While Blame is Going Around...

[Care4all]

A $200 million program? The next budget is $3.6 trillion. That's less than 0.01% of the yearly budget of the government. Did you post this as a joke?

this was just help in a down payment for 10's of thousands of low income families, he also had several other funded programs...one for the disabled low income to get in to homes etc...the goal was 5.5 million more low and middle income people in to homes by 2010.

i know president bush's initiatives on low income home ownership did not cause this mess, just as i know the CRA did not cause this mess....because less than 6% of the subprime loans were issued in CRA covered areas....94% of the loans were not for mortgages and homes in CRA low income, depressed communities....which are the communities where the CRA regulations come in to play.

Ed MCMann lost his house for goodness sakes....alot of this foreclosure mess is for very expensive homes, a half a million and higher in places like california....

would a bank really loan out a half a million to someone they knew made 20k a year without bells going off galore?

i also know that fannie accounted for 72% of the mortgaged back securities that were bundle back in 2002/03, and these were SAFE loans bundled together, conventional mortgages, primarily and the private sector of banks, not GSE's like fannie/freddie....accounted for only 27% of them....

but by 2006 the private banks and financial institutions were producing 56% of the MBS business and selling them off to others.....only they used alot of subprime mortgages in their mbs's making them risky/toxic, but no one knew it, that were buying them....because the ratings agencies rated them as triple AAA Securities....only later to find out, that these ratings agencies were paid by the very banks bundling the mortgages together....a real mess, because all of our 401 k's, mutual funds and retirement and pension funds invested in these MBS's because they were given these triple A ratings....

All of this X. is very critical in this mess...

plus, thes new mortgage companies were very small in the beginning, and went to these private banks for their financing and these private banks funded them, with no CRA requirements....i saw this in a documentary on this.... then these mortgage broker companies grew bigger and bigger by loosening their requirements year after year, the banks could not buy enough of these company's loans.....the banks were begging these fly by night mortgage companies to issue as many loans as they could....the banks even helped these companies to devise rotten loans to get more people in to them....

the bank execs should be flogged in public for what they did!

care

Good God man...

correction!
Good God WOMAN!

i could say welcome to the site! nice to meet you! but looks like you might be too mean for me to be my usual nice self to......soooooooo forget it, meany! j/k

care

 

[oreo]

.r

Do Conservatives believe President Bush's Home ownership challenge/initiative to put more minorities in to homes fueled any of this mess?

Personally, I believe it was a good initiative and one that most all of our presidents have had, to put more minorities in to home ownership.

None of this made the banks do what they did...buy up loans from fly by night brokers that loaned to anybody, without even trying to meet any type of qualifications....and then hid the risks of these loans by putting them in to MBSecurities, which they sold off at good prices, because the paid by the same banks ratings agency rated them with a AAA rating, a safe secure rating....?

But if Conservatives believe Fannie's charter to put more lower to middle income people in to homes was the cause of this mess, then why wouldn't Bush's home ownership initiative be?

HUD No. 03-140
Brian Sullivan
(202) 708-0685 x7527
HUD Newsroom
For Release
Tuesday
December 16, 2003

----------
BUSH SIGNS AMERICAN DREAM DOWNPAYMENT ACT
$200 million program will help tens of thousands of low-income families to become homeowners
{Photo: Acting Secretary Alphonso Jackson makes some remarks just before President Bush signed the American Dream Downpayment Act]
Acting Secretary Alphonso Jackson makes some remarks just before President Bush signed the American Dream Downpayment Act.

WASHINGTON - There is a reason why many American families can't buy their first home - they can't afford the downpayment and other upfront closing costs required to qualify for a mortgage. For as many as 40,000 low-income families, that will change as President Bush today signed The American Dream Downpayment Act into law.

Applauding Congress for authorizing the annual $200 million downpayment assistance program, Bush and Housing and Urban Development Acting Secretary Alphonso Jackson said the initiative will also help meet the Administration's "Homeownership Challenge" to increase minority homeownership by 5.5 million families by the end of the decade.

