I just found out about PolicyMap a new service that lets you map an insane amount of data by region on all subjects ranging from mortgage originations, neighborhood crime stats and income demographics (and tons more).  This could become a killer tool for homeowners looking to buy a home and for real estate agents and mortgage originators to use for everything from farming to advising clients.  It can also be used by lenders to make risk assesments on properties and more.

Since I’m a tech geek at heart this site really appeals to me and could become a useful tool for you.  It’s also an interesting toy to play around with to learn a bit about your neighborhood.

I pulled the below graph for Walnut Creek, CA that shows the percent of all purchase loans in the area that were made with subprime piggyback second financing.  This data is pulled from lender’s HMDA reporting and broken down by census tract.

Let’s not overlook the scary fact that in 2006 more than 55% of all subprime purchase loans in the purple areas had piggyback 2nds.  Of course this means that half of the subprime home purchases in these areas were made with zero down payment.

Here’s the legend:

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Source [blownmortgage]

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Filed under: Forecasts, Law, Mutual funds

Barron’s [subscription required] summarizes the likely fate of different classes of Auction Rate Securities (ARS) holders — the $330 billion market for securities that used to reset in weekly auctions before it froze up in February. It reports that If you hold ARSs sold by a municipality or a taxable, closed-end mutual fund you may already have gotten your money back or may do so within weeks. And those holding issues from tax-free, closed-end municipal-bond funds will likely see some money back before long. But others may have a long wait ahead.

I first wrote about this in February and since then, the post has accumulated 4,031 comments. I cannot imagine how difficult it must be for these people to think they had their money in a safe, money-market like fund — only to discover that they could not get access to their money at all. It appears that many of these ARS holders did not receive a prospectus and were not warned that the auctions could fail.

Meanwhile, here’s Barron’s prognosis for the different classes of ARS holders:

• Municipal Issuers. Issuers like cities and toll roads had about $165 billion of the ARS market. Bloomberg estimates that north of $63 billion of municipal ARS have been refinanced, and that ARS holders were bought out without losing any money. About half of the municipal auctions are working again, with interest rates in the 4% to 5% area.

Continue reading Will Auction Rate Securities (ARS) holders get their money back?

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Via [bloggingstocks]

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