Mortgage Borrowers Research Articles

Housing Assets as a Potential Solution for Financial Hardship: Households’ Mental Accounts of Housing Wealth in Three European Countries

The global financial crisis means that households in all EU countries must deal with income and asset insecurity. Life cycle theories predict that households will consume their savings in times of financial hardship and in retirement. However, thus far, housing assets have been consumed far less than other assets, though it has been suggested that the increased availability of additional mortgage borrowing will potentially change this. In this paper, household considerations about building and consuming housing equity are explored in Germany, Hungary and the UK. Based on empirical qualitative data, this paper presents an analysis of the potential role of housing assets in these countries now and in the near future.

Did the Federal Reserve’s MBS Purchase Program Lower Mortgage Rates?

We employ empirical pricing models for mortgage-backed security (MBS) yields and for mortgage rates to measure deviations from normal market functioning in order to assess how the Federal Reserve MBS purchase program--a 16 month program announced on November 25, 2008 and completed on March 31, 2010--affected risk premiums that were embedded in mortgage and swap markets. Our pricing models suggest that the announcement of the program, which signaled strong and credible government backing for mortgage markets in particular and for the financial system more generally, reduced mortgage rates by about 85 basis points between November 25 and December 31, 2008, even though no MBS had (yet) been purchased by the Federal Reserve ; Once the Federal Reserve's MBS program started purchasing MBS, we estimate that the abnormal risk premiums embedded mortgage rates decreased roughly 50 basis points. However, observed mortgage rates declined only slightly because of generally rising interest rates. ; After May 27, 2009 fairly normal pricing conditions existed in U.S. primary and secondary mortgage markets; that is, the relationship between mortgage rates and its determinants was similar to that observed prior to the financial crisis. After the end of the Federal Reserve's MBS purchase program on March 31, 2010, mortgage rates and interest rates more generally were significantly less than they had been at the beginning. ; In sum, we estimate that the Federal Reserve's MBS purchase program removed substantial risk premiums embedded in mortgage rates because of the financial crisis. The Federal Reserve also re-established a robust secondary mortgage market, which meant that the marginal mortgage borrower was funded by the capital markets and not directly by the banks during the financial crisis-had bank funding been the only source of funds, primary mortgage rates would have been much higher. ; Lastly, many observers have attributed part of the Federal Reserve's effect from purchasing MBS to portfolio rebalancing. We find that if portfolio rebalancing had a substantial effect, it may have had its greatest importance only after the Federal Reserve's purchases ended, but while the Federal Reserve held a substantial portion of the stock of outstanding MBS.

The Changing Pecking Order of Consumer Defaults

In the wake of the recent housing and financial crisis, many have argued that consumers are defaulting on their mortgage for strategic reasons, either because they are underwater or to preserve access to credit from other types of debt products, in order to maintain their consumption of other essential goods. In this paper, we examine the extent to which non-prime mortgage borrowers prioritize payments on their monthly mortgage over credit card debt obligations over a nine year period (2001-2009). Before the recent financial crisis, our default order data suggest that consumers were eight times more likely to prioritize payments on mortgage debt over credit card payments. As of late 2008, in contrast, the similar consumers were just as likely to default on mortgage debt as on credit card debt. Our results reveal that important explanations for the observed changes in the pecking order of defaults include: strategic mortgage default behavior among consumers with low and negative housing equity; illiquidity in the form of available credit; the rising costs of servicing mortgage debt; and the greater penetration of non-traditional mortgage products. These results support the importance of strategic consumer behavior, but also emphasize that the changes in the pecking order of defaults have come about because of ability-to-pay considerations.

