Where Housing Will Be in 2012 – Home prices are likely to fall for the next year, then stabilize, with a rebound in 2012 as the overall economy takes off again -  By Peter Coy, Mara Der Hovanesian, Christopher Palmeri, Amy S. Choi and Tara Kalwarski – BusinessWeek

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Actually, Krugman Was A Huge Advocate Of The Housing Boom – Joe Weisenthal – All day Paul Krugman has been involved in a brouhaha over a 2002 column which seemed to be advocating a housing bubble to get us out of the recession. He says he wasn’t calling for a bubble, just that he was just explaining Alan Greenspan was trying to do.  Mark Thornton has gone through Krugman’s entire archives and undermined this defense. Many of Krugman’s own quotes from that era suggest that he was an aggressive advocate of low-low interest in order to bring the housing market to a broil, thus bringing us out of the recession. – thanks to a friend – The Business Insider at Clusterstock

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Killing Condos – Daniel Indiviglio – If you think the market for houses is rough, you should see the condo market. The Wall Street Journal today says that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac aren’t helping matters: they’ve recently tightened their requirements to guarantee condo mortgages. As might be expected, some in Congress, including House Financial Services Chairman Barney Frank (D- MA), aren’t happy. But it’s a little unclear to me why Fannie and Freddie should listen to Congress, since guaranteeing condos poses greater risk to taxpayers’ wallets than single-family home mortgages.  – The Atlantic

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Mortgage bankers cut U.S. loan origination forecast – Bloomberg News – Mortgage originations in the U.S. may total $2.03 trillion this year, 27 percent less than earlier forecast, as rising interest rates reduce home refinancings, the Mortgage Bankers Association said. – LA Times