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"No Housing Recovery Lurks in Shadow Inventory"

Profile picture for Spleng
Contributions: 4633
"And foreclosures keep climbing, though some point to the fact that they seem to be leveling off. However, a strange thing is happening: We're seeing what's being called a "shadow inventory" of foreclosed homes."

"We believe there are in the neighborhood of 600,000 properties nationwide that banks have repossessed but not put on the market," said Rick Sharga, vice president of RealtyTrac, which compiles nationwide statistics on foreclosures. "California probably represents 80,000 of those homes. It could be disastrous if the banks suddenly flooded the market with those distressed properties. You'd have further depreciation and carnage."
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April 14 - Oakland

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Profile picture for sunnyview
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Banks will have to sell these properties, but for now they are sort of metering them onto the market like they are the remains of the bubble inventory. As long as people believe that, prices will just remain weak and not plummet. As soon as the jig is up or the first time buyers incentive expires, I expect another 7-10% drop in prices in many places like CA.
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April 14
Profile picture for BMFPitt
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Just wait til one bankstarts dumping them, though.  It will be a fast race to the bottom.
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April 14
Profile picture for sunnyview
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I agree. Question is will they do it this summer or wait until they can get all their refis through first. People won't or can't refi if prices go down more so I think they're just waiting to collect their loan fees before they start the dumping process.
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April 14
Profile picture for dacolan
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Given the latest data on defaults - March 09 having a 25.8% increase in defaults over the highest month ever on record in CA alone - they may have no choice but to start dumping, or their current 'shadow inventory' dilemma could mushroom to unmanageable levels.
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April 14
Profile picture for Spleng
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[off-topic post, removed by moderator]
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April 14
Profile picture for nvchaz
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[off-topic post, removed by moderator]
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April 14
Profile picture for Spleng
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Despair?

One more thing you have completely backwards,

including of course the decision you "say" you made to buy a house in the early stages of this economic meltdown.
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April 14
Profile picture for Randy_H
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I believe there is a lot of shadow inventory.  I think it's fairly irrefutable given the data anomalies. 

I also hope that banks dump them in a fast and furious race to the bottom.  That would be great for me personally.

However, I fear that won't happen.  Simply put, the banks are being propped up Japanese-style.  And, like the Japanese, that game can go on for year after year after year.  We could see the banks take many years to slowly turn over that inventory so long as they are allowed to value those assets on their books at some bogus value.

Removing the mark-to-market accounting rules has put our banks into a Japanese style Keiretsu:

Right now, the biggest mortgage lending banks are in the process of selling off their best-performing, top grade loans for discounts in the open market.  These are the loans they still have to mark-to-market.  They're selling them to raise capital.  Hedge funds are having a field day, buying top-grade debt for a steal.  Meanwhile, they're keeping their subprime toxic crap and their repo'd REO housing because they get to mark that stuff at 96% of book value.

So long as that state of affairs stands, the banks have no reason to sell all that REO.  They're better off financially renting those units or letting them rot and hoping they burn down for insurance money.
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April 14
Profile picture for Lady Chattel
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Just seems so counterproductive to manipulate it so much (responding to Randy's comments).  Propping up prices keeps too many people out of the market and creates the need for hokie financing just to afford a home that should be more affordable.   I swear I wish the entire country would band together and walk away from their mortages, let the entire systme fail and then we all hit the reset button and get back to normal, rational financing and economics.  
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April 14
Profile picture for White Picture
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I swear I wish the entire country would band together and walk away from their mortages, let the entire systme fail and then we all hit the reset button and get back to normal, rational financing and economics.  "
Wow ! It is a good idea... The home owner can keep their home without of pay the mortgage, and the renters keep pay their rent, then we start from there !
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April 14
Profile picture for Lady Chattel
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If only it could be that easy Hoang.......I know my thoughts were rambling and pathetic but I guess you got the jest of it.
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April 14
Profile picture for azrob
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I spoke with one of the agents whose company has the most REO (bank owned) listing books of business going in Phoenix. She told me that for several weeks now, the three biggest banks in terms of foreclosure homes have quit listing homes. Nada not a home.

