Gov. Nathan Deal today announced that Calpis America Inc. has selected Peachtree City for its U.S. headquarters and first manufacturing operation. The company will invest $20 million and create 42 jobs in its first year of operations.

“As the No. 1 poultry-producing state in the nation, Georgia is the ideal place for Calpis to expand in the United States,” said Deal. “International firms such as Calpis find success here not only because Georgia is one of the top markets for its products, but because the state is a hub for fast, efficient outreach to other markets in North and South America. The company’s strategic decision to locate here moves us closer to becoming the best place in the nation in which to do business.”

Calpis will construct a facility in Peachtree City Industrial Park to produce its direct-fed microbial product, CALSPORIN® animal feed ingredients, which is used widely in the livestock industry to supply a naturally occurring microorganism. Operations are anticipated to begin in April 2014, and Georgia Quick Start, the nation’s top-ranked customized workforce training program, will assist the company with its training needs.

Calpis’ long-standing livestock microbial product was developed through extensive research and launched in 1987 in Japan. The microbial product takes advantage of the bacterial species Bacillus subtilis to produce the fermentation product CALSPORIN® containing a naturally occurring microorganism which, according to research, may help build a preferable intestinal environment.

“U.S. consumers have for many years given us business opportunities and ideas to improve our products,” said president of Calpis America Inc. Masato Yoshida. “Not only is the U.S. the world’s biggest supplier of meat products, it also has a great potential to further develop the industry both in volume and quality. Locating this plant in Georgia will enable us to better serve the industry and to utilize the abundant workforce. Peachtree City provides us good access to our users as well as transportation convenience both domestically and internationally.”

The Georgia Department of Economic Development partnered with the Fayette County Development Authority to manage this project. Scott McMurray, director of the Georgia Department of Economic Development’s Logistics, Energy, Agriculture and Food Processing industry team, assisted Calpis on behalf of the state. Yumiko Nakazono, director of Georgia’s Japan office, coordinated the introduction of the company to the state during the SEUS-Japan conference in July 2012.

“We are excited to welcome another Japanese company to Fayette County,” said Fayette County Development Authority Chair Randy Hayes. “Matt Forshee and his team do a great job promoting Peachtree City as the location in metro Atlanta for internationally based companies to begin their U.S. operations. Our proximity to Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport and our unique quality of life are going to help Calpis get off to a great start here in Georgia.”

“Calpis’ choice to invest in Georgia is a perfect example of the reason Georgia established an office in Japan 40 years ago,” said Georgia Department of Economic Development Commissioner Chris Cummiskey. “The company joins more than 370 Japanese businesses throughout the state employing 20,000-plus Georgians. It is our partnerships both at home and abroad that make this sort of success possible.”

About Calpis Co., Ltd.
Calpis originated as a manufacturer of cultured milk drink named “CALPIS®,” under founder Kaiun Mishima, following development of the drink in 1919. The company has since expanded overseas, especially into Asia, with its beverages lineup as well as other dairy products. Using its expertise in fermentation processes, the company now makes dietary supplements and animal feed additives. Calpis Co., Ltd., headquartered in Tokyo, has existing U.S. facilities in Los Angeles, primarily for its beverage business, and Mount Prospect, Ill., for its feed business. Calpis Co., Ltd. had approximately $1.3 billion in net sales in 2011.

County officials across the country are finding mortgage paperwork that were improperly notarized or signed without proper review, dating as far back as 1998, the AP has found in its analysis.

For example, in Guilford County, N.C., about 74 percent of 6,100 mortgage documents filed since 2006 were found to have questionable signatures. 

“Because of these bad titles, property owners can’t prove they own the properties they think they bought, and banks can’t prove they had the right to sell them,” Jeff Thigpen, the registrar of deeds in Guilford County, N.C., told the AP.

Since last fall, banks have faced investigations over “robo-signing” procedures, which consists of shortcuts of approving and reviewing mortgage paperwork and foreclosures. The “robo-signing” scandal has brought many foreclosures into question as home owners have challenged the validity of their mortgage documents. 

Mortgage documents with robo-signed signatures could throw into question the ownership of the properties, says Katherine Porter, a professor at University of California Irvine School of Law. 

