Home-price gains to ease in 2006

The rate of home-price appreciation will moderate next year following four years of steep increases, while sales in 2006 will decline slightly from this year's record pace, according to the California Association of Realtors' "2006 Housing Market Forecast" released today. The forecast was presented during the association Centennial Realtor Expo at the San Diego Convention Center.  more...

Attorney faces real estate fraud charges

A prominent Georgia real estate attorney has been implicated in an alleged mortgage fraud scheme involving a 33-acre property in Snellville, Ga., the Gwinnett Daily Post reported Saturday.

Constance Thomas, 52, was charged with "theft by taking" for her alleged role in the fraudulent purchase of the Snellville land tract, the Post reported.  more...

Freddie Mac to help credit unions score mortgage business

Credit Union National Association, or CUNA, and mortgage giant Freddie Mac have beefed up their alliance to help credit unions compete for mortgage business, the two institutions said today.

Freddie Mac said the renewed alliance, effective through Sept. 1, 2007, will help credit unions compete for mortgage business through superior access to the secondary mortgage market and technology.  more...

Coalition urges affordable housing focus in Katrina rebuild

The National Low Income Housing Coalition estimates this week that 302,000 housing units were destroyed or damaged by Hurricane Katrina in the Gulf Coast. The estimate comes from the Federal Emergency Management Agency's most recent geographic analysis, the group said.

Of these units, 216,000, or 71 percent, were affordable to low-income households, those earning 80 percent of Area Median Income or less, according to NLIHC.  more...

How real estate companies recover from disaster

Clareity Consulting, which provides information technology consulting to the real estate industry and its related businesses, has issued a white paper discussing the need for disaster recovery planning.  more...

Online transaction system goes multilingual

California Realtors and their clients can now access information about their real estate transactions using Spanish, Mandarin Chinese and Vietnamese, the California Association of Realtors announced this week.

Relay, a Web-based real estate transaction management system developed by C.A.R. subsidiary Real Estate Business Technologies, was launched in English in July.

The language enhancement enables real estate consumers and industry professionals to communicate in multiple languages during all phases of the transaction.  more...

Refis boost real estate loan activity

Overall mortgage applications grew 1.5 percent last week on a seasonally adjusted basis from the week before, fueled by a surge in refinancings, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association's weekly survey.

The seasonally adjusted refinance index increased by 7 percent to 2,353.7 from 2,198.7 one week earlier, while the purchase index decreased by 2.6 percent to 500.3 from 513.4 the previous week.  more...

Real estate investor pleads guilty to fraud

A former New Jersey real estate investor pleaded guilty Monday to charges that he conspired with others to commit mortgage fraud, officials said.

Barry Fauntleroy, 39, admitted to causing the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to insure mortgage loans for unqualified home buyers, enabling Fauntleroy and co-defendants to earn huge profits on the sale of run-down properties financed with fraudulent loans, according to U.S. Attorney Christopher J. Christie.  more...

Overnight real estate rates steady

Long-term mortgage interest rates flattened Tuesday, and the benchmark 10-year Treasury bond yield held at 4.24 percent.

The 30-year fixed-rate average remained at 5.35 percent, and the 15-year fixed-rate edged up to 4.92 percent. The 1-year adjustable was unchanged at 3.93 percent.

The 30-year Treasury bond yield dipped to 4.53 percent.

Rates are current as of 7:15 p.m. Eastern Standard Time.

Mortgage rate figures are according to Bankrate.com, which publishes nightly averages based on its survey of 4,000 banks in 50 states.  more...