TigerHawk

TigerHawk (ti*ger*hawk): n. 1. The title of this blog and the nom de plume of its founding blogger; 2. A deep bow to the Princeton Tigers and the Iowa Hawkeyes; 3. The nickname for Iowa's Hawkeye logo. Posts include thoughts of the day on international affairs, politics, things that strike us as hilarious and personal observations. The opinions we express are our own, and not those of each other, our employers, our relatives, our dead ancestors, or unrelated people of similar ethnicity.

Tuesday, January 29, 2008

Taking redlining to a whole new level

By Charlottesvillain at 1/29/2008 09:57:00 AM

Back in the day before anyone with a pulse could qualify for a mortgage loan well beyond their means, banks and mortgage originators were sometimes accused of redlining, the practice of drawing lines around certain neighborhoods, usually of certain ethnic and/or socioeconomic status, where they would not lend. To combat this practice, Congress railed against the banks and ultimately enacted the Community Reinvestment Act, the purpose of which was to encourage lending in these neighhborhoods.

Today, Calculated Risk has linked to a very interesting document created by Countrywide Funding, the nations largest mortgage loan originator. The Soft Market County Index assigns all the counties in the US a score ranging from 1 to 5, with 5 representing the worst markets. Exactly how this will be used in the mortgage underwriting process is not clear, but presumably riskier neighborhoods will require more stringent underwriting. (Of course if Countrywide had followed such practices all along, perhaps we might have avoided some of the Real Homes of Genius).

How's your county holding up?

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5 Comments:

By Jeff, at Tue Jan 29, 11:05:00 AM:

Upstate NY in its entirety: 1

You have to sink down to the Southern Tier (Binghamton Area) to hit any 2s.

I suppose that's good news for our area.

By GreenmanTim, at Tue Jan 29, 11:49:00 AM:

Neither win, place or show, for though CT has 8 counties, the assessment only accounts for 6. Who's missing? The two remaining rural counties at the shoulders, Windam and Litchfield. Appalling myopia on the part of the insurers, for Litchfield, at least, is Eden itself.

By David M, at Tue Jan 29, 12:38:00 PM:

The Thunder Run has linked to this post in the - Web Reconnaissance for 01/29/2008 A short recon of what’s out there that might draw your attention, updated throughout the day...so check back often.

By Assistant Village Idiot, at Tue Jan 29, 04:04:00 PM:

GMT - Almost all of NH's counties are missing. Perhaps the list is only where Countrywide has offices or does a certain amount of business.

By Chris, at Wed Jan 30, 03:55:00 PM:

Mine in IL is also missing. We're home free!