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Author Archives: Brittany Dunn

California Foreclosure Sales Soar in March

California foreclosure sales increased on both a year-over-year and month-to-month basis in March, according to the latest monthly report from locally-based ForeclosureRadar. The company says the increase will likely come as a surprise to many given all the recent news about foreclosure alternatives like short sales and new loan modifications with principal balance reductions, but as many servicers themselves have stressed, the simple reality is that these programs won't help everyone.

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Citi Releases Q1 Earnings, Reports Highest Net Income Since Q2 2007

Citgroup, Inc. has turned it around. Following a $7.8 billion loss in the fourth quarter of 2009, the New York-based bank reported first quarter 2010 net income of $4.4 billion, or $0.15 per diluted share, in its earnings report released Monday. The bank's earnings blew analysts' predictions out of the water. According to Thomson Rueters, analysts it surveyed only expected Citi to break even this quarter.

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Excess Inventory May Impede Housing Recovery: Fannie Mae

Although housing is beginning to stabilize, excess inventory and shadow supply may hinder recovery, according to the April 2010 Economic Outlook released Monday by Fannie Mae's economic team. For all of 2010, Fannie Mae projects a 6 percent increase in home sales, down from a 9 percent increase forecast in the March outlook and a 12 percent increase projected in February. The GSE expects to see more moderate declines in home prices this year, but says elevated foreclosures and vacant homes still pose a big risk to home values.

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Encore Equities Names Division SVP

Encore Equities, a subsidiary of Dallas-based Encore Enterprises, Inc., recently appointed Mark Cypert as SVP of institutional equities. In his new role, Cypert will focus on raising institutional investor equity and managing Encore's research and underwriting program to help identify projects meeting Encore's commercial real estate investment criteria in the retail, multifamily, and hospitality sectors.

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San Francisco Housing Market Rebounds

San Francisco Home Prices

The housing market is tightening up in San Francisco, according to the most recent Market Focus Report released Friday by the Rosen Consulting Group and the San Francisco Association of Realtors. The report found that completed home sales in March 2010 increased 58 percent from the same month a year ago, absorbing much of the excess inventory in the market and intensifying competition among buyers for desirable properties.

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RE/MAX Secures Rankings in National Brokerage Surveys

RE/MAX International, a global real estate company based in Denver, recently announced that it was ranked in two national brokerage surveys. In the 2010 Power Broker Report produced by RIS Media, sales associates affiliated with RE/MAX brokerages averaged an impressive 15.1 transaction sides per agent, an 18% increase over their position in last year's survey. As a result, the survey ranked 69 RE/MAX brokerages among the top 300, representing 23 percent of all ranked brokerages. And in the REAL Trends 500 survey, 122 of the company's brokerages earned a ranking, giving RE/MAX 24 percent of the rankings.

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Fannie Updates Policies for Loan Eligibility After a Pre-Foreclosure Event

Fannie Mae has updated several policies regarding borrowers' future eligibility to obtain a new mortgage loan after experiencing a pre-foreclosure event, including a deed-in-lieu or short sale. The waiting period for a new loan will now be based on the loan-to-value ratio, occupancy of the property, and whether extenuating circumstances played a part in the borrower's inability to make mortgage payments. The GSE says the updated policies will further support overall market stability and reinforce the importance of borrowers working with their servicers.

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Goldman Faces SEC Charges for Defrauding Mortgage Investors

On Friday, Goldman Sachs and one of its VPs were charged by the Securities and Exchange Commission for defrauding investors by misstating key facts about a collateralized debt obligation (CDO) tied to subprime mortgages. The SEC said as the U.S. housing market was beginning to falter, Goldman Sachs collaborated with hedge fund Paulson & Co. to cherry-pick loan pools for the CDO that the companies were betting would default. Investors are said to have lost more than $1 billion.

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Bank of America Turns $3.2 Billion Profit in Q1

Posting back-to-back losses in the third and fourth quarters of 2009, the second half of last year was, to say the least, rough for Bank of America. But a new year marks new beginnings, and things seem to be turning around for the nation's biggest bank. According to the company's earnings report released Friday, Bank of America earned $3.2 billion in the first quarter of 2010. That's a huge improvement compared to the net loss of $194 million reported in the fourth quarter of 2009.

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Freddie Mac Appoints EVP of Single Family Portfolio Management

Effective April 19, 2010, Anthony Tony Renzi will assume the role of EVP of single family portfolio management at Freddie Mac, the McLean, Virginia-based company announced Thursday. In this newly-created position, Renzi will be responsible for managing and minimizing the losses on Freddie Mac's $1.8 trillion single-family guaranteed portfolio and will oversee Freddie Mac's loss mitigation activities.

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