There really seems to be truth to this, a concerted effort to manipulate supply, and thus price. Either that, or they really are trying to modify this huge book of loans, and don't have the staff on hand to sort through which homes have owners that will try to modify, and which ones don't.
 

As a side note, one of my acquaintances who lost her job, has had her foreclosure canceled twice, on her investment home she never lived in. I got a hold of her, in southern Spain where she is staying for now. She hasn't spoken with the bank in a year, has no interest in keeping the home under any circumstances.

So putting this all togehter, what can we conclude? There are likely tons and tons of foreclosures out there like this, that will eventually come on the market, but the entire process is a cluster-f****, and it is now impossible to analyze the market with any reasonable metrics.
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April 14
Profile picture for jimmy57
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"Add in homes that people would like to sell but simply can't find buyers for and must either hold or rent,..."

Count the house I'm renting among these. My landlord is one of many in this neighborhood who were persuaded over the last couple years (often by REAs?) to take their homes off the MLS and wait for a "better market".

But time is running out...his pick-a-payment ARM on this place will be catching up with him later this year, and as upside-down as he is, there's aren't many options.  He might fish for a modification, but what are the odds?

It's easy enough to see that our neighborhood has it's share of NODs and foreclosures; it's harder to guess how many others, like my landlord, are in this state of quiet distress -- still keeping up appearances (payments) but trapped with no clear escape route.
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April 14
Profile picture for Randy_H
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Rob&Jimmy

Exactly the same observations here.  Our current LL is definitely sweating it, if not closer to getting that NOD (which I monitor for monthly) than I suspect.

Rob hit on another dimension of the REO clusterf--k.  Simple, usual, predictable organizational problems.  It was probably 3 years ago when I was arguing with some folks on Patrick.net, and Rob was the only one who agreed with me that there would be no magic, sudden price drops due to REOs flooding the market.

Companies can't turn on a dime.  The bigger, the slower.  So these big banks are essentially paralyzed with massive REO books, and the local managers don't have the authority or the policy backbone in place to make decisions to unload the inventory.

Now, lay on top of that a weak or negative incentive from the banks due to mark-to-market accounting rule changes, and you have good, old fashioned, organizational inertia as the driving force behind the shadow inventory.

No conspiracy of collusion required. 
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April 14
Profile picture for TriWil
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So, I understand no one has a crystal ball, therefore no one can predict the future with any sort of certainty.  However, are there any guesses at all when these shadow inventories will be unleashed to the masses?  I'm searching to buy my first home and it seems I have nothing to look at, certainly nothing new since I started.  I'm going to hold out no matter what simply because I haven't found anything of interest to me thus far, but is there any hope that this shadow inventory will be available to me in the next six to nine months? 

Just curious as I don't understand this at all. 

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April 14
Profile picture for silent_observer
i am not fully convinced with this shadow inventory theory. where is the list spleng? if there are so many foreclosures that are not listed then we would have seen a www.notlistedforeclosures.com/<zipcode>/ by this time from one of the doomer(or realist)-bloggers like partrick or CR. i think it is just that banks have limited resources and they are just taking their own time to do it. with securitization crap it might add more delays to list a home. the reos that i tracked in decent neighborhoods sold pretty quickly with multiple offers.
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April 14
Profile picture for silent_observer
i am not fully convinced with this shadow inventory theory. where is the list spleng? if there are so many foreclosures that are not listed then we would have seen a www.shadowinventory.com/<zipcode> by this time from one of the doomer(or realist)-bloggers like partrick or CR. i think it is just that banks have limited resources and they are just taking their own time to do it. with securitization crap it might add more delays to list a home. the reos that i tracked in decent neighborhoods sold pretty quickly with multiple offers.<BR>
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April 14
Profile picture for jimmy57
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My last rented house received a NOD soon after we left (end of lease), and I know the owner didn't put up a fight, but It was still a full year before it appeared as a REO listing. 

I'm also inclined to the "logjam" explanation.  If there were policies in place to deliberately hold back REO inventory, wouldn't someone have leaked that story by now?

