Posted by Eric C on September 29, 2003 at 14:18:15:
Hi -
I agree that its an important event – and its one that most people don’t really “get”.
The GSEs may very well in be in far more trouble than is currently realized and if their troubles continue to multiply, many investors may come to understand that the old saying about “all real estate is local” to be only partially correct.
In an era of syndications, derivatives, and a whole lot of monetary nonsense, artificially low interest rates coupled with a massive increase in the money supply spells trouble with a capital “T” in the long run.
Anybody else liquidating besides me?
Actually, I been selling for a couple of years now. Too many people making me offers I couldn’t refuse.
Most of those proceeds is now waiting on the sidelines for the other (or another) shoe to drop. Its just not waiting in US dollars any longer.
NY Bank Lost $180 Million on Trailers? - Posted by Bob H (MO)
Posted by Bob H (MO) on September 29, 2003 at 08:46:11:
This morning while listening to Marketplace on NPR, Alan Sloan had a segment and he mentioned something that sounded like a NY bank (sounded like he mentioned “federal” with the name but I didn’t realize the importance of the name until after he said it) lost $180 million on loans for “trailers”. He didn’t specify if these were mobile homes or not but I’m guessing they were. His segment was basically warning people about October as that has historically been the best month to buy stocks (read as that is the month that most stock market crashes occur). He gave 2 big things that could really shake the financial markets, one being what’s been going on with mutual funds and that this bank would not be able to pay it’s regular dividend because it lost so much money on trailers and people would be wondering why they were taking such extreme risks.
I’ve been searching the marketplace.org site to listen to the program again but they haven’t put this morning’s on yet. If anyone else has any information regarding this I’d love to get it-maybe I misunderstood what he was saying but if this is true, mobile home loans would really come under scrutiny at an institutional level and as a result the “industry standard” interest rate might be forced up
BTW, Alan Sloan is the Wall Street editor for Newsweek
Re: NY Bank Lost $180 Million on Trailers? - Posted by Chuck
Posted by Chuck on September 29, 2003 at 10:36:58:
He’s probably referring to when Conseco (later Greenpoint) packaged their 100% financed (to the homebuyer) mortgages as an investment portfolio which they then marketed to the REIT’s… who ultimately lost money on the purchase.
This is way old news in Indiana (Conseco is based in Carmel, north of Indy).
Bob, refer to my posting of 9/25/03. I cut & pasted a couple of paragraphs from an article in the Wall Street Journal on that subject. Refer to the archives of the WSJ on 9/25 for the complete article. I agree with you in that I think that this may be an opportunity to do more MH financing deals (although with more due diligence). I got no response to my posting - Perhaps you will have better luck. I think it’s an important event.
