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Free
Speech Victory for Real Estate Websites
In a legal victory for
online free speech, Magistrate Judge James R. Muirhead of
the U.S. District Court for the District of New Hampshire
ruled yesterday that real estate advertising company ZeroBrokerFees.com
may do business online without having to first secure a
real estate broker’s license. More
Existing
Home Sales Plunged Last Month
Sales of existing homes
plunged in March by the largest amount in nearly two decades,
reflecting bad weather and increasing problems in the subprime
mortgage market, a real estate trade group reported Tuesday.
More
Ailing
subprime lender shuts mortgage unit
New Century Financial
Corp., the biggest subprime mortgage company to declare
bankruptcy, will close its home-lending unit and fire about
2,000 employees after failing to find a buyer. More
Federal
Court Orders New Hampshire Real Estate Commission to Stand
Trial For Restrictions On Advertising Websites
Magistrate Judge James
R. Muirhead of the U.S. District Court for the District
of New Hampshire—in a decision issued yesterday [March
13, 2007] but publicly released today—denied the New
Hampshire Real Estate Commission ‘s efforts to avoid
a constitutional challenge to the state’s real estate
broker licensing scheme. More
Real
Estate Groups Settle FTC Complaint - Associations to Stop
Blocking Rivals' Listings
The Federal Trade Commission
yesterday said groups representing thousands of real estate
agents in five states have agreed to drop practices that
hampered rival discount brokers from posting home-sale listings
on Internet sites. More
Exploring
the Web-sale option
The pre-Web world offered home sellers two options: Sell
through a real estate agent and pay a commission or go the
do-it-yourself route with a for-sale sign stuck in the front
lawn and maybe an ad in the local paper. More
ZeroBrokerFees
founder sues state of New Hampshire
Massachusetts Web site that lists
homes for sale is suing the state of New Hampshire over
that state's rules restricting home sales advertisements
to licensed brokers and newspapers, the Associated Press
reported. More
ZeroBrokerFees.com
files lawsuit Suit: Regulators may want Site to Obtain Realtor
license
A Massachusetts company that advertises
property for sale online is challenging New Hampshire's
real estate laws. The owners of ZeroBrokerFees.com of Beverly,
Mass., say websites that help people sell their homes online
without a Realtor shouldn't have to get a real estate license
to do so. More
Open
house market - The Internet is creating do-it-yourself home
buyers, but agents find it useful too.
Finding the perfect Braintree
home to accommodate three children, his wife, and his mother-in-law
has been a challenge for Mark Riley. But searching for the
house has been a breeze thanks to a proliferation of Internet
tools that have freed buyers from total dependence on real
estate agents. More
If real estate is prospering, chances are your agent isn't
It is hard to think of
many occupations that garner less good will these days than
the real estate agent. A great many of these agents and
brokers, more than 1.2 million, belong to the National Association
of Realtors, which the Department of Justice accused in
a recent lawsuit of behaving like a cross between a cartel
and a mafia, hoarding access to home-sale databases and
harassing competitors who dared to offer discounted commissions.
More
Lender Would Pay $12m In Mass.
Massachusetts customers
of Ameriquest Mortgage Co. would receive $12.2 million under
a nationwide settlement after charges that the mortgage
company had collected excessive fees and interest rates
on improper loans that homeowners often could not afford
to repay, a state official said yesterday. More
HUD and FDIC Settle Case Against New England Mortgage Company For Accepting Kickbacks For Business Referrals
East-West Mortgage Co.
received kickbacks from closing attorneys, appraisers, title
companies.
WASHINGTON – The
Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Federal
Deposit Insurance Corporation today announced a $150,000
settlement with one of the largest mortgage companies in
New England for violations of the Real Estate Settlement
Procedures Act (RESPA). More
Buyers
get choosy......when the selling gets tough
Robert and Juliet Pyles recently bought their first home
in East Boston. The three-family house was on the market
for $570,000, but they paid $540,000, a sure sign for them
that the Boston real estate market has shifted to favor
buyers.
More
Real
Estate Services For Sale By Owner
High demand in Washington's
housing market is encouraging some sellers to do without
the services of a real estate agent. The 6 percent fee typically
charged by an agent can add up to $30,000 on homes with
average selling prices of a half-million dollars, a price
commonly found for houses in the Virginia and Maryland suburbs.
More
Feds
probe real estate agents
Did you pay your real
estate broker too much? The U.S. Department of Justice may
be set to turn Tulsa, Okla. into a test-case for ending
the stranglehold 6 percent commissions have over the real
estate brokerage business.
More
Appraisal
Fraud: Your Home at Risk
Appraisers say they're
being pressured by lenders to inflate their estimates of
home values.
Anyone who's ever bought
or refinanced a home knows the sense of relief when the
appraisal comes in with high marks. The appraisal tells
bankers, brokers and, ultimately, investors whether a house
is a sound investment. More
Tougher
mortgage regs due?
Report: Fed banking regulators
consider guidelines that may limit the number of risky mortgages.
Federal banking regulators are weighing new guidelines for
mortgage lenders due to growing concern about risks in the
mortgage market, according to a published report. More
US
Studies Realtors' Rule on Net Listings
Some industry practices possibly anticompetitive
At a time when Massachusetts
real estate brokers face growing competition on the Internet,
the federal government is investigating whether the brokerage
industry is trying to restrict competition nationwide.
As part of a multipronged effort to promote the interests
of home buyers and sellers, the Department of Justice confirmed
yesterday that it is looking into unspecified industry practices.
The Wall Street Journal reported the government is preparing
to sue the National Association of Realtors for policies
that ''illegally restrict discounting of sales commissions"
in home purchases and sales. More
Spiraling
housing costs hurting Americans
The American dream of
having a job and owning a tidy home is becoming a fantasy
for more people. Housing prices are outstripping wage increases
in many areas, meaning more people are either spending above
their means or living in dilapidated conditions, according
to a pair of studies being released Friday by the Center
for Housing Policy, a coalition pushing for more affordable
housing. More
Voice
of East/West Poised to Move On
East/West
Mortgage founder John F. Gallagher says he has given up
on a quest to regain control of the company from Commerce
Bank & Trust and now looks forward to a settlement for
the remaining value of his contract as a top executive.
More
Former East-West
Employee Files Lawsuit
A former employee of East-West Mortgage founder John F.
Gallagher is looking for a piece of the fired executive's
claim against Commerce Bank of Worcester, which owns the
$2.4 billion mortgage company headquartered on the North
Shore. More
East-West Paying Out $800,000 to Consumers
Reimbursements Follow Violations Cited by Regulators; Division
of Banks’ Cease-and-Desist Order Still in Effect
Despite the upbeat East-West Mortgage radio commercials,
the behind-the-scenes picture at the lending company and
its parent, Worcester-based Commerce Bank & Trust Co.,
is less rosy, and now customers are being compensated for
the companies’ mistakes. More
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