On the conference call, Angelo Mozillo the CEO of Countrywide when asked what is going to need to happen before the market turns around and what are the reasons its so soft – he just said “no one saw this coming”. On the soft real estate market that he predicts will be the case until 2009. Nobody saw it coming?? Talk about hyperbole.
Some of the things Angelo is saying on the call–
“stretch themselves to get into a home, high desire to get a home”
“the mortgage product was developed to get the people into the homes, also known as exotic”
“traditional underwriting standards were altered to use more technology and more credit scoring as a judgmental factor in whether a loan could qualify or not as opposed to traditional documentation”
“i say 2009, it takes a long time to turn a battleship around, this is a huge battleship, first it needs to slow down, then stop, then turn, based on what ive seen in the past its going to take to 2008 to slow down 2009 to head in other direction, by that time reduced competition and pent up demand will….”
