Thu, Feb 16 2017, 9:53 AM
Results from this morning's residential construction report from the U.S. Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development were mixed...
Thu, Feb 16 2017, 9:53 AM
Most mortgages contain a requirement that the collateral property carry adequate insurance to cover repayment of the mortgage in the event of a loss. ...
Thu, Feb 16 2017, 9:38 AM
Bank of America has opened 3 completely automated branches without any employees. Customers can use ATMs or have video conferences with employees at o...
Thu, Feb 16 2017, 8:31 AM
Today begins with another glut of economic data at 8:30am, although it's fairly tame compared to yesterday's CPI/Retail Sales duo. Housing Starts are...
Thu, Feb 16 2017, 5:38 PM
As far as bond market rallies go, today's was one of the most mysterious in recent memory. Several conclusions will have to be jumped to in order to ...
Thu, Feb 16 2017, 4:51 PM
After spending the past 5 business days moving higher, mortgage rates finally found their footing today. The improvement came in phases, with today's ...
Wed, Feb 15 2017, 10:36 AM
Builder confidence in the market for single family homes slid 2 points again in February to a score of 65 on the National Association of Home Builders...
Wed, Feb 15 2017, 9:56 AM
“The flat earth society has members all around the globe.” Speaking of orbs, while global wealth totals $255 trillion , the median wealth of all 4.8 b...
Wed, Feb 15 2017, 8:44 AM
Applications for both purchase and refinance mortgages declined during the week ended February 10 compared to activity a week earlier. The Mortgage Ba...
Wed, Feb 15 2017, 8:33 AM
Fed Chair Yellen takes the hot-seat at Congress for a 2nd day today, but this time in front of the always-cheerful and relentlessly intelligent folks ...
Wed, Feb 15 2017, 5:19 PM
When it comes to the most simplistic charts of bond market trends, there are two "bad things" that rates could do in the current context. One of the...
Wed, Feb 15 2017, 4:29 PM
Mortgage rates rose for the 5th day in a row following a higher reading in this morning's inflation data and an upbeat Retail Sales report. In general...
Wed, Feb 15 2017, 1:47 PM
Mortgage delinquencies had their first fourth quarter uptick since 2013, the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) said on Wednesday. Its quarterly Natio...
Tue, Feb 14 2017, 8:47 AM
What did one boat say to the other? “Are you up for a little row-mance?” Oh boy. Don’t forget the chocolates for your sweetie. If the love thing doesn...
Tue, Feb 14 2017, 8:29 AM
A series of "higher lows" and "lower highs" is the defining characteristic of a consolidation pattern . The following chart highlights the current c...
Tue, Feb 14 2017, 5:22 PM
Bond markets (and markets in general) periodically experience an interesting phenomenon whereby traders are determined to make one of two bets followi...
Tue, Feb 14 2017, 4:34 PM
Mortgage rates moved higher for the 4th straight day today, following Fed Chair Janet Yellen's congressional testimony. It wasn't that Yellen's speech...
Tue, Feb 14 2017, 2:55 PM
Both the size of the foreclosure inventory and the number of foreclosures completed declined by large percentages from December 2015 to December 2016....
Tue, Feb 14 2017, 2:42 PM
No one asks for their employment verification or computes their debt-to-income ratio. Yet, when it comes to buying, selling, or renovating a home the ...
Tue, Feb 14 2017, 2:39 PM
Mortgage applications for new home purchases surged in January according to data from the Mortgage Bankers Association's (MBA's) Builder Application S...
Mon, Feb 13 2017, 3:22 PM
Fed Chair Janet Yellen 's semiannual testimony before Congress this week comes as the banking industry is about to undergo a dramatic makeover. Conseq...
Mon, Feb 13 2017, 9:16 AM
When I was a kid I’d go the bank, and my parents’ favorite teller and I would swap my money for the silver dimes and quarters she’d saved for me. I st...
Mon, Feb 13 2017, 8:56 AM
The week ahead sees data and relevant events come out in concentrated gluts, almost exclusively in the middle of the week. Everyone's favorite headli...
Mon, Feb 13 2017, 5:23 PM
With essentially nothing on the calendar today, and quite a lot on the calendar over the next 2 days, it's not too surprising to see bonds continue th...
Mon, Feb 13 2017, 4:35 PM
Mortgage rates stood at their lowest levels in more than 2 months as of last Wednesday, but have since moved higher for 3 straight days . This leaves ...
