1. Unleash the (CFPB) Hounds!

    For the three of you who are still wondering just what the heck the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) is all about, well, I direct you to this fancy CNN Money presentation:

    CNN Money: The New Pup Watching Our Money

    I’m sure this new agency will cast just as watchful, keen, and vigilant an eye over our money as all the other government agencies do. I mean, this was Elizabeth Warren’s brainchild, so it has to be good, right?

    (If you think I’m being sarcastic, congrats! You’d win a cookie … if I had one to hand out.)

    And, in what has got to be one of the most pathetic “Reasons We Need This New Government Agency” passages I’ve yet seen, I encourage readers to mouse-over the red “16,109” circle in the “Mortgage Brokers” section of the CNN presentation. Read what Mr. Carlo Panno has to say about the “sack of money” the evil bank all but forced him to take to buy a house.

    Always the studious type, Mr. Panno carefully read his mortgage docs before signing them … noticed that his payments would balloon from $300/biweekly to $1000/biweekly after two years … and then STILL SIGNED THE NOTE because the broker “assured him” he could refinance before the two-year SAVINGS EXTRAVAGANZA expired. (Heard that one before? Yeah, me too. About a million times.)

    You know what I think? I am quite certain that there is not, and never will be, a government agency capable of protecting glasslickers like this from themselves. (Much less those dastardly banks and mortgage brokers — for whom, I should point out, I harbor scarce love.)

    Note to Mr. Panno: Next time you leave the house, don’t forget your helmet.




     

     

  2. Survey: Debt Gives Young Adults Self-Esteem Boost

    I suspect that most of this has to do with the fact that young people tend to feel “invincible,” but it’s pretty interesting nonetheless:

    OSU: Young Adults Get Self-Esteem Boost From Debt

    From the article:

    For this study, the researchers examined data on two types of debt: loans taken out to pay for college, and total credit-card debt. They looked at how both forms of debt were related to people’s self-esteem and sense of mastery – their belief that they were in control of their life, and that they had the ability to achieve their goals.

    …Researchers found that the more credit card and college loan debt held by young adults aged 18 to 27, the higher their self-esteem and the more they felt like they were in control of their lives. The effect was strongest among those in the lowest economic class.

    Only the oldest of those studied – those aged 28 to 34 – began showing signs of stress about the money they owed.

    If anyone wondered just why it is that lending institutions make such an effort to get young adults into debt, well, wonder no more. You can build up an immense pile of debt between the ages of 18 and 28. By the time the invincibility of youth has worn off and reality has set in, your next 20 or 30 years of payments are already set in stone.

    Then, when that “expected future income” thing doesn’t pan out, you get a host of nasty little outcomes — like one in five student loans being in default.

    More from the study:

    But how debt affected young people depended on what other financial resources they had available, the study found.

    Results showed that those in the bottom 25 percent in total family income got the largest boost from holding debt – the more debt they held, both education and credit card, the bigger the positive impact on their self-esteem and mastery.

    Those in the middle class didn’t see any impact on their self-esteem and mastery by holding educational debt, perhaps because it is so common among their peers that it is seen as normal. But they did see boosts from holding credit-card debt – the more debt, the more positive effects.

    Whoopee. And the debt-induced beat goes on … so long as you get ’em hooked young!

    EDIT: A more in-depth opinion on this study can be found right here . . ..



     

     

  3. Survey: Americans Want Mortgage Subsidies

    Fun new survey data out from Rasmussen, regarding Americans and how they currently feel about government participation in the mortgage market:

    Rasmussen: Mortgage Survey

    See the glaring disconnect in the first two items? If fifty-six percent of Americans think the government should stay “altogether” out of the mortgage market, but seventy-nine percent want the mortgage-interest deduction to continue, then an awful lot of people have an awfully shallow view of what “government participation” means.

