Fri, Oct 25 2024, 11:41 AM
“A herd of cows broke into a Colorado weed farm. Police and animal control are on the scene, and the steaks are high.” This will be the last day in th...
Fri, Oct 25 2024, 11:17 AM
Granted, we were by no means looking for big things from this morning's Durable Goods data, but somehow it still managed to underwhelm. That's not sa...
Thu, Oct 24 2024, 4:56 PM
Better Balance, Finally
In the context of the first 3 days of the week, bonds pulled off a miracle today. M...
Thu, Oct 24 2024, 4:02 PM
Mortgage rates have risen every day since October 15th and some of the jumps have been fairly big. That followed an even bigger increase earlier in t...
Thu, Oct 24 2024, 11:09 AM
Were solid, rounded airplane windows considered “innovation”? Indiana’s Carol K. has the answer. There’s always innovation, in this case entertaining....
Thu, Oct 24 2024, 10:31 AM
Thursday morning brought the week's only arguably important economic data in the form of Jobless Claims and S&P's PMIs. Both have a decent track reco...
Wed, Oct 23 2024, 4:35 PM
Why Would Rates Care About a One-Party Sweep?
Our morning commentary resulted in widespread questions regard...
Wed, Oct 23 2024, 4:09 PM
Mortgage rates have been moving two directions recently and both of them are "up." Only the pace changes. Today's pace was modest to moderate, but b...
Wed, Oct 23 2024, 3:15 PM
Housing was chugging right along in early 2020, then covid happened. Housing experienced lots of unexpected volatility with the most important develo...
Wed, Oct 23 2024, 2:53 PM
The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) keeps track of applications for purchase and refi mortgages every week. Purchase apps are slower moving, less ...
Wed, Oct 23 2024, 11:49 AM
“The coast is clear,” and today I head to the Palm Beach Mortgage Professionals Expo hosted by FAMP’s Broward-Gold Coast Chapter. Legal issues will be...
Wed, Oct 23 2024, 10:13 AM
For those of you who already feel like you fully understand the message in Tuesday's recap, the next few days and weeks might get a little repetitive,...
Tue, Oct 22 2024, 4:35 PM
Much Calmer, But Risks Remain
Bonds had a significantly calmer day in terms of day-over-day change. In fact...
Tue, Oct 22 2024, 3:47 PM
Mortgage rates jumped to their highest levels since late July yesterday. Underlying market movement wasn't readily attributable to any singular headl...
Tue, Oct 22 2024, 11:54 AM
“An eye for an eye, Tooth for a tooth. Vote for me and I'll set you free! Rap on, brother, rap on. Well, the only person talking about loving thy brot...
Tue, Oct 22 2024, 10:30 AM
Monday was frustrating for the bond market. It was a medium large sell-off that would have made more sense as a flat, forgettable Monday. The only th...
Mon, Oct 21 2024, 4:48 PM
Ratio of Weakness to Confirmed Explanations is Off The Charts
Every year there are a few days where bonds mo...
Mon, Oct 21 2024, 3:42 PM
By the smallest of margins, mortgage rates are back up to levels last seen in July. That means we've gone from being fairly close to 6% in mid-Septem...
Mon, Oct 21 2024, 12:16 PM
First off, there's no great explanation for the extent to which bonds are losing ground this morning. These days happen occasionally. Sometimes an e...
Mon, Oct 21 2024, 11:46 AM
Sports have a lot of fans, and heroes. With only 10 days until Halloween, what a great time of year to be a sports fanatic. You never have to leave yo...
Fri, Oct 18 2024, 4:03 PM
Waiting Game Returns With Straightforward, Sleepy Friday
Bonds were technically a hair weaker in the overnig...
Fri, Oct 18 2024, 3:52 PM
There hasn't been much day to day movement in mortgage rates after the big jump caused by the jobs report earlier in the month. That jump ended on Mo...
Fri, Oct 18 2024, 3:01 PM
While this technically signals some cooling in new construction potential, it wasn't much more of a drop than investors expected. Moreover, there has...
Fri, Oct 18 2024, 12:14 PM
A while back I parked my car outside a government office building in Sacramento. "Sir, you can't park here," said a cop. "This is where our politician...
Fri, Oct 18 2024, 11:02 AM
While the recent trend has been unpleasant for the bond market, at least it's logical. Apart from some uncertainty related to the election and forthc...
