Wed, Nov 25 2015, 6:09 PM
Trading activity was fairly decent in bond markets today--especially considering the seasonal norms, though this is largely a factor of Thanksgiving f...
Wed, Nov 25 2015, 5:12 PM
Mortgage rates broke from tradition today by maintaining an almost perfectly flat trajectory leading up to Thanksgiving. This time of year is typ...
Wed, Nov 25 2015, 1:28 PM
Bond markets have had plenty of would-be market movers thrown in their general direction today. This began in the overnight session with massive mo...
Wed, Nov 25 2015, 1:15 PM
In short, the general loan limits remain unchanged from 2015's levels, but several high-cost county limits have been increased . As a reminder, Fa...
Tue, Nov 24 2015, 10:55 AM
Black Knight Financial Service's monthly "first look" at
October month-end mortgage performance standards continues to show a steady
decline almos...
Tue, Nov 24 2015, 10:54 AM
Home prices continue to rise faster than
the rate of inflation and the increase speeded up again in September. The S&P/Case-Shiller U.S. National ...
Tue, Nov 24 2015, 10:45 AM
Nonbank online lender CashCall
has paid $2 million in restitution and fines to settle California state
allegations that the company duped consum...
Tue, Nov 24 2015, 7:34 AM
As is often the case on the week of Thanksgiving, the regularly-scheduled economic data continues apace, even if it must be crammed into fewer days th...
Tue, Nov 24 2015, 5:39 PM
This continues to be one of the most anomalous Thanksgiving weeks in the history of Thanksgiving weeks--at least as far as bond markets are concerne...
Tue, Nov 24 2015, 4:47 PM
Mortgage rates held steady today on average, with a few lenders improving almost imperceptibly. The most prevalently-quoted conventional 30yr fix...
Tue, Nov 24 2015, 1:43 PM
The only significant development for markets today in terms of news or economic data was the overnight news that Turkey shot down a Russian fighter je...
Mon, Nov 23 2015, 10:51 AM
Pending sales, which had declined in
both September and October did indeed prove to be a leading indicator for
existing home sales in October. The
...
Mon, Nov 23 2015, 9:58 AM
What
is a huge concern of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac? It isn't rates, or
credit risk. It is having their business flow, and that of their
client...
Mon, Nov 23 2015, 9:37 AM
Last Friday, I talked about some of the general bond market dynamics we tend to see around this time of year. It wouldn't be a bad idea to check tha...
Mon, Nov 23 2015, 5:36 PM
Traders punched the clock, made their trades, and went home today. Before the clock-punching, there was the overnight session, in which European bond...
Mon, Nov 23 2015, 4:32 PM
Mortgage rates rose today for most lenders, albeit modestly. In fact, several lenders were unchanged from Friday's latest levels with the rest ...
Mon, Nov 23 2015, 1:38 PM
The story of today is largely a two-parter, and a fairly simple one at that. Part 1: bonds weaker in Europe. Part 2: bonds stronger in the US. The ...
Fri, Nov 20 2015, 10:09 AM
Those of you who are expecting Millennials
to shift gears and start becoming homeowners will have to keep holding your
breath. A new Freddie Mac su...
Fri, Nov 20 2015, 9:45 AM
With the year nearing an end Fannie Mae's chief
economist Doug Duncan and his Economic & Strategic Research (ESR) Group are
holding to their most r...
Fri, Nov 20 2015, 9:22 AM
Did
you know that November is American Indian and Alaska Native Heritage
month? There are currently 5.4 million American Indians and Alaska
Nati...
Fri, Nov 20 2015, 9:09 AM
For bond markets, the week of the Thanksgiving holiday tends to be fairly formulaic . It's not that the same thing happens every year, but with almo...
Fri, Nov 20 2015, 5:10 PM
Once again, the bulk of the day's recap was inadvertently captured in the mid-day-commentary. Feel free to read that instead of this if you want. ...
Fri, Nov 20 2015, 4:37 PM
Mortgage rates started the day slightly lower compared to yesterday's latest offerings. Mid-day weakness in bond markets resulted in most lenders...
Fri, Nov 20 2015, 1:47 PM
If illiquidity shows up for the start of the holiday trading season and says "I come bearing gifts!" you do not want those gifts. They typically cons...
Thu, Nov 19 2015, 11:28 AM
Measures of mortgage distress continued to reach new eight
to ten year lows during the third quarter of 2015. The Mortgage Bankers Association's (MB...
