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A YA romance from fan favorite John Green, a thriller from the creator of “Homeland,” and Jodi Kantor’s White House expose are the week’s most important reads.
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(Reuters) Demand for loans to buy homes and refinance mortgages slid in the final week of 2011, even as mortgage rates dipped, an industry group said on Wednesday.

Applications for U.S. home mortgages fell 4.1 percent in the week ended December 30, weighed down by a 9.6 percent drop in purchase loan requests and a 2.5 percent decline in refinancing requests, seasonally adjusted data from the Mortgage Bankers Association showed.

Average 30-year conforming mortgage rates dipped to the year’s low of 4.07 percent from 4.10 percent the prior week, and well below 4.82 percent at the end of 2010.

The slide to near-record-low borrowing rates has spurred more homeowners to seek refinancing, propelling that index up more than 60 percent in 2011.

But demand for loans to buy homes fell in the year, as borrowers struggled to come up with enough cash for down payments or stayed on the sidelines due to worries about unemployment. Some buyers had also leapt into the market in 2010 to take advantage of a first-time buyer tax credit.

The MBA said it does not expect any quick rebound in the mortgage market.

“As part of legislation to extend the payroll tax holiday, guarantee fees for loans purchased by the GSEs and mortgage insurance premiums for FHA loans will eventually increase,” Michael Fratantoni, MBA’s vice president of research and economics, said in a statement. “Given the announced implementation of this change, we do not expect to see an impact on mortgage rates and application activity until at least February.”

Bob Moulton, president of Americana Mortgage Group in Manhasset, New York, said the company’s pipeline of loan requests is off to a better start in 2012 than the same time a year ago, boosted by refinancing.

But caution prevails with a big overhang of unsold homes and the presidential election looming,Cheap Ed hardy belts, he said.

Refinancing applications represented about 82 percent of total mortgage activity in the latest week, the highest share of the year.

“It’s going to be another couple of years until these short sales and foreclosures are flushed out of the system, so you might see a little weakness in prices this year,” Moulton added. “We’re feeling a little better about 2012 than 2011, but you’re always waiting for the next shoe to drop.”

The MBA released data for two weeks on Wednesday, rather than one, because of the Christmas and New Year holidays.

In the week ended December 23, total mortgage demand climbed 0.3 percent, with refinancing up 0.5 percent and purchase applications down 0.1 percent.

The survey covers over 75 percent of U.S. retail residential mortgage applications, according to MBA.

To be credible, unless you’re long and lean, this isn’t an simple look apt pull off. The opener is to select the right colors and proportions. Steer clear of daisy duke shorts in a light wash and choose a longer manner in a media alternatively black wash. Pull above a couple of vague tights in a slimming shade such for black, gray, or marine and work as sexy suede pumps or high sleek boots in a alike color. The fewer compare, the thinner you’ll look so stick to a monochromatic effect.

By Sasha Charnin Morrison for UsMagazine.com. To peruse more of the Recessionista blog, press here.

On the altitude, try a long boyfriend cardigan or a blazer with a streaming tunic. Think of your shorts favor you would a little skirt. How would you work that out?

American Eagle and H&M are showing inexpensive denim cutoffs in their pre spring lines, yet I’m especially loving the Gap’s cuffed edition, which comes in sizes 4-18 ($24.50, gap.com).

I adore the path Nicole Richie dresses. Shes always the first celeb to go a trend, and she knows how to make it her own. Case in point: denim shorts with dark tights, which is one of her go-to ensembles.

MaCoHa—no, it’s not some Manhattan neighborhood you’ve not listened of. It stands because the Malawi Council for the Handicapped, and it’s Holly Dunlap’s current occasion célèbre and devise collaborator. A little over two years ago, Dunlap discontinued her successful footwear and accessories line Hollywould and decamped to Africa. It was there that she met her Italian beau, who was building a school in Malawi, and resolved apt “trade an life in for different.” So she bartered the parties, manicures, and climate conditioning in New York and Los Angeles for a 1984 Toyota Sprinter, no Internet, and the easy life.

Dunlap’s new tag 4MaCoHa offers embroidered tunics ($95 to $150) and home merchandise ($65 to $595), which are entire made from local Malawian cotton along MaCoHa’s disabled workers, who are unconcerned, blind, alternatively have amputated limbs (the pate patternmaker namely a twice amputee). At a preview for the label’s Resort fire accumulation yesterday, Dunlap unraveled that “because of witchcraft dogmas, folk in Africa still meditation that if something has a handicapped babe, then their kin is swore, and MaCoHa is almost showing the nation what [the] weakened tin do.” Dunlap attempted to reside true to orthodox African designs (they’ve been production caftans since the seventies) and elected the bright color palette. She too added in a few private references to the accumulation, favor the hand-loomed carpet that took over a week to make, which looks favor the poster for 1960’s surf documentary The Endless Summer (Dunlap loves to hang ten). Dunlap’s goal is to establish extra employ opportunities for MaCoHa and to create a claim in the nation for their own productions instead of exporting everything. The MaCoHa artisans, who “were born smiling,” are enjoying their moment in the sun. “They look at themselves on the Web site and say, ‘That’s me!’,” Dunlap said. “They adore a little morsel of renown.”

4MaCoHa works ashore bargain in December on L-attitude.com.
—Brittany Adams

Photos: Courtesy of Holly Dunlap and 4MaCoHa