Thu, Oct 17 2024, 5:27 PM
Fairly Big Sell-Off, But Last Week's Range is Intact
Bonds dealt with a trifecta of unfriendly economic data...
Thu, Oct 17 2024, 3:45 PM
Mortgage rates are driven by the bond market and bonds consistently take cues from economic data. Traders have been waiting on this Thursday's econom...
Thu, Oct 17 2024, 11:53 AM
Ever since last Thursday's econ data failed to cause a stir in financial markets, we knew we'd be waiting until today for big, data-driven volatility ...
Thu, Oct 17 2024, 11:43 AM
Today would have been the 65th birthday of comedian Norm Macdonald. And while that may make your head shake, here’s something else that definitely wil...
Wed, Oct 16 2024, 4:24 PM
Thursday Morning is This Week's Biggest Volatility Risk
While there was certainly a bit of an upward drift i...
Wed, Oct 16 2024, 3:44 PM
Mortgage rates have been holding in a fairly narrow range since the middle of last week and today was one of the least interesting additions to the tr...
Wed, Oct 16 2024, 11:46 AM
An attorney will tell you, “Never miss a good chance to shut up.” Today I head to the Portland/Vancouver area for a few days with Banner Bank. Oregon ...
Wed, Oct 16 2024, 10:48 AM
The market was hungry for data before the jobs report week and has been even hungrier since then. Unfortunately, there haven't been many compelling r...
Tue, Oct 15 2024, 4:34 PM
Uneventful Day, But That's a Victory These Days
Last week's bond market action offered some glimmers of hope...
Tue, Oct 15 2024, 4:03 PM
The average mortgage lender is quoting rates that are just a fraction of a hair lower today compared to last Friday. Lenders were either closed or ot...
Tue, Oct 15 2024, 11:44 AM
Some things aren’t what they seem to be. What about places… what if you moved and your new home wasn’t how it originally seemed to be? There is a tren...
Tue, Oct 15 2024, 9:36 AM
Bonds moved into stronger territory over the 3 day weekend in a move largely attributed to de-escalation in the Middle East and the sharp drop in oil ...
Fri, Oct 11 2024, 3:58 PM
Boring Week and Next Week Isn't Much More Promising
It's always a bit jarring to go from something like last...
Fri, Oct 11 2024, 3:28 PM
While this week's rates were substantially higher than most of last week's, if we remove a few flashes of volatility, the average lender stayed very ...
Fri, Oct 11 2024, 11:48 AM
Preparing for the next hurricane in Florida? Or Louisiana? Or Texas? Call this really smart or really humorous, it’s up to you. (And no, I don’t know ...
Fri, Oct 11 2024, 11:14 AM
When it comes to economic data with any real significance, today only offered two reports: PPI and Consumer Sentiment. Neither have an especially stu...
Thu, Oct 10 2024, 4:53 PM
Bonds Turn Green Despite Plenty of Volatility
It was touch and go in the mid-day hours as early stability (m...
Thu, Oct 10 2024, 3:59 PM
We can appreciate that the daunting task of determining what "the" actual mortgage rate may be at any given moment. The word "the" is singled out in ...
Thu, Oct 10 2024, 12:52 PM
Hey, I like a good raccoon swarm as much as the next guy, but you couldn’t pay me to walk out there in that yard. Speaking of pay, a common question i...
Thu, Oct 10 2024, 11:34 AM
At first glance, it looks as if the bond market will make it through Thursday morning without being too worse for the wear. When the monthly core CPI...
Wed, Oct 9 2024, 3:45 PM
Don't Expect Salvation From CPI
Bonds lost a bit of ground on Wednesday with Treasuries having a far rougher...
Wed, Oct 9 2024, 3:28 PM
Today brought the release of the minutes from the most recent Fed meeting in addition to numerous Fed speeches and the scheduled auction of 10yr Treas...
Wed, Oct 9 2024, 11:39 AM
Should it concern us that, a few days ago, it was pointed out that from now until Nov. 26, there’s at least one football game on TV to watch every day...
Wed, Oct 9 2024, 10:09 AM
This week's economic calendar is choked with Fed speeches and most of them are happening today. Collectively, those will be more relevant than the re...
Tue, Oct 8 2024, 4:31 PM
Worst is Over. Now What?
Good things happened in the bond market on Tuesday. There was a bit of a scare in ...
