Walk the line — or walk away [Northern California]

Walk the line — or walk away [Northern California]

Josefa Ramirez and her husband, Juan Carlos, both 43, spent 10 years moving in and out of San Francisco apartments before buying their two-bedroom, one-bath Antioch home in 2006 for $375,000.

“It took almost two years to raise our credit score,” she said, but finally they were approved for a loan. “We didn’t care if the house wasn’t big, we just wanted something warm.”

They promised their son, Juan Carlos, Jr., 9, as soon as they bought a house so they could have a dog, a Chow-mix stray now named Doris they adopted from a shelter. There’s also a contrary cat named Princess. Their daughter, Ana Kristina, 5, calls them both her sisters when she draws pictures of her family.

That meant paying $2,700 a month for their “fixer” which required a new roof, wiring and landscaping. Their loan adjusted in June to more than $3,200 a month. Ramirez, a hair stylist, said business has been slow and Juan Carlos was laid off from his construction job with a local contractor. Recent houses in their north Antioch neighborhood are now selling for around $150,000. They stopped paying in February.

A bank on life support [South Florida]

A bank on life support [South Florida]

First Priority Bank is certainly not the only local bank suffering from the popping of the real estate bubble and a meteoric rise in foreclosures.

But First Priority has been impacted far more than its Southwest Florida peers.

The bank reported $33.8 million in problem loans at the end of December — nearly 17 percent of its portfolio. It restated its fourth-quarter financial report, increasing losses from $7.4 million to $19 million and decreasing the bank’s all-important capital cushion from $25.9 million to $14.1 million.

IDC Publishing Inc., a Wisconsin-based financial analyst, gave First Priority its lowest rating of “1” in a year-end report. Banks with such a rating — on a scale of 1 to 300 — have the “highest probability of failure,” IDC says.

Not all real estate agents are suffering

Not all real estate agents are suffering

For many real estate agents, these aren’t exactly the best of times. Don’t put David McIlvaine in that category.

The suburban Baltimore broker just had his best first quarter ever. With his business tripling over the past year, McIlvaine recently had to hire another staffer and buy more file cabinets just to keep up with the crush of work.

What’s the secret to his success?

McIlvaine specializes in selling foreclosed properties. It’s one of the few booming sectors in a deeply troubled housing market.

What’s next for pension funds in the real estate fallout?

What’s next for pension funds in the real estate fallout?

A California bankruptcy sounds like a bad suspense novel, with themes of falling values, increased costs, missed payment deadlines and enormous acreage that adds scale to the horrifying tale.

But it’s the link to the nation’s largest pension fund that makes me wonder what the last chapter will hold – and how many other deals will fall while the story is playing out.

Specifically, I’m wondering: How many of Michigan’s pension funds are just as exposed, and which local properties could fall first?

The bankruptcy is LandSource Communities Development, which now holds claim to 15,000 acres near Los Angeles – now one of the largest land deals to “falter amid the national housing glut,” according to the Los Angeles Times.

Renaissance condo to assess owners

Renaissance condo to assess owners

Water intrusion has led to many lawsuits and a hefty assessment

Now, after a series of negotiations failed to produce a settlement, and with a trial date set but still a year away, the association is taking a different tack. It has voted to fix the leaks itself by hiring a waterproofing firm and a new contractor to do the work beginning next month.

“So far it hasn’t come to fruition to get them to do what’s necessary, so we are going to do it ourselves,” said John Hagerty, district manager for Sentry Management, which manages the Renaissance on behalf of the association.

The price tag? About $2.7 million.

Foreclosures take an emotional toll on many homeowners

Foreclosures take an emotional toll on many homeowners

On a brisk day last fall in Prineville, Ore., Raymond and Deanna Donaca faced the unthinkable: They were losing their home to foreclosure and had days to move out.

For more than two decades, the couple had lived in their three-level house, where the elms outside blazed with yellow shades of fall and their four golden retrievers slept in the yard. The town had always been home, with a lazy river and rolling hills dotted by gnarled juniper trees.

Yet just before lunch on Oct. 23, the Donacas closed all their home’s doors except the one to the garage and left their 1981 Cadillac Eldorado running. Toxic fumes filled the home. When sheriff’s deputies arrived at about 1 p.m., they found the body of Raymond, 71, on the second floor along with three dead dogs. The body of Deanna, 69, was in an upstairs bedroom, close to another dead retriever.

“It is believed that the Donacas committed suicide after attempts to save their home following a foreclosure notice left them believing they had few options,” the Crook County Sheriff’s Office said in a report.