More Than $50B in Adjustable-Rate Mortages to Reset in October 2007

An article entitled, “Mortgage Resets: Record Bill Coming Due,” was published today on the CNN.com website. It provides great insight as to how the real estate market can go from bad to worse in upcoming months. Hybrid adjustable-rate mortgages, or ARMs, were a popular financing option for homebuyers in 2004 and 2005. Many of these homeowners will see an increase in their mortgage payment of over 30 percent once those resets occur. That is a significant increase which could lead to a tidal wave of late payments and, eventually, foreclosure for a large number of homeowners.

Deutsche Bank Leading the Way in South Florida Foreclosures

Daily Business Review published a very interesting article today entitled “Special Report: Condo Lending”. It provides a list of the top five banks who have filed the most foreclosure actions from January 1, 2007 to May 4, 2007 in South Florida. Below is that list:

The most revealing part is that these banks have no reason to be overly concerned. In most cases, the loans were repackaged as mortgage-backed securities and sold to Wall Street investors. Public records may reveal the banks as the possessor of these loans, because their names are still associated with the notes, but it is the investors who will bear the monetary loss due to the risky underwriting practices of these banks. In fact, the banks actually make additional money by charging fees to the investors by acting as custodians in managing the foreclosure proceedings for them. Helluva a gig! They’re making money on the front-end and back-end!