Mortgage Resets – Here comes the next wave

Mortgage Resets

I know everyone really wants to believe the housing market is going to get better in 2010. I know we’ve all had enough of the gloom and doom, but it appears we have to brace ourselves for more of the same, at best.

We’re so used to turning the channel when we get bored with what’s on. We expect to drive up to the window and have our food ready. We swallow a pill in anticipation of instant headache relief.

But, from the looks of this graph, we’re going to be in this one for a while. It’s better to know ahead of time to be prepared. Stop spending. Save what you can, when you can. Scale back, downsize, reuse, recycle.

The real estate market will come back strong. It always does. We’ll just have to be patient a while longer.

So, what’s the good news?  There’s never been a better time to invest in real estate.

If you live in the Triad area of North Carolina, we’d love to help you with your investing.  Check out our Triad Master Mind. It’s a great group of local investors and we’re all working together to help each other profit through real estate.

Don’t wait to invest, invest and wait!  Huge returns will be there to reap in your future.

Happy investing!

Top 10 States for Foreclosure

US Map

  1. Nevada – in the third quarter of 2009, more than one in every 20 Nevada households went into foreclosure.
  2. Florida – had unrealistic appreciation for the last 4 years.
  3. California – claims many toxic loans to non-English speaking buyers.
  4. Arizona – is severely overbuilt – over 80,000 vacant homes in Phoenix alone.
  5. Idaho – unable to sustain their 20% appreciation every year from 2003-2006 combined with the current economy.
  6. Michigan – automotive related job losses.
  7. Illinois – received the third largest volume of foreclosure notices in the US
  8. Utah – in 2009, more than 42% of their sub-prime loans adjusted, the national average was 27.8%
  9. Maryland – officials are blaming exotic loans and balloon mortgages
  10. New Jersey

These state all had unsustainably high home prices and many buyers who really couldn’t afford the houses they were purchasing — most with toxic mortgages — followed by downturn-related unemployment. It was the perfect storm for a real estate collapse.

Unfortunately, foreclosures are not letting up.  RealtyTrac reports more than 300,000 U.S. properties received a foreclosure filing in November 2009 for the ninth straight month.

Produce the Note – pro-active steps when facing foreclosure

Are you in or facing foreclosure? To protect yourself and your property, ask your lender to produce your original mortgage note.

A request to produce the note requires the lender to prove it actually has the authority to foreclose on you.  The lender must officially produce the original promissory note, with your signature, in the lawsuit.

Your goal with this process is to make certain the institution foreclosing is, in fact, the owner of the note. There is only one original note for your mortgage that has your signature on it. This is the document that proves you owe the debt.

In the past few years, many mortgage notes have been sold and re-sold to other institutions and investment companies either individually or, more often, when bundled together as huge securitized packages on Wall Street. These sales were done so often and so quickly that, many times, proper documentation did not follow the exchanges resulting in the final institution who’s collecting the debt not having paperwork to verify their legal right to collect.  In fact, this happens about 1/2 the time!

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Foreclosure Upset Bid Refund – how do you get it?

Federal Courthouse

Have you ever bid at the courthouse on a foreclosed property? Was yours the original bid or was it an upset bid?

What is an “upset bid”?

At a foreclosure auction at the courthouse, once a highest bidder is determined, there is a 10 day period during which North Carolina allows someone willing to pay more to place a higher bid. They must raise the accepted bid by a minimum of 5% and include a cash deposit of 5% of their bid price.

If you are outbid or your bid is “upset”, the process begins again and another higher bidder has 10 days to make a better offer. If, after the 10 day upset period expires there are no higher bids, the person who placed the last highest bid wins the right to purchase for their bid price if it has been accepted by the seller.

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