By Tracey Kaplan and Maria J. Ávila López
Two weeks before their Sunnyvale home was to be auctioned off on the courthouse steps, Sonia Leverman and her sons seized on a desperate David-vs.-Goliath strategy: They sued their lender.
Everything else the Levermans tried had already failed. By turning to the courts, they joined a fast-growing number of fearful and frustrated California home- owners who hope litigation will allow them to hold onto the American dream — maybe at a lower monthly mortgage cost, maybe just for a while longer until the inevitable foreclosure.
In the last five years, the number of foreclosure lawsuits filed in federal court in California has ballooned — like an exploding adjustable-rate mortgage — from only 29 statewide in 2005 to nearly 1,400 last year.
Many such lawsuits also are filed in state courts, which don't track the numbers or the outcomes.
The striking increase in suits against lenders reflects the difficulty many with underwater mortgages are having in getting loan modifications, either through the government program or the banks themselves...
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Better to Wait Until Home Buyer Tax Credit Expires?
By Emily Friedlander
The home builders and Realtors are jazzed for the home buyer tax credit’s remaining weeks. It’s tempting for home buyers to get caught up in the hype. But perhaps you’re better off waiting?
In case you missed the news, the federal government will give you money if you buy a house–$8,000 for first-time buyers and up to $6,500 for current homeowners within certain price and income limits. The benefit covers buyers who enter into contracts before April 30 and close by June 30.
Over at Zillow’s Blog, they’re debating a Denver reader’s question: “It it better to buy now or wait until the credit expires?” He explains that competition is heated in his price range of below $150,000 in Denver and wonders if that will ebb after April.
Answers are mixed. One commenter says that prices will fall after the credit expires: “I’ve seen prices in my neighborhood jump up over $30k since the credit started,” he writes. Indeed, some analysts have argued that the benefit of the tax credit has been priced into the market and that by stimulating demand, home sellers have been able to hold off on steeper price cuts. When the credit expires, the thinking goes, home prices could fall a bit to compensate...