Mon, Feb 29 2016, 5:10 PM
Mortgage rates were slightly lower today, recovering only some of the weakness seen over the past several business days. Apart from last Friday, to...
Fri, Feb 26 2016, 10:58 AM
I continue to see lenders and vendors who are trying to help their clients in the best ways they know how in spite of the labyrinth of weighty, and o...
Fri, Feb 26 2016, 8:30 AM
Stocks and oil have had a big impact on bonds, but they're not the only story
Central bank rhetoric has been helping Treasuries hold ground when st...
Fri, Feb 26 2016, 7:41 PM
After yesterday's strong performance it would have been nice to at least hold those gains. If that had happened, the bigger picture would look decid...
Fri, Feb 26 2016, 5:55 PM
Mortgage rates moved higher again today--this time at a slightly quicker pace--bringing averages up to the highest levels in at least a week. That ...
Fri, Feb 26 2016, 2:42 PM
In a speech this week to its Consumer Advisory Board the director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) laid out nine goals for the Bur...
Fri, Feb 26 2016, 2:33 PM
The percentage of homes sales that were all cash transactions increased in November, bucking a long term trend . CoreLogic, in its monthly cash sale...
Thu, Feb 25 2016, 11:17 AM
The Federal Housing Finance Agency's House Price Index (HPI) for December came in slightly higher than the Case-Shiller National Home Price Index di...
Thu, Feb 25 2016, 11:11 AM
How much do small firms spend on examiners and auditors camping out in their shops? And w hat about legal bills? I am sure it is a tiny fraction of w...
Thu, Feb 25 2016, 7:34 AM
Over the past few days, we've seen bigger-than-normal intraday swings in bond markets. The day began with one trend in force only to end with tradi...
Thu, Feb 25 2016, 5:32 PM
Data overlooked as bonds react to stocks/oil early
Bonds then ignore stock/oil rally later in the day and hold ground at stronger levels
Could ...
Thu, Feb 25 2016, 4:39 PM
Mortgage rates were slightly higher today, and that leaves them much higher than the long-term lows seen 2 weeks ago. Of course "much" is a relativ...
Thu, Feb 25 2016, 1:14 PM
In a new white paper titled Home Equity Lending Landscape , CoreLogic says that in the recent past homeowners who wanted to tap the equity in their h...
Wed, Feb 24 2016, 11:00 AM
A sharp drop in sales in the West brought about an overall decline in the national rate of new home sales in January. The U.S. Census Bureau and the ...
Wed, Feb 24 2016, 10:44 AM
Here's your IT lesson for the day. The NSA's Skynet program utilizes metadata to identify suspected terrorists. The system uses mass surveillance of...
Wed, Feb 24 2016, 9:33 AM
After two straight weeks of solid refinance-driven growth, mortgage application volume retreated during the week ended February 19. The Mortgage Ban...
Wed, Feb 24 2016, 9:09 AM
10's have been bouncing at 1.71, secretly, overnight
It's breaking this morning and the next battle is clearly implied by early February trading pa...
Wed, Feb 24 2016, 5:44 PM
Bonds start strong. Good MBS gains and a few positive reprices early
Everything went south as oil jumped off lows
Stocks jumped even higher and...
Wed, Feb 24 2016, 4:30 PM
Mortgage rates generally held their ground today. In fact, rates were lower than yesterday's, on average, but quite a few lenders raised rates from...
Wed, Feb 24 2016, 3:59 PM
Fannie Mae is updating its Selling Guide to include changes several areas. The changes include elimination of the continuity of obligation policy ...
Tue, Feb 23 2016, 11:01 AM
Existing home sales and home prices both increased in January, the latter again driven by a tight supply of available houses in many markets. The Nat...
Tue, Feb 23 2016, 10:39 AM
One of the sea changes that swept in with the housing crisis was the growth of single family houses as a share of rental properties . Frank Nothaft,...
Tue, Feb 23 2016, 10:31 AM
Mortgage delinquencies rose in January, topping the 5 percent mark for the first time in 11 months Black Knight Financial Services said on Monday. Th...
Tue, Feb 23 2016, 10:30 AM
Home price gains were somewhat mixed in December with some of the S&P Case-Shiller posting larger increases than in November and others negative or un...
Tue, Feb 23 2016, 10:26 AM
Actuaries, statisticians, the press, and the mortgage industry love acronyms and abbreviations, any list of which would take up this entire commentary...
