Tue, Apr 9 2024, 11:37 AM
Here in the Hill Country near Austin, Texas, there’s an active market of sellers and buyers of real estate. It is a safe bet that most use agents; aro...
Tue, Mar 5 2024, 10:55 AM
Conference season is cranking back up, and some believe that apple orchards are in danger of extinction give the amount of “applewood smoked” bacon in...
Thu, Feb 15 2024, 11:01 AM
In my travels I’ve eaten some unusual foods, although maybe not this unusual, but here in Boise the talk is about how unusual it is that applications ...
Mon, Jan 8 2024, 1:33 PM
Even as consumer sentiment about housing remained generally pessimistic, a change in perceptions about the future of mortgage interest rates did a lot...
Wed, Dec 27 2023, 10:54 AM
Susan Toste writes to Ira Selwin who sends me (see how these things work?), “Can you believe it is 364 days until Christmas and people already have th...
Tue, Dec 19 2023, 10:56 AM
Change is constant: How ‘bout U.S. Steel, the Pittsburgh steel producer that played a key role in the nation’s industrialization, being acquired by Ni...
Tue, Dec 12 2023, 10:14 AM
Today I head to Northern California, home of plenty of technology. The other day I went to the doctor and the receptionist handed me a tablet and said...
Tue, Oct 31 2023, 10:56 AM
“Change is inevitable, except from a vending machine.” Corporate changes are the name of the game. Atlanta’s Crescent Mortgage’s bank owner is alignin...
Mon, Aug 7 2023, 10:39 AM
Jordan Peele met his famous comedy partner Keegan-Michael Key around 2002 at Second City in Chicago, and eventually performed this classic routine tha...
Tue, Aug 1 2023, 10:05 AM
Overheard last night at a bar here in Austin, Texas: “It’s hotter than the hinges to the gates of hell.” Not so hot, as residential lenders know, are ...
Wed, Jul 26 2023, 10:40 AM
Today's Fed meeting announcement is the last one until September 20. Mortgage rates, of course, are prone to moving around even without the Fed’s dire...
Fri, Jul 7 2023, 10:32 AM
What’s our Federal Reserve concerned about? I was in a restaurant last night in Truckee, California, and was shown the table and handed the menu. When...
Tue, Jun 20 2023, 9:40 AM
I am fortunate to travel around some (no, I am not on the missing Titanic tourist submarine, nor personally shepherding the new Credit Trigger Bill in...
Tue, Jun 13 2023, 10:38 AM
Sad?: “Invitations to the Unabomber's funeral were mailed out, but no one wants to open them.” Hopefully not sad: for anyone wanting to know about com...
Wed, May 24 2023, 10:26 AM
As the MBA’s Secondary Conference in New York wraps up, and jokes are made about who actually paid for Fannie’s reception (informally titled “The Repu...
Tue, May 2 2023, 10:07 AM
If you’re really happy when a scheduled conference or Zoom call is cancelled, does that mean you’re in the wrong line of work? (Asking for a friend.) ...
Thu, Apr 27 2023, 10:27 AM
Born in Ukraine, Golda Meir said, “Old age is like a plane flying through a storm. Once you are aboard there is nothing you can do about it." (Doubtfu...
Mon, Apr 24 2023, 9:31 AM
I head to Colorado Springs this morning, the scene of $3,000 mountain bikes in bike racks on top of $500 cars. There are roughly 380 bank branches in ...
Tue, Apr 11 2023, 10:22 AM
“The human brain is the most amazing organ in the human body. It works 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, from birth up until the moment that you buy yo...
Tue, Apr 4 2023, 10:25 AM
I was having dinner in Manhattan last night, with the topics including Virgin Orbit filing for bankruptcy and the continuing Homepoint rumors (any que...
Fri, Mar 24 2023, 9:49 AM
“I got stuck in a conversation with some wealthy people and one woman asked me how my investments were doing. I replied that both avocadoes should be ...
Mon, Mar 13 2023, 9:23 AM
Where should we start the week? How about how predictions and forecasts are nearly worthless when they’re out of date one week later? How about with a...
Fri, Mar 3 2023, 9:53 AM
I won’t sugar coat this. Here’s some rough news for lenders and LOs: With plenty of quant jocks to slice and dice numbers, Goldman Sachs tells us that...
Tue, Feb 14 2023, 10:12 AM
I am in Reno today, Spokane tomorrow, but I spent much of last week in Chicago which is very much a melting pot of languages. One can walk down the st...
Mon, Feb 13 2023, 9:59 AM
Tomorrow is Valentine’s Day, traditionally associated with love. But on the opposite side of the spectrum, an Ohio animal shelter is offering to write...