Global Legal Standards: Common Rules to Protect Property and Businesses

I decided to make you familiar with an aspect of American property law. You may not realize that a formalistic approach is taken regarding the necessity of consent to form contracts often presented to consumers, including subprime mortgage borrowers who signed the notes (which are themselves contracts) and mortgage documents to transfer the property to lenders. Because many who give what is known as objective consent ie they sign the paper incorporating an agreement, but they do not understand the terms of the contract or the impact on them, I argue that the form contract may protect businesses that use these, but not the property of those consumers/borrowers. These types of “take it or leave it” contracts are known as adhesion contracts. In subprime mortgages lenders offer borrowers form contracts (promissory notes) which the borrower must sign in order to obtain the loan. There is no negotiation of the terms of the note or the mortgage document.A significant part of the subprime crisis in residential real estate in the United States is due to a lack of subjective consent to the contracts entered into regarding the subprime mortgage loans. Then, of course because of globalization of investments this economic crisis affected investors worldwide. As was presented at the meeting of the Italian Civil Law Notaries in Torino in January 2008, many of these global investors trusted the US regulators and U.S. ratings agencies only to learn that neither was working effectively or as investors believed.

Refinancing transitions and equity extraction among CRA mortgage borrowers

Refinancing transitions can alter both the long-term cost and the sustainability of a homeownership tenure. However, because few datasets allow researchers to follow homeowners from one mortgage to the next, little research exists regarding the extent and nature of refinancing transitions. This article uses uniquely rich data from the Community Advantage Program (CAP) to examine the refinancing decisions of a sample of low-income borrowers with 30-year fixed-rate purchase mortgages. While the majority of refinancing CAP borrowers secured lower-cost prime loans, a minority refinanced into adjustable-rate mortgages and into products with above-prime interest rates. The empirical analysis documents the refinancing transitions made by CAP borrowers and explores the role of equity extraction in the refinancing decision. Refinancing motivated by a desire to secure a lower interest rate is shown to be substantively distinct from refinancing that includes equity extraction. This difference carries over into borrowers’ selection of refinancing products, as borrowers who extract equity transition more frequently into non-prime FRM and ARM products than borrowers that rate refinance.

Mortgage Defaults

A model of mortgage defaults is built into the standard incomplete markets model. Households face income and house-price shocks and purchase houses using long-term mortgages. Interest rates on mortgages are determined in equilibrium according to the risk of default. The model accounts for the observed patterns of housing consumption, mortgage borrowing, and defaults. Default-prevention policies are evaluated. The mortgage default rate, housing demand, households’ ability to self-insure, and welfare are hump-shaped in the degree of recourse (the level of defaulters’ wealth that can be garnished). Two forces affect default. More recourse implies that the punishment for default is harsher; this reduces the default rate. But more recourse also decreases the interest rates offered; this increases borrowing and the default rate. Introducing loan-to-value (LTV) limits for new mortgages contains borrowing, lowering the default rate with negligible negative effects on housing demand. The combination of recourse mortgages and LTV limits reduces the default rate while boosting housing demand. The behavior of economies with alternative prudential regulations is evaluated during a boom-bust episode in aggregate house prices. In the economy with both recourse mortgages and LTV limits, the mortgage default rate is less sensitive to fluctuations in aggregate house prices.

ABS Inflows to the United States and the Global Financial Crisis

The 'global saving glut' (GSG) hypothesis argues that the surge in capital inflows from emerging market economies to the United States led to significant declines in long-term interest rates in the United States and other industrial economies. In turn, these lower interest rates, when combined with both innovations and deficiencies of the U.S. credit market, are believed to have contributed to the U.S. housing bubble and to the buildup in financial vulnerabilities that led to the financial crisis. Because the GSG countries for the most part restricted their U.S. purchases to Treasuries and Agency debt, their provision of savings to ultimately risky subprime mortgage borrowers was necessarily indirect, pushing down yields on safe assets and increasing the appetite for alternative investments on the part of other investors. We present a more complete picture of how capital flows contributed to the crisis, drawing attention to the sizable inflows from European investors into U.S. private-label asset-backed securities (ABS), including mortgage-backed securities and other structured investment products. By adding to domestic demand for private-label ABS, substantial foreign acquisitions of these securities contributed to the decline in their spreads over Treasury yields. Through a combination of empirical estimation and model simulation, we verify that both GSG inflows into Treasuries and Agencies, as well as European acquisitions of ABS, played a role in contributing to downward pressures on U.S. interest rates.

