W:1083,1531:2983:3137]******Bush Mortgage Bubble FAQs

re: Bush Mortgage Bubble FAQs[W:1083,1531]

iguanaman said:

Your post was agreeing with him. You said banks were responsible and so does he. You are both right.

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No. It was put squarely on the back of Bush.

re: Bush Mortgage Bubble FAQs[W:1083,1531]

This thread may warrant my first ever "ignore" on DP.

re: Bush Mortgage Bubble FAQs[W:1083,1531]

~Dr.Who~ said:

Rome burns and the masses get to argue over their hatred towards each other's political bent....

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So posting facts = hatred?

mtm1963 said:

i would garner, no one is reading them.

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Why would people not read it. Am I not making clear straightforward points? Am I not posting solid factual links to back up those points?

MaggieD said:

No. It was put squarely on the back of Bush.

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Yes I am blaming Bush. But see how I used actual facts to make my case instead of anecdotal stories. Please let me know which clear straightforward point you dont believe.

StringBean said:

This thread may warrant my first ever "ignore" on DP.

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That’s not a surprising reply. I find Conservatives often run away from the facts. Before you run away, could you please explain why you want to run away?

Anyhoo, thanks everybody for the praise. Not one of you could contest anything I posted. You could only whine or deflect. Lets face it, your beef is I posted facts that shred the silly things you want to believe and you cant use your usual excuses to make the facts go away.

re: Bush Mortgage Bubble FAQs[W:1083,1531]

Vern said:

Anyhoo, thanks everybody for the praise. Not one of you could contest anything I posted. You could only whine or deflect. Lets face it, your beef is I posted facts that shred the silly things you want to believe and you cant use your usual excuses to make the facts go away.

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Thanks for straightening us out, Vern. 'Preciate it.

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Vern said:

That’s not a surprising reply. I find Conservatives often run away from the facts. Before you run away, could you please explain why you want to run away?

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I fear I may vomit if I see another one of your "Q & A" posts.

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Vern said:

I still see alot of misconceptions about the Bush Mortgage Bubble and the Bush policies that encouraged, funde and protected it so I thought I would start an FAQ section. Since the resulting destruction of the housing and financial sector are still a drag on the economy today, it seems relevent

Q When did the Bush Mortgage Bubble start?

A The general timeframe is it started late 2004.

From Bush’s President’s Working Group on Financial Markets October 2008

“The Presidents Working Group’s March policy statement acknowledged that turmoil in financial markets clearly was triggered by a dramatic weakening of underwriting standards for U.S. subprime mortgages, beginning in late 2004 and extending into 2007.”
http://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/fin-mkts/Documents/q4progress update.pdf

"Since 1995 there has been essentially no change in the basic CRA rules or enforcement process that can be reasonably linked to the subprime lending activity. This fact weakens the link between the CRA and the current crisis since the crisis is rooted in poor performance of mortgage loans made between 2004 and 2007. "
http://www.federalreserve.gov/newsevents/speech/20081203_analysis.pdf

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Vern even Obama agrees it was Government regulators that pushed for the lessening of mortgage lending standards


Proof the Democrats knew and fought all attempt at regulatory efforts by the Bush administration


Nancy Pelosi and her Ilk

re: Bush Mortgage Bubble FAQs[W:1083,1531]



In the Spring and Summer of 1994, Secretary Henry Cisneros met with leaders of major national organizations from the housing industry to solicit their views about establishing a national homeownership partnership.”
- HUD, "Partners in the American Dream", May 1995

“In 1994, at the President’s request, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) began work to develop a National Homeownership Strategy with the goal of lifting the overall homeownership rate to 67.5 percent by the end of the year 2000. While the most tangible goal of the National Homeownership Strategy was to raise the overall homeownership rate, in presenting the strategy HUD pointed explicitly to declines in homeownership rates among low-income, young, and minority households as motivation for these efforts.” - U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development Office of Policy Development and Research website

"At the request of President Clinton, HUD is working with dozens of national leaders in government and the housing industry to implement the National Homeownership Strategy, an unprecedented public-private partnership to increase homeownership to a record-high level over the next 6 years.” - Urban Policy Brief Number 2, August 1995

“Federal institutions, policies, and programs alone cannot meet President Clinton's goal of record-high levels of homeownership within the next 6 years. HUD has forged a nationwide partnership that will draw on the resources and creativity of lenders, builders, real estate professionals, community-based nonprofit organizations, consumer groups, State and local governments and housing finance agencies, and many others in a cooperative, multifaceted campaign to create ownership opportunities” - The National Homeownership Strategy

Action 11: Removing Barriers to Mortgage Financing for Starter Homes
Action 29: Alternative Approaches to Homebuying Transactions
Action 35: Home Mortgage Loan-to-Value Flexibility
Action 36: Subsidies to Reduce Downpayment and Mortgage Costs
Action 44: Flexible Mortgage Underwriting Criteria
Action 45: Public-Private Leveraging for Affordable Home Financing

By 1996, HUD was directing the GSE's to provide at least 42% of their mortgage financing to low-income borrowers and 12% of their portfolios to “special affordable” loans

Nyt...