Fri, Feb 10 2017, 8:52 AM
The stock market is not the economy. That’s a simple financial truth, but it is hard to keep in mind during rallies or sell-offs. Especially when main...
Fri, Feb 10 2017, 8:45 AM
This mostly data-free week ends today with one of the only potential market movers ranking as "2nd tier" or better. But Consumer Sentiment at 10am i...
Fri, Feb 10 2017, 4:56 PM
It was an exceptionally slow day for bond markets with the exception of some tension, at times, during the morning hours. Treasuries and MBS both beg...
Fri, Feb 10 2017, 4:37 PM
On the cusp of the all-important and usually busy spring housing season, an increasing number of local markets are mismatched; that is, buyers are not...
Fri, Feb 10 2017, 3:05 PM
Mortgage rates continued higher today, bringing them back in line with Monday's levels. Part of the rise was due to weaker trading levels in bond mark...
Thu, Feb 9 2017, 10:18 AM
“Sometimes I wake up grumpy; other times I let him sleep.” Kids in NY are sleeping in since the schools are closed today. But if you worked for Deutsc...
Thu, Feb 9 2017, 8:39 AM
To everything, there is a season.
The sun also rises.
Nothing lasts forever.
Regardless of the words used to describe the phenomenon, there i...
Thu, Feb 9 2017, 5:57 PM
This morning's commentary invoked some figurative language evokes notions of seasonality (have you ever seen invoke and evoke used in the same sentenc...
Thu, Feb 9 2017, 5:26 PM
Mortgage rates finally moved higher after three straight days of solid improvement. If it's any consolation, today's rise wasn't on par with even one ...
Thu, Feb 9 2017, 1:14 PM
Prices in more than half of major metropolitan markets with available data are now at or above their previous price peaks after what the National Asso...
Wed, Feb 8 2017, 12:20 PM
Fannie Mae's Home Purchase Sentiment Index (HPSI) reversed a five-month long decline in January, posting a 2-percentage point increase . The Index, wh...
Wed, Feb 8 2017, 12:12 PM
MND recently summarized an analysis by the Urban Institute about a recent Fannie Mae pilot program to underwrite securitization of a $1 billion loan w...
Wed, Feb 8 2017, 9:16 AM
Think there’s no creativity allowed in the down payment help arena? Think again. Loftium pays up to $20,000 towards your down payment and offers month...
Wed, Feb 8 2017, 8:58 AM
As the socioeconomic fates of the world's biggest countries travel down the road of life, sometimes it's smooth sailing and sometimes there's a 17 ca...
Wed, Feb 8 2017, 8:25 AM
Mortgage activity increased during the week ended February 3, with applications for both purchase and refinance mortgages pulling in small gains . The...
Wed, Feb 8 2017, 5:37 PM
Bonds made it 3 days in a row today--rallying to the best levels since mid-January. In fact, apart from Jan 17th, today's closing yields were the l...
Wed, Feb 8 2017, 4:47 PM
Mortgage rates fell for the third straight day today. Each day has seen moderate improvement. Taken together, they add up to a strong move lower from ...
Tue, Feb 7 2017, 10:12 AM
The year ended with home price increases, as measured by CoreLogic's Home Price Index (HPI) dropping below 1 percent on a month-over-month basis for t...
Tue, Feb 7 2017, 10:10 AM
Increased availability and flexibility in jumbo lending was the principal reason for an increase in the Mortgage Bankers Association's (MBA's) Mortgag...
Tue, Feb 7 2017, 10:07 AM
Our Census Bureau is at it again. Did you know that 5 million U.S. veterans are living in areas designated as rural between 2011 and 2015 per a new re...
Tue, Feb 7 2017, 8:50 AM
Bonds Are Officially in a Positive Short-Term Trend. This was also the case heading into mid January, but steady selling following Yellen's speech (J...
Tue, Feb 7 2017, 5:41 PM
Salient, easily-identifiable motivations for bond market movements continue to be elusive. The times of the day where liquidity (numbers of buyer...
Tue, Feb 7 2017, 4:48 PM
Mortgage rates moved lower again today as investors remained cautious amid political uncertainty at home and abroad. Stocks began the day higher but l...
Mon, Feb 6 2017, 12:19 PM
Apparently we aren't all procrastinators. Black Knight Financial Services looked at Internal Revenue Service (IRS) filing statistics and how they rela...
Mon, Feb 6 2017, 8:45 AM
Tomorrow we’ll take a deep look at potential future Dodd-Frank changes , but for something more concrete the Census Bureau told us that U.S. home owne...
