KeNo's Housing and Economic Portal: Saturday November 27 Housing and Economic stories

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Comedian-Wrestler Couple Keep Florida Home for Free in a Foreclosure Limbo - (www.bloomberg.com) Comedian Lynn Moore and her husband, retired pro wrestler “Cougar Jay,” were on the verge of losing their St. Augustine, Florida, home when PNC Financial Services Group Inc.’s foreclosure hearing was canceled last month. Moore, who runs a comedy club under the stage name Jackie Knight, and her husband, whose real name is Dion, last made a mortgage payment in mid-2009. She said they need to stay put until at least January, when Dion, 50, expects to receive a federal education grant they can use to rent a new home. They are among the hundreds of thousands of Americans who dwell in the limbo between homeownership and eviction as banks and courts sort through foreclosure cases. Questions over the legitimacy of mortgage documents used by banks such as Wells Fargo & Co. and Bank of America Corp. have triggered litigation nationwide. As a result, foreclosure proceedings have been delayed, buying time for homeowners in default.

Was Ireland Just Given A 24-Hour Ultimatum To Accept A Bailout? - (www.businessinsider.com) Set the clocks! According to The Guardian, Ireland has been given a 24 hour ultimatum: An increasingly isolated Irish government was coming under mounting pressure tonight to seek a European or International Monetary Fund bailout within 24 hours amid fears that contagion from its crippled banking sector might spread through the weaker eurozone countries. Portugal, Spain, the European Central Bank and opposition parties all urged Brian Cowen's coalition government to remove the threat of a second crisis in six months by putting a firewall between Ireland and its partners in the 16-nation single currency. It's a little unclear where the 24 hour number comes from though. Later in the article it says this. Ireland's opposition's finance spokesman, Michael Noonan, said he believed European intervention was "under way" and matters would come to a head within 24 hours. The government, he said, was "fighting a rearguard action for appearances purposes".'

Ireland in Talks With EU as Merkel Pushes for Bailout - (www.bloomberg.com) Ireland is in talks with European officials about current “market conditions” as Germany pushes it to accept a bailout and help reverse a bond sell-off among the euro-region’s deficit-laden nations. “Ongoing contacts continue at official level with international colleagues in light of current market conditions,” a Finance Ministry spokesman said in an email late yesterday. “Ireland has made no application for external support” and the government is “fully funded till well into 2011,” the spokesman said. The confirmation of talks comes as euro-region finance ministers prepare to meet in Brussels tomorrow. Allaying investor concerns about Irish finances would help advance Chancellor Angela Merkel’s plan to require investors to help pay for future rescues, a German government official said.European leaders remain divided on Merkel’s proposal, the timing of a bailout for Ireland and whether the European Central Bank should keep buying bonds of debt-laden countries.

California’s Budget Gap Looms Over Revenue Notes: Muni Credit- (www.bloomberg.com) California is selling $10 billion of one-year notes to boost cash on hand, as the state that produces 13 percent of the U.S. gross domestic product tries to assure investors it can repay the loan amid a $25 billion budget gap. Investors are being offered $2 billion of notes maturing in May at tentative yields of 1 percent to 1.25 percent, according to two people familiar with the offering. That’s about 0.58 to 0.83 percentage point more than top-rated one-year municipal bonds as of Nov. 12, according to Municipal Market Advisors data. The $8 billion of notes maturing in June are quoted at 1.25 percent to 1.5 percent, or about 0.83 to 1.08 percentage points more than top-rated notes. The issue comes after the state’s Legislative Analyst’s Office said California’s deficit may exceed $25 billion in the next 19 months, including $6.1 billion in the fiscal year that ends in June. Treasurer Bill Lockyer also is selling $3.75 billion of long-term obligations starting later this week. “If you are full on California then don’t add fuel to the fire,” said Marilyn Cohen, chief executive officer of Envision Capital Management in Los Angeles, who manages $250 million in fixed-income assets. “If you hardly have any California exposure and you’ve got money sitting in money markets, then you better make sure it’s worth your while because the news headlines are going to continue to go from bad to terminal.”

Europe stumbles blindly towards its 1931 moment - (www.telegraph.co.uk) It is the European Central Bank that should be printing money on a mass scale to purchase government debt, not the US Federal Reserve. Unless the ECB takes fast and dramatic action, it risks destroying the currency it is paid to manage, and allowing a political catastrophe to unfold in Europe. If mishandled, Ireland could all too easily become a sovereign version of Credit Anstalt - the Austrian bank that brought down the central European financial system in 1931, sent tremors through London and New York, and set off the second deeper phase of the Great Depression, the phase when politics turned ugly. “Does the ECB understand the concept of contagion?” asked Jacques Cailloux, chief Europe economist at RBS. Three EMU countries have already been shut out of the capital markets, and footloose foreign creditors hold €2 trillion of debt securities issued by Spain, Portugal, Ireland, and Greece?