Mon, Jan 23 2023, 9:53 AM
Do you know what “splooting” is? Here’s a hint: 4-legged animals do it. (Hey, I don’t make these things up.) Quite the word. Words are very interestin...
Thu, Dec 29 2022, 10:29 AM
What does someone look like when they started working in our business at age 15? Well, there’s always this interview last week with Robbie Chrisman (y...
Fri, Dec 16 2022, 10:09 AM
This morning I Head East to Chicago for a handful of days. If you’ve wondered what a pilot sees when landing at O’Hare, here’s a mesmerizing video. (W...
Tue, Oct 25 2022, 9:24 AM
In the press, here’s some information on the hit the Fed’s balance sheet has taken give the bond market selloff. And here at the MBA’s annual, some of...
Fri, Sep 30 2022, 10:41 AM
If you’ve ever had to hire people, did you sort your applications into three piles: Mad, Hopeless, or Possible? For his Antarctic expeditions, Ernest ...
Mon, Aug 22 2022, 10:35 AM
John Kenneth Galbraith said, “The only function of economic forecasting is to make astrology look respectable.” How about forecasts of how dramatic th...
Tue, Jul 12 2022, 10:39 AM
I mentioned yesterday that 4 out of 3 people have trouble with math, but it doesn’t take a genius to do subtraction. 6 - .2 = 5.8, right? Wouldn’t you...
Mon, Jul 11 2022, 11:13 AM
Did you know that 4 out of 3 people have trouble with math? I do too, as suggested by my capital markets background, but I know enough to understand t...
Fri, Jun 10 2022, 10:27 AM
Start the day with a little something non-mortgage? Ira S. with U.S. Mortgage, on his time off, of course, found “River Runner.” One can basically cli...
Mon, May 23 2022, 10:52 AM
I recently opened my slang dictionary to the page that defined the origin of, “Different ways to skin a cat” and left it near my cat Myrtle’s water bo...
Thu, Apr 14 2022, 10:34 AM
It’s Thursday. What should we talk about today? Elon Musk’s bid for Twitter? How about the jump in adjustable-rate locks as evidenced by the MBA’s fig...
Fri, Apr 8 2022, 11:27 AM
The risk-free 2-year Treasury began 2022 yielding .73 and is now at 2.52 percent! Does your company offer 2-1 buydown loans? Do your LOs even know wha...
Wed, Feb 23 2022, 3:02 PM
Fannie Mae’s economists have again stepped up their expectations for the Fed’s response to escalating inflation. A 7.5 percent annual increase in the ...
Wed, Feb 16 2022, 8:48 AM
Things change and time passes. A little more than three months ago we “fell back” and now we have less than a month until most states in the U.S. chan...
Tue, Jan 25 2022, 11:31 AM
Numbers are interesting things. “1” is the number of dogs, that I know of, rescued by a drone dragging a sausage and leading the dog to safety out of ...
Thu, Dec 30 2021, 11:12 AM
Do we have an 8-year memory in an industry with 10-year business cycles? Bridging the gap between affordability, qualifying with a low income, and ris...
Mon, Dec 20 2021, 1:35 PM
Fannie Mae jumped up its forecast for real GDP on a Q4/Q4 basis this week, revising it from 4.8 percent in last month's report to 5.5 percent. The com...
Mon, Dec 20 2021, 10:52 AM
W.C. Fields said, “Money will not buy happiness, but it will let you be unhappy in nice places.” Unfortunately, many people have much less of it, and ...
Thu, Dec 16 2021, 10:57 AM
Both Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are reminding homeowners and mortgage servicers that their disaster relief options are in effect for those affected by...
Fri, Nov 19 2021, 12:45 PM
The ink wasn’t dry on Fannie Mae’s October economic forecast when the month’s Consumer Price Index (CPI) was published showing an inflation rate two-t...
Thu, Nov 18 2021, 10:19 AM
Recently the podcast, its link at the bottom of this opening paragraph daily, quoted, “Change in residential lending is mandatory; progress is optiona...
Mon, Nov 15 2021, 10:54 AM
This morning I head to Kansas for the MBAKC annual membership luncheon later this week. Home price appreciation is doing just fine in Kansas City , an...
Mon, Nov 1 2021, 1:18 PM
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac (the GSEs) reported their respective third quarter 2021 financial results on Friday. Both posted significant increases in n...
Wed, Oct 20 2021, 10:27 AM
Someone here in San Diego asked an audience, “Who out there misses their Blackberry?” and many raised their hands. Technology… an interesting thing. H...
Thu, Sep 9 2021, 11:28 AM
The GSEs, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, will be required to submit Equitable Housing Finance Plans to their regulator the Federal Housing Finance Agency...
