bank executives scheduled to testify along a man leading a nationwide investigation into these problems. rich edson from the fox business network joins us live from d.c. now. rich, this has become a major issue. it has. investigators are still looking into the full extent of this. it could turn into a real legal mess. some analysts say the foreclosure scandal could end up costing banks billions. the national realtor s group has already blamed foreclosure problems for slower home sales. one senator is charging sloppy bureaucratic mismanagement and fraud. bank ebbsives and regulators will go through another hearing on capitol hill thursday when a house panel examines the scandal. shep? shepard: hitch rich head son. sales went up. double the increase. the largest jump since the month of march. it was due in part to a surge in car sales. if you take those out of the
effect the number of people under foreclosure. if you were getting kicked out of your house, you may stay a little longer. you may not. it s going to effect the number of people getting their homes foreclosed. it will slow the process down. not going to have a major impact on the economy. it will have some. it s really putting off the inevitable. yes and dragging out the process. and that s annoying. that hurts everybody. that is bad. you re dragging more people into it, people who don t even have foreclosure problems. yes. if you drag it out, people who were going to get jobs, that will slow them down. if i am trying to sell a house, i m now sitting around saying, this is going to take me longer because it s going to take longer for all of the foreclosed homes to sell. this is why i m asking you this. people are saying, i don t have foreclosure problems. this isn t going to effect me. if you re getting your house foreclosed on, this will effect you the lease. very well-p
bank of america the first to halt foreclosures in the country and today another bank pnc financial joined the list of those suspending foreclosures in 23 states that require a long court process. peter barnes of the fox business network is live with us in our capitol hill newsroom. what are folks of b of a saying about this? well, shep, in a speech here in washington today, the ceo of bank of america said this national freeze is meant to clear the air while the bank reviews and correct foreclosure filings with faulty legal paperwork. we haven t found any errors. there is technical issues. we are checking our home again again to make sure we get it right. as soon as we do, we will continue the process. this may give some defaulting homeowners with b of a only a temporary reprieve. the bank thinks most of these foreclosures will stick once it fixes the filings over the next few weeks, shep. shepard: as we know federal investigators are looking into the foreclosure problems. where
obama administration and the republicans didn t want any piece of it because unfortunately our system is broken and the banks run the place. do they get credit, the obama administration and fienberg for talking now about at least this provision that would break compensation contracts in case of another crisis. in case of another crisis? would that be no? that s a joke. that says, no, i m going to keep letting them rob you, but when we re totally out of money, maybe i ll stop them from robbing you, by that time it will be too late. you know what s happening right now, chris? this is the last great heist, the banks are actually insolvent. they still have those toxic assets, they still have the foreclosure problems. this is just a cover-up. what s happening is they re making record profits by taking taxpayer money. every dollar that they take home in bonuses today is a dollar that s going to come out of taxpayer pockets later. it s the last great heist while
the banks aren t bad people they are overwhelmed right now. banks are scared to death of course. they are feeling the same thing that you re feeling. you know the bank people. mitt romney campaigning in florida where the primary vote is less than a week away. florida has one of the worst foreclosure problems in the country. bad every where but horrendous in florida. worse than anywhere else. mitt romney was standing in front of a foreclosed home in florida when he made his banks aren t bad people comment yesterday. that is not going to help him on this housing issue. an issue which he really already needs political help. don t try to stop the foreclosure process, let it run its course and hit the bottom. president obama in last night s state of the union never said the name mitt romney exactly. but when he said this, everybody knew who he was talking about. responsible homeowners shouldn t have to sit and wait for the housing market to hit bottom to get some relief.