The residential mortgage market has been reeling lately, suffering blow after blow over the past five years as a product of one of the largest real estate bubbles in American history popping dramatically in 2006-2007. Now, as 2012 approaches, many players in the real estate industry are gauging the strength of the residential mortgage market and assessing its chances for growth – or further decline – for the next year.
Suffice to say, the current state of the market is weak. Nearly a third of all homes in the United States today are underwater, or owe more on their homes than they are currently worth. This is a problem because negative equity often leads to delinquent payments, then defaults, then foreclosure. In addition, foreclosure rates are still high. Num
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The Verdict: Overall, the Platinum Visa card from Visions has a number of advantages. The card offers a generous credit limit, rewards points and an APR as low as 8.00%. Even though the annual fee is only $14 this is still a major drawback for the credit card. There are dozens of rewards cards from credit unions and banks alike that offer the same benefits at no yearly cost to the cardholder. For this reason alone it is difficult to recommend this credit card to consumers.
Overview: Visions Federal Credit Union offers four basic credit cards to members, including the Platinum Visa card. This card offers rewards points through ScoreCard that may be redeemed for merchandise or travel, along with a credit limit up to $30,000. Although it provides free travel insurance for cardholders, there are a few downsides to this card that make it a poor choice for some members.
How These Cards Work: The Platinum Visa card from Visions is accepted worldwide.
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If you are a homeowner who had mortgage debt forgiven either in full or in part during the 2007 to 2012 tax years then you may benefit from the IRS Mortgage Forgiveness Debt Relief Act 2007.
This debt relief act means that some homeowners could be in a better situation than they expect,but recent surveys indicate that many homeowners are unaware of this.
The IRS website says,
Normally, debt forgiveness results in taxable income. However, under the Mortgage Forgiveness Debt Relief Act of 2007, you may be able to exclude up to $2 million of debt forgiven on your principal residence.
If a married individual files separately will face a $1 million limit. Debt which is considered excusable includes debt which has been reduced thanks to mortgage restructuring, or those which have been forgiven due to foreclosure. The debt only qualifies if it relates to buying, building or making dramatic improvements to your primary residence.
In addition, the debt must have been secured on the home originally.
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Unemployment and underemployment are down and payrolls are up, according to the latest report from the U.S. Department of Labor. Unemployment dropped .1% to 9.0% for the month; however, the number of unemployed hasnt strayed more than two percentage points from this level in seven months. Despite improvement, the numbers are not as high as predicted and are still far too low considering population growth. While private-sector payrolls are up construction and government payrolls saw an overall decline, which does not bolster predictions of economic recovery. For more on this continue reading the following article from Tim Iacono.
The Labor Department reported that nonfarm payrolls increased by 80,000 in October after an upwardly revised gain of 104,000 in August and 158,000 in September as the jobless rate fell from 9.1 percent to 9.0 percent.
While the October payrolls gain came in slightly below consensus estimates, total upward revisions of 102,000 for the prior two months helped to offset this disappointment, however, the U.S.
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What went wrong at MF Global?: I had never heard of MF Global, the derivatives broker that filed for bankruptcy over the past weekend before but here is a very good explanation of what went wrong with risk management at the firm.
Replacing bonds with dividend payers: With bond yields much lower than the dividend yield on many stocks, many investors are wondering whether they should replace bonds with dividend payers. Responding to a reader question, Money magazine’s Walter Updegrave explains why it is dangerous to think dividend payers and bonds are interchangeable.
Great guy but broke: The New York Jets’ backup quarterback Mark Brunell becomes another sportsman who went broke. This news article says that Mr. Brunell invested millions in investments in businesses that later went bankrupt. Just like the rest of us, Mr. Brunell would have been much better off if he had paid some attention to investing sensibly.
New ownership for Canadian MoneySaver: The Globe’s Rob Carrick reported that Canadian MoneySaver has a surprising new owner. In hi
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— Thomas Potts @ 7:44 am — 
December 4, 2011