Fri, Oct 12 2018, 9:59 AM
Is there potential for today to turn into a "black Friday" with catastrophic stock losses that usher in the most amazing bond rally we've seen in year...
Fri, Oct 12 2018, 9:10 AM
“Rob, are you hearing about investors taking more of a hard line on every issue right now? In recent years they would give an extra day, or waive some...
Fri, Oct 12 2018, 8:48 AM
Want to get that reluctant customer who has been "about to" buy a home for months a little push? If an analysis by the Urban Institute (UI) as reporte...
Fri, Oct 12 2018, 8:26 AM
The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) reports a drop in applications for the purchase of newly constructed homes last month. Those applications fell ...
Thu, Oct 11 2018, 6:16 PM
Bonds rallied today, eventually. Most of the session was fairly flat with the afternoon bringing most of the rally thanks to another sell-off in st...
Thu, Oct 11 2018, 5:08 PM
Mortgage rates fell today as the stock market sell-off remained in focus. Stocks and rates certainly don't have a linear and predictable relationship,...
Thu, Oct 11 2018, 9:25 AM
Anything more than 20 points is a big day of selling in terms of the S&P, but that's a small enough number to be relatively common, periodically. Fro...
Thu, Oct 11 2018, 9:04 AM
We’re in the middle of mortgage conference season. (Are there any apple orchards left with all the applewood smoked bacon served at breakfasts?) The M...
Wed, Oct 10 2018, 6:35 PM
Remember last Wednesday? Rather forget it? Yeah, me too.
That was the day that bond yields spiked last week. The size and speed of the move was o...
Wed, Oct 10 2018, 5:58 PM
Mortgage rates are based on mortgage-backed securities (MBS), which are essentially bonds. Conventional wisdom holds that stocks and bonds supplement ...
Wed, Oct 10 2018, 5:00 PM
It was largely ignored with the ongoing rush of news from Washington, but late last month Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) introduced a bill she says i...
Wed, Oct 10 2018, 9:36 AM
One of the most important themes I've tried to communicate over the past 2 weeks is that the bond market is in the middle of redefining or repricing...
Wed, Oct 10 2018, 8:52 AM
As Hurricane Michael heads toward Florida & Georgia (with the wind and storm surge, lenders and investors act – for example, Mr. Cooper has temporaril...
Wed, Oct 10 2018, 8:11 AM
Mortgage application activity declined during the week as the 30-year mortgage rate crossed the 5.0 percent line for the first time in seven years and...
Tue, Oct 9 2018, 5:12 PM
Today was a freebie for bond markets (and stocks to some extent). In the grand scheme of things, no one will look back at today and conclude anythi...
Tue, Oct 9 2018, 4:32 PM
Mortgage rates recovered a small portion of their recent losses today, but the average loan applicant might not even notice. The 2 key ingredients of ...
Tue, Oct 9 2018, 9:06 AM
2009-2013 was an unprecedented time for the US bond market. It benefited not only from the initial blast of the Great Recession and the sluggish re...
Tue, Oct 9 2018, 8:59 AM
Maybe I read somewhere that the average age of a loan officer is 76. Maybe not. (Actually, my visits with companies informally indicate that overall a...
Tue, Oct 9 2018, 8:29 AM
Hurricane Florence, the storm that tore up much of eastern North and South Caroline in September, may be especially disastrous in terms of VA loans. B...
Tue, Oct 9 2018, 8:16 AM
It appears that, while Americans are generally upbeat about the economy, housing, and their own financial fortunes, they have a little difficulty main...
Fri, Oct 5 2018, 8:48 PM
The jobs report may have missed the mark in terms of payrolls, but average hourly earnings put in its 4th straight month holding 2.8% (y/y) or high...
Fri, Oct 5 2018, 3:21 PM
Mortgage rates moved back over the 5% threshold, on average, for the first time since early 2011 today following mixed data on the jobs market. Why wo...
Fri, Oct 5 2018, 10:52 AM
Mortgage lenders have been increasingly reporting tighter margins as costs rise for each actual loan transaction. In the last few years the principal ...
Fri, Oct 5 2018, 8:58 AM
“Rob, is any lender making money out there?” Well, what’s the old “joke?” “How do you get $5 million in the mortgage biz? Start with $10 million!” Not...
Fri, Oct 5 2018, 8:30 AM
At this point, there's nothing left to be said or done in preparation for today's NFP data. Bonds stand on the edge of the most recent abyss. This t...