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April 14
Profile picture for azrob
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well, what I know for sure:
1. Phoenix, 40,000 homes have an active NTR filing (we have only one filing, NTR, 90 days late, 90 days before possible foreclosure) this number increased 4000 over the past 30 days. (10,800 new notices filed, 3600 foreclosures, 3200  canceled NTR's in march)

2. Anecdotal information, from ______ broker, who is the broker for one of the most active REO listing firms in the valley. Three major lenders went from hundreds of new listings to zero over the past several weeks. She has no explanation as to why.

3. One foreclosure I personally know, NTR was cancelled 4 months ago, a new one filed, now being delayed. the owner has left the country for the year, and will be coming back to enroll in an MBA program, not to work. Owner has zero interest in keeping the home, and will not be employed for the next two years. (debt $260K, current value, maybe $90K)

4. some loan modifications banks are making are ridiculous. One account in the newspaper, a homeowner who lost her job, had her mortgage lowered to $485 for five years. That is below the rental rate for a roommate in Phoenix. Taxes on a cheap home hear would be $900 at least, and insurance $600. Ask yourself this question: would you rent a home to somebody for $485 for five years, with the prayer they decide to buy it at the end of that period??? of course not! While this loan may stay on a bank's books as a good value, it is a ridiculous business decision.
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April 14
Profile picture for Randy_H
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Ask yourself this question: would you rent a home to somebody for $485 for five years, with the prayer they decide to buy it at the end of that period??? of course not! While this loan may stay on a bank's books as a good value, it is a ridiculous business decision.

Rob,

You're making the error of assuming the bank will ultimately need to show a positive cash flow from this decision.  In the current environment, the bank is relatively safe to assume that they will not need to realize positive flow for so many years that it is effectively not relevant to the decision.  In fact, there is probably an equal chance that the asset itself will be relieved from the bank's books by future act of government intervention.

Were I a senior strategy policy maker at one of this major banks, I'd be inclined to go a slowly as possible and invest as little as possible in cleaning up the REO part of my balance sheet.  Reason being that I risk, as the bank, moving early to take the pain, rid my REO, and realize my losses and losing out to my competitors who just sit around and wait for the US Gov't to do it for them, courtesy of the taxpayers.

It's a very cynical game, but this is exactly what got Japan into so much trouble.  Exactly.  We're perpetuating the credit crisis (which Krismer still claims never existed).  Did anyone see the bond auction yesterday?  Wowzers.  The credit crunch ain't even halfway through the first act yet.
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April 15
Profile picture for Randy_H
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I can also concur with the anecdotal observations of Rob and Jimmy, from what I've followed here in Marin for over 3 years now in REO.  For about the last 30 months I've been tracking every NOD forward in Southern Marin county, and then tried to follow what happened to any 4BR foreclosures.

All but a couple of these homes are being rented out by the banks, and not listed anywhere as REO (on the bank's REO sites), or in the MLS by a broker.  In a couple of cases I had our agent use his in-house REO broker to go after addresses we were interested in.  In one case she couldn't get the bank to respond at all, even though we discovered that home had been vacant for over a year (according to an irate next door neighbor), and that the bank did still own the home.  In the other case the bank responded that they were still asessing their REO inventory, and had leased the home in question out to a corporate relo agency.  Except, the (ambitous) broker decided to knock on the door and managed to talk to the renters, who she says told her they found the home on Craigslist and signed a 1-year lease with a management company.  They had no idea the home was owned by a bank, and were skeptical of the broker's claims they were renting a bank-owned foreclosure.

So, is it possible that the banks are farming their REO out to bargain-basement management companies who are renting them out unscrupulously (meaning not disclosing to tenants the current situation).  It is relevant because it is possible the tenants get kicked out before their lease expires upon sale of the home (at least in this county).
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April 15
Profile picture for silent_observer
Read this.

another reason why banks wouldn't want to hang on to the properties. they have to pay property tax, insurance, association dues etc., to maintain the home. if the shadow inventory logic is true banks will keep these properties for years instead of giving it away.
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April 15
Profile picture for supercub
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"another reason why banks wouldn't want to hang on to the properties. they have to pay property tax, insurance, association dues etc., to maintain the home. if the shadow inventory logic is true banks will keep these properties for years instead of giving it away."