Thu, Nov 19 2015, 11:24 AM
Is the dream of a decent education gone
for the children of middle-class Americans?
A new study by RealtyTrac indicates that if you consider standa...
Thu, Nov 19 2015, 11:00 AM
The share of cash sales inched up
slightly in August, reaching 31.7 percent, a 0.8 percent month-over-month
change. Despite the marginal change,
c...
Thu, Nov 19 2015, 10:57 AM
Ellie Mae says its October data on
closed and denied loans indicate that credit is loosening. The company said that average FICO scores continued
...
Thu, Nov 19 2015, 10:46 AM
Every day we all hear rumors, big and small, mostly unfounded.
Rumors like that large companies in the vein of Franklin American and
Freedom Mortg...
Thu, Nov 19 2015, 8:34 AM
There is no question that the Fed hinted at a brave new world for global interest rates in yesterday's Minutes release, but for most market participan...
Thu, Nov 19 2015, 5:18 PM
This will largely be a rehash of the Mid-Day commentary as it captured all of the day's relevant themes. The themes in question are at least threefo...
Thu, Nov 19 2015, 4:42 PM
Mortgage rates moved nicely lower today, relative to the recent, plodding improvements. This brings most lenders back to their lowest levels sinc...
Thu, Nov 19 2015, 2:49 PM
Home sales appeared to slam on the brakes in October, at
least according to Redfin. The company
said sales increased by only 0.3 percent compared...
Thu, Nov 19 2015, 1:28 PM
Staying on this topic of yesterday's weird juxtaposition of analysis from the Fed, today's trading is fairly logical. The juxtaposition in question i...
Wed, Nov 18 2015, 12:19 PM
Residential construction data from October were mixed, but declines were largely due to the multi-family sector . Permitting was up modestly while th...
Wed, Nov 18 2015, 10:58 AM
Where
the heck did 40 years go? Call any person who underwrites loans or
draws docs and ask if they'd like to do that for 40 straight years. The
...
Wed, Nov 18 2015, 8:44 AM
It was another holiday muddled week for the Mortgage Bankers Association's
Market Composite Index. The index, a
measure of applications volume, ro...
Wed, Nov 18 2015, 7:33 AM
If I were to deliver my normal pre-Fed shtick, I would probably point out the fact that the Fed has a tendency to use the Minutes release to promote a...
Wed, Nov 18 2015, 6:22 PM
As expected, today's Fed Minutes were a non-event. Well, almost... While the bulk of the Minutes release was simply a wordier version of the October...
Wed, Nov 18 2015, 4:57 PM
Mortgage rates were just slightly higher today, keeping them in a holding pattern just shy of 4-month highs. This after an abrupt move higher fro...
Wed, Nov 18 2015, 1:32 PM
With the 2pm release of the Minutes from the most recent Fed meeting less than an hour away, bond markets are clearly in consolidation mode. Both Tre...
Tue, Nov 17 2015, 10:52 AM
Well that didn't last long.
After jumping to the highest level in a decade in October the Housing
Market Index (HMI) a measure of builder confidenc...
Tue, Nov 17 2015, 10:10 AM
I
do a little traveling (this week, hopefully, is California, Colorado,
and Kansas) so it was interesting to see that Pro Teck Valuation
Service...
Tue, Nov 17 2015, 8:30 AM
We had a good run last week of modest gains that followed the abrupt selling-spree that began in late October. In other words, rates rose quickly , ...
Tue, Nov 17 2015, 5:26 PM
Mortgage rates had an interesting day today, with most lenders beginning at slightly higher levels, but improving by the end of the day. The aver...
Tue, Nov 17 2015, 5:26 PM
Bond markets bounced back from a weaker morning trading session to end the day largely unchanged. The selling began at 3am, shortly after the start o...
Tue, Nov 17 2015, 2:20 PM
Ever heard of Carlyle? Is that like Cargill? How about Veritas? En vino? No?
Well, 2 of the above are almost exclusively responsible for bond...
Mon, Nov 16 2015, 10:52 AM
Many
nations are a hodge-podge of ethnic diversity, and the U.S. Census
Bureau tells us that there are at least 350 languages spoken across our
...
Mon, Nov 16 2015, 7:33 AM
There are several past examples of global tragedies affecting domestic interest rates. It's not uncommon to see far less grotesque events than those ...
Mon, Nov 16 2015, 5:37 PM
For a few moments in the middle of the day, it looked like bond markets might be thinking about getting something going insofar as making the recen...
