Altos Research: How's The Market?
March 5, 2010
by
0 Add comments
Some good news for those of you who have made Blogger.com your blogging platform of choice: You’ll now find handy Blogger sharing icons sprinkled in various spots on AltosResearch.com. Our expanding lineup of supported sharing destinations:
From left to right, the nominees for the category of ’Sharable Destination’ are:
Email, Facebook, Posterous, LinkedIn, Tumblr, Twitter, WordPress, TypePad, and Blogger
And the winner is…
Are you a Blogger blogger?{ 0 comments }
February 27, 2010
by
1 Add comments
Just in time for the spring fashion season, we’re introducing a new addition to our lineup of themes for AltosReports and AltosConnect – Black. Never out of style, this new design goes with everything in your wardrobe and is appropriate for any occasion. Below are a few snapshots – if you like what you see, just select ‘Black’ from the theme menu on the ‘Personalize Reports’ screen the next time you login:
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
February 2, 2010
by
2 Add comments
In last week’s “2010 Housing Market Leading Indictors” webinar, we discussed the need for the private banking sector to pick up the slack in mortgage origination when the federal government bows out this Spring. A requirement for a successful transition is the recovery of mortgage securitization (RMBS issuance) that will enable private banks to offload the risk accompanying mortgage lending in an uncertain housing market environment.
Jacob Gaffney’s report from the ASF 2010 – “Mortgage Modifications Drive Lack of Private Investor Demand” – is an excellent review of a session hosted yesterday where managers from Citigroup, Deutsche Bank, and General Electric Investment Corporation discussed RMBS issuance and other securitization options to spur private sector lending in 2010.
This session is on the heels of a previous article - ”New Private-Label RMBS May Thaw Jumbo Market: Report” – published last month. From the article:
The mortgage finance industry is abuzz with word of new residential mortgage-backed securities (RMBS) issued by private investment firms — the first such planned issuance in more than a year, and some say a sign that the credit freeze may be thawing out for private-label RMBS.
On StructuredFinanceNews.com, there’s additional coverage about ABS from the ASF today – Govt. Programs Have Had Positive Impact on ABS, ASF Panelists Say.
These structured products served as the foundation for many of the derivative products scorned during the 2008 banking meltdown (CDO, CLOs, etc.) but ironically, might be the elixir that enables the government’s exit from the mortgage market.
Is Mortgage securitization coming back? RMBS hitting The Street…{ Comments on this entry are closed }
January 29, 2010
by
7 Add comments
Thanks to those that joined us for Wednesday’s live webinar – “2010 Housing Market Leading Indicators, presented by Altos Research.” We’ve had TONS of requests for the presentation slides and a recording of the event. Ask and ye shall receive…
The presentation is now hosted on our YouTube Channel and available in parts to enable you to jump through the key parts of the presentation that most interest you.
Part I: Seller Confidence Indicators emerging in January 2010; Seller Price Discovery trends since 2007.
Part II: Seller Price Reduction trends; Housing Supply; Lagging Luxury Segment.
Part III: Mortgage Market and effects on the housing market; S&P/Case-Shiller HPI for October & November 2009; Discussion of the San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Phoenix housing markets.
Part IV: Discussion of the Phoenix, Atlanta, Seattle, Chicago, and Portland housing markets.
Part V: Key takeaways from the 2009 Housing Market, including Price Floor Evidence and Stimulus Response including government support of the mortgage market and the homebuyer tax credit.
Part VI: 2010-2011 housing market expectations; Forecast of 2011 housing prices; Discussion of the economy’s affect on the housing market; Shadow Inventory
We’ll be hosting more of these presentations throughout 2010, so comments and topical suggestions are welcome.
If you’d like the presentation slides from the webinar, you can download them in PDF file format here.
2010 Housing Market Leading Indicators{ Comments on this entry are closed }
January 29, 2010
by
0 Add comments
Big event starting on Sunday. We’ll be there. Why is the American Securitization Forum 2010 Conference so important? The topics covered at the ASF meetings set the tone for the next year and show the financial market’s response to government and private sector initiatives for the securitization market. Many of our clients trade RMBS, whole loan asset portfolios, service mortgages, and purchase distressed assets – this is a key event for us to see what’s happening out there.