    If you don’t think that the mortgage-interest deduction amounts to a subsidy for homeowners, and therefore, is the very essence of “government participation” in the market, then you’re nuts. Take away that deduction, and see what happens to home prices. Mortgage qualification standards are based upon that federal tax deduction being there, effectively “helping” people make their house payments. If the deduction were to go away, qualification standards would necessarily tighten. Joe and Jane Sixpack wouldn’t be able to qualify for as high a mortgage payment as they could previously, as more of their gross income would now be going to taxes. Thus, over time, home prices would decline.

    For this survey to mean much, someone really ought to define “altogether.” Because to me, that’d mean the dissolution of Fannie, Freddie, and the FHA, as well as the removal of the mortgage-interest tax deduction. But that wasn’t what the Rasmussen respondents inferred, or were told. Obviously.

    What an idea, huh? Get rid of Fannie, Freddie, the FHA — who between them control 90 percent of the mortgage market these days — and the sacrosanct mortgage-interest deduction. You want to talk about a full-on house price collapse? That’d do it!




     

     

  4. Home (Free) on the Range

    You want stimulus? Well, how ’bout the chance to go almost 15 months without a house payment?

    Thanks to cottony-soft (and FedGov encouraged) accounting standards, banks are loathe to foreclose on underwater properties. As a bank, realizing five- and six-digit losses is no fun. It tends to leave ouchies on your balance sheet, and more importantly, has a negative effect on management bonuses.

    Cause, meet effect:

    Defaulted borrowers were spending an average of 469 days in their home after ceasing to make payments as of July 31, so the financial attraction of strategic defaults increases.

    Four hundred days with no house payment? A fellow could save up quite a stash in his piggy bank, going that long without sending a check to the mortgage company.

    In any case, that tantalizing little snippet comes from an article at AmericanBanker.com.

    And speaking of homeowner savings, just imagine all the dutiful home care and maintenance being performed by all these “living free for now” borrowers — borrowers who know that one day the bank will be coming to throw their La-Z-Boy on the lawn and Master Lock all the doors. The question isn’t if, but when.

    Oh, I’m sure that leaky roof will get fixed. Any day now.

    Yes, indeed. Delaying foreclosures (most econ-types refer to it as “extend and pretend”) with schemes like relaxed accounting standards and FedGov-initiated can-kickings (HAMP much?) should work out just fine.




     

     

  5. DTIs of HAMP Modification Recipients

    Because I have become very much a financial hardass in my old age, I’ve been against FedGov’s HAMP program from Day One. (To show that I am an Equal Opportunity Hardass, I am virulently against taxpayer funds going to banks or other corporate entities, as well.)

    Still, I keep up with HAMP results (or lack thereof) because train wrecks this large are just hard to ignore. And also because watching FedGov throw piles of good money after bad is better entertainment than most primetime TV (which isn’t saying much).

    So here we go with the July batch of HAMP results:

    Financialstability.gov: HAMP Servicer Report — July 2010

    In particular, I’d like to call reader attention to a chart on page three:

    Aside from the inherent irony in finding numbers like this at a site called “financialstability.gov,” and ignoring the brazen injustice done by allowing any U.S. dot-gov entity to even use said domain, you have to be amazed — really amazed — at the financial condition of HAMPsters at large.

    With Numbers This Bad…

    What we see here is that for folks who’ve had their mortgages modified via HAMP, the median debt-to-income (DTI) ratios are downright scary.

    Think about this: The median back-end DTI for successful HAMP applicants, before their mortgages were modified, was almost 80 percent.

    After mod, the median back-end DTI is still almost 64 percent.

    So, at the median, having 64 percent of their pre-tax income going to debt payments is an improvement.

    And since part of HAMP qualification is supposed to focus on whether or not the borrower actually has a shot at staying in the house, presumably making payments to the bank from now until pigs fly, then you have to wonder just how bad the non-approved applicants’ DTIs are. (Almost half of the people who’ve applied to HAMP have been bounced from the program, for various reasons.)

    If having a 60+ percent back-end DTI after a modification is seen as “affordable,” then I probably don’t want to what “unaffordable” is.

    Yeah. Mortgage modifications or not, these are still defaults looking for a place to happen.