Reversing the Trend: The Recent Expansion of the Reverse Mortgage Market

Reverse mortgages allow elderly homeowners to tap into their housing wealth without having to sell or move out of their homes. However, very few eligible homeowners used reverse mortgages to achieve consumption smoothing until recently, when the reverse mortgage market in the United States witnessed substantial growth. In this article, I examine 1989–2007 loan‐level reverse mortgage data and conduct three sets of analyses to better understand the demand for reverse mortgages among elderly homeowners. First, I study the ZIP code characteristics correlated with reverse mortgage originations. Second, I show that recent reverse mortgage borrowers are significantly different from earlier borrowers in many respects. Third, I investigate the reasons why the reverse mortgage market experienced substantial growth in the mid‐2000s. Combining the reverse mortgage data with county‐level house price data, I find that higher house prices lead to more reverse mortgage originations. Specifically, the increases in house prices account for about one‐third of the overall growth in the reverse mortgage market from 2003 to 2007.

Are Commercial Mortgage Defaults Affected by Tax Considerations?

We study whether tax considerations are an important determinant of commercial mortgage default. We also study whether large lenders are better informed, or better at interpreting information for lending purposes, and hence have lower foreclosure rates; whether lenders have more information on larger borrowers than smaller borrowers, and hence have lower foreclosure rates on larger loans; and whether commercial mortgage defaults are related to debt service coverage and loan-to-values, both initial and contemporaneous. The paper's main findings are fourfold. First, holding all else equal, there is evidence that tax considerations influence investors' decisions about when to "put" assets to lenders. The results are consistent with the argument of Constantinides (1984). Second, the evidence suggests that large lenders are especially knowledgeable about commercial mortgage borrowers and commercial property markets, in that they have lower foreclosure rates than smaller lenders. Third, on the question of whether lenders have more information on larger borrowers than smaller borrowers, we find that larger loans have, on average, lower default rates than smaller loans. Fourth, the findings suggest that lower default rates are associated with higher debt service coverage ratios, both initial and contemporaneous.

Are Housing Prices, Household Debt, and Growth Sustainable?

Rising home prices and low interest rates have fueled the recent surge in mortgage borrowing and enabled consumers to spend at high rates relative to their income. Low interest rates have counterbalanced the growth in debt and acted to dampen the growth in household debt-service burdens. As past Levy Institute strategic analyses have pointed out, these trends are not sustainable: Household spending relative to income cannot grow indefinitely.

Are Adjustable-Rate Mortgage Borrowers Borrowing Constrained?

Past research argues that changes in adjustable-rate mortgage (ARM) payments may lead households to cut back on consumption or to default on their mortgages. In this paper, we argue that these outcomes are more likely if ARM borrowers are borrowing constrained, and find that ARM borrowers exhibit characteristics and behavior that are consistent with being borrowing constrained. Although the demographic and financial characteristics of ARM and fixed-rate mortgage (FRM) borrowers are quite similar, ARM borrowers differ from FRM borrowers in their uses of credit and attitudes towards it. In addition, we find the consumption growth of households with an ARM is more sensitive to past income than the consumption growth of other households, suggesting the ARM borrowers are more likely subject to borrowing constraints that hinder their ability to smooth consumption.

Subprime Loan Default Resolutions: Do They Vary Across Mortgage Products and Borrower Demographic Groups?

This paper examines default outcomes for subprime first lien loans during the recent subprime mortgage boom. It conducts this investigation in two phases. The paper first examines factors associated with pre-foreclosure outcomes for subprime mortgages in default. It then examines factors associated with different outcomes for loans that enter foreclosure. These factors include less understood elements such as mortgage product features and borrower demographics. The analysis is based on detailed loan-level data and employs multinomial logit models in a hazard framework. Results show that default resolutions vary with product features and borrower demographics. Adjustable rate and interest-only mortgages, and loans with low- or no-documentation are more likely to enter foreclosure proceedings, and, once in foreclosure, are more likely to become REO. The existence of junior liens increases the probability of the loan remaining in default. Owner-occupancy is associated with lower likelihood of foreclosure initiation and REO, and greater likelihood of curing default. Additionally, default outcomes are impacted by local legal, economic and housing market conditions, and the equity in the home.