From September 30, 1999:
In a move that could help increase home ownership rates among minorities and low-income consumers, the Fannie Mae Corporation is easing the credit requirements on loans that it will purchase from banks and other lenders.

The action, which will begin as a pilot program involving 24 banks in 15 markets -- including the New York metropolitan region -- will encourage those banks to extend home mortgages to individuals whose credit is generally not good enough to qualify for conventional loans. Fannie Mae officials say they hope to make it a nationwide program by next spring.

Fannie Mae, the nation's biggest underwriter of home mortgages, has been under increasing pressure from the Clinton Administration to expand mortgage loans among low and moderate income people and felt pressure from stock holders to maintain its phenomenal growth in profits.

In addition, banks, thrift institutions and mortgage companies have been pressing Fannie Mae to help them make more loans to so-called subprime borrowers. These borrowers whose incomes, credit ratings and savings are not good enough to qualify for conventional loans, can only get loans from finance companies that charge much higher interest rates -- anywhere from three to four percentage points higher than conventional loans.

''Fannie Mae has expanded home ownership for millions of families in the 1990's by reducing down payment requirements,'' said Franklin D. Raines, Fannie Mae's chairman and chief executive officer. ''Yet there remain too many borrowers whose credit is just a notch below what our underwriting has required who have been relegated to paying significantly higher mortgage rates in the so-called subprime market.''

Demographic information on these borrowers is sketchy. But at least one study indicates that 18 percent of the loans in the subprime market went to black borrowers, compared to 5 per cent of loans in the conventional loan market.

In moving, even tentatively, into this new area of lending, Fannie Mae is taking on significantly more risk, which may not pose any difficulties during flush economic times. But the government-subsidized corporation may run into trouble in an economic downturn, prompting a government rescue similar to that of the savings and loan industry in the 1980's.

''From the perspective of many people, including me, this is another thrift industry growing up around us,'' said Peter Wallison a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. ''If they fail, the government will have to step up and bail them out the way it stepped up and bailed out the thrift industry.''

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NATIONAL BUREAU OF ECONOMIC RESEARCH “There is a clear pattern of increased defaults for loans made by these banks in quarters around the (CRA) exam. Moreover, the effects are larger for loans made within CRA tracts,” or predominantly low-income and minority areas.

To satisfy CRA examiners, “flexible” lending by large banks rose an average 5% and those loans defaulted about 15% more often, the 43-page study found.

The strongest link between CRA lending and defaults took place in the runup to the crisis — 2004 to 2006 — when banks rapidly sold CRA mortgages for securitization by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and Wall Street.

CRA regulations are at the core of Fannie’s and Freddie’s so-called affordable housing mission. In the early 1990s, a Democrat Congress gave HUD the authority to set and enforce (through fines) CRA-grade loan quotas at Fannie and Freddie.

It passed a law requiring the government-backed agencies to “assist insured depository institutions to meet their obligations under the (CRA).” The goal was to help banks meet lending quotas by buying their CRA loans.

But they had to loosen underwriting standards to do it. And that’s what they did ".

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From Peter Wallison,

Fannie and Freddie

1. Fannie and Freddie were the largest investors in subprime private securities, having purchased about a third of all such issuances over the period 2004-2007. As the Wallison dissent demonstrates, these securities were rich in loans that met government mandated affordable housing goals.

2. The Federal Housing Enterprises Financial Safety and Soundness Act of 1992 (the GSE Act) and HUD’s 1995 National Homeownership Strategy launched a classic race to the bottom based on credit flexibilities. HUD assured broad compliance by drafting virtually the entire mortgage industry. Most significant was the policy to largely eliminate downpayments for targeted borrowers. As the government demanded more and more such lending, particularly those with incomes below 80 percent of median and special target groups, virtually the entire industry responded by moving further and further down the demand curve and out the risk curve. FHA, Fannie, Freddie, banks, subprime lenders, Alt-A lenders, first-time buyers, repeat buyers, and cash-out refinance borrowers all became much more highly leveraged. Moral hazard became rampant as downpayments and initial equity disappeared throughout much of the housing finance system.

