How bad is the foreclosure crisis?

How Bad Is It?

Five years into what is possibly the worst foreclosure disaster in American history; 5.6% of homeowners in North Carolina are greater than 90 days behind on their mortgage. In a highly irregular move Ben Bernanke, Chairman of the Federal Reserve, released and unsolicited outline to Congressional Committees with ties to the banking and finance industries. The fact that Congress did not ask for the outline, which describes the Federal Reserves plan to combat the foreclosure crisis, is an indication of the severity of the situation.

Home prices have fallen 30% since the peak of the real estate boom and one in four homeowners are underwater. With nearly 7M homeowners across the Nation in serious risk of foreclosure, what has taken so long for relief to come?

Here are the main points of Bernanke’s plan:
 Establish large scale principle reduction initiative
 Help underwater homeowners refinance at lower interest rates
 Convert vacant government owned homes into affordable housing
 Establish fair consumer protections for mortgage servicing

It is unclear if these recommendations will work or even if they will be adopted, but something must be done. It is too late for many, hopefully this is a step in the right direction.

As always thanks for reading and feel free to comment.

@OCCUPYNC77