Furthermore, if invalid documents are discovered in the chain of ownership, shoddy mortgage paperwork has the potential to delay the sale of a home or make it difficult for buyers to get a mortgage because title insurers won’t write a policy for the property, says Justin Ailes, vice president of government affairs of the American Land Title Association. 

Source: “Widespread Robo-signing of Mortgage Documents Found as far Back as 1998 Could Haunt Owners,” Associated Press (Sept. 1, 2011)

The process of making purchase decisions

You’ve all been told you need to be using social media and some have even pitched to you that it is the end all be all, and although we wildly disagree and remind people it’s simply a communication channel people are coming to expect you to be on (much like when telephones were introduced, people slowly adjusted as did business). But does social media have enough of an influence over purchase decisions (like hiring a Realtor or where to buy) to demand your presence?

Online research company Knowledge Networks studied the purchase decisions of Americans and found that the likelihood of a consumer to discover new products or brands is rising rapidly with 38 million 13 to 80 year olds now influenced by social media, up 14% from just six months ago.

Millions referring to social media before purchasing

People who reported being social media users in 2011 reported high levels of influence as follows:

1. 23.1 million discover new brands or products through social media (up 22% from 2010)
2. 22.5 million use social media to learn about unfamiliar brands or products (up 9% from 2010)
3. 17.8 million are “strongly influenced” in their purchase decisions by opinions in social media (up 19% from 2010)
4. 15.1 million refer to social media before making purchase decisions (up 29% from 2010)
5. Roughly 80 million people check social media from a mobile device

Consumers are now integrating social media as a part of their phone use with 40% of teens and adults who have ever used social media accessing it through their mobile device (up 28% from just 6 months ago). Location based services are rapidly increasing in size and popularity with Foursquare alone celebrating crossing the 10 million user mark. Mobile devices are playing an increasing role in purchase decisions as well with 27% of users comparing or checking prices via social media and 24% regularly checking reviews of locations, brands and services.

“Tying consumer interactions back to brands and purchase decisions is essential for marketers, in social media no less than any other platform,” said Patricia Graham, Chief Strategy Officer of Knowledge Networks. “While we have seen a dramatic rise in key metrics that quantify Social Media’s influence, we also have observed a wide variation of influence at the category level.”

“The on-the-go consumer is becoming more mobile in their social media usage,” said Chuck Martin, Director of the Center for Media Research at MediaPost Communications. “This move to mobility combined with the increasing influence of social media during the purchase process has great implications for marketers, who will have to look at location as well as which product purchases are most affected.”

Purchase decisions and you

Realtors, how does this influence your career? It’s much less about an actual house than it is two things- you and neighborhoods. Consumers are now using the web and their phones to research you, ask their friends for referrals, read reviews about you and read your blog long before they reach out to you and what their friends say influences whether or not you get hired. Consumers are also asking their networks about neighborhoods they’re considering and reading up on the area via review sites and the like before they make a purchase.

What this means to you is that you should first be armed with the same knowledge they are and be sure you’re aware of sites like Yelp and review sites. Secondly, it means your presence in social media be it Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn or elsewhere, improves your chances of a referral because if there is nothing for them to read about you, they don’t feel like they’ve done any research. Consumers are buying your services and they’re buying a neighborhood, and if neither exist online or no one in their network knows of it, the chances of the sale narrow. We anticipate this trend of consumers influencing each other via social media will continue to grow rapidly.

AG Beat news:

AgentGenius is a rapidly growing real estate social media, tech, news, and opinion site built and designed by and for the on-the-go agent. Our mission is to be a positive force in the industry, led by people inside of real estate. We aim to keep you up to date on trends that we study closely in order to forecast what’s next on the horizon.

The National Association of Realtors® is urging regulators to go back to the drawing board on the proposed Qualified Residential Mortgage rule.

At a news conference on Capitol Hill today, the original sponsors of the QRM provision in the Dodd-Frank Act – Sens. Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.) and Kay Hagan (D-N.C.) – joined Reps. John Campbell (R-Calif.) and Brad Sherman (D-Calif.) to urge regulators to reconsider unnecessarily high down payment requirements under the proposed QRM rule.