And you gleaned those conflicting statements from that link? 

So much for no child left behind.
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April 15
Profile picture for Lady Chattel
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LMAO Supercub.......

If a home can only sell for less than the taxes and fees assoc with the house then heck yeah a bank wants to dump it, but if the banks thinks they can sell the home and still make some $$ then they will hang on to it much like many homeowners who thing next year will be the time to sell, things will bounce back soon, and on and on and on.  

Did anyone catch the new CEO of Walmart on the Today show this morning? He was talking about trends and what consumers are buying and what it says about our economy, well, his answer to one of the questions included a comment that said "the recovery is not V shaped, it will take some time to happen".......got to love that.

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April 15
Profile picture for supercub
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LC, The banks will dump the crap shacks if for no other reason than to avoid having to deal with the city ordinances which would cost them big bucks. In many cases, the city will require them to fix them, or tear them down, they are the owners of record, just like joe public.

What we saw here in the mid 80's was the banks reverted to renting out the houses AND the commercial properties that were worth keeping for the interim. At some point in time, they will sell those, but in the meantime, they are covering most or some of their costs and not losing. I"m waiting to see when the commercial bank owned properties are put on the rental market, and competing against the building next door. It will happen and it won't be pretty.

So far, this is all playing out the same way it did here but on a much, much bigger scale and for different reasons. Murphys law? 
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April 15
Profile picture for dacolan
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Obamamod Plan

When I hammered [BofA spokesman Rick Simon] about how many borrowers were actually eligible for the modifications, he said it was really too soon to tell, but added, “a lot of people think this plan covers more than it covers.”

He talked about how some borrowers have either abandoned properties, won't provide needed documents, or can't afford a modification at any payment rate. “This program, as with anything we do in modification, is based on the desire of the homeowner to retain the property and the financial wherewithal to retain the property.”

On top of that, an op-ed in the American Banker by mortgage guru Howard Glaser, suggests yet another problem with Obamamods:

    Today this is the servicer's dilemma: With little experience and know-how on conducting loan workouts on a mass scale, no amount of financial incentives alone will help them execute the Obama plan in the time required to backstop the economy. Without the right tools and retraining, servicers are doomed to toil away unproductively. There is a real possibility that the mortgage industry, and the administration, will be overwhelmed by the sheer load.

No question the industry is trying, but I don't think anyone should be surprised that foreclosures will continue to compound, pushing already bloated housing inventories higher and already crushed home prices lower.

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April 15
Profile picture for Lady Chattel
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Ouch dacolan.....ouch......

I need some oreos......

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April 15
Profile picture for Orangecrest
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Really?

Housing index posts biggest jump in 5 years

Economist: ‘We are at or near the bottom of the current housing depression'

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/30230273

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April 15
Profile picture for westridge88

I also beleive the market will have some large negatives in the next 6 months however there are many investor filling their pockets with highly discounted properties right now.  If you are waiting for the bottom by the time you find it the banks will not be taking rdiiculously low prices for good homes...remember...no risk, no reward....as soon as banks see any stability things will tighten up.  I picked up a home in AZ last week for a song...great neighborhood, 3900tf2. Never risk what you cannot afford to lose...Cash and high ernst money steal deals away from higher bidders.  JMO

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April 15
Profile picture for nvchaz
Contributions: 1617
You nailed it westridge88!

Does anyone honestly think that they are gonna let the little guy pick up properties for 30 cents on the dollar? There will be investing consortiums and corporations sucking these out of the REO tube before they even hit the MLS. Most of the CountryWide management has left to form a buying corporation right down the street in Simi Valley! These greed-pigs are going to make their money both ways.

That's what cracks me up about those on this board saying wait, wait, wait. Wait until 2012, wait until 2015, ha ha!

[inappropriate post, removed by moderator]
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April 15

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