By Jillayne Schlicke on May 9, 2013
A word from The Tim: This post is from long-time Seattle Bubble participant Jillayne Schlicke, real estate educator through her company CE Forward. Jillayne keeps a close watch on industry news, and agreed to write up this detailed look at NACA for the readers here. Thanks, Jillayne! I attended a meeting last week sponsored by [...]
Posted in Local, News | Tagged mortgages, NACA
By The Tim on January 11, 2013
I like to keep tabs on what’s going on in my neighborhood, and when a little house a block away was listed for rent on Craigslist (screenshot) this week, I remembered seeing it as a foreclosure on the market for sale last year. I got a little curious to know some more about this home’s [...]
Posted in Features | Tagged banks, foreclosures, lending, mortgages
By The Tim on October 24, 2012
There is one major political topic that has been mysteriously absent from both major presidential campaigns during this year’s presidential election season… housing. Nick Timiraos noted this in the Wall Street Journal in early September. Here we are in late October, four debates later, and nothing has really changed. Barely a peep about housing from [...]
Posted in National, News, Opinion | Tagged economics, Economy, Inman, interest, mortgages, NPR, Obama, politics, Romney, tax deduction
By The Tim on September 7, 2012
I received the following email from a reader asking about the federal government’s Home Affordable Refinance Program (HARP) earlier this week: I have been looking into the HARP 2.0 program to refinance my home. I qualify according to program guidelines, but find it hard to shop interest rates and find lenders that deal honestly with [...]
Posted in Features | Tagged government_meddling, HARP, Interest Rates, Jillayne, mortgages, reader_question, refinancing, Rhonda-Porter
By The Tim on April 19, 2012
Here’s a sampling of quotes from news articles about mortgage interest rates. “…a new reality: The economy has made the transition from tentative to robust recovery, and the period of historically low interest rates is ending.” “In the residential market, the belief that the period of historically low interest rates may end has begun to [...]
Posted in National, News | Tagged interest, Interest Rates, mortgages
By The Tim on October 12, 2011
[Read Part 1: Proposal: Replace the Mortgage Interest Deduction with a Flat Homeowner Deduction] In the comments on the proposal I made yesterday, Doug asked a reasonable question: Have you figured out what the deduction would be if you did this, and made it deficit neutral? That would be an interesting exercise. Good question. Let’s [...]
Posted in Features, Opinion | Tagged government_meddling, homebuying, mortgages, tax deduction
