An erroneous interpretation of the word “subprime” would lead one to believe that a subprime mortgage is a loan issued at a rate beneath the prime interest rate. In fact, the term subprime refers to the creditworthiness of the borrower. A subprime borrower is defined as person with a tarnished or limited credit history; the credit issued to a risky borrower at a rate greater than the prime rate is termed a subprime loan.
If these loans are so risky why have they, up until recently, accounted for approximately 25% of mortgage originations in our country? We hope that the list of articles and government publications below help shed some light on subprime lending and its relation to our nation’s foreclosure crisis.
Recent articles and further reading on subprime loans:
All articles are available through CPL in both electronic and print format. For assistance accessing these articles online contact your nearest Cleveland Public Library.
Chomsisengphet, S., & Pennington-Cross, A. (2006). The Evolution of the Subprime Mortgage Market. Review. 88(1), 31-56. Retrieved on September 7, 2007, from http://snipurl.com/1qfcu?
Der Hovanesian, Mara. (2007). A mortgage mess spreads. Business Week. 39. Retrieved September 7, 2007 from http://snipurl.com/1qfdc
Fox, Justin. (2007). Subprime’s silver lining. Time. 169 (14), 53-54.
Mclean, Bethany. (2007). Where were the cops? Fortune. 156 (5), 53.
Timimraos, Nick. (2007). Behind the U.S. mortgage mess. Wall Street Journal Online. Retrieved September, 6, 2007, from http://snipurl.com/1qeiv
United States - Subprime lending - Live now, pay later. (2007). The Economist. 383(8523), 51.
Government publications:
Congressional Research Service. (2007). RL33930 - Subprime Mortgages: Primer on Current Lending and Foreclosure Issues. Retrieved September 6, 2007, from http://www.opencrs.com/document/RL33930/
United States. (2004). Subprime lending: defining the market and its customers : joint hearing before the Subcommittee on Housing and Community Opportunity and the Subcommittee on Financial Institutions and Consumer Credit of the Committee on Financial Services, U.S. House of Representatives, One Hundred Eighth Congress, second session, March 30, 2004. Washington: U.S. G.P.O. Retrieved September 6, 2007, from http://purl.access.gpo.gov/GPO/LPS54632
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What do the blue dots mean???
Dots on Foreclosed properties
Somebody please correct me if I am wrong--I was told that the City of Cleveland building department boards up foreclosures and uses different colored dots to denote the bank with the foreclosed mortgage. Correct?
BTW, this is a great application of Web 2.0. I look forward to the opportunity to post without anonymity :) lmcshane
dots
only one bank owns all of the foreclosed properties throughout cleveland?
dots
so only one bank owns all of the foreclosed properties?
BLUE DOTS
According to personnel in the City of Cleveland Building Department the color of the dots identifies the company that boarded up the property. It has nothing to do with mortgages at all.