Mortgage rates inched lower yesterday morning after rising modestly on Monday. While consumer borrowing costs did improve, the day ended with rates under pressure as stocks made a late afternoon comeback from the lows of the session. No lenders repriced for the worse but these events were an omen for...
Mortgage rates capped off a great week in sour fashion last Friday. After four days of stock selling induced rate rallying, lenders were finally forced to reprice for the worse on Friday. While mortgage rates did rise more than they have on average, the best 30 year conventional fixed loan rate was still...
Mortgage rates bounced around a tight range for most of the week. There wasn't much in the way of news to motivate movement in the first three days of the week. Although we did get several key earnings releases, the economics calendar was essential empty and the market's general tone reflected...
My headline yesterday was: Mortgage Rates Fully Recover from Recent Uptick. Energy Building in Benchmarks. This is what I said: Over the past two days benchmark Treasury yields and MBS prices have barely budged from a tight trading range. Trading has been very slow as market participants have been unmotivated...
Consumer mortgage borrowing costs improved a few basis points yesterday as prices of mortgage backed securities ticked higher, recapturing the price losses that occured late last week. As the price gains held through close, most lenders repriced better, lowering consumer borrowing costs by 0.125 to 0...
Mortgage rates fell yesterday thanks to a much weaker than expected consumer confidence survey. This scheduled economic release combined with a few other unscheduled events forced investors to sell stocks and move funds over to the safest assets in the world, US Treasuries. This fueled a rally in mortgage...
Mortgage rates improved a few basis points yesterday. Lenders were somewhat subdued in passing along interest rate improvements though. This is a function of a few reasons. First, mortgage-backed securities prices have held to a tight range over the course of the week. The second reason is a bit more...
Reports on the sales of both new and existing homes were released on Friday, March 23 and Monday, March 26 and they pointed in distinctly opposite directions. The National Association of Realtors (NAR) released figures showing an unexpected surge in existing home sales for February on the heels of a...
Is it the end of the end of the housing bubble ? The National Association of Realtors (NAR) seemed to think so as it issued its November report on the sales of existing houses, the second month in a row when sales showed slight improvement over the previous month. New home sales also showed signs of...
Mortgage rates were mixed for the week ending September 7 and September 8, with no definitive movement in either direction. After three weeks of declines, both Freddie Mac and the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) surveys saw rates up, down, and unchanged. According to Freddie Mac, the 30-year fixed...