Subprime Mortgage Crisis2007–2010
The expansion of mortgages to high-risk borrowers, coupled with rising house prices, contributed to a period of turmoil in financial markets that lasted from 2007 to 2010.
How and Why the Crisis OccurredThe subprime mortgage crisis of 2007–10 stemmed from an earlier expansion of mortgage credit, including to borrowers who previously would have had difficulty getting mortgages, which both contributed to and was facilitated by rapidly rising home prices. Historically, potential homebuyers found it difficult to obtain mortgages if they had below average credit histories, provided small down payments or sought high-payment loans. Unless protected by government insurance, lenders often denied such mortgage requests.
While some high-risk families could obtain small-sized mortgages backed by the Federal Housing Administration (FHA), others, facing limited credit options, rented. In that era, homeownership fluctuated around 65 percent, mortgage foreclosure rates were low, and home construction and house prices mainly reflected swings in mortgage interest rates and income.In the early and mid-2000s, high-risk mortgages became available from lenders who funded mortgages by repackaging them into pools that were sold to investors. New financial products were used to apportion these risks, with private-label mortgage-backed securities (PMBS) providing most of the funding of subprime mortgages. The less vulnerable of these securities were viewed as having low risk either because they were insured with new financial instruments or because other securities would first absorb any losses on the underlying mortgages (DiMartino and Duca 2007). This enabled more first-time homebuyers to obtain mortgages (Duca, Muellbauer, and Murphy 2011), and homeownership rose.
https://www.federalreservehistory.org/essays/subprime-mortgage-crisis
