VOTE YES ON 1 – At a press conference in the morning, Govenor Charlie Crist kicked off “Yes on 1 – Save Our Homes NOW,” a campaign to pass the property tax amendment in January. “Passage of this amendment will go a long way to firing up the Florida economy and the real estate market that we all depend on,” Crist said in Orlando to a crowd of about 200 people.
FHA MORTGAGES – The pullback in subprime mortgage lending created a vacuum that could be filled by an expansion of the FHA loan program. The U.S. Senate reached a deal yesterday on a bill that lowers the downpayment requirement to 1.5 percent and increases the maximum mortgage amount to $417,000.
MORTGAGE RATES – Mortgage rates, which had been sliding, went up this week to 6.11 percent from last week’s 5.96 percent.
COUNTRYWIDE – Why did Countrywide Financial Corp., the nation’s largest mortgage lender, lend money to homebuyers who couldn’t afford to pay it back? Two states, California and Illinois, announced an investigation into the company’s business practices yesterday.
ECONOMY – In an interview with National Public Radio today, former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan says the odds the U.S. will fall into a recession are “clearly rising” and he believes economic growth is “getting close to stall speed."