Other loan risk factors were magnified by the push to reduce equity. My Forensic Study documents that self-denominated subprime first mortgages traditionally had 20 percent or more initial equity. In 1989 cash equity of 20 percent or more was common on “A-” subprime loans, with several investors setting a maximum LTV of 75 percent.3 Maximum LTVs of 70-75 percent and 60-70 percent respectively were required on subprime “B” and “C” loans. In 1991, Fannie and FHA’s median LTVs were about 73 percent4 and 95 percent respectively. The GSE Act mandated that Fannie and Freddie undertake an entirely new mission to compete with FHA and traditional subprime lenders. The government’s central role in increasing borrower leverage is documented later in this article.

3. Fannie and Freddie also led a second race to the bottom. Their charter privileges made them the leverage and moral hazard leaders. Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner recently observed that all financial crises are caused by too much leverage.5 Back in late 2009, in a private interview with the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission,6 he enumerated six causes of the financial crisis, including moral hazard and the unique role played by the GSEs:7

“Moral hazard was everywhere and endemic. The biggest source was in the GSEs [Fannie and Freddie]. The GSEs were entirely moral hazard."

-----------------------------------------

1. “A long period of stability, including no history of a significant fall in house prices.” Note: as early as 2001 Josh Rosner and James Grant both noted ample credit provided by the GSEs was the source of this apparent stability;

2. “Rates very low for too long.” Note: each period of low interest rates was an opportunity for the GSEs to use their charter advantages to gain market share. Their share of outstanding mortgages went from 41.1 percent in 2000 to 46.8 percent in 2003;

3. A parallel banking system, growing up alongside the traditional banking system, funded short, and vulnerable to panics. Note: Fannie and Freddie were the largest and most leveraged part of this parallel banking system and suffered from a schizophrenic regulatory regime comprised of HUD and OFHEO;

4. Incentives to borrow and take advantage of regulatory arbitrage. Note: the GSEs were the biggest beneficiaries of regulatory arbitrage and incentives to borrow;

5. Inadequate regulation and lack of aggressive enforcement. Note: Geithner substantially dilutes this as a cause by noting that that “people don’t have perfect foresight” and “can’t be preemptive in this stuff.”8 HUD’s pro-active regulatory enforcement with respect to the GSEs’ affordable housing mandates has now been now broadly recognized as ill advised.

HUD set forth its view as to how the GSEs would use their competitive advantages to reshape the subprime market in 2009

"Because the GSEs have a funding advantage over other market participants, they have the ability to under price their competitors and increase their market share. This advantage, as has been the case in the prime market, could allow the GSEs to eventually play a significant role in the subprime market. As the GSEs become more comfortable with subprime lending, the line between what today is considered a subprime loan versus a prime loan will likely deteriorate, making expansion by the GSEs look more like an increase in the prime market."

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Democrats fighting off Republican attempts to Regulate Fannie and Freddie..

Maxine Waters..." Mister Chairman, we DO NOT have a Crisis at Freddie Mac...." And VERN blames this on Bush ?? How pathetic

In 2004 the Corrupt Appointee to head up Fannie Mae, Franklin Raines ran TV add's to as a way to fight off regulatory advances by the Republicans.

Raines new TV add

Fannie Mae’s “Astounding” National Television Ad
On March 31, 2004, the day before the Senate Banking Committee was scheduled to begin debating GSE regulations, Franklin Raines had Fannie Mae run the following advertisement on national television. Featuring a worried looking Hispanic couple, a man said, “Uh-oh.”

Woman: “What?”

Man: “It looks like Congress is talking about new regulations for Fannie Mae.”

Woman: “Will that keep us from getting that lower mortgage rate?”

Man: “Some economists say rates may go up.”

Woman: “But that could mean we won’t be able to afford the new house.

Man: “I know.”


Bush from 2002 to 2007 tried repeatedly to get Fannie and Freddie under some regulatory control.


" With such fervent Democrat resistance, the Bush Administration continued to do what it could within the Executive Branch. In February 2004, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) tried to strengthen its GSE oversight. The Democrat party and its allies, such as ACORN, moved swiftly and strongly. In a March press conference, Barney Frank (D-MA) stated, “We cannot accept and leave alone this sweeping decision by a federal regulator to substantially diminish the role state-elected and appointed officials have in protecting their economies and their consumers.” On April 7, Senator John Edwards (D-NC) introduced legislation to quietly nullify the OCC regulations. On April 30, 32 House Democrats and three Republicans co-sponsored a bill to do the same. In a May 3 letter to Congress, ACORN strongly supported the effort to nullify the regulations, arguing, “the OCC has shut down the laboratories of democracy and its actions place citizens around the nation at risk of becoming victims of predatory lending or other unfair practices.” On September 15, Democrats went after the OCC directly, introducing legislation that would have given Congress stronger power over the bureau. With Republicans holding a majority in Congress, the bill never had a chance of passing, but the move provided a forum for Democrats to reshape the issue from being about Fannie Mae to being about anyone who suggested Fannie be effectively regulated.

