Bankruptcy judges won't get the power to rewrite the terms of mortgages on primary residences anytime soon, after a dozen Democrats joined Republicans in the Senate on Thursday and voted against tacking bankruptcy "cram down" legislation onto another housing bill.

These days, it is hard to find a person who has not been touched in some way by the foreclosure maelstrom that seems to feed off its own fuel as it swirls across the nation, turning homeowners into renters and leaving many homes vacant, neglected, abandoned, and in the worst cases grossly vandalized. Foreclosure-related filings on U.S. homes during the first three months of the year were up 9 percent from the previous quarter and 24 percent from a year ago, surpassing previous highs for the current downturn, data aggregator RealtyTrac said today. The 803,489 properties subject to some kind of foreclosure filing during the first quarter -- including default notices, auction sale notices and bank repossessions -- was a new record since RealtyTrac began reporting in January 2005.

Three battles are under way: Treasury borrowing vs. interest rates; slower economic decline vs. bottom; and banks vs. everybody else. Total Treasury new-cash borrowings this week and next: $171 billion, a tad high (the 2009 two-week average: $75 billion). The Fed on March 18 said it would buy $300 billion in Treasurys this year -- many thought in an effort to control Treasury interest rates, specifically holding the 10-year under 3 percent. Not so: the 10-year is trading at 3.16 percent today. By Lou Barnes, Friday, May 1, 2009. Inman News

April 24, 2009 WASHINGTON - After a staggering 74 percent decline from the peak in July 2005, new U.S. home sales appear to be bottoming out. The pace of home sales, which hit a record-low in January, jumped in February and was flat in March, the Commerce Department said Friday. At the same time, the inventory of new homes for sale dropped a badly needed 5 percent from February levels. “We believe that the bottom is at hand and that sales will begin turning in the second half of this year,” wrote IHS Global Insight economist Patrick Newport. “As previous recessions show, demand for new homes does not evaporate altogether, even in the hardest of times.” New home sales fell just 0.6 percent in March to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 356,000 from an upwardly revised February rate of 358,000. February’s results were adjusted upward by more than 6 percent. The report shows the slide in demand for new homes is ending after more than 40 months of decline, wrote David Resler, chief economist with Nomura Securities. “Sales and starts are at extremely low levels,” he wrote in a note to clients. “But, probably having bottomed, they have nowhere to go but up.” That’s not yet the case for prices. The median sales price fell to $201,400, a 12 percent drop from a year earlier. The median price is the midpoint, which means half of the homes sold for more and half for less. Prices are likely to remain weak for months as builders continue to clear out their stock of unsold homes. Sales varied dramatically around the country. The best performance was in the West, where sales rose more than 15 percent from February. The worst turnout was in the Northeast, where sales sank more than 32 percent. They were unchanged in the South, and down nearly 8 percent in the Midwest. Since the data measures signed contracts to buy new homes rather than completed sales, they probably got a boost from the new $8,000 tax credit for first-time buyers passed in mid-February. In addition, California offers a $10,000 state tax credit for buyers of new homes, and that’s likely boosting sales in that state. An index of builders’ confidence released earlier this month posted its biggest one-month jump in five years as many homebuyers seized on lower prices and incentives and took advantage of lower interest rates and tax credits. “There are some buyers beginning to come back into he market,” David Crowe, the trade association’s chief economist said Friday. Demand for new homes appears to be recovering faster than demand for previously occupied homes. In March, sales of existing homes fell 3 percent to an annual rate of 4.57 million from a downwardly revised pace of 4.71 homes in February, the National Association of Realtors said Thursday.

Most housing indexes track broad geographic areas, so Manhattan's ritzy Upper East Side might be lumped in with gritty neighborhoods in Newark, N.J. The Forbes Luxury Housing Index tracks sales prices in the 500 most expensive neighborhoods by ZIP code. Prices will be updated weekly as new transactions occur. Below, areas with the largest median price declines and gains in the last year. More > % change: -0.17%current price: $1,258,811 Source: Altos Research New Jersey Suburb's Prices Holding Up Bucolic Mendham, N.J., again leads this week's list of biggest gainers. Home Of The Week: Mendham Mansion This confident, traditional brick property rests on eight acres of wooded land just miles from New York City.Biggest Drops Place Price April 27, 2009 % Change From 2008 Mendham, NJ 07945 $1,260,507 9.84% Wellesley, MA 02482 $1,239,961 10.45% San Mateo, CA 94402 $1,191,307 10.52% Great Neck, NY 11021 $1,398,326 11.20% Pasadena, CA 91105 $1,386,923 11.47% Biggest Gainers Place Price April 27, 2009 % Change From 2008 Marina del Rey, CA 90292 $1,808,653 -31.70% Rumson, N.J. 07760 $1,340,953 -30.72% Dana Point, CA 92624 $1,025,146 -28.39% Los Angeles1, CA 90019 $583,723 -27.20% Sunnyvale, CA 94089 $427,149 -26.92%