Thu, Oct 4 2018, 4:48 PM
If you're looking for today's recap, check out the Huddle. Or just know that we sold-off a bit more and then settled sideways, fairly close to yester...
Thu, Oct 4 2018, 3:44 PM
If you don't happen to make it past this first sentence, just know that anyone telling you rates are much higher today is NOT lying to you. Anyone tel...
Thu, Oct 4 2018, 10:54 AM
The availability of mortgage credit at least as measured by the Mortgage Bankers Association's (MBA's) Mortgage Credit Availability Index (MCAI) pulle...
Thu, Oct 4 2018, 10:44 AM
Lesson learned? Whether they saw their credit decimated by the housing crisis and the Great Recession or merely watched loan standards tightened beyon...
Thu, Oct 4 2018, 9:30 AM
If you didn't catch it, and want to get caught up with yesterday's big move, this tweet has several links that should bring you thoroughly up to speed...
Thu, Oct 4 2018, 9:14 AM
In bad news, mortgage rates went up about .25% yesterday. In good news, more homes are going up for sale. According to realtor.com there was a Septemb...
Thu, Oct 4 2018, 8:12 AM
Nearly two years ago the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) approved Underserved Market Plans from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. These plans, part of...
Wed, Oct 3 2018, 6:20 PM
In terms of outright movement toward higher rates, you'd have to go back to the days following the election in November 2016 to find anything worse ...
Wed, Oct 3 2018, 4:43 PM
Mortgage rates skyrocketed today, in relative terms. It was the single worst day in nearly 2 years, and among only a few days where effective rates mo...
Wed, Oct 3 2018, 9:25 AM
Between 2001 and 2016, 97 percent of total job growth in the Unites States happened in urban counties. And while rural America is absolutely strugglin...
Wed, Oct 3 2018, 8:24 AM
As mortgage interest rates moved higher during the week ended September 28, with small increases carrying most to new seven year highs, application ac...
Wed, Oct 3 2018, 8:23 AM
Zen practitioners are an odd lot. One of their hallmark koans--the one about whether or not a tree falling in the woods makes a sound--is nonsense. ...
Tue, Oct 2 2018, 4:21 PM
Bonds had a couple options to choose from today when it came to potential market movers. As far as known quantities, we knew there would be a speech ...
Tue, Oct 2 2018, 3:46 PM
Mortgage rates fell modestly today, and thus managed to avoid heading any closer to the 7-year highs just overhead. Underlying bond markets benefited ...
Tue, Oct 2 2018, 11:47 AM
Two Zillow subsidiaries are estimating it will cost the average U.S. homebuyer $40,000 to get in the door of their new home. Depending on where the ho...
Tue, Oct 2 2018, 8:49 AM
“Stay away from negative people. They have a problem for every solution.” There are plenty of folks out there reminding lenders of the seasonality of ...
Tue, Oct 2 2018, 8:37 AM
So there's this sideways trading range, and we're waiting for bonds to break out. The end...
Seriously though! It's really that simple . We'd b...
Tue, Oct 2 2018, 8:17 AM
The take-away from CoreLogic's report on its August Home Price Index is that home price appreciation during the month was the slowest in two years . T...
Mon, Oct 1 2018, 5:14 PM
After slogging up toward (but not over) long-term highs 2 weeks ago, 10yr yields began a waiting game that looked like it would take a cue from last W...
Mon, Oct 1 2018, 4:37 PM
After hitting the lowest levels in exactly 2 weeks on Friday, mortgage rates bounced back up toward their recent highs today. This risk was already ta...
Mon, Oct 1 2018, 11:29 AM
The total value of construction put in place during August only ticked up 0.1 percent compared to July, but the small, steady increases each month hav...
Mon, Oct 1 2018, 9:13 AM
Believe it or not, any given month stands a better than average chance to convey some sort of theme for bond trading. In other words, there tends to ...
Mon, Oct 1 2018, 8:51 AM
Is every non-bank lender of any size looking at offshore options to save money? Perhaps, and underwriting costs and productivity are usually brought u...
Fri, Sep 28 2018, 5:00 PM
Today brought rather pervasive pressure on longer-term rates and mortgages. It wasn't a significant amount of selling, but it was fairly steady thr...
Fri, Sep 28 2018, 4:25 PM
Mortgage rates were slightly lower again today, but there are some caveats. First of all, the average lender wasn't in substantially better shape comp...
