FHA Market Share Tops 36%, New Record

In news that should come as no surprise to anyone, the Mortgage Bankers Association is reporting that in June government-insured loans - meaning FHA and VA financing, but mostly FHA loans - represented 36 percent of all loan applications, the largest market penetration since 1990.

In comparison, the lowest recorded market share was 5.8 percent in August 2005.

"A primary reason government-insured loans have retained a high share of the purchase market is that these loans typically require lower down payments than conventional loans," said Orawin Velz, MBA's Associate Vice President of Economic Forecasting. "In addition, lending standards tend to be tighter for conventional loans, especially for loans that require private mortgage insurance." 

Sounds to me like a recipe for a additional foreclosures in a couple of years.

Number of Troubled Banks Rises to 552; FDIC Fund Sinks Into the Red

Rich Hake called the FDIC the "new RTC" at Reggie's workshop last weekend; here's proof.

WSJ:
The government insurance fund that protects more than $4.5 trillion of U.S. bank deposits slipped into the red at the end of September, after fifty banks collapsed during the third quarter.

The deposit insurance fund dropped by $18.6 billion during the third quarter of 2009 to negative $8.2 billion, as the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. set aside $21.7 billion in provisions for additional bank failures. This is the second time in the agency's history that the balance has fallen into negative territory.

The FDIC has already called on the industry to prepay $45 billion in assessments at the end of the year that will be set aside to cover the cost of bank failures in 2010.

Fifty U.S. banks failed in the third quarter, the largest quarterly total since 55 banks went bust during the second quarter of 1990. The FDIC's list of "problem" banks swelled to 552 at the end of September, its highest level in 16 years and up from 416 in June.

Read the rest of the article at:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125907631604662501.html?mod=WSJ_hpp_MIDDLTopStories

Note Buyers & Investors Convention November 10-12 in San Diego

The NoteWorthy convention for note brokers and investors will be held in San Diego November 10-12.

This is an opportunity to learn about the note business at the industry convention. There will be workshops to learn from and an opportunity to meet the "MONEY"!

If you're interested in attending I have a very special rate of only $99 for locals that want to attend (others pay $388)! Go to http://www.noteworthyconvention.com and put "tan2009" into the "Enter Discount Code" part of the Ticket Information section after you have put how many will attend. See you there!