In April 2004, the Bush Administration fought against a bill introduced to the House by Garry Miller (R-CA) and Barney Frank (D-MA) to eliminate the $290,319 ceiling on mortgage size that the Federal Housing Administration could insure. The bill set far higher cielings, according to each local housing market and influenced by local community organizations. For instance, in San Francisco, the insured limit would soar to $568,000. Fannie Mae’s chief economist testified in favor of the bill, which never made it out of Republican-controlled committee.

In the summer 2004, Bush had the Treasury obtain legality opinions from the Justice Department and Congressional Budget Office about limiting Fannie’s ability to issue debt. Congressional Democrats were up in arms, led by Barney Frank (D-MA). At a September 2004 Freddie Mac conference, he stated, “I think they would run into an absolute firestorm if they did that.” According to National Mortgage News, Rep. Frank went on to suggest lowering the income levels borrowers needed to have before receiving mortgages of certain sizes

In November 2004, Barney Frank (D-MA), senior Democrat on the House Financial Services Committee, stated continued OFHEO funding was “inappropriate” due to the controversial nature of the OFHEO report. In a November 2004, he bluntly called for a detailed public investigation of OFHEO, stating “It is clear that a leadership change at OFHEO is overdue.” In June, Mr. Frank had supported the Bush request for additional OFHEO funding…in November, after the September “Special Examination” report, he reversed that support and called for a leadership change.

re: Bush Mortgage Bubble FAQs[W:1083,1531]

Bush's HUD Secretary Mel Martinez successfully increased the size of the Capital Requirement from Clintons 3% to Bush's 10%...

In August 2003, Barney Frank (D-MA) — ranking Democrat on the House Financial Services Committee and the person who generaled the Democrat strategy with regard to GSE regulation — argued strongly to make it easier for people/speculators to get new house construction loans while putting less money up as collateral. In a mid-August letter to Fannie Mae, Mr. Frank urged Fannie to withdraw the underwriting guidelines that the Bush Administration had successfully gotten Fannie to strengthen (raising the principal/collateral commitment from 3% to 10%). He wrote, the Bush-inspired “changes could make manufactured housing too expensive for many Americans.” Mr. Frank was successful; Fannie announced in February 2004, it would lower the capital requirement from 10% to 5%… the move became effective December 1, 2004, two weeks before the SEC released a scathing report on Fannie’s improper accounting. Easy money on new house constructions turned out to be one of the prime causes of the housing overexpansion that helped define the bubble.

From the House Financial Service Committee...

Sen. Charles Schumer (D, NY): “And my worry is that we’re using the recent safety and soundness concerns, particularly with Freddie, and with a poor regulator, as a straw man to curtail Fannie and Freddie’s mission.”

Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA): “nearly a dozen hearings where, frankly, we were trying to fix something that wasn’t broke… In fact, the GSEs (Fannie, Freddie) have exceeded their housing goals. What we need to do today is to focus on the regulator, and this must be done in a manner so as not to impede their affordable housing mission – a mission that has seen innovation flourish, from desktop underwriting (no formal analysis) to 100% loans (no collateral).”

Rep. Maxine Waters (D, CA), speaking to Housing and Urban Development Secretary Mel Martinez: “Secretary Martinez, if it ain’t broke, why do you want to fix it? Have the GSEs ever missed their housing goals?”


Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA): “I don’t want the same kind of focus on safety and soundness that we have in OCC (Office of the Comptroller of the Currency) and OTS (Office of Thrift Supervision). I want to load the dice a little bit more in this situation towards subsidized housing.”

Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA): “I think we see entities that are fundamentally sound financially and withstand some of the disastrous scenarios. And even if there were a problem, the federal government doesn’t bail them out.”

Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-NY): To OFHEO head, Armando Falcon, “The question that represents is the confidence that your agency has with regard to regulating these GSEs… Why should I have confidence; why should anyone have confidence in you as a regulator at this point?”

Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-NY): “I’m just pissed of at OFHEO (the regulator), because if it wasn’t for you I don’t think that we’d be here in the first place…you’ve given them an excuse to try to have this forum so that we can talk about it and maybe change the direction and the mission of what the GSEs had, which they’ve done a tremendous job.

