Product Description

Over the last two years, the United States has observed, with some horror, the explosion and collapse of entire segments of the housing market, especially those driven by subprime and alternative or "exotic" home mortgage lending. The unfortunately timely Foreclosed explains the rise of high-risk lending and why these newer types of loans-and their associated regulatory infrastructure-failed in substantial ways. Dan Immergluck narrates the boom in subprime and exotic loans, recounting how financial innovations and deregulation facilitated excessive risk-taking, and how these loans have harmed different populations and communities.

Immergluck, who has been working, researching, and writing on issues tied to housing finance and neighborhood change for almost twenty years, has an intimate knowledge of the promotion of homeownership and the history of mortgages in the United States. The changes to the mortgage market over the past fifteen years-including the securitization of mortgages and the failure of regulators to maintain control over a much riskier array of mortgage products led, he finds, inexorably to the current crisis.

After describing the development of generally stable and risk-limiting mortgage markets throughout much of the twentieth century, Foreclosed details how federal policy-makers failed to regulate the new high-risk lending markets that arose in the late 1990s and early 2000s. The book also examines federal, state, and local efforts to deal with the mortgage and foreclosure crisis of 2007 and 2008. Immergluck draws upon his wealth of experience to provide an overarching set of principles and a detailed set of policy recommendations for "righting the ship" of U.S. housing finance in ways that will promote affordable yet sustainable homeownership as an option for a broad set of households and communities.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #128254 in Books
• Published on: 2009-06
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 251 pages

From the Back Cover
"Foreclosed is a must-read for anyone who wants to understand how the mortgage market really works and the sources of the current mortgage market meltdown."--Susan M. Wachter, Richard B. Worley Professor of Financial Management, Professor of Real Estate and Finance, and Co-Director, Institute for Urban Research, The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania

"Foreclosed will elicit a chorus of thank-yous to Dan Immergluck. In this clear and compelling analysis, the roots of the subprime crisis are untangled with precision and sophistication. This timely effort is sure to become a key resource to those who wonder what happened and why, and what needs to be done to prevent future catastrophes."--Rachel Bratt, Tufts University

"Foreclosed is a well-documented and engaging account of how the United States built and then, by dismantling safeguards and ignoring the consequences of unbridled complexity, destroyed one of the world's most effective and democratic housing systems. The Obama administration should carefully consider Dan Immergluck's suggestions for getting that system back on track and for bringing back the neighborhoods destroyed by misguided policies and practices of the past several decades."--Ellen Seidman, Senior Fellow in the Asset Building Program of the New America Foundation

"Foreclosed is accessible, comprehensive, informative, and insightful. It provides a critical but balanced analysis of the current mortgage crisis, its origins, consequences, and solutions. It is very well written and will appeal to a broad audience including policymakers, policy analysts, bankers, and lawyers. Dan Immergluck's recommendations couldn't be more timely."--Alex Schwartz, Milano The New School for Management, author of Housing Policy in the United State

About the Author
Dan Immergluck is Associate Professor of City and Regional Planning at Georgia Institute of Technology. He is the author most recently of Credit to the Community: Community Reinvestment and Fair Lending Policy in the U.S. Immergluck has testified before the U.S. Congress, the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, federal agencies, and state and local legislative bodies.

Customer Reviews

Sound mortgage markets require a mixed-economy approach
"Foreclosed" is on the ROROTOKO list of cutting-edge intellectual nonfiction. Professor Immergluck's book interview ran here as cover feature on June 24, 2009.

Anatomy of Today's Housing and Mortgage Crisis
This book confirms what most people within the housing industry already knew, that Dan Immergluck is perhaps the preeminent authority on all things related to the most recent crises currently plaguing the housing industry. The author lends a lot of credibility on the subject matter, given that he has been researching the effects of foreclosed properties for several years now and is not simply an example of the researcher who latches on to the most recent "flavor of the day". Given that the current foreclosure tsunami within the U.S. is nearing the three year mark, I would encourage all potential readers to make room within your summer reading list for this book.

As is typical with much of his earlier work on credit and the lending industry, Dan Immergluck takes a forensic approach of examining how we have gotten to where we are today. As a result, the reader is treated to a thorough historical examination of the banking system and all of those responsible for overseeing its development over the past few decades. Despite his notable dispassionate and evenhanded approach to presenting the material within the book, Immergluck's reporting will surely leave you outraged as to government's and industry's culpability in allowing unprepared first-time homeowners to enter such a vulnerable financial situation. For all those who feel that foreclosure is something that affects "the other guy", Immergluck's book serves as a sobering reminder that the foreclosure down the street has potentially far-reaching implications for even those who are responsible in their homeownership and mortgage situation. This fact alone should cause you to be concerned enough to read this book, for despite its disturbing message on the state of the current American housing market you cannot help but read further.

Andy Carswell, Ph.D.
Department of Housing & Consumer Economics
University of Georgia

Finally Making the Complex Story Comprehensible
Many things in life are so complex that they are never understood, or the very process of explaining them leaves us even more confused. The recent crisis in the residential mortgage market is a leading example of this. An individual residential mortgage can have features that most persons never understand (graduated payment adjustable rate mortgages with negative amortization??). When the layers of the seconday mortgage market with multiple tranches and derivatives are added, and then over 100 different forms of foreclosure laws are used, it is no wonder that most simply shake their heads and give up.
Dan Immergluck's "Foreclosed" is one of the most brilliant and powerful descriptions of the mortgage market to appear. It takes the entire mortgage industry and makes it clear and simple, without making it simplistic. If the industry, and the federal regulators, could have read this book we would not be facing the crisis of today.

Frank S. Alexander
Professor of Law
Emory University School of Law