"Today we are taking action to bring many thousands of Americans closer to the great goal of owning a home," said President Bush. "These funds will help American families achieve their goals, strengthen our communities, and our entire nation."

"This is a good day for thousands of families who have only dreamed about sharing in the American Dream of homeownership," said Jackson. "Not only will this law allow thousands of hard-working Americans to unlock the door to homeownership, it will also help close the gap that separates minority households from the rest of the country when it comes to owning a home to call their own."

High downpayment and closing costs represent the most significant barrier to homeownership for first-time homebuyers. The American Dream Downpayment Act will provide a maximum downpayment assistance grant of either $10,000 or six percent of the purchase price of the home, whichever is greater. In addition, the Bush Administration is committed to reforming the homebuying process that would lower closing costs by approximately $700 per loan, further stimulating homeownership for all Americans.

The American Dream Downpayment Act will be administered under HUD's HOME Investment Partnerships Program (HOME). Since its inception, the HOME Program has played a vital role in addressing the shortages of affordable rental housing and homeownership in communities nationwide. Information about the American Dream Downpayment Act is available on the Internet.

Last year HUD released a report that concludes adding 5.5 million minority homeowners will stimulate an additional $256 billion in benefits to the housing sector of the U.S. economy. In addition, HUD created The Blueprint for the American Dream Partnership, a coalition involving every segment of the housing industry to build broad-based support of the President's goal of increasing homeownership opportunities for minority families.

HUD is the nation's housing agency committed to increasing homeownership, particularly among minorities; creating affordable housing opportunities for low-income Americans; and, supporting the homeless, elderly, people with disabilities and people living with AIDS. The Department also promotes economic and community development as well as enforces the nation's fair housing laws. More information about HUD and its programs is available on the Internet at Homes and Communities - U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and espanol.hud.gov.

Wouldn't ya know. This economic disaster started with Jimmy Carter way back in the late 1970's that wanted to offer mortage loans to minority & lower incomes. In fact, the Adjustable rate mortgage, aka ARM, aka sub-prime mortgage started way--way back then.

Then READ on --

New York Times
Sept. 30, 1999
Title: Fannie Mae reduces credit requirements to aid mortgage lending:

"Read it & weap all you die hard democrats & liberals." In fact, look it up yourselves, because I am getting sick & tired of making an easy link for you. Pay special attention to the warning also listed in this article.

As the article is witness too--democrats instigated this total economic disaster with their "everyone deserves homeownership policy" & we are all paying for it today. We are hemorraging jobs in this country, good people are loosing their retirements, their kids college educations, their homes. Why? Because of Democrats & their policy of "everyone deserves homeownership" policy starting in the late 1970's, aka the Jimmy Carter "you deserve a home policy". Then democrats in the late 1990's took it to another level of making certain that a whopping 40% of the portfolios' of Freddie & Fannie were in RISKY LOANS!--by eliminating down payment requirements, lowering credit rating requirements & lowering income requirements.'

Not only that, but they ignored every single warning--to democrat dominated banking boards--starting in 1995--& then fought every single attempt to reign in Freddie & Fannie from then on.

If you don't believe me--then ask BILL CLINTON who is on video record--BLAMING HIS OWN PARTY-- DEMOCRATS for this economic disaster. If you want to look for heads in this economic collapse you can start with democrat Barney Franks & democrat Criss Dodd--both banking committee chairmen who were warned time & time again, or from 2001 on, of this on-coming train wreck & they both completely ignored them. And in fact, fought legistlatures & auditors tooth & nail to NOT make requirements for Fannie/Freddie higher.

Oh? Did I forget to mention Franklin D. Reignes--you know one of Obama's campaign committee chairman & was the Clinton appointee of Fannie Mae--walked away from Fannie Mae with over 125 million dollars in bonuses Upps! Franklin D. Reignes was taken to court & made to pay back 25 million of the 125 million he took from this government--(tax payer agency.)

