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Economists calculate that the decline in home prices has cost American homeowners approximately $7 trillion in home equity. Compounding this problem is the fact that the inventory of homes available for sale remains high and there is potential for a significant volume of “shadow inventory” to hit the market. Intervention is necessary to support the fragile recovery in the housing market and to prevent further declines in home values. What steps must policy makers take to prevent the loss...

Opening today’s paper to more reports about the apparent processing problems involving foreclosures, I was struck by the near total absence of any discussion concerning ways to constructively address this dilemma. Instead of framing the discussions in the useful context of “root cause” and “solutions”, the dialog has too often been cast in terms of “victims” and “villains”....

If you’re a home mortgage loan originator, mortgage broker, realtor, title agent or other provider of services related to the processing or closing of a residential mortgage loan, you know that January 1, 2010 is D-Day for the use of the new Good Faith Estimate (GFE) of settlement charges (www.hud.gov/respa) and HUD-1 Settlement Statement (www.hud.gov/respa) prescribed by the RESPA reform final rule published January 16, 2009. Hopefully, you and your firm are well on you way to being ready to implement the rule. ...