Barney Frank (D-MA): “I worry about increasing the capital requirements…I’d like to get Fannie and Freddie more deeply into helping low income housing and possibly moving into something that’s more explicitly a subsidy (taxpayer money used as principle in subprime mortgages). My concern is that this would not what would be a regulator’s or Treasury’s idea of what would be the best way of promoting safety and soundness… “

Barney Frank (D-MA) even went so far as to suggest the issue of Fannie Mae regulation should rest in the hands of Fannie’s CEO:

Barney Frank: Let me ask [George] Gould and [Franklin] Raines on behalf of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, do you feel that over the past years you have been substantially under-regulated? Mr. Raines?

Franklin Raines: No, sir.

Barney Frank: Mr. Gould?

George Gould: No, sir. . . .

Barney Frank: OK. Then I am not entirely sure why we are here. . . .

re: Bush Mortgage Bubble FAQs[W:1083,1531]

Clinton filled the GSE's with his corrupt buddies which include Franklin Rains and Jamie Gorelick..

" From 1993-1999, the Clinton Administration replaced many of Fannie Mae’s key executives, including the CEO, the CEO’s number two, and nearly half the board of directiors. As a government sponsored enterprise (GSE), the President had the authority to make those appointments. The board, which increasingly consisted of Presidential appointments, then worked with the new CEO to change Fannie Mae executives’ salary structures in order to incentivize them to reach higher mortgage targets. More specifically, the board promised senior executive millions in bonuses each year as long as Fannie reported certain earnings figures. Just a quick reminder… Fannie’s ability to reach earnings targets is directly related to the number of mortgages it buys, as long as those mortgages do not default or as long as Fannie executives do not recognize negative changes in the payment flow "

By June 2003, the Freddie accounting investigation had forced management to admit to having misstated $5 billion of earnings. Of course, many analysts and investors began to look very closely at Fannie’s accounting.

But on Fannie Mae's website there was THIS posted statement.
“Fannie Mae’s reported financial results follow Generally Accepted Accounting Principles to the letter…. There should be no question about our accounting.”


Franklin Raines..

''Fannie Mae has expanded home ownership for millions of families in the 1990s by reducing down payment requirements,'' said Franklin Raines, Fannie Mae's chairman and CEO. ''Yet there remain too many borrowers whose credit is just a notch below what our underwriting has required who have been relegated to paying significantly higher mortgage rates in the so-called subprime market.''

A report was issued after the collapse to explain why it happened and who was to blame was headed up by a Californian Democrat who would only allow information that backed the ridiculous narrative that it was the Banks and Bush who were to blame..

There was one loan dissenter in the group, Peter Wallison.

"After the majority’s report was published, many people lamented that it was not possible to achieve a bipartisan agreement even on the facts. But the way the Commission was organized and run made this impossible. One glaring example will illustrate the problem. In March 2010, Edward Pinto, a resident fellow (and my colleague) at the American Enterprise Institute who had served as chief credit officer at Fannie Mae, sent the Commission a 70-page, fully sourced memorandum on the number of subprime and other high-risk mortgages in the financial system in 2008. Pinto’s research showed that he had found more than 25 million such mortgages (his later work showed that there were approximately 27 million). Since there are about 55 million mortgages in the U.S., Pinto’s research indicated that, as the financial crisis began, half of all U.S. mortgages were of inferior quality and liable to default when housing prices were no longer rising. In August, Pinto supplemented his initial research with a paper documenting the efforts of the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), over two decades and through two administrations, to increase home ownership by reducing mortgage-underwriting standards "

It's a desperate and almost pathological attempt to attach the Sub-Prime Collapse to Bush but it's a distorted revisionistic and twisted attempt to imply at all, that it all started up after 2004.

"In 1995, President Bill Clinton's HUD agreed to let Fannie and Freddie get affordable-housing credit for buying subprime securities that included loans to low-income borrowers. The idea was that subprime lending benefited many borrowers who did not qualify for conventional loans. HUD expected that Freddie and Fannie would impose their high lending standards on subprime lenders."

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On July 31, 2003, in the 108th Congress, recognizing the dangers in Fannie and Freddie, and after hearings where Fannie and Freddie were taken to the carpet for improper practices, Senators John Sununu (R-NH), Chuck Hagel (R-NE) and Elizabeth Dole (R-NC) introduced legislation to strengthen and improve the oversight of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Trent Lott and John McCain were co-sponsors. This bill (S. 1508) passed the Senate Banking Committee, with Democrats opposing. With the opposition by Democrats, traditionally seen as evidence that a bill will never pass the 60-vote cloture rule for a floor vote, the bill died in the 108th Congress.

It needed 5 Democrat votes on the Senate Floor but all Senate Democrats opposed it.

