To Our Clients, Colleagues and Friends,

How long does a bank have left to live after it receives a Prompt Corrective Action letter?  If you look at Los Padres Bank, they consented to a PCA letter on July 27th (they were told to raise capital), and they got seized this past Friday.  That was 24 days. [...]

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One aspect of mortgage banking that can sometimes confuse those on the origination side is what investors like, or don’t like, about a lien or mortgage. One basic question is, “Who wants to pay 102 or 104 (a 2 or 4 point premium) for a loan that pays off in 3 months?” It was reported [...]

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“An economist is an expert who will know tomorrow why the things he predicted yesterday didn’t happen today.” (Is that a great quote, or what?) At the start of the year, not only were the smartest guys in the room talking about how mortgage rates would go up when the Fed ended their $1.2 trillion [...]

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I am sending the commentary out from a Starbucks in Austin, TX (trying not to watch bleary-eyed UT sorority pledges stagger in and out), and the real estate market is pretty stable. But there are areas that are, shall we say, “more affordable”. See Detroit Property A and Detroit Propety B. 
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Doctors can be so frustrating. [...]

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