With the upcoming changes to the residential mortgage market - the US government’s pull back from housing market lending and the re-expiration of the homebuyer’s tax credit in April 2010 – it’s a pivotal year in the housing market to see if the recovery is real, if we’ve simply troughed, or if we’re headed lower (gasp!).
Here’s a look at a few agenda items at the ASF 2010:
Personally, my favorite event is the Working Lunch – A Discussion Between Newt Gingrich and Howard Dean, Moderated by Larry Kudlow. Need I say more?
Drop me a line (scott@altosresearch.com) if you’re attending to talk about the housing market and what we’re seeing out there. Starbucks or Budweiser – your choice. I’m buying.
See you there.
ASF 2010 – Washington DC (Jan 31-Feb 3){ Comments on this entry are closed }
January 20, 2010
by
3 Add comments
A DSNews article from yesterday (”GAO Releases Report on Loan Performance and Negative Equity“) covers the release of a US Government Accountability Office report – Loan Performance and Negative Home Equity in the Nonprime Mortgage Market. The report is a look at loan performance and negative equity across the 16 US markets, taking a faulty “balance sheet” approach – examining metro level data and estimating the percentage of homeowners with negative equity based on June 30, 2009 data. The report doesn’t account for recent market trends in these metros and thus incorrectly assesses the overall negative equity situation.
From the DSNews article about the report:
“Using the S&P/Case-Shiller index, the report estimated the percentage of borrowers with negative equity for 16 metropolitan areas. These percentages ranged from about 9 percent in Denver to more than 90 percent in Los Vegas. In the 16 metropolitan areas reviewed…”
Source: Loan Performance and Negative Home Equity in the Nonprime Mortgage Market published by US Government Accountability Office (December 16, 2009)
This assessment fails to account for recent gains several metros, under-emphasizes a troubling trend for markets that appear to be do doing better than others and under-values markets that have highly negative estimates. Looking at the market data for the latter half of 2009 for two of the three top and bottom markets listed in the report – Las Vegas, Miami, Denver and Boston starts to show trends not captured in the report:
Year-on-Year Housing Price Changes: Denver, Boston, Miami & Las Vegas
The “good” market – Denver – is just now starting to feel the housing market pressure. Denver bucked the national trends all throughout 2007 and 2008. It wasn’t until July 2009 – one month after the data used in the GAO report that Denver prices had year-on-year losses: [click to continue…]
Surprise! Government report on Negative Equity Gets it Wrong{ Comments on this entry are closed }
January 18, 2010
by
4 Add comments
We’ve just returned from New York City, attending last week’s Real Estate Connect New York City 2010 hosted by InmanNews. Outstanding event to hear what’s happening right now in the real estate industry, and we’re all about real-time… Thought this would be a good time to close out our “2009 Year End Trends” blog post series, focusing on the Northeast markets. (And besides, it’s time to start looking ahead to 2010 since we’re three weeks into the year now..)
Unlike the rest of the country in this series, I’m taking a broader view of the major Northeast housing markets by looking at metro-level data instead of city-level data for New York, Boston, Philadelphia and Washington DC. Here’s a quick look at the market data followed by analysis of what we’re seeing in this region:
Median Ask Price Trends by MSA: New York, Boston, Philadelphia & Washington DC
Active Housing Supply by MSA: New York, Boston, Philadelphia & Washington DC
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
January 14, 2010
by
2 Add comments
The Altos Research January 2010 Real-Time National Housing Report is now available for download. Some highlights from this month’s report:
If you’re a new reader to “How’s the Market?”, our monthly real-time housing reports provide metro-level analysis of the 25 metropolitan statistical areas that compose the S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price Index and Radar Logic 25-City index. Our real estate market data and trends typically lead these national indices by 3-4 months. Additional information about our Data & Market Analytics Platform and data subscription services is available here on our company website.
Here’s a look at the Altos 10-City Composite trends since 2008:
The Altos 10-City Composite is a leading indicator of the S&P/Case-Shiller HPI
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
