Mortgage Applications Decline -0.1% WoW Due To Declining Mortgage Refis

Mortgage applications were essentially flat last week as rates increased for the fourth time in five weeks, driven by bond market volatility in advance of the presidential election and the next FOMC meeting. The 30-year fixed rate, at 6.73 percent, was at its highest level since July 2024.

WASHINGTON, D.C. (October 30, 2024) — Mortgage applications decreased 0.1 percent from one week earlier, according to data from the Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) Weekly Applications Survey for the week ending October 25, 2024.

The Market Composite Index, a measure of mortgage loan application volume, decreased 0.1 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis from one week earlier. On an unadjusted basis, the Index decreased 1 percent compared with the previous week. The seasonally adjusted Purchase Index increased 5 percent from one week earlier. The unadjusted Purchase Index increased 4 percent compared with the previous week and was 10 percent higher than the same week one year ago.

The Refinance Index decreased 6 percent from the previous week and was 84 percent higher than the same week one year ago.

House Prices Still On Fire! Case-Shiller National Home Price Index Grows At 4.2% YoY

Biden/Harris started the fire! And the house market is still burning.

S&P/Case-Shiller released the monthly Home Price Indices for August (“August” is a 3-month average of June, July and August closing prices). August closing prices include some contracts signed in April, so there is a significant lag to this data. Here is a graph of the month-over-month (MoM) change in the Case-Shiller National Index Seasonally Adjusted (SA).

xxxx

Fire! Is still burning. The Fed tried to extinguish it and failed.

The DC Stomp! Q2 Net Real GDP Declines By -4.7% (Real GDP Growth Less Public Debt Growth)

I call it the DC Stomp! Where The Federal Government finances its GDP growth through debt. In Q2 2024, the NET real GDP was negative at -4.7% YoY (real GDP growth less public debt growth).

Under Biden/Harris, only Q2 2021 saw a positive net real GDP of 4.5% YoY. All other quarters saw a negative net

To be fair, only under Clinton and House Speaker Gingrich did we see consecutive quarters of positive net Real GDP growth since Gingrich held Clinton accountable (latter half of 1990s). Big debt issuance resulted from multiple wars and recessions.

Biden/Harris Replicates Reagan’s Soviet Bankruptcy Strategy IN REVERSE, US Debt Stands At $36 TRILLION With $220.3 TRILLION In Unfunded Liabilities (Too Bad Total US Assets Are Only $217 TRILLON)

I just watched Dennis Quaid in “Reagan”. Excellent film. But it reminded me of how Reagan sank the Soviet Union: by outspending the Soviet Union on the arms race. It worked! The Soviet Union, hamstrung by grossly inefficent central planning, couldn’t keep up and collapsed under President George H.W.Bush.

Fast forward to today. Starting with Barack Obama and Joe Biden in 2009, following the financial crisis in 2008. The Federal government ramped up Federal spending, and Federal debt. While The Federal Reserve, the hand maiden to the Federal government, ramped up M2 Money supply.

“You never want a serious crisis to go to waste. And what I mean by that is an opportunity to do things that you think you could not do before.” – Rahm Emmanuel

Then came Biden/Harris who drove Federal debt and spending to absurb level (orange box). Like the financial crisis, fans of big government and big government spending will utter the word “Covid.” But that is gross misleading. Covid was the excused for wild spending and debt issurance. And MORE Fed money printing. It’s almost as if Obama/Biden/Harris were replicating Reagan’s bankrupcy strategy in reverse! That is, collapsing the US from within.

As we are all painfully aware, the US Debt now stands at $36 TRILLION with $220.3 TRILLION in unfunded liabilities. Too bad total US Assets are only $217 TRILLON.

Do I believe that Obama/Biden/Harris want a “Great Reset”? Absolutley. Just look at our fiscally unsustable open borders and our politiicians blatanly lying to us. :Like Ohio’s Senator Sherrod Brown who brags about his helping write the border bill that would reverse Trump’s deportations and fund the speeding up of immigration.

Running On Empty? Chicago Fed National Activity Index Stumbles To -0.28 In September From -0.01 In August

Jackson Browne appartently knew that the Biden/Harris economic recovery would run out of gas as soon as Federal spending started to slow down. The US economy is running on empty.

Evidence? The Chicago Fed National Activity Index (CFNAI) decreased to –0.28 in September from –0.01 in August. Two of the four broad categories of indicators used to construct the index decreased from August, and all four categories made negative contributions in September. The index’s three-month moving average, CFNAI-MA3, decreased to –0.19 in September from –0.14 in August.

The USD Swaption Surface is steeply sloped to 1 month.

Bungle In The Economic Jungle! Existing Home Sales Decreased to 3.84 million SAAR in September, New Cycle Low (Lowest Since 2010)

We are in the jungle. And its a bungle in the economic jungle.

Existing home sales disappointed (yet again) in September, declining 1.0% MoM (vs expectations of a 0.5% MoM rise). August’s 2.5% MoM drop was revised up to a 2.0% MoM drop, but still left existing home sales down 3.5% YoY…

Source: Bloomberg

Total sales SAAR dropped to 3.84mm, the lowest since 2010…

Source: Bloomberg

Even with the weaker September sales figures, “factors usually associated with higher home sales are developing,” Lawrence Yun, NAR chief economist, said in his ubiquitously optimistic statement.