Well--where in the hell are the handcuffs now? Oh-- forgot to mention that we have a democrat majority in all houses, & they won't arrest themselves or investigate themselves. "It's always someone elses fault."

 

[KittenKoder]

Funny thing ... none of this matters ... no one pointed a gun to the heads of people who got into the loans so ultimately they are the ones to really blame if anyone.

 

[DiveCon]

I never thought it was to blame, i was just asking conservatives since they are blaming Clinton's home ownership initiative for this mess and CRA.

this is a strawman you keep bringing up
no one i know is saying that the CRA was the SOLE reason for the problem
it was a PART of the problem
and YES the CRA was used to intimidate banks to loosen their way of doing business
so, some of their loans(while not officially under the CRA) were still effected by it
then other programs came into play as well
and yes, there were some greedy bastards that took advantage
then as someone else pointed out, the house flippers that destroyed the housing market by rapidly expanding the values of homes beyond their real value
then people bought these homes believing the values would continue to climb
didnt happen

 

[Ravi]

No, I agree they should have the opportunities with the caveat that the same rules apply to all...If you are approved (have the income to make monthly house payments plus insurance and taxes), you should qualify for the loan. Not everyone is or should be a homeowner. By making the numbers work on paper because someone falls into a minority or low income class helps no one and it actually, in the long run hurts many more than the original buyer. I am currently in my 4th house and understood at each closing that, if I did not make my payments on time as per the contract, I would lose the house. That is really not a hard contract to understand.

The assumption here is that it is some kind of social program to move minorities and low income people into home ownership that led to this meltdown. That is simply false and not even close to true. The bad mortgages that flooded the market were mostly $500,000+ properties bought as INVESTMENT properties, mostly in the Sun Belt and resort areas, by people trying to make money flipping high-end properties! And in turn, these mortgages being packaged into investment vehicles (derivatives) and traded as commodities in securities markets.

This crisis is essentially the rich (or wannabe rich) rolling the dice, and then an entire planet of idiot investors playing along, and the dice coming up short. Has NOTHING to do with low income minorities getting into houses due to well-meaning social legislation.

There is no way you can believe that it "had nothing to do with low income and minorities".
While I admit your take on it might have merit, you should be able to see that the Community Reinvestment Act was not for the rich. The majority of the people I see in the reported on that are being foreclosed do not appear to be rich. They are losing their only place of residence from what I have seen and researched.

These predatory lenders cropped up because they were aware of the pressures on banks to give loans to less than qualified people because of.....(liberals favorite word) "FAIRNESS". Who is it fair to now?

That isn't actually true...if it were though, we could blame it squarely on Bush because he is the one that moved against the states...he made it so the states couldn't write laws to outlaw predatory lending practices.

 

[editec]

No income verification and no asset verification loans were WRONG for at least two reasons, but since the bankers wanted them -- because they knew that they would not be holding those mortgages -- those dubious mortgages eventually went south.

First of all this cheap money/NINA loaning was partially responsible for the inapproprate and unsustainable rise in the market prices of homes.

Secondly, since the toxic mortgages didn't just end there, but became the meat of the dereivatives crises, they were the original snow-ball which started this economic collapse.

Listen to me, people...

the price of real estate HAS to bear some relationship to the median salaries of the areas where that real estate is sold.

Making money very very cheap, or giving morgages to people who cannot pay them back WILL drive up the prices of homes for a while, but eventually the homebuyers still need to make enough money to pay back those loans or the market WILL correct.

Take a look around you, folks.

What is the median price of homes in your area?

Now, what is the median annual incomes of the families in your area?

If those numbers aren't rather close? I'd say about median home prices being about 125% tp 200% of annual income?

Then the market prices of RE in your area is STILL too high.

 

[pete]

Funny thing ... none of this matters ... no one pointed a gun to the heads of people who got into the loans so ultimately they are the ones to really blame if anyone.

