News

2011

October

07
  • Conquering with complaints. Consumers today are more empowered than ever after they've been wronged by a company. That's because squeaky wheels have more and better ways to squeak. Effective complaining is a learned skill, whether it involves a
06
  • Freddie and Fannie reject debt relief. Home values have fallen so much in Arizona that almost half the people with mortgages there owe more than their homes are worth. So when federal money became available to help stem the tide of
05
04
  • Wall Street protesters hope to plant seeds. New York’s budding anti-capitalism protest movement began last month with a vague sense of grievance over the widening gap between the rich and poor in America. But in three weeks, it has provided fuel
  • Fannie Mae knew early of foreclosure abuses. Fannie Mae the mortgage finance giant, learned as early as 2003 of extensive foreclosure abuses among the law firms it had hired to remove troubled borrowers from their homes. But the company did little to correct

September

28
  • GM's OnStar reverses course on tracking. General Motors' OnStar division announced Tuesday that it has changed course and decided not to collect driving data from customers who have canceled their OnStar subscriptions. OnStar provides a variety of services, including vehicle diagnostics,
  • Health insurance costs shifted to workers. Premiums for employer-sponsored health insurance continued to escalate this year even as the share of workers getting less generous coverage reached a new high, according to survey data released Tuesday. In 2011, for the first time,
27
  • Freddie Mac loan deal defective, report says. Freddie Mac used a flawed analysis when it accepted $1.35 billion from Bank of America to settle claims that the bank misled it about loans purchased during the mortgage boom, according to an oversight report scheduled
22
  • Young adults gain health insurance. Nearly 1 million more young adults have obtained health insurance since the 2010 health-care law began requiring insurers to let adult children stay on their parents’ plans until age 26, according to government data released Wednesday. The jump
19
  • What to do when a layoff occurs. No one likes to think about being laid off, but in today's shaky economy it can happen to employees even in fields that once seemed secure. If the bad news does come your way, resist
15
  • Foreclosures surge in hardest-hit markets. Significantly more properties entered the foreclosure process during August in the nation's hardest-hit markets, including battered parts of inland California and other areas in the West, as Bank of America Corp. stepped up its activity
  • Tight standards make mortgages tough to get. Home buyers such as Bob and Janet Zych have fueled the U.S. housing market for decades. They have excellent credit with scores that top 800, life-long careers and investment portfolios that have set them up
13
  • Student loan default rates jump. The number of borrowers defaulting on federal student loans has jumped sharply, the latest indication that rising college tuition costs, low graduation rates and poor job prospects are getting more and more students over their
  • Reverse mortgages don't always work. Trusted celebrity pitchmen such as Henry Winkler, Robert Wagner and James Garner do a good job telling older homeowners about the benefits of a reverse mortgage. Here's what they don't tell seniors: Reverse mortgages are
  • College graduates driving increase in bankruptcy. College graduates are the fastest-growing group of consumers who have filed for bankruptcy protection in the past five years, according to a new study by a financial nonprofit, which underscores the broad reach of the
08
  • Social Security pays millions to dead people. While many Americans worry that the Social Security Administration won't have enough money left to pay their benefits when they retire, the agency is doling out millions of dollars to people who aren't even alive.
  • Healthcare costs rose while insurance coverage fell. U.S. workers whose wages stagnated over the last decade also saw their health insurance degrade, even as medical costs gobbled up a growing share of their income, two new studies show. An estimated 29 million
06
  • Consumer protection nominee promises cooperation. President Barack Obama's nominee to head the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is promising to be accountable to Congress and is playing down the lawsuits his agency will be able to file against banks and
 

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