“There are more inventory choices for consumers, lower mortgage rates than a year ago and continued job additions to the economy.”

First-time buyers made up 26% of purchases, matching an all-time low.

Some 1.39 million homes were for sale in September, up 23% from a year earlier, the NAR report showed. The supply of homes still remains below pre-pandemic levels.

At the current sales pace, available inventory would last 4.3 months, the longest in more than four years.

The median sales price rose 3% in September from a year ago to $404,500.

Around the country, previously owned home sales dropped in three of four regions, including a 1.7% decline in the South to the slowest pace since the start of 2012.

Closings fell 2.2% in the Midwest to a 13-year low, and 4.2% in the Northeast. Sales rose 4.1% in the West, driven by California and Arizona.

While the short-term (lagged) may bring an improvement in existing home sales (based on the lagged impact of declining mortgage rates), as the chart below shows, since The Fed unleashed its rate0cutting cycle, mortgage rates have risen aggressively once again…

Source: Bloomberg

…not a good sign for the housing market’s affordability.

However, inventory problems could persist since “84 percent of mortgaged homes have a rate below 6%, so the number of sellers that would be financially incentivized to sell would remain limited,” Odeta Kushi, deputy chief economist at title insurance giant First American Financial Corp. said in the report.

Watch Harris laugh insanely if confronted with this news.

Mortgage Purchase Index Decreased 5 Percent From Previous Week (I’ll Feel A Whole Lot Better If Harris Loses)

I’ll feel a whole lot better … when Kamala Harris is gone.

Mortgage applications decreased 6.7 percent from one week earlier, according to data from the Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) Weekly Applications Survey for the week ending October 18, 2024.

The Market Composite Index, a measure of mortgage loan application volume, decreased 6.7 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis from one week earlier. On an unadjusted basis, the Index decreased 7 percent compared with the previous week. The seasonally adjusted Purchase Index decreased 5 percent from one week earlier. The unadjusted Purchase Index decreased 5 percent compared with the previous week and was 3 percent higher than the same week one year ago.

The Refinance Index decreased 8 percent from the previous week and was 90 percent higher than the same week one year ago.

Implied volatility in Treasury yields has risen to the highest since December.

Surprise! Citi Economic Surprise Index Rises To Highest Level Since April On Crumbling Economy (10Y Treasury Yield Highest Since August)

The US economy is crumbing down under Biden/Harris. No, the economy doesn’t hurt so good.

The Citi Economic Surprise Index just rose to its highest level since April.

The 10Y Treasury yield just rose to its highest level since August.

Changeling! Leading Economic Index For US Declines AGAIN By 0.5% In September (Down -2.6% Over 6 Months)

SF Woman. That is my name for Kamala Harris, the ultimate political changeling, taking full credit for the economy, then trying to distance herself from Biden. As the US economy continues to contract.

The Conference Board Leading Economic Index® (LEI) for the US declined by 0.5% in September 2024 to 99.7 (2016=100), following a 0.3% decline in August. Over the six-month period between March and September 2024, the LEI fell by 2.6%, more than its 2.2% decline over the previous six-month period (September 2023 to March 2024).

Weakness in factory new orders continued to be a major drag on the US LEI in September as the global manufacturing slump persists. Additionally, the yield curve remained inverted, building permits declined, and consumers’ outlook for future business conditions was tepid. Gains among other LEI components were not significant enough to offset weakness among the four gauges mentioned above. Overall, the LEI continued to signal uncertainty for economic activity ahead.

*Changeling, in European folklore, a deformed or imbecilic offspring of fairies or elves substituted by them surreptitiously for a human infant. According to legend, the abducted human children are given to the devil or used to strengthen fairy stock.

$36 Tons Of Debt! Federal Gov’t Ends 2024 With $1.8 Trillion Deficit As National Debt Nears $36 Trillion (Family Of Five Citizens Has A Liability Of $3.25 Million For Unfunded Liabilities)

Tennessee Ernie Ford sang it best. $36 tons of debt. Another day older and deeper in debt. Notice virually no political candidate will acknowledge or discuss.

The federal government spent $1.8 trillion more than it collected in tax revenue in fiscal year 2024, according to figures released Friday by U.S. Treasury Department.

Congress has run a deficit every year since 2001. In the past 50 years, the federal government has ended with a fiscal year-end budget surplus four times, most recently in 2001.

The deficit for fiscal 2024 was $1.8 trillion, or $138 billion higher than the prior year’s deficit. As a percentage of GDP, the deficit was 6.4%, an increase from 6.2% in fiscal 2023. The 2024 deficit is $196 billion lower than in 2023, excluding the effect of the Supreme Court’s 2023 decision in Biden v. Nebraska regarding student loan programs, according to year-end data from the September 2024 Monthly Treasury Statement of Receipts and Outlays of the United States Government.

And then we have the REAL disaster in the form of unfunded liabilities of $220 TRIILLION (or $651,000 per citizen). For a family of 5 citizens (like my household), that amounts to $3.26 MILLION per household of 5.

Imagine Kamala’s filibustering a response to a question about the national debt and unfunded liabilities. Other than “Donald Trump.”

Perhaps Tennesse Ernie Ford could have recorded “220 Trillion Tons of Unfunded Liabilities” instead.