The nation’s largest lender, Countrywide, tonight announced that in an effort to cut costs and essentially save the company, it would be cutting 12,000 jobs.

The cuts, amounting to as much as 20 percent of its work force, are needed because the company expects new mortgages to fall about 25 percent in 2008 from this year’s levels, Countrywide said.

“During the past two years the growth in home price appreciation has stopped dead in its tracks and in many areas of the country it has turned in the wrong direction,” Mozilo said in the letter. In recent weeks, Countrywide borrowed $11.5 billion and sold a $2 billion stake to Bank of America so it could keep operating its retail banking and mortgage lending businesses.

What say you now folks?

The R Word

Are we not in for some scary times to come?

I think this is going to lead us in one direction — R E C E S S I O N

That’s right . . . given everything going on with the business and economy, it looks RECESSION is coming soon to a country near you!

Never fear, though! If you can remain smart about how you invest (both in real estate and in equities), how you save, and mostly, how you spend, you can ride it out. Some of the best opportunities can be found in tough times, which means it’s time to start looking!

If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to our RSS feed or sign up for our real estate social network. Thanks for visiting!

Tags: countrywide, Economy, Interest Rates, lender, loan, mortgage-lender, recession