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NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Tens of thousands of frightened homeowners looking to get out from under the crumbling walls of the subprime mortgage collapse have found refuge in a variety of programs. When Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd mentioned the national Homeowner's HOPE Hotline in comments Tuesday, it triggered some 3,000 calls. An announcement in April that the Neighborhood Assistance Corporation of America would be offering $1 billion in rescue money to beleaguered borrowers has prompted more than 50,000 inquiries, according to the organization. And in Ohio, New York, Massachusetts, Maryland and other states, distressed mortgage holders are clamoring...

Fretting about bonus money is Wall Street's latest fixation, but investment bankers may soon have more pressing worries. September could bring a wave of layoffs as big banks aim to bounce back from the summer's credit market swoon. Mass firings now could help brokerage firms cut costs and show investors they're taking decisive action to compete better in a tough market. It also may have dawned on banking honchos that cutting staff will help preserve whatever's left of their dwindling bonus pools. "I think [bank execs] are thinking, if I cut right now maybe I save some of this bonus,"...

The New York investment bank will cut 1,200 positions in 23 locations as a result of the closing of BNC Mortgage. It will take an after-tax charge of $25 million and a goodwill write-down of $27 million, it said. Lehman said that poor market conditions in the mortgage space of late have "necessitated a substantial reduction in its resources and capacity in the subprime space," according to a release. The company said earlier this summer that it was combining its two non-prime residential mortgage businesses - Aurora Loan Services of Littleton, Colo., which specializes in Alt-A mortgages, and BNC Mortgage...

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Investors who are counting on the Federal Reserve to cut interest rates sometime in the next month or so may end up badly disappointed. The credit crunch of the last month has convinced many on Wall Street that a cut in the central bank's key short-term interest rate is basically a lock. Stocks jumped Friday after the Fed announced a surprise cut in the little used discount rate that the central bank charges on loans made directly to banks - and again on Tuesday on bets the Fed will cut its other key rate, the fed...

H&R Block Inc.'s (HRB:H&R Block, Inc News, chart, profile, more Last: 19.79+0.59+3.07% 9:15am 08/22/2007 Delayed quote dataAdd to portfolio Analyst Create alertInsider Discuss Financials Sponsored by: HRB19.79, +0.59, +3.1%) Block Financial Corp. unit withdrew a net of $650 million from its working capital lines of credit to cover capital needs during the credit crunch. The Kansas City, Mo., company said it withdrew $200 million on Aug. 16 and an added $850 million on Aug. 20, using the money to pay off the previous loan. The company said in recent weeks "the credit market has become increasingly constrained and unstable," cutting...

WASHINGTON - Plummeting stock prices. Mortgage lenders filing for bankruptcy or shutting down. Layoffs at homebuilders and banks. Soaring foreclosures and loan defaults. Damage from the nation's slumping housing market is evident throughout the economy and permeates financial markets. Add real estate agents to the growing list of victims, although they know few tears will be shed for them. The National Association of Realtors expects membership rolls to decline this year for the first time in a decade. The group ended 2006 with nearly 1.4 million members — almost double the roughly 716,000 it had in 1997 — but expects...

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Already-battered U.S. auto sales could be the next victim of the problems with mortgages, declining home and stock prices as potential car buyers delay purchases due to uncertainty. Industrywide U.S. auto sales in August could be off 10 percent from a year ago, according to an early read from sales tracker Edmunds.com. That follows July sales that were 19 percent below year-earlier levels. Video More video Justin Urquhart Stewart of Seven Investment Management joins CNN to talk about mortgages and the markets. Play video Video More video CNN's Gerri Willis offers tips for weathering the mortgage...

Countrywide Financial (CFC - Cramer's Take - Stockpickr - Rating) isn't the only big bank threatened by the deepening real estate crisis. An analysis of the largest 20 banks and thrifts by TheStreet.com Ratings shows that four institutions are under-reserved for possible credit losses, a red flag as the economy slows and mortgage defaults rise. Perhaps more troubling, the numbers show that one of those institutions -- Washington Mutual (WM - Cramer's Take - Stockpickr - Rating) -- could join Countrywide in facing serious liquidity problems as worries about the housing and mortgage markets multiply. Meanwhile, another big lender, National...

As markets went on a rollercoaster ride last week, our economy is coming close to a day of reckoning for loose credit policies being followed by the Federal Reserve Bank. Simply, foreign banks we have been relying on to buy our debt are waking up to the reality of much higher default rates than predicted, and many mortgage backed securities have been reduced to “junk” ratings. Wall Street fears the possibility of tightening credit and the tightening of America’s belts. Why, they say, “if Americans spend only what they can afford, think of the ripple effects throughout the economy!” This...

NEW YORK (Reuters) -- A prolonged U.S. housing slump is causing a surge in the number of job losses announced by U.S. financial services companies, consulting firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas Inc. said Tuesday. The financial industry has announced 87,962 job cuts so far this year, 75 percent more than the total of 50,327 in all of 2006. Of this year's cuts, 41 percent related to troubles in the mortgage market, including riskier subprime mortgages, Challenger said. In August alone, there have been 20,957 announced job cuts, including 11,040 since Friday, Challenger said. Since Friday, Bear Stearns Cos Inc. (up...

