|
|
News Real-estate bust brings foreclosure boom Gov. Crist is making good on his campaign promises
to save the Florida homeowner. The Legislature passed groundbreaking
legislation to stop the crazy increases in homeowners' insurance.
Gov. Crist has followed up with mandates freezing insurance rates,
barring the cancellation of existing policies and calling another
special session to address property-tax relief. Yet, one critical ingredient of a comprehensive
plan to save the state's real-estate industry still is missing
and not being discussed. Foreclosures in Florida are at their
highest rates in years. Many homeowners and investors are victims
of "exotic" mortgages, which allowed them to purchase
properties with little money down and with what seemed like small,
manageable payments. Spoiled by historically low interest rates, many
of us entered into adjustable-rate mortgages several years ago
that are now "adjusting" into extremely high payments.
If homeowners and investors can't pay their mortgages, it does
not matter if they can pay their insurance or taxes. Most mortgages once were backed by the federal government,
which, in turn, allowed significant time before a house could
be seized. Today's mortgages do not have such constraints;
lenders can foreclose in as little as two months.
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||