Right ... not to forget the ones especially in CA that then took out equity loans against the home who's value then dropped and they couldn't or didn't want to pay, but walked with 100's of thousands of dollars and now want help on top of that.

 

[Freemason]

Well, I think there is a difference between assistance with a down payment and closing costs versus pressure to approve bogus loans. What we are doing now is providing BILLIONS, not millions, to cover a very poor plan set in motion long before Bush got in office.

My question is, when will "Bush's Watch" end and the "Obama Nation" begin to be scrutinized and held accountable? I wouldn't be surprised if we are still trying to lynch ol' George in 2012. The new era of change is upon us and we had better hold him to his promises and not let him whine his way through four years of failure, because the job was to hard...yeah...it's a mess. But by God, if you can't hit the nail on the head and drive it home, then don't pick up the hammer!

i dunno, do you think 6 weeks is long enough?

9 months in to the Bush presidency and it still wasn't his responsibility for the 9/11 terror attack, if memory serves me....?

100 years from now 9/11 will never be Bush's responsibility. That event rest soley on the shoulders of Bill Clinton.

 

[Freemason]

I ask this question again. Concerning this mortage issue when will B.Frank and C.Dodd be forced to answer some tough question under oath? They had the duty of oversight not sweetheart deals, etc...!

 

[KittenKoder]

Funny thing ... none of this matters ... no one pointed a gun to the heads of people who got into the loans so ultimately they are the ones to really blame if anyone.

Right ... not to forget the ones especially in CA that then took out equity loans against the home who's value then dropped and they couldn't or didn't want to pay, but walked with 100's of thousands of dollars and now want help on top of that.

Hadn't heard about that one ... but yeah, that would certainly hurt the country even more.

I just say fuck em, everyone who took out loans they couldn't pay for, take all their belongings and let then start over. I never borrowed money, but still had to start over, losing everything, just because that's life. Take what they have, pay off what they can with that, then scrap anything that doesn't stay afloat and start over world wide, banks included. Sometimes you just need to reboot.

 

[bthoma91]

Well, I think there is a difference between assistance with a down payment and closing costs versus pressure to approve bogus loans. What we are doing now is providing BILLIONS, not millions, to cover a very poor plan set in motion long before Bush got in office.

My question is, when will "Bush's Watch" end and the "Obama Nation" begin to be scrutinized and held accountable? I wouldn't be surprised if we are still trying to lynch ol' George in 2012. The new era of change is upon us and we had better hold him to his promises and not let him whine his way through four years of failure, because the job was to hard...yeah...it's a mess. But by God, if you can't hit the nail on the head and drive it home, then don't pick up the hammer!

well put. Obama and his administration seem like they are going to be putting the blame on Bush untill hes out of office.

 

[KittenKoder]

Well, I think there is a difference between assistance with a down payment and closing costs versus pressure to approve bogus loans. What we are doing now is providing BILLIONS, not millions, to cover a very poor plan set in motion long before Bush got in office.

My question is, when will "Bush's Watch" end and the "Obama Nation" begin to be scrutinized and held accountable? I wouldn't be surprised if we are still trying to lynch ol' George in 2012. The new era of change is upon us and we had better hold him to his promises and not let him whine his way through four years of failure, because the job was to hard...yeah...it's a mess. But by God, if you can't hit the nail on the head and drive it home, then don't pick up the hammer!

well put. Obama and his administration seem like they are going to be putting the blame on Bush untill hes out of office.

Um .. it's not Obama who does this ... it's the blind followers of his, just like the blind followers of Jr. who still deny he was a moron to. People just need to stop following parties and start thinking again or nothing will ever get better.

 

[txlonghorn]

Well, I think there is a difference between assistance with a down payment and closing costs versus pressure to approve bogus loans. What we are doing now is providing BILLIONS, not millions, to cover a very poor plan set in motion long before Bush got in office.

