NEW house sales remained sluggish last month, posting only a slight increase, new figures out from the Housing Industry Association (HIA) show. The HIA new home sales data showed an 0.8 per cent rise in the sale of homes and units for October. Detached home sales fell by 1.6 per cent to be down two per cent over the three months to October.

» House sales sluggish in October - The Australian, 28th November 2007

A new report on mortgage defaults argues that rising property prices have disguised the true extent of problems in the home loan market. The report by the credit ratings agency Fitch says rising prices have let borrowers sell or re-finance when they get into difficulty.

. . .

If that is the case, all it would take is an economic downturn that flattened house prices and drove up jobless rates to cause serious mortgage defaults nationwide.

» Mortgage stress not localised, experts say - The ABC, 28th November 2007.

WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) — U.S. home prices were falling in every region of the country in September, according to a closely watched index of home prices released Tuesday.
Home prices fell in September in all 20 major cities covered by the Case-Shiller price index, even in cities that had been holding up before the August freeze in mortgage markets, Standard & Poor’s reported.

» Record home-price declines as all top cities turn sour - Market Watch, 27th November 2007

EXCESSIVE use of credit and credit cards has contributed to a leap in the number of personal bankruptcy cases, the Insolvency and Trustee Service of Australia says. According to its annual report, there were 31,971 new bankruptcies, debt agreements or personal insolvency cases in Australia in 2006-07, an increase of 16.9 per cent on the previous year.

» Credit sending Aussies broke - The news, 28th November 2007.

IT has become fashionable of late to say that America’s subprime borrowers themselves deserve a good part of the blame for the current mortgage mess. They were either greedy (looking for easy money in a bubbly real estate market) or irresponsible (assuming a debt whose terms they did not understand).

They should be punished for their behavior, the argument goes — not rewarded with loan workouts.

. . .

Should greedy subprime borrowers take responsibility or should greedy subprime lenders get tagged? Nothing is ever black and white, of course. Undoubtedly, there are plenty of cases in which both borrower and lender are at fault, and others in which just one of the parties may bear greater blame.

» Blame the Borrowers? Not So Fast - The New York Times, 25th November 2007.

THE sub-prime mortgage crisis is poised to get much worse.

Next year, interest rates are set to rise - or “reset” - on $US362 billion ($412 billion) worth of adjustable-rate sub-prime mortgages, according to data calculated by Bank of America Corp.

» Sub-prime mess set to get worse - The Australian, November 26th 2007

HOME affordability is at its lowest level in 22 years, with more than a third of a family’s income needed to make average mortgage repayments, the Real Estate Institute of Australia (REIA) says. The Deposit Power/REIA Affordability report for the September quarter found 36.6 per cent of household income was needed to cover average home loan repayments.

» Home affordability lowest in 22 years - news.com, 23rd November 2007.

THE chances of a global “growth recession,” where world growth dips to below 2 per cent, are about one in three next year, according to economists at Germany’s biggest bank Deutsche Bank.

”The bursting of the housing and credit bubble this year and the ensuing credit and banking crisis have elevated the level of uncertainty about the economic outlook to an unusually high level,” the Deutsche report said.

» 1-in-3 chance of global ‘recession’ - news.com, 21st November 2007