“As the leading advocate for home ownership, NAR firmly believes Congress intended to create a broad QRM exemption – strong evidence shows that responsible lending standards and ensuring a borrower’s ability to repay have the greatest impact on reducing lender risk, and not high down payments,” said NAR President Ron Phipps, broker-president of Phipps Realty in Warwick, R.I.

NAR has forged the broad-based Coalition for Sensible Housing Policy, which includes 44 organizations focused on drawing attention to the proposed regulation’s onerous 20 percent down payment requirement. The coalition asked for and recently received an extension of the comment period until August 1, 2011. NAR and its coalition partners have also gathered the support of 44 U.S. Senators, who recently wrote to regulators expressing their intent on QRM and opposing the imposition of a sizable down payment; 282 House members signed a similar letter.

Concurrent with the event, NAR and the coalition unveiled a white paper, “Proposed Qualified Residential Mortgage Definition Harms Creditworthy Borrowers While Frustrating Housing Recovery,” an in-depth analysis of the impact of the proposed QRM rule. The white paper will be submitted as the coalition’s official comments to the rule.

NAR wants federal regulators to honor congressional intent by crafting a QRM exemption that includes a wide variety of traditionally safe, well documented and properly underwritten products.

“As written, the proposed QRM rule violates congressional intent, makes home ownership more expensive for millions of responsible consumers and jeopardizes the fragile housing recovery,” Phipps said. “We urge regulators to reconsider the proposed QRM definition to help hard-working, creditworthy Americans continue to realize their dreams of homeownership.”

# # #

The National Association of Realtors®, “The Voice for Real Estate,” is America’s largest trade association, representing 1.1 million members involved in all aspects of the residential and commercial real estate industries.

Although the 2,314-page Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act signed into law last year doesn’t affect real estate brokers and agents as much as, say, mortgage originators, it does have some significant implications for the industry, said Phillip Schulman, a partner at the Washington, D.C. law firm K&L Gates LLP.

In his remarks at the Real Estate Services Forum Thursday during the REALTORS® Midyear Legislative Meetings, Schulman told attendees that the mortgage lending sector was targeted by many of the bill’s provisions.

“[Dodd-Frank] came down hard on loan officers and mortgage brokers. Why? Because they were the ones working with the borrowers,” said Schulman, adding that in the future all originators will be qualified, licensed, and registered, as well as issued a unique identifier.

“Anytime there’s a violation committed by a loan officer, it’s going to be reported in a nationwide system,” he said.

The bill also affects the financial sector, particularly in terms of the structure of securities, which are debts or equities that are packaged for investment. To avoid the financial fraud of the previous decade, Dodd-Frank requires financial companies that create securities to hold a minimum 5 percent stake in them — the exception being securities that are composed of qualified residential mortgages (QRM).

Current QRM requirements for borrowers include no option adjustable-rate mortgages (ARMs), no bankruptcy in the past three years, no prior short sale or foreclosure, and points and fees charged by the lender totaling less than 3 percent of the loan’s value. Furthermore, lenders and regulators have recently recommended implementing a higher minimum down payment.

The increasingly stringent requirements pose a serious challenge to a viable housing market, Schulman noted.

“The eligible loan is shrinking and shrinking, and it’s going to be harder for someone who has any dents or scratches in their credit to get a loan,” he said. “It’s all well and good to get the riff-raff out of the business and get rid of these exotic, fly-by-night financial products, but let’s not throw the baby out with the bath water.

“We just came through a decade of this laissez-faire attitude. The atmosphere was one of easy money. We put millions of Americans in homes who probably should not have been there. Today, Washington is all about risk management. Congress and regulators stepped in and were asked to regulate. So they did what they always do. They overregulated. I think until we earn back the trust of the Congress and the regulators and even the American people, we’re going to continue to be scrutinized like never before.”

Here are a few other important, real estate-related changes brought about by the bill:

Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection: This new behemoth regulatory agency — which Jay N. Varon, Schulman’s fellow speaker and a litigation partner with law firm Foley & Lardner LLP, characterized as the “centerpiece” of Dodd-Frank — will officially launch on July 21. This organization will encompass a half-dozen current regulatory agencies and 18 consumer statutes, including RESPA. It will also have what Varon called “nuclear” penalties, meaning punishments for violations will be much more stringent than they are now.

