Mortgage Industry Blog

A Mortgage Rate Strategy For July's Jobs Report At 8:30 AM ET Friday, the Bureau of Labor Statistics will release the July 2011 Non-Farm Payrolls report. Mark it in your calendar. If you’ve been watching mortgage rates fall to new all-time lows this week and fear a mortgage rate reversal, Friday...

Closing At The Start Of September? Watch Out For Labor Day.  Home sales have heated up, according to the National Association of REALTORS®. More homes are going under contract this summer than went during the winter or spring seasons. Many of these homes are scheduled for late-August/early-Septe...

A Simple Explanation Of The Federal Reserve Statement (June 22, 2011 Edition) Wednesday, the Federal Open Market Committee voted to leave the Fed Funds Rate unchanged within its current target range of 0.000-0.250 percent. The vote was 10-0 - the fourth straight unanimous vote for the nation's Ce...

Homebuilder Confidence Slips To 9-Month Low   Despite rising new home sales and an increase in building permits nationwide, home builder confidence slipped to a 9-month low in June. The monthly Housing Market Index from the National Association of Homebuilders registered 13 this month - three tic...

What's Ahead For Mortgage Rates : Week of June 20, 2011   Mortgage markets improved last week as Wall Street managed news on both sides of the economic coin. There were several instances of higher-than-expected inflation - an event that tends to lead rates higher - but weak domestic jobs data and...

  The housing market received a jolt of good news Thursday. The Commerce Department reports that Single-Family Housing Starts improved in May. As compared to April, last month's Single-Family Housing Starts rose 4 percent to a seasonally-adjusted, annualized rate of 419,000 units, a figure slight...

Foreclosure rates are falling. According to foreclosure-tracking firm RealtyTrac, monthly foreclosure filings fell 2 percent in May to just under 215,000 filings nationwide. A foreclosure filing is defined as any one of the following: a default notice, a scheduled auction, or a bank repossession...

Is This The Start Of A Refi Boom? Mortgage Rates Fall For 8 Straight Weeks. Mortgage rates are falling, falling, falling. On a wave of uncertainty about Greece and its debt; and weaker-than-expected economic data at home, conforming 30-year fixed rate mortgage rates have fallen to levels not seen...

What's Ahead For Mortgage Rates This Week : June 13, 2011 Mortgage markets moved in feverish fashion last week, changing with extreme frequency, and eventually ending slightly worse on the week. Conforming mortgage rates fell to a 6-month low Wednesday but, by Friday, they had retreated higher. L...

Do You Know What Questions To Ask Your Lender? A mortgage comes with many moving pieces and understanding them is the key getting a great deal. Unfortunately, studies show that few Americans have a firm grasp of how mortgages work - from mortgage types to mortgage fees. In this back-to-basics int...