A 2005 Bill pushed by the Republicans

Sponsor Chuck Hagel
1/26/2005--Introduced.
Federal Housing Enterprise Regulatory Reform Act of 2005 - Amends the Federal Housing Enterprises Financial Safety and Soundness Act of 1992 to establish:

(1) in lieu of the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight of the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), an independent Federal Housing Enterprise Regulatory Agency which shall have authority over the Federal Home Loan Bank
Finance Corporation, the Federal Home Loan Banks, the Federal National Mortgage Association (Fannie Mae), and the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation (Freddie Mac); and

(2) the Federal Housing Enterprise Board. Sets forth operating, administrative, and regulatory provisions of the Agency, including provisions respecting:

(1) assessment authority;
(2) authority to limit nonmission-related assets;
(3) minimum and critical capital levels;
(4) risk-based capital test;
(5) capital classifications and undercapitalized enterprises;
(6) enforcement actions and penalties;
(7) golden parachutes; and
(8) reporting.

Amends the Federal Home Loan Bank Act to establish the Federal Home Loan Bank Finance Corporation. Transfers the functions of the Office of Finance of the Federal Home Loan Banks to such Corporation. Excludes the Federal Home Loan Banks from certain securities reporting requirements.
Abolishes the Federal Housing Finance Board.

Writen by the House Republican Conference

Was not enacted.

THIS BILL would have reigned in Fannie and Freddie and had ZERO Democrat support. This is the bit of information Ole' VERN wishes he could have removed from the Internet, or any other written publication, because it's just more proof that through the Bush years attempt after attempt to stop the coming crash was either ignored or fought off by key Democrats.

Chris Dodd, then the ranking member of the Banking Committee and now its chair, was in the middle of receiving preferential loan treatment from Countrywide Mortgage, one of the companies gaming the system in the credit crisis. Meanwhile, Barack Obama took hundreds of thousands of dollars from the lobbyists McCain mentions in this speech, making him the #2 recipient of Fannie/Freddie money

This bill was re-introduced in 2007 with the Democrats in control of the banking committee, and of-course, it never made it out of committee.

Oh but it's ALL George Bush's fault...How pathetic. Look, I have my issues with George Bush. He Spent too much and was soft on immigration but I hate liars in general, sooooo the last few pages I posted has plenty of information that stops VERNs Narrative in it's tracks and ALSO shows who was ACTUALLY responsible for

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Fenton said:

Oh but it's ALL George Bush's fault...How pathetic. Look, I have my issues with George Bush. He Spent too much and was soft on immigration but I hate liars in general, sooooo the last few pages I posted has plenty of information that stops VERNs Narrative in it's tracks and ALSO shows who was ACTUALLY responsible for

Click to expand...

I am so impressed with the research you've done here, Fenton. Thank you for a remarkable job.

:applaud:applaud

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Also this is but a fraction of information that exist and that I have access too. It's a good time blowing their Narratives out of the water and will continue to do so as long as they push their lies.

And really, people push the " Bush Depression" Narrative for one reason, because they are ACTUALLY blaming Obama's incompetence and his horrible economy on a President who hasn't been in office in over 4 years.

I know, it's a desperate attempt to attribute the continued suffering of millions of middle class families on any one but the current President but a Liberal in general is a person who's willing to sell their integrity for a nickel if it switches the blame off of their obvious failure of a president.

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MaggieD said:

I am so impressed with the research you've done here, Fenton. Thank you for a remarkable job.

:applaud:applaud

Click to expand...

Thank you. I started studying the Sub-Prime Collapse about 3 years ago, just out of curiosity. It didn't make sense to me that private lending institutions would take the chance at insolvency by writing loans that were substandard.

As it turns out, they were following regulatory forces put into place in Clinton's Affordable Home Strategy in 1995. So when the Left was screaming it was a lack of regulations, it was actually REGULATORS like HUD that created and drove the secondary market.

I have allot on Eric Holder when he worked under Janet Reno and quotes from her threatening banks that "did not play ball".

And then these Liberals started pushing the " it's Bush's Fault " lie because their President is tanking economy and they can't accept responsibility for their actions so I have a drop-box account that's loaded with information that counters their desperate claims.

I've just accessed about a quarter of it and posted it.

Obama's currently doing the exact same thing with Ginnie Mae AND arguing for the to lower their standards. Unbelievable.

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MaggieD said:

I am so impressed with the research you've done here, Fenton. Thank you for a remarkable job.