Prohibitions on steering and loan-officer compensation: Dodd-Frank changed the compensation model for loan officers to prevent them from steering consumers into loans that may not be right for them, yet profitable for the lending company. According to Schulman, loan officers will collect the same sum per loan, whether it’s a 30-year fixed mortgage or an option ARM. Still, he said this new arrangement isn’t entirely fool-proof. “Businessmen figure out a way to make every system work. Sure, they’ll pay them 50 basis points for loans of all kinds. But they can also pay them bonuses based on total volume,” he explained.

Appraisals and AMCs: New regulations in Dodd-Frank are designed to protect appraiser independence, Schulman said. These rules also sunset the Home Valuation Code of Conduct (HVCC), which caused a great deal of consternation among real estate professionals who say it contributed to the collapse of deals after it was enacted in 2009.

— Brian Summerfield, REALTOR Magazine

2010 was a volatile year for foreclosures as well. Last year around this time we examined the question of shadow inventory. We noted then that shadow inventory could be defined in a number of ways. Some consider all loans with at least one missed payment as part of shadow inventory while others account for cures through modifications and short sales in determining shadow inventory. In terms of foreclosures, things appeared quite dismal last March. So, is the worst behind us?

It is still difficult to say. What is relatively safe to say about 2010 is that the bottleneck has shifted – from delinquencies to the foreclosure inventory. In other words, a significant portion of the delinquent inventory that built up since the beginning of the crises is now moving into the foreclosure inventory as modification efforts and cures are taking effect. The result is declining delinquent inventory and increasing foreclosure inventory. What is also relatively safe to say is that new problem loans continue to improve; all states are showing significant 12-month declines in new seriously delinquent loan inventory and a 38 percent annual decline nationally.

To put it into numbers, according to Lender Processing Services (LPS), there were 8.1 million total non-current loans (delinquent and in foreclosure inventory) in February of 2010 – the peak of the foreclosure crisis. Currently there are about 6.9 million non-current (i.e., at least 30-days delinquent) loans. This decline has contributed to a significant drop in delinquencies. Delinquencies fell by 18 percent over the course of 2010, while more serious delinquencies (90+ days late) fell by 12 percent. Since a share of these delinquencies that have not cured or been modified has ended up in the foreclosure inventory, the foreclosure inventory is up over 9 percent over the past year.

Similarly, foreclosure starts were up over 10 percent over 2010, though the evolving crisis in documentation and foreclosure processing might slow the rate at which delinquent loans move to foreclosure starts. Early 2011 numbers already suggest that trend. Nevertheless, out of 6.9 million first-lien, non-current loans, 2.2 million are in foreclosure inventory, 2.1 million are seriously delinquent, 1.8 million are new delinquencies and around 710,000 are 60 to 90 days late.

Again, early 2011 numbers are showing a greater impact from the foreclosure processing and documentation scrutiny banks are currently under. This will result in a longer “hanging” period of the foreclosure and REO inventory. For example, while foreclosure sales (moving of loans from the foreclosure inventory to REO status) topped out at over 120,000 a month before the documentation scrutiny began, they are currently down to about the 65,000-80,000 range.

Another interesting occurrence resulting from the foreclosure documentation and processing scrutiny is the recycling of loans previously in foreclosure inventory back into the seriously delinquent inventory. As LPS’ decomposition of seriously delinquent inventory shows, over one-third of that inventory are loans 12 or more months delinquent; a third of those are 24 months or more delinquent. The share of seriously delinquent loans grew by 172 percent over the last year. Another indication of the recycling of previous foreclosure inventory is that 35 percent of foreclosure starts are actually repeat foreclosures; this share has been consistently rising since the last summer.