My question is, when will "Bush's Watch" end and the "Obama Nation" begin to be scrutinized and held accountable? I wouldn't be surprised if we are still trying to lynch ol' George in 2012. The new era of change is upon us and we had better hold him to his promises and not let him whine his way through four years of failure, because the job was to hard...yeah...it's a mess. But by God, if you can't hit the nail on the head and drive it home, then don't pick up the hammer!

well put. Obama and his administration seem like they are going to be putting the blame on Bush untill hes out of office.

Um .. it's not Obama who does this ... it's the blind followers of his, just like the blind followers of Jr. who still deny he was a moron to. People just need to stop following parties and start thinking again or nothing will ever get better.

it's not Obama who does what?

 

[KittenKoder]

well put. Obama and his administration seem like they are going to be putting the blame on Bush untill hes out of office.

Um .. it's not Obama who does this ... it's the blind followers of his, just like the blind followers of Jr. who still deny he was a moron to. People just need to stop following parties and start thinking again or nothing will ever get better.

it's not Obama who does what?

There ... it's in bold now ... any clearer?

 

[txlonghorn]

Um .. it's not Obama who does this ... it's the blind followers of his, just like the blind followers of Jr. who still deny he was a moron to. People just need to stop following parties and start thinking again or nothing will ever get better.

If you are saying that BO doesn't blame Bush, then you might want to read this.

Obama blames financial woes on Bush - Josh Gerstein - POLITICO.com

 

[bthoma91]

Well, I think there is a difference between assistance with a down payment and closing costs versus pressure to approve bogus loans. What we are doing now is providing BILLIONS, not millions, to cover a very poor plan set in motion long before Bush got in office.

My question is, when will "Bush's Watch" end and the "Obama Nation" begin to be scrutinized and held accountable? I wouldn't be surprised if we are still trying to lynch ol' George in 2012. The new era of change is upon us and we had better hold him to his promises and not let him whine his way through four years of failure, because the job was to hard...yeah...it's a mess. But by God, if you can't hit the nail on the head and drive it home, then don't pick up the hammer!

well put. Obama and his administration seem like they are going to be putting the blame on Bush untill hes out of office.

Um .. it's not Obama who does this ... it's the blind followers of his, just like the blind followers of Jr. who still deny he was a moron to. People just need to stop following parties and start thinking again or nothing will ever get better.

its not obama whos putting the blame? are you kidding me? watch every speech since him and nancy pelosi pushed for that ridiculous spending bill and youll here him "I did not ask for this" "I walked into this" "NOthing we did" hes obvioulsy putting blame on someone

 

[Care4all]

Funny thing ... none of this matters ... no one pointed a gun to the heads of people who got into the loans so ultimately they are the ones to really blame if anyone.

So you expect a bank to give you a mortgage loan for any amount of money you ask from them?

I don't think so kitten....at least for matthew and me, we sweated it, on whether the bank was going to approve us for our first mortgage. We fully expected them to turn us down, if we could not qualify...

To say that the assumption should have been there on the borrowers part, that the bank would loan you money that they did not think you could afford, is a bit naive.

The assumption is that a bank will NOT loan you money, that they believe you can not afford.

It turned out to be the other way around with matthew and I, the bank came back and said we could buy a house for over $100k more than what we were buying.

At that point is when Matthew and I came in to the picture and had to decide, did we really want to buy this house or did we want to spend $100k more for something more grandios?

Matthew and I knew our own personal situation and we liked to travel and vacation and we wanted to continue to be able to do those things so we personally made the decision to not be mortgage poor and buy the smaller, but nice, house.

This is when we came in to the picture, and we had decisions to make, but the bank is the ONE THAT TOLD US what we could afford according to their statistics and calculations and all the information we had to give them on our debts and assets and job income and length in jobs etc.... our decision was whether we wanted or could go in to debt, for the amount their charts said we could...

