Housing Market, Mortgage | featured news

Mortgage rates generally fell again this week, with the average rate on 30-year fixed-rate mortgages reaching the lowest level in at least 38 years, according to Freddie Mac's weekly survey.

Go ahead. Break the chains. Stop paying on your mortgage if you owe more than the house is worth. And most important: Don't feel guilty about it. Don't think you're doing something morally wrong.

That's the incendiary core message of a new academic paper by Brent T. White, a University of Arizona law school professor, titled "Underwater and Not Walking Away: Shame, Fear and the Social Management of the Housing Crisis."

As foreclosure casualties mount, the Obama administration Monday is expected to announce additional steps to get long-term help for borrowers, CNNMoney reports.

Daverena White took a chance on the American dream of homeownership -- and lost big.

After a slow start, the Obama administration's mortgage relief program has reached one in five eligible homeowners, a government report says.

Frustrated by the banks' inability or unwillingness to stop an avalanche of foreclosures, the states are considering lawsuits over the creation and marketing of millions of bad loans as well as the dismal pace of mortgage modifications.

Such cases would have been impossible until recently, because federal regulators had exclusive oversight of national banks. But a 5-to-4 Supreme Court decision in June allowed the states to exercise their own supervision, giving them significant leverage.

The Obama administration on Monday unveiled a new program to support state and local housing finance agencies. The plan will help the agencies finance mortgages for first-time homebuyers and develop rental housing.

A mortgage fraud crackdown announced Thursday resulted in the arrests of dozens of people, including six lawyers, seven loan officers and three mortgage brokers in four states.

The Obama administration’s effort to help homeowners avoid foreclosure may not achieve its goal of helping 3 million to 4 million borrowers, a government watchdog group says.

U.S. mortgage applications fell last week despite the lowest loan rates in four months, the Mortgage Bankers Association said.