Praetorian wrote:
lanter1 wrote:
Praetorian wrote:
dare I write the word subprime
It bit me in the behind...my team was doing really well and we came in on Sept 6th and no longer had jobs.
Sorry lanter1. I am sure its impact was felt most on the average guy. It is a little surprising that the Fed lowered interest rates. Whatever happened to the free market sorting things out for itself. Some one decided that subprime mortages were a good idea and they were wrong. So, why reward such mistakes? I dont pretend to understand the business of interest rates, but I never understood how cutting interest rates prevents the big boys from handing out these mortgages once the good times roll again.
I think the concept of subprime is not the problem...it's all the unique loan programs such as negative am and no doc that seem to have caused a lot of the trouble. Also, there were a whole lot of shady brokers doing unethical loans such as putting people on a two year fixed rate with a three year prepay penalties. Subprime will always exist, but you won't see the irresponsible/risky programs that have existed the last 5 to 6 years. There are a lot of good loans that can still be completed for customers in the 500 credit score range, but the companies need to stay disciplined by limiting debt-to-income ratios and loan-to-values.
As far as cutting rates, I think it was the right decision to relieve some of the pressure currently on the secondary mortgage markets and to give the banks a positive vibe after being beat up for the last 8 months. The cut is enabling mortgage companies to do loans that they could not complete 2 months ago by having lower debt-to-income ratios. A company like Countrywide going out of business would not be good for the overall mortgage market or consumer confidence in financial services.