The New Economic Misery Index: Five Sectors that Show Financial Pain for Americans. Food Stamps, Bankruptcy, Credit Access, Employment, and Housing.
Talking with a few colleagues I was reminded about a misery index used in the 1970s to measure the real feel of the stagflation hitting the country. Today, we have a more insidious version of economic crisis because what is good for Wall Street is counter to what is good for the average American. There […]
Bankruptcy Filings to Match Divorce Filings in 2009: 1.5 Million. 35.8 Million Americans on Food Stamps – 11 Percent of the Population. The 5 Indicators of the Misery Index.
It is a sobering fact that in 2009, there will be as many people filing for bankruptcy as those filing for a divorce. We are on track to seeing an average of nearly 5,900 bankruptcy filings a day for 2009. While some people use the stock market as their barometer of economic recovery, there are […]
Option ARM Disaster Arrival: Mortgages More Problematic than Originally Thought. $134 Billion Recasting in Next Two Years. 94 Percent Made only Minimum Payment. Only 35,000 of the 1 million Option ARM loans Modified.
Option ARMs, the dubious name for a mortgage product of financial destruction, are back in the limelight showing that they have not gone away. Everyone by now has heard about option ARMs. These toxic mortgages allowed borrowers a buffet of payment options. However, in recent data released this week we are told that things are […]
Negative Equity Nation for 1 out of 5 Homeowners: The Psychology of the 10 Million American Homeowners with Zero Equity.
Recent data suggests that the number one factor for walking away from a home is negative equity. For us to understand this dynamic, it is important to understand why someone would leave a home with a mortgage. According to the U.S. Census Bureau some 51.6 million owner occupied homes have a mortgage. This is data […]