What does this all mean for the shadow inventory? In short, there is still a lot of it out there. There are currently a little over 3 million loans in the shadow inventory. This number includes all loans in the foreclosure inventory and a share of delinquent loans. It also includes delinquent loans that are anticipated to enter foreclosure over the next year. These “new entrants” account for about one-third of the 3 million shadow inventory estimate. The loans excluded (i.e., subtracted) from the shadow inventory are those serious delinquencies already listed for sale and modifications. According to the Mortgage Metrics Report from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) and the Office of Thrift Supervision (OTS) for the fourth quarter 2010, non-HAMP modification activity seriously ramped up in 2010. Two-thirds of the modifications in 2010 were non-HAMP and there was a total of 939,835 modifications in all of 2010. With trial modification, that adds up to over 2.1 million modifications for the whole of 2010. The Mortgage Metrics Report also shows that about 30 percent of those modifications will re-default 6 months after the modification. Lastly, REO inventory not yet on the market is added to the shadow inventory. This brings the final figure to about 2.36 million properties. All of that information allows us to estimate the number of months it would take to clear the current shadow inventory. Again, if we do not account for delinquencies anticipated to enter foreclosure over the next year, the final shadow inventory comes out to 1.5 million properties.

Over the past year, distressed sales have accounted on average for 34 percent of existing home sales. If this trend continues, current shadow inventory would take about 16 months to clear. This figure naturally varies significantly among the states. But also, the share of distressed sales has been growing in recent months. The NAR’s REALTOR® Confidence Index shows increases in distressed sales from 37 percent in January to 40 percent in March. At the March rate of 40 percent, shadow inventory would clear in 14 months.

When comes to shadow inventory, there continues to be many moving pieces which affect the way in which shadow inventory may clear. One issue that could have the most impact is banks’ handling of foreclosures and how that will play out. Another continuing issue is the number of homeowners who are “underwater” and the likelihood of whether or not they will walk away from their mortgages. And there are still a number of Option ARMs scheduled to reset in 2011 and 2012. With tightening of lending rules, these homeowners may have a more difficult time refinancing their loans into more favorable terms.

By Selma Hepp, Research Economist National Association of Realtors

Greetings folks, awhile back I wrote a blog that featured John Paulson and his rationale for taking the plunge back into the housing market.  Paulson cites inflation as the precipitator for his logic.  Well to be honest, most thought he was delusional.  But there may be more to this chaotic thinking than we had anticipated.  However, I can assure you of one thing….inflation is not the only reason to risk heading back into housing market.  Let’s examine this concept further.

Okay, I told you that Paulson is the hedge fund manager who placed negative bets on various mortgage-backed securities during 2007 and 2008.  We know further that these securities took a nose dive in value during the 2008 crisis giving the obstreperous Paulson multi-billionaire and celebrity status! 

So why would John Paulson flip the script now that the housing market has tanked and advise us to buy real estate?  Okay before you go ballistic on me I would think that his opinion at least merits some moderate consideration, right?  Oh you are so cynical! 

Folks looks what’s going on!  China has been slowing selling off its treasuries. Back in the spring of 2009 China held $900 billion in treasuries.  Last check China’s treasury holdings fell to about $891 billion.  Furthermore, the Federal Reserve is now the largest holder of treasury debt.  The Fed under its current policy of Quantitative Easing 2 is buying $600 of treasury debt not only to hold down interest rates but to also cause inflation.  As you know it is in their infinite wisdom that inflation will stimulate the economy and create jobs.  

So let go back at look at Paulson’s prognostications.  He made three financial predictions that are noteworthy.  The first was that gold would go through the roof.  We could see a once going for $2,400 on its way up to $4,000 an ounce.  Second, he said you should get out of bonds while you can.  He further suggested that it would be more financially feasible to invest in blue chip stocks with strong dividend yields rather than bonds. 

Hmmm….I also just read in Time magazine that famed investor Bill Gross of Pimco recently sold all of the Treasury Bonds in his funds portfolio.  It amounted to just a paltry $150 billion worth of our debt. His reason was that the yields were as high as they could go and now would probably fall.  Wow, that’s an eye opener!  Bond yields and bond prices moving in opposite directions.  Nuff said! 

Paulson’s third prediction, buy a home…..Now!  In fact he stated that if you don’t own a home, buy one; if you own one home, buy another one, and if you own two homes buy a third.  Paulson even went so far as to state that we should lend our relatives the money to buy a home too!

Why the heck was this guy thinking?  In a word….inflation.  Paulson anticipates a resurgent inflation.  That’s not the kind of inflation that boosts stock prices and turns mutual fund managers into rock stars, but the kind of inflation that causes the prices of every day goods to skyrocket turning homeowners into investment wizards.