State mortgage foreclosure policies and lender interventions: Impacts on borrower behavior in default

AbstractDue to the rise in foreclosure filings, policymakers are increasingly concerned with helping families in financial distress keep their homes. This paper tests the extent to which distressed mortgage borrowers benefit from three types of state foreclosure polices: (1) judicial foreclosure proceedings, (2) statutory rights of redemption, and (3) statewide foreclosure‐prevention initiatives. Based on an analysis of borrowers in default who reside in 22 cross‐state metropolitan statistical area pairs, state policies generally have weak effects. Both judicial foreclosure proceedings and foreclosure prevention initiatives are associated with modest increases in loan modification rates. Using a matching procedure, a lender's letter promoting mortgage default counseling was associated with increases in loan modifications, decreases in loan cures, and decreases in foreclosure starts. The effects of the letter were also stronger in states with judicial proceedings. © 2011 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.

Are Adjustable-Rate Mortgage Borrowers Borrowing Constrained?

Past research argues that changes in adjustable-rate mortgage (ARM) payments may lead households to cut back on consumption or to default on their mortgages. In this paper, we argue that these outcomes are more likely if ARM borrowers are borrowing constrained, and find that ARM borrowers exhibit characteristics and behavior that are consistent with being borrowing constrained. Although the demographic and financial characteristics of ARM and fixed-rate mortgage (FRM) borrowers are quite similar, ARM borrowers differ from FRM borrowers in their uses of credit and attitudes towards it. In addition, we find the consumption growth of households with an ARM is more sensitive to past income than the consumption growth of other households, suggesting the ARM borrowers are more likely subject to borrowing constraints that hinder their ability to smooth consumption.

Pathways after Default: What Happens to Distressed Mortgage Borrowers and Their Homes?

We use a detailed dataset of seriously delinquent mortgages to examine the dynamic process of mortgage default – from initial delinquency and default to final resolution of the loan and disposition of the property. We estimate a two-stage competing risk hazard model to assess the factors associated with whether a borrower behind on mortgage payments receives a legal notice of foreclosure, and with what ultimately happens to the borrower and property. In particular, we focus on a borrower’s ability to avoid a foreclosure auction by getting a modification, by refinancing the loan, or by selling the property. We find that the outcomes of the foreclosure process are significantly related to: the terms of the loan; the borrower’s credit history; current loan-to-value and the presence of a junior lien; the borrower’s post-default payment behavior; the borrower’s participation in foreclosure counseling; neighborhood characteristics such as foreclosure rates, recent house price depreciation and median income; and the borrower’s race and ethnicity.

Using a decision tree to analyze mortgage borrower decision behavior and values concerning interest rates and house prices

In reality, mortgage borrowers are more seriously concerned with the current mortgage boundary (i.e. option exercise) value than with the current option value (i.e. expected present value of the prospective option exercise value). Hence, by combining a simulation framework and a decision tree, the terminations of mortgage behavior can be classified forward but not backward as by the binomial lattice. After simulating 5000 projections for both Taiwan house prices and interest rates, as well as computing for current mortgage boundary values obtained by modifying Ambrose and Buttimer (2000) to step through the mortgage decision tree, the result shows that the prepayment is affected by rising interest rate volatility. Moreover, the delinquency and the reinstatement are affected by both rising interest rate and house price volatilities. However, due to the cost of delinquency and credit penalties, the foreclosure could not compete over the reinstatement when house prices and interest rates are in a high-volatility situation. The reinstatement is encouraging for the borrowers. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Did the Federal Reserve's MBS Purchase Program Lower Mortgage Rates?