Two years ago, my wife and I sat at a long conference table in a mortgage-title office in Bethesda. Sitting next to us: our real estate agent, who drew up our bid on a townhouse in Germantown two days after showing it to us. We didn't get an inspection, and I don't recall going back for a second look. We had to act fast or someone else would get it. Our bid won the house -- our very own first home -- and now we had to close the deal. The owners sat across the table. They seemed more nervous...

NEW YORK (Fortune) -- Capital One's shuttered GreenPoint Mortgage is the latest mortgage banking explosion to bump Wall Street's panic meter up a notch, and industry insiders say it is just another indicator that retail banks will be stung by the credit mess they helped create. "Banks are not going to want to be in the mortgage business after all this is over," says Richard Wilkes, a mortgage industry veteran who ran First Nationwide Mortgage before it became a part of Citigroup. More from FORTUNE The Bear truth Where were the cops? Subprime on the Rhine FORTUNE 500 Current Issue...

(Fortune Magazine) -- What could the collapse in the subprime mortgage market possibly have to do with whether Dr. Jeffrey and Madeline Stier get full price for their four-bedroom house in the wealthy New York City suburb of Larchmont? Not much, you would think. After all, the people who live in Larchmont tend to be lawyers, doctors, and Wall Streeters. Generally speaking, they aren't the credit-challenged borrowers who must resort to subprime mortgages to finance their homes. Reduced: The asking price for this house in affluent Larchmont, N.Y., was recently reduced from $2.5 million to $1.99 million. More from FORTUNE...

LONDON (CNNMoney.com) -- Job cuts have begun at Bear Stearns and that could mark the start of a broader wave of layoffs across Wall Street as firms survey the damage caused by the recent downturn in financial markets. Some 240 employees at a Bear Stearns lending unit were laid off Wednesday, according to a company spokesperson. Video More video Carlos Slim: World's Richest Man Play video The pink slips come a little more than a month after two of the firm's hedge funds blew up, ultimately costing Bear Stearns co-president Warren Spector his job. The meltdown in financial markets is...

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Earlier this year, a Wisconsin couple won a judgment against Chevy Chase Bank that said the bank deceived them over the terms of their mortgage. The judge ordered Chevy Chase to rescind the loan and certified the lawsuit as class-action, which could potentially release thousands of other borrowers who felt misled. Current Mortgage Rates Type Overall avgs 30 yr fixed mtg 6.24% 15 yr fixed mtg 5.89% 30 yr fixed jumbo mtg 7.08% 5/1 ARM 6.11% 5/1 jumbo ARM 6.57% Find personalized rates: Video More video Tim Hughes of the IG Index joins CNN to talk...

(Fortune Magazine) -- For the past five years risk has been the invisible man on Wall Street. Banks, hedge funds, and lenders behaved as if home prices always rise, borrowers never miss a payment, and companies never blunder into bankruptcy. Now a crisis of confidence that began with subprime mortgage defaults is sweeping the Street, and risk is invisible no more. Banks are wobbling, markets are quaking, and ordinary investors are wondering how badly they'll be hurt. Risk, as always, will exact its revenge. Subscribe to Fortune The Usual Suspects Behind the latest blowups are some of the same faces...

After a welcome weekend respite from the market's turbulence, investors will quickly learn in the coming week whether Friday's Fed-induced rally was just short-term relief or something more sustainable. Much of that may depend on whether the Fed's move Friday to slice the rate charged at its discount lending window was enough to loosen the noose around normal lending operations around the world. The credit markets remain the lynchpin for any sustained stock market recovery. "We are certainly not out of the woods yet," says Mike Malone, trading analyst at Cowen & Co. "The markets will remain volatile ... until...

Fed declares "downside risks" to economy have increased, OKs half percentage point cut in discount rate on loans to banks. (Breaking

Many homebuyers in recent years took out exotic mortgages that ultimately backfired. This raises the question of why such booby-trapped financing was available at all. Fisher Investments Charles Schwab TD AMERITRADE Options House Zecco.com Fidelity Investments The answer, in part, stems from overaggressive marketing of what were once niche products intended only for the most financially sophisticated and creditworthy customers. During the housing boom in recent years, banks began offering such elaborate loans to huge numbers of average homebuyers, allowing them to get in over their heads and contributing to the current mortgage crisis, as many borrowers ended up defaulting....

Stocks extend slide on Countrywide news By JOE BEL BRUNO, AP Business Writer 20 minutes ago Stocks fell sharply Thursday after a move by Countrywide Financial Corp. confirmed fears of widening problems with some mortgages and tighter access to credit. A sell-off overseas offered Wall Street little reason to try to stanch the bleeding a day after the Dow Jones industrial average closed below the 13,000 mark for the first time since April and the Standard & Poor's 500 index moved into negative territory for the year. Investors' confidence took a drubbing Wednesday on concerns about potential trouble at Countrywide,...