    Get Ya Some

    I’d step up to the trough and request a modification for myself — hey, who doesn’t want a “more affordable” mortgage PLUS the opportunity to stick somebody else with the bill? — but somehow I doubt that my front- and back-end DTIs of roughly ten percent would allow me to qualify for any sweet HAMP action. (Since I have no non-mortgage debt, both of my DTIs are equal.)

    Darn the bad luck, anyway. Savers and responsible folk? Shut out from reaping taxpayer largesse once again.

    Instead, we just get to pay for it.




     

     

  6. Student Loans For the Win

    Mary Pilon at the Wall Street Journal tells us that total outstanding student-loan debt has now overtaken total outstanding credit-card debt:

    WSJ: Student Loan Debt Surpasses Credit Cards

    As of June, there was roughly $830 billion outstanding in student loans, compared to $826 billion in credit-card debt.

    Swell, ain’t it? I tell you, this country can strap on the anchors and leg chains of debt like nobody’s business.




     

     

  7. Worst-Paying College Degrees

    Now here’s an interesting article from Yahoo. Apparently someone has taken the time to compile a list of the worst-paying college degrees out there:

    Yahoo: 20 Worst-Paying Degrees of 2010

    I get a kick out of lists like this — especially ones that reinforce my own views on the relative value (or lack thereof) of higher education. Which is that “higher education,” in and of itself, is very rarely the Ticket to Financial Success which society makes it out to be. (Check out this article in the Harvard Business Review; the difference between “knowledge” and “skills” is immense. The higher-ed conglomerate may disperse knowledge, but usually, what employers want are skills.)

    And oh yeah — if you take on lots of debt to get that higher ed, you can easily end up worse off — far worse off — than if you had no degree at all.

    Because I’m lazy, I won’t reprint the whole list here. However, the top five worst-paying degrees…

    College Degree Starting Pay Mid-Career Pay
    1. Child and Family Studies $29,500 $38,400
    2. Elementary Education $31,600 $44,400
    3. Social Work $31,800 $44,900
    4. Athletic Training $32,800 $45,700
    5. Culinary Arts $35,900 $50,600

    … are pretty much what I’d expect. (Wait — where is Underwater Basket Weaving?)

    I do, though, have to take issue with how the author finishes out her missive:

    If you’d rather end up with one of the best-paying college degrees, you’ll have to major in something that requires a lot of math classes.

    I’m not so sure about that. I mean, politicians seem to do pretty well financially. And it’s obvious that math was never a core requisite at any point in their lives.




     

     

  8. Debt-Free is Nice, But…

    A couple of weeks back, I spent some time thumping on How to Get What You Want in Life With the Money You Already Have, a book written by Carol Keeffe in the early 1990s. While not a literary prize by any stretch, the book deserves some credit: It did get me started in the world of personal-finance reading.

    One of Keeffe’s particularly egregious recommendations — and this is just kerfuffle waiting to happen — is for folks to make minimum payments on all their bills and credit cards until they’ve saved up six months’ worth of salary as an emergency fund. To me, such a plan would almost guarantee failure. How many folks do you know with the financial (and disciplinary) ability to pull that off?

    Not many, is my guess.

    I much prefer Dave Ramsey’s Baby Steps plan, and its suggestion to make “minimum payments only” until one saves $1,000 (or $500, if you’re a low-income household) … and THEN to attack the debts full-force and head-on.

    However, as I was finger-flipping through How to Get What You Want a little more, I managed to find a few paragraphs that stood out — in a good way! Actually, I found this to be quite insightful, and a bit Suze-Orman-esque:

    For most of us there are two things that would make a big difference in the quality of our lives: (1) having the deeply satisfying feeling of knowing we’re directing money toward making our dreams come true, and (2) having the secure feeling of knowing money is available for today’s emergencies as well as tomorrow’s needs.

    Well, I’m not so sure about the “making dreams come true” part, but I’ll vouch for the utter goodness of financial security. Having money available for emergencies changes everything. Life looks far different when you’re ready for the speedbumps and potholes.

