-Sparks, NV
> Pct. jobs recovered: 1.6%
> Q4 2012 jobs: 187,600
> Pre-recession jobs peak: 225,200
> Recession jobs trough: 187,000
> Pct. jobs lost: 16.9%Between 2007 and 2010, the median home value in Reno-Sparks, Nevada declined 37.4%, the 13th biggest drop in the country among metro areas. The problems of the recession have plagued states in the southwest, which once had booming housing markets, arguably more than any other part in the country. From the beginning of 2007 to the third quarter of this year, jobs are projected to decline by 38,200, or 16.9% of the workforce. And according to the report, only 600 jobs, a mere 1.6%, will be recovered by the end of the year.
Read more: http://247wallst.com/2012/01/19/the-nin-cities-that-havent-recovered-from-the-recession/
The NAR ( National Association of Realtors) Has been fudging the data on the sales of esisting homes for at least the last four years. Just in case you didn’t make the connection, that’s at least since the Obama Immaculation.
The NAR is now revising their numbers downward, and by as much as 20%. Apparently the numbers didn’t match those of Corelogic. And now the NAR doesn’t want to be seen as untrustworthy, so, now they are revising their numbers downward. NAR numbers used to relied on as reliable and now they might be running scared.
The concern is that an over-count might mean that a much larger backlog of unsold homes still looms over the US economy. That could mean that another drop of as much as 20 % could loom over the US housing market.
But the NAR says they are working on a new method to re-evaluate the market.
I’m surely ready tojump in and trust them again. Aren’t you?
Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/02/22/us-usa-economy-housing-idUSTRE71L10U20110222
Here’s another one of the “Best of” and “Worst of” lists that must fill journalists need for “product.” This time it is ranking the best of and the worst of the 50 states according to their arbitrary opinion.
These are the same kinds of lists that the politicians and the activist refer to when they seek to further pick the pockets of the public. Notice that they don’t include the per capita taxes the states collect.
FWIW, Nevada ranks #46 on the list:
46. Nevada
> State debt per capita: $1,690 (6th lowest)
> Pct. without health insurance: 22.6% (2nd highest)
> Pct. below poverty line: 13.0% (24th lowest)
> Unemployment: 13.4% (the highest)Nevada has dropped five places in our rankings. This drop is due primarily to its credit downgrade this year from AA+ to AA. Surprisingly, the state has one of the lowest debts per capita in the country, at just $1,690 per person. However, it has other financial woes that make it a long-term risk. Nevada properties declined 44.5% in value between 2006 and 2010, the worst decline in the country. In October alone, one in every 180 homes was foreclosed upon, easily the worst rate in the country. The state also has the second lowest percentage of residents covered by health insurance and the highest unemployment rate in the country.
California ranks the worst, # 50, but you probably already knew that.
Read more (To save you time, Nevada is on page #6.).
A friend received the following email from Sen Harry Reid;
Dear M XXXXXXXXXXXXX:
Thank you for contacting me. I appreciate hearing from you and agree with you about the importance of restoring fiscal discipline in Washington.As you probably know, this year’s federal deficit is expected to be about $1.5 trillion. Meanwhile, our debt exceeds $ 14 trillion and is growing rapidly. Perhaps even more importantly, in coming decades, as the baby boomers retire and projected health care costs increase, our nation is on an unsustainable long-term fiscal path. It is important that leaders in both parties work together to address this problem.
One important way to restore fiscal discipline is to abide by so-called “pay-as-you-go,” or “PAYGO” rules. Under PAYGO, all new mandatory spending or tax breaks must be fully offset, so that it does not increase the deficit. In the last Congress, I sponsored legislation, H.J.Res. 45, to put the PAYGO rules into law. These rules proved to be very successful in the 1990’s, and helped the government achieve a budget surplus. So I was pleased when my legislation was approved and signed into law by the President last year.
The PAYGO rules will help, but they alone will not solve the long-term deficit problem. We also need to conduct a thorough review of all federal spending and eliminate waste wherever we find it. In addition, we need to do a better job of closing tax loopholes and cracking down on cheaters who cost the government literally hundreds of billions of dollars every year. All of this will be difficult, but it needs to happen, and it is essential that we work together to solve the problem.
Again, thank you very much for taking the time to share your thoughts with me. I appreciate it and look forward to hearing from you in the near future.
My best wishes to you.
Sincerely,
A
HARRY REID
United States Senator
NevadaHR:BK
This definitely shows Harry cares – if you believe it.
