In its latest report, RealtyTrac announced that foreclosure activity fell in 84 percent of metro areas with at least 200,000 residents on a year-over-year basis. That’s the good news. The real question is how long will it last? According to the company’s mid-year report, California, Nevada and Arizona cities accounted for all top 10 metro [...]
Q: I am hoping that you can help!!! We have contacted so many people and everyone tells us the same thing. My wife and I make too much money for them to help us. There are so many issues and factors that the end of the rope is coming closer and closer and we don't [...]
Q: I’ve been hearing that there are new resources for people who are unemployed to help save their homes. I’ve been out of work for 9 months, and while I have been looking hard to find a job, I haven’t found anything yet that comes close to what I was earning before. In the meantime, [...]
Housing Crisis News on the Ilyce Glink Show July 24, 2011: What passes for good news in the fifth year of the housing crisis? The good: Countrywide Mortgage Gives $108 Million to Homeowners Who Were Overcharged. Building permits issued in June 2011 were up 2.5 percent from May, and up a whopping 6.7 percent from [...]
Q: My mother is 80 years old and lives in San Antonio, Texas. Her home is approximately 50 years old. The house needs some serious remodeling. It needs to be leveled and the beams from the roof poking into one of her bedrooms. She is still working but wants to retire. Are there any programs [...]
This week, the National Association of Realtors (NAR) sent a letter to Shaun Donovan, secretary of Housing and Urban Development, Timothy Geithner, secretary of the Treasury, and Gene Sperling, director of the National Economic Council. In the letter, the Realtors put forth their belief that “Stability in the housing market will lead to a quicker [...]
Q: I am a retired 63 year-old with a combined income of $37,000 annually. My wife will begin collecting an additional $704 per month in Social Security starting this November. We both have excellent credit scores of 800. Here’s our situation: We purchased our home in 2004 for $125,000, have a balance of $76,000 on [...]
Q: Here’s my question: Let’s say a husband and wife own a rental property with a joint tenancy and a right to survivorship deed. Later, they divorce without changing the deed, and 10 years later, one of them passes away. Does the remaining owner automatically pick-up the ownership for the deceased owner’s share? Does the [...]
Robert Bridges, a professor of clinical finance and business economics at the University of Southern California's Marshall School of Business, published an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal last week, in which he argued that "Today's young people would be foolish to imitate their parents and view [home] ownership as the cornerstone of personal [...]
When Weather Affects the Economy on the Ilyce Glink Show July 17, 2011: We are in the dog days of summer and I'm not sure what the situation is in your area, but we have had a series of crazy summer storms in the Midwest this year. Earlier this week, Chicagoland experienced hurricane-category winds of [...]