Tue, Feb 23 2016, 8:52 AM
Bond markets have been slightly weaker over the past few days, but overall, still arguably trading sideways inside a narrow range. Looked at in the m...
Tue, Feb 23 2016, 5:12 PM
Sad start, but happy ending for bond markets
"Tradeflows" (the trading cues that remain after we take away any overt cues like economic data, headl...
Tue, Feb 23 2016, 4:22 PM
Mortgage rates experienced some volatility today, but ended up in slightly stronger territory on average. At first, rates were higher, as underlyin...
Mon, Feb 22 2016, 10:14 AM
Foreclosure activity declined on a month-over-month basis nationwide in January although completed foreclosures were up significantly on an annual b...
Mon, Feb 22 2016, 10:12 AM
In the last 50+ years Detroit has lost nearly two thirds of its population. (Yes, 2/3.) And now the City of Detroit is offering up a mortgage pair...
Mon, Feb 22 2016, 9:04 AM
If you're just tuning in to 2016's bond market trends, it's been a good year so far. 10yr yields began around 2.30 and fell as low as 1.53 for a f...
Mon, Feb 22 2016, 5:27 PM
Mortgage rates maintained recent sideways momentum today, holding inside a narrow range established last week. This range is particularly interesti...
Mon, Feb 22 2016, 5:09 PM
Modest losses for Treasuries and MBS by the close
Should have been worse judging by stock/oil gains
Corporate bond supply was big--also typical...
Mon, Feb 22 2016, 1:19 PM
Despite three years of solid recovery in home prices, a surprising number of homeowners don't realize what they've gained.
Most underestimate w...
Fri, Feb 19 2016, 10:36 AM
"A man goes to his nearest zoo. He walks around the entire place and the only animal there is a dog. It was a shih tzu." In a similar vein, I guess, b...
Fri, Feb 19 2016, 7:33 AM
I was hyperactively remarking to a mentor back in the day about how things were happening in markets almost exactly as I thought they would. I was ex...
Fri, Feb 19 2016, 7:13 PM
Both Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac (the GSEs) released fourth quarter and year-end results for their 2015 fiscal years this week. While both GSEs post...
Fri, Feb 19 2016, 7:05 PM
Both lower home prices and decreasing interest rates contributed to an increase in home affordability during the fourth quarter of 2015 according to...
Fri, Feb 19 2016, 5:25 PM
Today was a fine day for bond markets. There were no significant gains or losses by the closing bell, and indeed no real drama in between. Treasur...
Fri, Feb 19 2016, 4:17 PM
Mortgage rates improved slightly today, on average, despite modest weakness in underlying bond markets. We discussed this possibility yesterday in ...
Fri, Feb 19 2016, 3:35 PM
Both Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac (the GSEs) released fourth quarter and year-end results for their 2015 fiscal years this week. While both GSEs post...
Fri, Feb 19 2016, 3:31 PM
Both lower home prices and decreasing interest rates contributed to an increase in home affordability during the fourth quarter of 2015 according to...
Thu, Feb 18 2016, 10:43 AM
Freddie Mac is announcing changes to its Single-Family Seller/Servicer Guide which the company says will provide expanded homeownership opportuniti...
Thu, Feb 18 2016, 8:39 AM
Rates fight to hold under important long-term ceiling (marked by 1.84% in 10yr yields)
Assessing possibility that last week was a long-term bounce ...
Thu, Feb 18 2016, 8:09 PM
Mortgage rates finally held their ground today, earning back some of the ground lost over the past 3 days. While a substantial gap remains between ...
Thu, Feb 18 2016, 8:03 PM
Bonds unchanged overnight, then follow German Bunds toward lower yields mid-morning
Oil Inventory data hit oil prices and stocks, thus lubricating ...
Thu, Feb 18 2016, 2:00 PM
The overall delinquency rate on
mortgage loans has now fallen below historic average levels. The Mortgage
Bankers Association (MBA) said on Thursd...
Wed, Feb 17 2016, 11:02 AM
To put some perspective on things, a trillion seconds is roughly 31,710 years. The Fed indicates that household housing debt is about $8.8 trillion ...
Wed, Feb 17 2016, 9:07 AM
Applications for refinancing again drove a significant increase in mortgage applications during the week ended February 12 as mortgage rates continu...
Wed, Feb 17 2016, 8:56 AM
U.S. housing starts unexpectedly fell in January likely as bad weather disrupted building projects in some parts of the country, in what could be a te...