We employ empirical pricing models for mortgage-backed security (MBS) yields and for mortgage rates to measure deviations from normal market functioning in order to assess how the Federal Reserve MBS purchase program--a 16 month program announced on November 25, 2008 and completed on March 31, 2010--affected risk premiums that were embedded in mortgage and swap markets. Our pricing models suggest that the announcement of the program, which signaled strong and credible government backing for mortgage markets in particular and for the financial system more generally, reduced mortgage rates by about 85 basis points between November 25 and December 31, 2008, even though no MBS had (yet) been purchased by the Federal Reserve. Once the Federal Reserve's MBS program started purchasing MBS, we estimate that the abnormal risk premiums embedded mortgage rates decreased roughly 50 basis points. However, observed mortgage rates declined only slightly because of generally rising interest rates. After May 27, 2009, fairly normal pricing conditions existed in U.S. primary and secondary mortgage markets that is, the relationship between mortgage rates and its determinants was similar to that observed prior to the financial crisis. After the end of the Federal Reserve's MBS purchase program on March 31, 2010, mortgage rates and interest rates more generally were significantly less than they had been at the beginning. In sum, we estimate that the Federal Reserve's MBS purchase program removed substantial risk premiums embedded in mortgage rates because of the financial crisis. The Federal Reserve also re-established a robust secondary mortgage market, which meant that the marginal mortgage borrower was funded by the capital markets and not directly by the banks during the financial crisis-had bank funding been the only source of funds, primary mortgage rates would have been much higher. Lastly, many observers have attributed part of the Federal Reserve's effect from purchasing MBS to portfolio rebalancing. We find that if p

시스템다이내믹스 시뮬레이션을 이용한 주택 수요 조절 정책의 타당성 평가

Recent periodical boom and burst of house price have made mortgage lending issues become the main public interest in Korean real estate market. However, because mortgage-lending issues had not been discussed until then, housing market forecasting associated with mortgage lending has been difficult while using an empirical approach. Thus, comprehensive and systematic approach is required as well as validity of mortgage lending policies should be evaluated. In this regard, this research conducts a sensitivity analysis to validate the proposed policies and estimates the effects of current policies on LTV and DTI ratios with a comparison of another policies scenario. A causal loop and sensitivity analysis using system dynamics confirmed that LTV and DTI regulation is strong clout to housing market. However, to prevent transfer of potential mortgage borrowers to nonmonetary institutions, regulations in loans of nonmonetary institutions should be practiced in accompaniment with regulations of primary lending agencies.

Anglo-American Credit Scoring and Consumer Debt in the Subprime Mortgage Crisis of 2007 as Models for Other Countries?

The system of credit scoring has been built up in recent times on the basis of a compromise struck between individuality and surveillance in ways that boosted consumption through consumer debt. This paper considers the role of credit scoring in the recent financial crisis, concluding that even if credit scoring had worked as intended under its own terms, the practice would not have been enough to limit the defaulting of mortgage borrowers under conditions of falling house prices. The broader economic problem is the crippling amount of consumer debt involved; hence the paper places credit scoring in the larger explanatory framework of consumer debt and, more generally, consumerism in its more problematic form. The sorting accomplished by credit scoring is open to abuses in the marketplace, unless it is tempered by the application of guardrails by a regulatory authority. As cultures beyond the Anglo-American sphere adopt this practice, guardrails like those applied to credit scoring in America are needed; as even the current U.S. Administration has acknowledged, the existing guardrails will have to be complemented by stricter social standards. The paper provides a derivation of the theoretical background on credit scoring as surveillance, and includes a literature survey.

Anglo-American Credit Scoring and Consumer Debt in the Subprime Mortgage Crisis of 2007 as Models for Other Countries?

The system of credit scoring has been built up in recent times on the basis of a compromise struck between individuality and surveillance in ways that boosted consumption through consumer debt. This paper considers the role of credit scoring in the recent financial crisis, concluding that even if credit scoring had worked as intended under its own terms, the practice would not have been enough to limit the defaulting of mortgage borrowers under conditions of falling house prices. The broader economic problem is the crippling amount of consumer debt involved; hence the paper places credit scoring in the larger explanatory framework of consumer debt and, more generally, consumerism in its more problematic form. The sorting accomplished by credit scoring is open to abuses in the marketplace, unless it is tempered by the application of guardrails by a regulatory authority. As cultures beyond the Anglo-American sphere adopt this practice, guardrails like those applied to credit scoring in America are needed; as even the current U.S. Administration has acknowledged, the existing guardrails will have to be complemented by stricter social standards. The paper provides a derivation of the theoretical background on credit scoring as surveillance, and includes a literature survey.