Regions

Washington, D.C.–The fiscal 2009 budget released Monday by the Bush administration suggests that the housing slump will be an ongoing problem for the U.S. economy this year, the Wall Street Journal reports.According to budget documents, “it now appears that the effects of the housing slump on real (gross domestic product) growth will persist into 2008, holding down growth and delaying the expected rebound in activity.” However, the administration said that beyond 2008, housing “should cease to be a negative influence on growth.”The budget also indicates that, because of major bank consolidation, the banking sector may see significant damage from the…

Detroit–Loan provider GMAC said it posted a loss of $724 million for the fourth quarter of 2007, mostly due to its troubled home mortgage division, the Guardian reported Tuesday.In the fourth quarter in 2006, Detroit-based GMAC, a former unit of General Motors, saw a profit of more than $1 billion.The company’s home loan division, Residential Capital, lost $921 million in the quarter–its fifth consecutive quarterly loss. GMAC has reduced risky lending and cut 5,000 jobs and said it may sell all or part of the division.Citing “continued disruption in the mortgage, housing and capital markets,” GMAC saw a net loss…

Philadelphia–The Philadelphia Housing Authority has filed a lawsuit that accuses the federal housing secretary of ordering the city to hand a $2 million property over to a politically connected developer, The New York Times reported Tuesday.According to the lawsuit, housing secretary Alphonso R. Jackson threatened to deny millions of dollars in federal aid after the city failed to provide the property. However, Department of Housing and Urban Development officials denied the charges this week and said Jackson had no prior relationship with the developer, songwriter and producer Kenny Gamble.Gamble’s company, Universal Community Homes, is part of a joint venture that…

New York–Financial and homebuilder stocks declined Monday as news of the weakening employment sector increased fears that consumer credit will continue downward, the Financial Times reports.Concern that rising loan delinquencies and falling home prices would dampen corporate earnings didn’t help; retail stocks also lost ground as investors looked to sell after last week’s jobs report, which indicated a U.S. recession has become more of a reality.Mid-Monday, the S&P 500 was down 0.8 percent at 1,384.81. The homebuilder sector was down by 5.3 percent and the financial sector by 2.2 percent. The Nasdaq Composite dropped 0.8 percent to 2,393.33; the Dow…

By Suzann D. Silverman, Editor-in-Chief, Commercial Property NewsCommercial/multifamily mortgage originations ended last year down, thanks largely to the credit crunch, the Mortgage Bankers Association announced on Monday at the annual Commercial Real Estate Finance/Multifamily Housing Convention & Expo. And while solid fundamentals provide promise for the future, when the economy does return, certain aspects of the real estate financing business will be different, according to a presentation by MBA senior vice president & chief economist for research and business development Douglas Duncan (pictured) and senior director of commercial/multifamily research Jamie Woodwell. “Location, location, location (will be) mattering again,” noted Woodwell,…

By Suzann D. Silverman, Editor-in-Chief, Commercial Property News“Prudence Took a Vacation, and Then She Came Back” is what moderator Shekar Narasimhan, managing partner of Beekman Advisors Inc., nicknamed the multifamily session “The Music Stopped: Who Has a Chair?” at the Mortgage Bankers Association’s Commercial Real Estate Finance/Multifamily Housing Convention & Expo, and it was a fitting title. Generally, the speakers agreed that while the commercial and multifamily markets can expect some pain, especially given a number of unknowns to come, the credit crunch and single-family fallout have proven to be more of a much-needed wakeup call than anything else. That’s…

By Anuradha Kher, Online News Editor Washington, D.C.–Enterprise Community Investment, Inc., Jubilee Housing, Jubilee JumpStart and PNC Bank will rehabilitate the Ontario Court affordable housing apartments, located at 2525 Ontario Rd. NW in Washington, D.C.’s Adams Morgan community. All 27 units on this property will undergo renovations and a 24-hour child-care center will be built. Ontario Court is owned by Jubilee Housing and will continue to be affordable for low- to moderate-income families earning up to 80 percent of area median income (AMI). More than half of the apartments will be affordable to those earning 30 percent or less of AMI.“Enterprise…

New York–Although the average Manhattan home has doubled in value in the past decade, the housing market has begun to affect the Big Apple, reminding some economists of the housing decline that trailed the 1980s real estate boom, The New York Times reports.Rents in Manhattan decreased last month by more than 7 percent in some areas, according to a report by the Real Estate Group New York.Some expect the current situation to worsen: James W. Hughes, dean of the Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers University–who has tallied the New York City real estate market…

Washington, D.C.–As the $150 billion stimulus plan hits the Senate for approval, lawmakers are suggesting housing needs more help, the Financial Times reported Monday.The home foreclosure rate has remained high, despite attempts to encourage the private sector to reduce it–prompting Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd to say last week that “to the extent this economic crisis has a face: it’s housing. And to the extent there’s a face on the housing crisis, it’s the foreclosure crisis.”The Hope Now Alliance, a group of mortgage lenders, servicers and counselors formed In October to help subprime homeowners refinance and avoid foreclosure, has…

Beijing–The central bank of China ordered commercial lenders to ease loan restrictions for affordable housing developers, the Economic Times reports.The People’s Bank of China said last week that banks are able to extend loans for affordable housing if the developers raise 30 percent of the total capital–previously, the requirement for more expensive homes was 35 percent.As China’s real estate market has grown, the government has been trying to offer incentives for builders to provide affordable housing. The central bank raised the lending period from 3 to 5 years and said that banks now can lend to affordable housing developers at…