Rich Sweum's Blog

No more "Broker originated appraisals," starting in 200_  It is interesting that the New York lawsuit against WAMU for inflating appraisals morphed into another opportunity to throw brokers under the bus.  I agree there is a lot of appraisal fraud out there, but the new requirements seem to unfai...

Last month, I had an interesting conversation with a builder/developer.  I keep my mouth shut and kept nodding and uttered nothing but "hmmm, ahhh, ohhh, uhuh."  It was really interesting getting his perspective on the goings on of the housing market.  He had owned a few small apartment complexes...

I was starting to get excited last week, we had a couple of days that were HUGE rebounds into positive territory, erasing some of the weeks of losses in the MBS market.  Could it continue?  I wanted to think it would, but in my brain, I knew there was too much inflationary data out there!Now, her...

The folks that I know who are "salesmen/women" have built a lifestyle that can only be supported and maintained by an income stream that make them buy into a delusional perception of reality that "all is good and the market should be coming back anytime now!"  If they acknowledge any inkling of r...

I had a client locked on a 30 year fixed, 5.25% back on January 22.  She goes go bankrate.bomb and leaves me for some hoser that quotes a 30 year fixed at 5% the next day.  Priceless.I warned her, she would be sorry!  Well, she calls me yesterday, can I still get 5.25%???  Turns out, she was payi...

The Fed has 2 clubs in their bag...the funds rate and the discount rate.  When they get on the Tee this next month with their 3 iron, and look at the green on this 175 yard par 3, surrounded by water...Ben is going to swing away, and the ball is either going to skip off the green OR miss it compl...

I remember peeing my pants as a 11 year old, waiting for 1 hour in a line for Gas.  We were too far away from the Gas station for my mom to feel comfortable letting me walk there alone, and I kept thinking...I can hold it, I can hold it.  Well, bladder pressure won the day.  What does this have t...

Just in time, we have a visionary Democrat that could potentially re-invigorate the Alphabet Soup method of economic recovery!  The NYT recently did a piece, as did Newsweek, reviewing how Roosevelt dealt with the foreclosure mess.  The Home Owners Loan Corp essentially bought mortgages that were...

Ok, I completely admit that if you were to throw the Quadratic Equation in front of me, I would start to do the skitters.  But I do have my head around basic math concepts...and have since the 5th grade.A few months ago I met with a young married couple that had recently completed their graduate ...

Just a little rant here to detoxify myself prior to the weekend.  Since Fannie and Freddie have got out of the business of "warranting" new condominium projects and put the burden on individual lenders financing these bad boys are a complete nightmare.The units are having a hard enough time as it...