Yes, i think alot of poor people were very ignorant and stupid on this and they definately made mistakes....

But WHO DOESN'T want to own a home? Who doesn't want to be part of the "ownership society" in this country that after 30 years brings wealth?

These brokers/banks PURSUED this yearning of those without....and preyed upon it, no question on that....and these banks made some very stupid, unconscionable business decisions that should have gotten them all fired, but they could mask their decisions in to MBS's....and sell them off to unsuspecting pension and retirement funds....so the scam continued while they all collected their fees for every transaction....

Then when the poor and unsuspecting middle class were running short they created even riskier loans to capture those that really couldn't afford them, then they began a marketing program to target the wealthier middle class, advertising like crazy home improvement loans, refinancing in to lower interest rates while taking out extra money to pay down the credit cards, where you can write the interest down on taxes, and home equity loans to pay for the kids colleges and so on and so forth....never even contemplating that houses would NOT continue to rise....the banks knew more than the people, that the homes had never continued to rise, and always hit a wall at one time or another...they had the history of such with the 1929 crash and the crash in the 70's and the housing crash in 1988 that brought down our savings and Loans.

This went on and on and on and on and on....to where the whole country was affected.

It's not that i do not think the poor were a part of this mess, i believe they were...i just know that this was not because of the CRA or President Bush's proposals on housing that caused this mess, because those WERE NOT the areas where the banks and brokers concentrated their marketing and loans issued.

care

 

[KittenKoder]

well put. Obama and his administration seem like they are going to be putting the blame on Bush untill hes out of office.

Um .. it's not Obama who does this ... it's the blind followers of his, just like the blind followers of Jr. who still deny he was a moron to. People just need to stop following parties and start thinking again or nothing will ever get better.

its not obama whos putting the blame? are you kidding me? watch every speech since him and nancy pelosi pushed for that ridiculous spending bill and youll here him "I did not ask for this" "I walked into this" "NOthing we did" hes obvioulsy putting blame on someone

No ... those are only facts ... putting the blame is what partisans keep doing which is what is slowing the progress the most. Obama is only able to get his failed policies because people are too busy blaming to actually take stock in what's happening. Jr. did handle it poorly, so did Clinton when he first realized the inevitable, and Sr. was just too busy to deal with it in it's infancy. The reality is, none of them are to blame, but none of them are doing a good job to help. Obama is doing the exact same thing Jr. did, and it will cause more damage.

Sadly the best way to handle all this would have been how Sr. did, leave it be. It's the whole world not just America that is having a problem, because too many people lived beyond their means in too many countries. It can't be stopped, slowed, or even weakened. But instead of people talking about it, all they are doing is pointing fingers and letting the politicians make it worse.

 

[txlonghorn]

I agree with that do some degree, but you have to take responsibility if you're going to take control. It's one thing to make good decisions to right the wrongs of others and take credit for it. It's a completely different and far more detrimental thing to make even worse decisions and blame somebody else for the outcome.

You and I both know that they can't leave it alone. It would be a wasted opportunity to get the BS passed.

 

[Care4all]

No...I don't think this is meant as a joke at all. There are people who actually feel this is a relavent point of comparison. CALL ME CRAZY!!! It really is a little strange isn't it? I could understand if this 200 million was filled with earmarks and only went to people who couldn't get loans. But it was designed to help those who could qualify for the loan but didn't have the means to put down any money.

yes tex, this program of president bush's was GOOD and guess what, it was part of his CRA FOCUS... and the focus he gave fannie and freddie to put these QUALIFYING people in these low income communities, in to homes by giving them the down payment to do it....

fannie and freddie, according to their bank charter to put the poor in to homes, could NOT give a mortgage without the 5% down payment and without the poor qualifying with their salary, debt, assets, job review....so Bush's program to give the 5% downpayment, to help them get in to homes with conventional 30 yr mortgages was good....this was all to put more poorer people, without stellar credit, in to homes in lower income areas....CRA.

care