MORTGAGE

Resale home prices rose to a record high in July, their eighth consecutive monthly gain, according to report on Wednesday that an analyst said signaled a gradual slowdown in a strong market.

Applications for U.S. home mortgages rose last week, reflecting a jump in demand for home loan refinancing as mortgage rates dropped, an industry group said on Wednesday.

Home prices in the 20-city Case Shiller Index rose for the fourth straight month in July, but the operative phrase remains: let the buyer beware. Demand conditions in most major U.S. cities remains soft, and even though home prices are attractive now, price retrenchments are possible.

European government officials and financial institutions are starting to make dramatic steps needed to manage their way through a debt crisis that threatens to drag the world economy into recession.

Sales and prices of new single-family U.S. homes fell in August despite historically low mortgage rates, underscoring the difficulties policymakers face in efforts to boost the moribund housing sector.

President Barack Obama is facing mounting resistance to a settlement from liberal supporters and a growing number of state attorneys general who say a deal would exonerate banks for their role in the subprime mortgage crisis.

A millionaire developer who lived in the same central Florida neighborhood as Tiger Woods was convicted Saturday of murdering his wife in their mansion.

Bank of America Corp is in talks to sell its correspondent mortgage lending unit to a division of Fortress Investment Group LLC, the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday.

With European banks tanking and the U.S. growth rate grinding to a halt, how does the average investor protect his assets? By being focused.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) is on track to record a weekly decline of more than 800 points -- its worst weekly swoon in two years. But the important question for the typical investor is, 'Where's the Dow likely to head in the next six months?'

Two significant speeches from senior Reserve Bank officials in the past day or so have added to the arguments and view the central bank has about the current state and direction of the Australian economy, which appeared in this week's minutes of the September 6 RBA board meeting.

FBR Capital Markets anticipates that Congress will be unable to pass legislation to lower the loan limits below $625,500 until at least 2013, and expects that it could be even longer.

UBS CEO Oswald Gruebel will ask the board of the Swiss financial giant to back his leadership and keep its investment bank after a $2.3 billion loss blamed on a rogue trader piled pressure on him to scale back or even split off the division.

UBS CEO Oswald Gruebel will stress to the board of directors that he wants the investment bank to remain part of Swiss bank's "integrated banking model" in meetings on Thursday and Friday, sources said, after rogue trading cost the bank $2.3 billion.

A federal appeals court revived a lawsuit by homeowners who accused eight major homebuilders of causing them to overpay for their homes by marketing nearby houses to high-risk borrowers who later went into foreclosure.

The U.S. Federal Reserve Wednesday announced it will sell $400 billion worth of short-maturity bonds and reinvest in bonds with maturities of 6 to 30 years by the end of June 2012, in a program commonly referred to as Operation Twist.

A federal appeals court revived on Wednesday a lawsuit by homeowners who accused several major U.S. homebuilders of causing them harm by marketing neighboring homes to people at high risk of foreclosure.

The Federal Reserve on Wednesday looks set to launch a fresh effort to invigorate the faltering U.S. recovery, embarking on what could be the first in a series of incremental steps to foster stronger growth.

The stock price has been languishing for more than two years -- shares have lost almost half their value year-to-date.

The new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau will release a final rule early next year requiring lenders to make sure prospective borrowers have the ability to repay their mortgages, the acting head of the agency said on Tuesday.

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the country's two largest mortgage finance providers, are expected to gradually increase the fees they charge lenders in the next year, their federal regulator said on Monday.