    Keeffe continues:

    If you were thinking that eliminating a bill would make a significant difference in the quality of your life, watch out. It’s only a diversionary tactic of the mind. Of course things would be better if the bills were more under control or gone altogether. But eliminating a bill creates only a temporary feeling of relief compared with the deep and lasting feelings of power and security that money in hand creates. The availability of money means choices, and choices mean control. Lack of bills will never compare to the potency of having choices (money).

    You know what? I agree with this. One. Hundred. Percent.

    As a guy who’s made it through Step 3 of Ramsey’s Baby Steps (no debt except for the mortgage; fully-funded emergency fund is in place), I found that for me, while paying off that last debt felt great, hitting my savings mark felt even better.

    As Keeffe notes, “Eliminating a bill creates only a temporary feeling of relief, compared with the deep and lasting feelings of power and security that money in hand creates.” To this I say: AMEN.

    Debt-free is sweet, but there is no substitute for savings.

    But We Gotta Qualify This…

    As much as I love what Keeffe says here, she is still presenting it in the context of “You need to have a bunch of money saved BEFORE you begin seriously paying off your debts.” The logic of this baffles me entirely. While it sounds silly, I want to scream at her, “Hey! The longer your readers stay in debt, the less likely they’re ever going to get out of it!”

    Though of course I have no quantifiable evidence to support this, everything I’ve learned to date, and everything I’ve seen, points toward the assertion that the more you muddle through life, simply “living with” your bills and debts, the less likely you are to ever get out from under them. Let’s face it: Banks and other lending institutions endeavor to make it so.

    At some point the lack of progress, the years of frustration and stress — all of it accumulates into the deadly “This is just how everyone lives!” attitude.

    At which point, you’re sunk.




     

     

  9. Student Loan Default Rates

    Those of you with an interest in default rates — student loan default rates, in particular — will want to set aside a few minutes to read the following:

    Chronicle Of Higher Ed: Student-Loan Default Rates: Understated

    Of course findings such as the following will come as a complete and utter shock to everyone (not!):

    According to unpublished data obtained by The Chronicle, one in every five government loans that entered repayment in 1995 has gone into default. The default rate is higher for loans made to students from two-year colleges, and higher still, reaching 40 percent, for those who attended for-profit institutions.

    One in every five loans that entered repayment in 1995 are in default? Yikes. That is nasty. As in, subprime nasty. This is worth mentioning because, according to the fine folks at S&P in July, 2009 …

    S&P now projects defaults on subprime loans issued in 2005, 2006 and 2007 at 11 percent, 30 percent and 49 percent, respectively.

    So the folks issuing student loans to pretty much anybody with a pulse still have some work to do to reach those vaunted levels we associate with subprime default rates. Keep at it, guys! You’re making progress!

    Back to the Chronicle piece:

    But it’s the high rates of default at for-profit institutions that are likely to get the most attention from members of Congress, who have recently raised concerns about the cost and quality of for-profit higher education. Fifteen years into repayment, two out of every five loans made to students who attended two-year for-profit colleges are in default.

    Boy — this would be really troubling to hear if we didn’t recognize that student loans are undoubtedly “good debt” meant only to help you reach your dreams!




     

     

  10. Still Paying Your Mortgage as Agreed?

    Then you’re the sucker. (Assuming you haven’t already figured that out.)

    SF Chronicle: “Bill Would Shield Homeowners’ Credit Ratings”

    From the article:

    A bill introduced on Thursday by U.S. Rep. Jackie Speier, D-Hillsborough, would shield homeowner credit ratings after a loan modification.

    “To play by the rules, modify your loan and then have it as a blemish on your credit report is just flabbergasting; it adds insult to injury,” said Speier. “The credit system should not punish responsible homeowners who modify their mortgage payments to keep their homes.”

    There are lots of things I’d like to say to Speier, but none of them are nice. So, in the interest of keeping this a family show, I will refrain.

    I will just state here that, in my opinion, the only freedom this country strives for any longer is the freedom from responsibility.