SDB Club Benchmark Real Estate

The European Central Bank held interest rates at a record low today as renewed financial-market tensions complicate its exit from crisis mode. The ECB‘s Governing Council meeting in Frankfurt set the benchmark lending rate at 1 percent for an 18th month, as predicted by all 52 economists in a Bloomberg News survey. President Jean-Claude Trichet [...]

Mortgage interest rates hit their lowest level for a year. A 30-year fixed rate mortgage could be had for as little as 4.84 percent, plus closing costs, providing you have great credit and enough cash for closing costs, reserves and a 20 percent down payment. That’s low Interest rates haven’t been this low since December, [...]

Here we go again another government attempt to stop foreclosure. With government initiated loan modification programs failing to put a stop to the foreclosure crisis. Ben S. Bernanke, Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, told congressional leaders in a letter yesterday that the Fed will seek to renegotiate mortgages it [...]

Shrugging off investors fears of a double-dip recession and punishing deflation, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke predicted that a moderate U.S. economic expansion is likely to continue despite numerous threats to growth. Testifying before the Senate Banking Committee, Bernanke acknowledged that European debt problems are slowing U.S. growth, as is the protracted slump in the [...]

Interest rates are the costs for borrowing money. The calculation for an interest rate is a simple expression of interest payments as a percentage of principal. Benchmark interest rates are set by an entities like the Federal Reserve, government, or a bank and are used to peg other consumer and commercial interest rates. These interest [...]

The euro rose against the yen and dollar in Asia Tuesday as rallying regional equities prompted short-term investors to scoop up the risk-sensitive common currency, though lingering concern over European debt woes will likely limit further rises, dealers said. The respite in the euro’s recent falls came as Asian bourses strengthened, bucking expectations for weakness [...]

The “flight to quality” continued yesterday (Wednesday) as investors pushed up the price of Treasuries on fears the U.S. Federal Reserve’s drastic rate cut means the economy’s woes are far from over. But while Treasury prices hit record highs, concerns surfaced among analysts about how much farther the rally can go considering the implied message [...]