Inconsistencies in the economy during the first quarter have not dampened Freddie Mac’s forecast for housing for the coming year. Freddie Mac has held fast to its prediction that 2016 will be the best year for housing since before the crisis. Freddie Mac doubled down on its housing forecast for 2016 as it released the results of the latest Multi-Indicator Market Index on Wednesday. The national index stood at 83 at the end of February, its highest level since September 2008.
A level of 83 indicates a housing market that is on the outer range of its historic benchmark level of activity. Inside of the national index, the current on mortgage indicator rose by nearly 8 percent over-the-year up to 85 point 5, which is the low end of the stable range but the highest level for that indicator since August 2008—indicative of the increasingly lower levels of mortgage delinquencies that the mortgage industry is seeing.
Advocacy group California Reinvestment Coalition has asked HUD to impose a moratorium on home equity conversion mortgage foreclosures by CIT Group and its subsidiary, Financial Freedom. CRC requested the moratorium based on new data it obtained from HUD in the form of a fact sheet which shows that CIT Group was responsible for 39 percent of the 41 thousand reverse mortgage foreclosures in the United States since April 2009 despite having an estimated market share of only 17 percent in the reverse mortgage market.