Foreclosure Act Does Squat for Homeowners
Representatives from numerous organizations assembled this week at a press conference in Washington, D.C., to call upon the House of Representatives to fix the legislation, which includes billions in taxpayer-funded breaks to homebuilders and financial-services companies...Critics of the legislation say the measure doesn't do enough to help individuals and families who are now suffering the consequences of a stalled economy. Instead, it aids the homebuilding and financial-services industries, who are in dire straits because of their own actions.

Homeowners Battle to Stop Home Foreclosures and fines
See who is behind HOA abuses of power. Associa Management Company is the largest HOA management company in the US and is owned byTexas Senator John Carona. Need help see American Homeowners Resource Center and Texas Homeowners for HOA Reform.
See Fox News Report  

House Democrats reshape bill to help more homeowners
House Democrats, opposed to the Senate's focus on helping homebuilders, moved Tuesday to reshape housing legislation to help more homeowners. "We need to provide relief to the buyers and families themselves, not just the banks and builders," said Rep. Charles Rangel, D-N.Y. House Democrats, he said, intend to put "families first."...Also today, House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank, D-Mass., will hold a hearing on his bill to provide $300 billion for federal guarantees of mortgages for troubled borrowers if lenders make them more affordable.

Looming Deficit Impedes Federal Housing Agency
Housing officials say the agency will face a deficit for the first time in its 74-year history, starting in the fiscal year that begins in October. And they blame a rapidly growing and increasingly troubled sector of the F.H.A.’s mortgage portfolio, known as the seller-financed down payment loan program, which has suffered from high delinquency and foreclosure rates in recent years... In 2000, such mortgages made up less than 2 percent of F.H.A.-insured loans, officials say. By 2007, statistics show, they accounted for 35 percent of F.H.A. loans...“These types of loans have pushed F.H.A. to the brink of insolvency,”  Alphonso R. Jackson, the housing secretary, told senators recently. “They are costing hard-working Americans their homes.” Mr. Jackson announced last week that he would resign his post as of April 18...But HUD is not the only agency to raise concerns about seller down payment loans. In 2005, the Government Accountability Office raised concerns that were echoed by the Internal Revenue Service a year later.

One in 10 home loans is under water: Economy.com
One-tenth of U.S. homeowners hold mortgages that are larger than the worth of their homes, Moody's Economy.com said on Friday.Nearly 8.8 million homeowners, or 10.3 percent, are in over their heads, its chief economist, Mark Zandi, estimates...

Homebuilder Freeze all PAC (Money) to Elected Officials
  See Video News Report

Realty Check Poll after 1 hour

Should builders get money from the government for the housing crisis?   * 155 responses  Results after 1 hour
	No 31%
	Yes 4.5%
	No one should get any money 64%

Realty Check Poll after 20 hours

Should builders get money from the government for the housing crisis?   * 438 responses No 38% Yes 4.8% No one should get any money 58% Not a scientific survey

Realty Check Poll After 24 Hours Should builders get money from the government for the housing crisis?   * 569 responses No 39% Yes 4.7% No one should get any money 56% Not a scientific survey.

Realty Check Poll February 19, 2008

Should builders get money from the government for the housing crisis?   * 631 responses
	No 41%
	Yes 4.9%
	No one should get any money 55%

Project Lifeline provides 30 day breather for loan mods
Loan servicers and lenders who handle about nine out of 10 subprime loans have agreed to participate in an initiative to help delinquent borrowers by putting foreclosure proceedings on hold for up to 30 days to evaluate alternatives. The Project Lifeline initiative, targeted at borrowers who are 90 days or more behind on their payments, was announced by six major lenders on Feb. 12 (see Inman News story).

If Everyone’s Finger-Pointing, Who’s to Blame?
A wave of lawsuits is beginning to wash over the troubled mortgage market and the rest of the financial world. Homeowners are suing mortgage lenders. Mortgage lenders are suing Wall Street banks. Wall Street banks are suing loan specialists. And investors are suing everyone...Some of the loans have defaulted, and a trustee’s report on the pool of loans packaged and underwritten by UBS, the Swiss investment bank, shows that losses on some defaulted mortgages are as high as 100 percent. As of November, about 27 percent of the loans in the pool were either delinquent 60 days or more, in foreclosure or had resulted in a repossessed home.

State lawmakers wrestle with abusive lending
In the three months since Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller launched a foreclosure hotline, nearly 6,000 Iowans have called for help. The calls come to the Iowa Mediation Service, which Miller hopes will be able to negotiate with lenders to help borrowers keep their homes. "We're trying to do it on a mass basis," Miller says. Foreclosure rates for homes purchased using non-standard, high-interest loans have reached historic highs in Iowa and around the USA.

FBI: Housing scams more than double
Federal mortgage fraud convictions have more than doubled in the past year, and the FBI expects a growth in foreclosure scams as the crisis over substandard, high-interest home loans escalates. Foreclosure rates for these mortgages, known as subprime loans, are at historic highs, according to surveys by the Mortgage Bankers Association and government records.