Click to expand...

oh maggie, that hurts my feelings. fenton has done nothing but post tired and disproven editorials and youtube videos. And everyone of his posts needs you to pretend not to know the Bush Mortgage Bubble started in late 2004. seriously, how do you push the 'bush tried to stop the bubble' narrative after what I've posted.

wait I know, hey maggie, I have an uncle who works in finance, he told me the Bush Mortgage Bubble started in late 2004. cant argue with anecdotal stories can you?

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Vern said:

oh maggie, that hurts my feelings. fenton has done nothing but post tired and disproven editorials and youtube videos. And everyone of his posts needs you to pretend not to know the Bush Mortgage Bubble started in late 2004. seriously, how do you push the 'bush tried to stop the bubble' narrative after what I've posted.

wait I know, hey maggie, I have an uncle who works in finance, he told me the Bush Mortgage Bubble started in late 2004. cant argue with anecdotal stories can you?

Click to expand...

Vern, I know the smoke-and-mirrors started well before 2004.

I worked with the buyers who could use the government's Nehemiah program and put nothing down. I watched Ameri-Dream offer the same product. Both fake-assed products offered by FHA that let no-money-down buyers get 4% cash back from the seller for their down payment and closing costs.

I had to deal with dishonest subprime lenders as a Seller's Agent -- saw their so-called pre-approval letters fall to dust under the light of my due diligence to protect my seller from taking his home off the market to wait for buyer financing. As a buyer's agent, I dealt with some of these buyers . . . trying to buy homes when they couldn't buy lunch.

I saw buyers pay $15,000 in closing costs to their sub-prime lender. $15,000?? A **** without even a kiss. But the buyers didn't pay it -- they got those proceeds from the lender at the closing table.

I saw appraisers turn a blind eye to the comparables and let homes sell for well over what they were worth. I evaluated other people's buyers when they made offers on my clients' homes and saw the fake mortgage preapproval letters generated by sub-prime lenders.

I witnessed homes selling for 10% over list price with dual and triple offers. I saw entry-level condominiums sell for $60 in January; then the same-model/same-condition sell for $68,000 in April and $72K in July.

When history promised 3% annual appreciation, I saw homes appreciate at 10% and more -- well before 2004.

You may not respect my anecdotal evidence . . . and I can understand that . . . but no amount "evidence" is going to convince me of something that "my own lyin' eyes" can refute.

re: Bush Mortgage Bubble FAQs[W:1083,1531]

MaggieD said:

Vern, I know the smoke-and-mirrors started well before 2004.

I worked with the buyers who could use the government's Nehemiah program and put nothing down. I watched Ameri-Dream offer the same product. Both fake-assed products offered by FHA that let no-money-down buyers get 4% cash back from the seller for their down payment and closing costs.

I had to deal with dishonest subprime lenders as a Seller's Agent -- saw their so-called pre-approval letters fall to dust under the light of my due diligence to protect my seller from taking his home off the market to wait for buyer financing. As a buyer's agent, I dealt with some of these buyers . . . trying to buy homes when they couldn't buy lunch.

I saw buyers pay $15,000 in closing costs to their sub-prime lender. $15,000?? A **** without even a kiss. But the buyers didn't pay it -- they got those proceeds from the lender at the closing table.

I saw appraisers turn a blind eye to the comparables and let homes sell for well over what they were worth. I evaluated other people's buyers when they made offers on my clients' homes and saw the fake mortgage preapproval letters generated by sub-prime lenders.

I witnessed homes selling for 10% over list price with dual and triple offers. I saw entry-level condominiums sell for $60 in January; then the same-model/same-condition sell for $68,000 in April and $72K in July.

When history promised 3% annual appreciation, I saw homes appreciate at 10% and more -- well before 2004.

You may not respect my anecdotal evidence . . . and I can understand that . . . but no amount "evidence" is going to convince me of something that "my own lyin' eyes" can refute.

Click to expand...

I saw.speculators.come to the high desert around Joshua Tree.

At.the time you.could.get a decent 2-3 bedroom house on five acres.for around $60k.

Then the.speculators came and simply.bought every.available.property.

In a year those $60k homes became.$180k homes.

Even after the crash they only fell to about $120k.

Add to that thd two people I know who were told they were signing regular loans but actually got balloon mortgages.

And the one friend who got the balloon mortgage, made all her payments on time, then didn't get the refi into a regular mortgage she was promised.

So much shenanigans on the industry's part, so many "get rich in real estate with no money down" ads all over tv.

re: Bush Mortgage Bubble FAQs[W:1083,1531]

What if...? said:

I saw.speculators.come to the high desert around Joshua Tree.

At.the time you.could.get a decent 2-3 bedroom house on five acres.for around $60k.

Then the.speculators came and simply.bought every.available.property.

In a year those $60k homes became.$180k homes.

