The Mortgage Haiku Collage

Now that I've set out all 17 entries individually,
I'd thought I'd put them all in one easy to access place.

What is a Haiku you ask?

The traditional Japanese Haiku format follows the syllable pattern of 5 - 7 - 5. The writer might bring in a word or concept (kiga) that evokes memories of a particular season.
The last line is usually in sharp contrast (caesura) to the body of the poem.

I chose to backdrop each poem with a traditional Japanese watercolor or photograph. Some in contrast, others not.

To the Haiku purist the following might not be proper in the strict sense. Your latitude is appreciated.

Why 17? It is the total number of syllables in a Haiku, no other reason.
Why separate them? Each one should be read and engaged individually.

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Outside Links:

• "Succinct and serene, it's home loan haiku", San Jose Mercury News
• "Mortgage Haiku?", Redfin Blog
• Inman News - Left Brain / Right Brain
• Hotpads Carnival of Real Estate - Mortgage Haiku
  
• Inman News Carnival of Real Estate - Mortgage Haiku
• The Boston Globe - Mortgage Haiku

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Lisa asked for a little help in understanding my Haiku. I realized if one person asks, how many others don't ask?

They say a Poet should never have to explain his verse - it's a good thing I'm not a Poet!

So, Lisa...

Not just for you, but for all the others who are maybe a little too intimidated to ask, here is a cheat sheet for each one.

Haiku 1: It's estimated that somewhere close to 80% of the homeowners who let their home go to Trustee Sale, NEVER contact their lender. Wow!

Haiku 2: I see time and time again the Payment Option Arm showing up in Short Sale transactions. Generally these people bought into the minimum payment and then bought Cars and took fancy vacations. Now, that life style is coming back to haunt them.

Haiku 3: As a Mortgage Broker many of us have seen the regulations and pending tightening against being aimed at us. For good reason I might add. We all know there are crooks and thieves out there - and many of them are Mortgage Brokers. However there are also honest ethical people out there who do the right thing and always have.

Haiku 4: When a Payment Option Arm recasts, it doesn't just adjust, it can easily double or triple their payments. How many jobs can a family work just too keep up?

Haiku 5: NINA. It's a type of loan we used to have. It stood for No Income, No Assets. The borrower simply signed the loan application and the Income and Asset sections were blank. That loan is long gone. NINA was also one of Columbus' three ships.

Haiku 6: I start paying attention to the news at 5 AM. I stream financial tv into the office as well as subscribing o over 160 blogs. Chang is happening so quickly these days, the only thing that is constant seems to be change.

Haiku 7: The 1003 (pronounced Ten - O - Three) is the standard mortgage application form. As guidelines change, what was fundable yesterday, might not be today, and what tomorrow holds - well we just don't know.

Haiku 8: Of the aforementioned 160 + blogs in my daily reader these are some of the best bloggers in the business.

Haiku 9: This is one of my favorites. A mortgage can mean drastically different things to different people.

Haiku 10: In this day, the old tried and true methods of generating business probably aren't working. To survive, you must adapt!

Haiku 11: It seems everyone is looking for someone or something to blame.

Haiku 12: Financial Crunch, Liquidity Crunch. Sometimes I get a little tired of hearing the same thing over and over. When it comes to Crunch's make mine Chocolate!

Haiku 13: The Slam Dunk. It's a Loan Officer term for a loan that doesn't require a lot of work and flies through underwriting. Or at least it used to.

Haiku 14: So many people look at blogging, SEO, Metatags as the way to build business. If that's all your doing - your missing the boat!

Haiku 15: Once again, for the real estate professional what used to be isn't what needs to be today. This came from a conversation I had with a real estate agent who just didn't understand why a loan couldn't be done.

Haiku 16: With all the good changes that are happening we still see Buyers not willing to make the commitment to enter the market.

Haiku 17: This was one of my favorite pictures. I must have tried 20 different ways to fit the words in without taking away from the picture. This was the best i could come up with.

Like the coming and going tide, the real estate market is cyclical. To me this picture reminded me both of that and the idea to stay on the path. The current troubles we are seeing are only temporary.

And there you have it. A simple and easy KEY to each poem!

Protect Our House

Yes, it's another Countrywide story.  If you can believe it I am very tired about writing about the curious happenings at Countrywide.  I've talked to many other blogger's  who  are overloaded as well.   We're close to hitting the saturation point .

But this is one story that gave me a chuckle and I have to share.  Bear with me.

