5 Tips to Celebrating Your First Holidays After a Divorce – The first holiday season after a divorce or separation can place tremendous emotional strain on the best of us. Now that you and your ex have parted ways, the holiday parties and family gatherings you have been celebrating for years as a couple suddenly seem daunting and complicated. Who gets to go to which parties? How do you “share custody” of friendships? What do you say when someone asks why your better half is no longer at your side? It’s enough to make an already emotionally fraught season barely tolerable.

Wells Fargo to pay $591 million to Fannie Mae in mortgage settlement – Wells Fargo & Co. said Monday it has agreed to pay $591 million to Fannie Mae to settle disputes over soured mortgages the bank sold to the seized housing finance giant during the subprime housing boom.

RealtyTrac: Foreclosures still bringing down value of residential properties – Foreclosures hurt more than just those families who’ve lost their homes. They drag down the value of housing in entire neighborhoods.

Preparation is the Foundation for Achieving Settlement in Mediation – Mediation is becoming a “must” in many states prior to a judge hearing a case. While it may not be a written statute or rule, it is a preferred practice, especially in civil cases. Having the opportunity to achieve settlement of a dispute without the time, expense and unpredictability of a trial takes an effort, but when properly planned for can allow both parties to feel that a fair resolution has been accomplished.

Mortgage tab may cost banks $105B more – Bank costs are still piling up from legal actions involving mortgages and mortgage securities issued during the years just before the U.S. financial crisis.

Freddie Mac: Mortgage rates rise; 30-year fixed averages 4.29% – A nervous mortgage market drove interest rates higher this week ahead of the Thanksgiving holiday, with the average for a 30-year fixed-rate loan rising to 4.29% from 4.22% a week earlier, Freddie Mac said.

Average 30-year mortgage rate jumps to 4.35% – Average U.S. rates on fixed mortgages rose for the second straight week amid some signs of economic strength. Still rates remain near historically low levels.

Foreclosures Climbed In October – U.S. foreclosures in October were up 2% from the month prior, according to a new report from RealtyTrac.

Why Divorce Is Such An Isolating Experience – While you should avoid barraging them with a nonstop litany of complaints and woes (and remember, no matter how needy you feel, friendship is not just one-sided communication), ultimately, your true friends will be happy to support you, listen to you and give you advice. And if they don’t have time for you, then they’re not really your friends and you’re better off without them.

Ask the Mediator: Miami Dolphins John Martin and NFL workplace bullying – Workplace bullying also includes undermining and sabotaging of another’s work. A single bully can have a detrimental impact on the workplace, especially when higher-ups ignore the problem or fail to intervene.

Freddie Mac: Fixed mortgage rates moving higher; 30-year at 4.16% – A brighter economic picture sent mortgage interest rates higher this week, with housing finance giant Freddie reporting that a 30-year fixed-rate home loan averaged 4.16%, up from 4.1% last week.

Delinquencies, Foreclosures back to Early Recession Levels – All four measures of distress in the housing market dropped to post-crash lows during the third quarter of 2013 the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) said today.  The national delinquency rate, serious delinquencies, loans in foreclosure, and foreclosure starts all registered significant declines during the quarter.

Divorce Confidential: How to Prepare for a Settlement Meeting – A settlement meeting allows you and your spouse to sit in a conference room, face to face, in hopes of keeping key issues out of Court and moving your divorce to a speedy conclusion. While the goal is to resolve all the issues in a settlement conference, it is not always guaranteed that these issues will be settled in this meeting, especially if things become heated during negotiation.

U.S. Sept foreclosure decline biggest since downturn began-CoreLogic – Completed U.S. foreclosures plunged by 39 percent in September compared to a year ago, the biggest annual decline since the housing downturn began in 2007, data from CoreLogic showed on Thursday.

Mortgage rates ease slightly, Freddie Mac says; 30-year at 4.1% – Mortgage rates slipped lower this week, with Freddie Mac saying lenders were offering the 30-year fixed-rate home loan at an average 4.1%, compared with 4.13% last week.

Foreclosure on Property After Bankruptcy? – Foreclosure: There are two common types of foreclosure in the United States — judicial and nonjudicial. Judicial foreclosure, as the word implies, requires the lender to go through the court system to take back ownership of the property. Nonjudicial foreclosure allows the lender to sell the property at a foreclosure auction, without court approval, after following a state-specific foreclosure process.

Average 30-year mortgage rate falls to 4.13% – Mortgage rates are now at four-month lows nationwide.

United States: Divorce May Be Contagious, Study Finds – Researchers at Brown University, headed by Rose McDermott, Ph.d., examined data on marriage, divorce and remarriage dating back thirty years set from the long-running Framingham, Massachusetts Heart Study. The results were staggering.  Study participants were 75 percent more likely to divorce if a friend divorces – that’s 75 percent!

Health Care’s Unrivaled Job Gains And Where It Matters Most – Rochester, McAllen and dozens of other metropolitan areas, as well as a few states, rely on health care as one of the primary sources for new jobs and stable careers. Meanwhile, looking at the U.S. as a whole, the stable health care sector has become an increasingly larger force in the labor market.

Splitsville? How to divide property in a divorce – What will happen to the marital home? This is a question that many divorcing couples face. Indeed, it’s one of their top concerns, after worries about the impact of the split on kids and on finances, according to an August survey by the legal site Avvo.com.

Immigration Reform 2013: ‘National Day For Dignity And Respect’ Sees Rallies In Over 150 Cities – In over 150 cities in 40 states, supporters of an overhaul of the nation’s immigration system marched over the weekend in an effort to keep hope alive for the passage of a comprehensive reform in 2013.  Supporters said they were marching for a reform which would extend a pathway to citizenship for many of the 11.7 million undocumented immigrants living in the United States, refigure legal immigration rules to protect families and worker rights, and put a halt to the deportations which often separate families.