Even after the crash they only fell to about $120k.

Add to that thd two people I know who were told they were signing regular loans but actually got balloon mortgages.

And the one friend who got the balloon mortgage, made all her payments on time, then didn't get the refi into a regular mortgage she was promised.

So much shenanigans on the industry's part, so many "get rich in real estate with no money down" ads all over tv.

Click to expand...

And let's not forget the myriad ads for home equity loans at 125% of list price. The lender made a pocketful of money on the refinance and the home owner bought **** with the proceeds.

re: Bush Mortgage Bubble FAQs[W:1083,1531]

MaggieD said:

And let's not forget the myriad ads for home equity loans at 125% of list price. The lender made a pocketful of money on the refinance and the home owner bought **** with the proceeds.

Click to expand...

I actually made a bit of a fool of myself begging two different friends NOT to do that kind of refi.

One didn't listen. They lost their home.

One did. They later bought me dinner.

I'm no expert, I just worked in the remodeling industry, laegely for flippers.

When I found out that 85% of the prior months home.sales were "flips" I started doing my chicken little routine.

re: Bush Mortgage Bubble FAQs[W:1083,1531]

Oh, and by the way, here we go again:

WASHINGTON - The Obama administration is engaged in a broad push to make more home loans available to people with weaker credit.

It's an effort that officials say will help power the economic recovery but that skeptics say could open the door to the risky lending that caused the housing crash in the first place.

President Obama's economic advisers and outside experts say the nation's much-celebrated housing rebound is leaving too many people behind, including young people looking to buy their first homes and individuals with credit records weakened by the recession.

In response, administration officials say they are working to get banks to lend to a wider range of borrowers by taking advantage of taxpayer-backed programs - including those offered by the Federal Housing Administration - that insure home loans against default.

Housing officials are urging the Justice Department to provide assurances to banks, which have become increasingly cautious, that they will not face legal or financial recriminations if they make loans to riskier borrowers who meet government standards but later default.

Click to expand...

Scary ****.

re: Bush Mortgage Bubble FAQs[W:1083,1531]

I suppose that banks fraudulently packaging sub-prime mortgages and ratings agencies rating these risky investments at a high level might have had an impact on the market once these loans started failing.

re: Bush Mortgage Bubble FAQs[W:1083,1531]

Vern said:

oh maggie, that hurts my feelings. fenton has done nothing but post tired and disproven editorials and youtube videos. And everyone of his posts needs you to pretend not to know the Bush Mortgage Bubble started in late 2004. seriously, how do you push the 'bush tried to stop the bubble' narrative after what I've posted.

wait I know, hey maggie, I have an uncle who works in finance, he told me the Bush Mortgage Bubble started in late 2004. cant argue with anecdotal stories can you?

Click to expand...

I don't know if anyone has posted this report yet but it is still more evidence that nothing that you have presented is anything more than pure hackery.. Blaming this all on Bush while simultaneously absolving Democrats from any responsibility is just laughable.



EDIT: I see Fenton already posted this.

re: Bush Mortgage Bubble FAQs[W:1083,1531]

Maggie, I have no doubt you saw unethical or even illegal behavior before 2004. I’m just saying what you saw prior to 2004 did not constitute a bubble. States saw the same unethical and illegal behavior you saw. Its why over 30 states passed laws to crack down on this behavior. What happened to those laws again? Oh yea, the OCC preempted all state laws against predatory lending. Banks literally changed their charters to be ‘regulated’ by bush's regulators. Finance companies also sold themselves to national banks to take advantage of the ‘lax regulation’. So the unethical or even illegal behavior you saw became systemic.

“As illustrated in figure 2, the share of assets divided among federally chartered and state-chartered banks remained relatively steady for a decade; between 1992 and 2003, national banks held an average of about 56 percent of all bank assets, and state banks held an average of about 44 percent. However, in 2004, the share of bank assets of banks with the federal charter increased to 67 percent, and the share of bank assets of banks with state charters decreased to 33 percent “

http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d06387.pdf


And I don’t doubt you saw home prices appreciate but rising home prices does not equal a bubble. Before 2004, home price appreciation was simply supply and demand. As the fed increased interest rates and the numbers of qualified buyers declined, home prices would have slowed their appreciation or flattened out. But they didn’t. When you stop checking borrower’s income for 50 % of all mortgages you’ve artificially increased demand everywhere.

And Maggie, its not me saying it started late 2004, it’s Bush’s working group, the fed and the actual data on subprime and No Doc loans. Why do you think Bush’s working group and the Fed have such a clear timeframe of the bubble? I’m not posting editorials or blogs. I’m posting solid factual links.