Saturation

First a little recap.  Inside the walls of Countrywide is a powerful PR machine unlike any other mortgage company.  Back in August this machine spit out a canned email message that it then had all it's loan officers send out as if they had written it themselves.  I wrote about it here in my post titled "... know that I am here, backed by Countrywide".

Days later I was astonished to hear they had a two pronged attack in "I'm applying for the Branch Manager Position".  Same story, brought to you this time from the branch manager level.

I then posted a query a month later in which I found it very curious that I had two people in two nearby towns, both behind in their Countrywide mortgages; one foreclosed on in the most expedient and aggressive manner, and the other allowed to live on with little to no harassment for almost a year!  That was "Tale of Two Cities" .  Are they really trying to keep REOs off their books by selective foreclosures?

The WristBand

So when Countrywide employee moral was at it's lowest, and the company turned to PR Giant Burson-Marsteller and switched it's focus from outside to inside, I was pretty much burned out on all too familiar Countrywide Bashing posts.  I'm talking about the "Protect Our House" campaign in which CW employees signed a pledge of allegiance and got to wear these nifty Lance Armstrong styled wristbands.  Remember that?

I just let that story slip off into oblivion.  I was clearly in CW overload.

eBay, Capitalism, and First

The yesterday, while doing research for an upcoming post (selling your home on eBay) I inadvertently ran across a Countrywide "Protect Our House" wristband listed for sale.  I couldn't believe what I was seeing.  So I did a search and found that this guy wasn't alone!

Here's the list I found: LINK  Currently at 22 Auctions.

The winner?  The first one listed (Oct 10th) by Air44bg .  It sold for $182.50!  Currently they are selling at $20 if they get a bidder at all.  It clearly pays to be first.  If you look at the ones being sold today you'll see the market has deteriorated.  Like builders, they have to give away "Free Upgrades".  Here is one with a free Countrywide Mousepad,  and another with a Countrywide Puzzle.

I think I'll wait a little longer - yeah, I'm sitting on the fence for this one.

    

Technorati Tags: Countrywide, Wristbands, ebay

St. Joseph find me a buyer - fast!

I had previously written a story about how interesting it was that I found companies marketing St. Joseph statues to home sellers. 

Well, I guess that idea caught on with Agents. 

The California Association of Realtors - which licenses your local Real Estate Professional, has a page on their site selling products designed to help them (the Agents)  in their business.  The page is public and sells items like

• Marketing Plans,
• Presentation Plans,
• Door Hangers,
• Open House Signs

The idea is that the Association is there to foster and promote their business.  They even have a radio commercial going right now.  Have you heard it?

I track all sorts of things.  One of the interesting things (to me) is where new visitors come from, if they used a search engine, and if so, what words they put into that search engine to find me.

 Yesterday, I saw that someone had found the site and spent a great deal of time reading my posts - all because they used MSN and were looking for "st joeseph statue for selling homes".  Misspelled and all.  No really!  Here, try this: LINK.  I should be #1.

BTW: The two biggest hits I get are for Lending Tree Fraud, and most anything that has Mortgage Accelerator Complaints attached to it.  I guess they are pretty popular.

I scrolled down and found the page for C.A.R. and saw that they were selling statues in bulk!

I can't say I like this.  Why?

The Association exists for the betterment of it's members.  It subscribes to higher standards and pushes for those standards in many ways.  Not to offend anyone, but politics and religion aside, should this Professional Association be supporting something controversial like this?  What does this say about C.A.R.?

What's next? 

Find the Loan Program of your dreams

- Just add this Adorable Urinal Mint!

 

(sold in cases of 144 only) 

I know - That's Gross!

Point made.

 

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Friday Humor

One of my favorite Real Estate Jokes from days gone by.

A mortgage company was staffing up, crunched for time, and HR director devised a "one-minute interview" for prospective employees. The first candidate was an accountant, and the head of HR asked, "What is one plus one?" The accountant says, "Well, if you are talking about the value of one in the current year, and the second value of one also being in the same calendar year, then the answer would be two." The HR chief says, "Well done, we'll get back to you."

The second candidate is an underwriter, and when asked the same question replies, "I am assuming that this is similar to other numbers, and therefore based on common methods of evaluating the equation the answer would be two." The head of HR says, "Well done, we'll get back to you."

The third candidate is an appraiser, and HR asks, "What is one plus one?"

The appraiser replies, "What number did you have in mind?"

"You're hired."

Like I said,

From days gone by!

Have a great Friday!

Mike "Always used an independent 3rd party appraiser" Mueller