Yes, homebuyers are jumping into a generally slowing housing market to “beat the heat.” That is, beat The Fed’s monetary tightening.
Mortgage applications increased 2.0 percent from one week earlier, according to data from the Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending May 6, 2022.
The seasonally adjusted Purchase Index increased 5 percent from one week earlier. The unadjusted Purchase Index increased 5 percent compared with the previous week and was 8 percent lower than the same week one year ago.
The Refinance Index decreased 2 percent from the previous week and was 72 percent lower than the same week one year ago.
Simply unaffordable! US housing, that is. As The Federal Reserve tries to fight inflation caused by Biden’s Medusa-like policies, mortgage rates are soaring and we are seeing an INCREASE in mortgage purchase applications ahead of Fed tightening. Panic in (Fed) Needle Park!
Mortgage applications increased 2.5 percent from one week earlier, according to data from the Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending April 29, 2022. The Refinance Index increased 0.2 percent from the previous week and was 71 percent lower than the same week one year ago.
The seasonally adjusted Purchase Index increased 4 percent from one week earlier. The unadjusted Purchase Index increased 5 percent compared with the previous week and was11 percent lower than the same week one year ago.
Adjustable rate mortgage (ARM) share has risen to 9.3% along with mortgage rates.
Between Biden’s energy policies, Congressional Covid relief and seemingly perpetual monetary stimulus from The Fed, we have 20% growth in home prices despite mortgage rates soaring.
And as The Fed is expected to tighten, mortgage rates hit 5.50%.
Federal Reserve Governor Lael Brainard said the U.S. central bank will continue to tighten policy methodically and shrink its balance sheet at a rapid pace as soon as May.
Brainard’s hawkish remarks sent bond prices crashing and 10Y bond yields up over 16 bps.
While Bankrate’s 30Y mortgage rate is down slightly today, the surge in the 10Y and 2Y Treasury yields could push mortgage rates above 5% by tomorrow,
Even Europe is feeling Brainard’s wrath. Italian 10Y sovereign yields are up almost 20 bps.
The NASDAQ index is down 300 points on Brainard’s utterance.
Gee thanks Lael from all us wanting to finance the purchase of a house.
Wasting away again in Biden/Pelosiville, looking for my lost inexpensive gasoline and food. Some people say that Putin is to blame, but we know its Biden/Pelosi’s fault.
The US Treasury 10Y-2Y yield curve just inverted, generally a precursor to a recession. Called it, nothing but net!
Meanwhile, today’s jobs report shows that Bidenflation is crushing America’s wage growth. While average hourly earnings grew to 5.6% YoY, we are still seeing inflation growing at 7.9% YoY meaning that inflation is reeling hurting the middle class and lower-income households.
The good news is that the U-3 unemployment rate fell to 3.6%, almost back to the Trump-era unemployment rate of 3.5% prior to the Covid outbreak. And the unemployment rate remains below the CBO’s short-term natural rate of unemployment indicating that the labor market is OVERHEATED.
Today’s jobs report was pretty good, as we would expect from a recovery caused by governments shutting down economies, then reopening them. 431k jobs were added, but less than last month’s jobs added of 678k and less than the forecast 490k.
The number of people NOT in the labor force fell slightly, but it still around 100 million. The number of people holding multiple jobs to overcome Bidenflation rose to 7.5 million.
On the mortgage front, Bankrate’s 30-year mortgage rate rose to 4.90% as the 2-year Treasury rate (yellow) rises and the number of expected Fed rate hikes over the coming year is 9.26%.
The reason why the fear of ARMs is unwarranted is that ARMs generally have CAPS on rate increases, either in a given period or over the life of the loan. Of course, READ the loan terms to ensure that the ARMs has restrictive caps on rate increases.
Currently, the 5/1 ARM is at 3.26% while the 30-year FRM is at 4.56%, a spread of 130 basis points.
Mortgage rates of all flavors are rising rapidly with the expectation of Federal Reserve Quantitative Tightening (QT). There are several headwinds that could counter The Fed’s QT efforts such as low GDP growth (Atlanta Fed’s GDPNow real-time GDP tracker is at 0.9% for Q1), the Russia-Ukraine invasion, approaching midterm elections, etc. But as of today, The Fed seems on a collision course with rising mortgage rates.
With the increasing likelihood of Fed rate hikes over the next year, we are seeing an increase in US ARM loan share from 4% to 7.9%, almost a doubling of ARM share. But FRMs are still over 90% of all mortgage originations.
Lending institutions would prefer consumers to use ARMs rather than FRMs since ARMs allow for the transfer on long-term interest rate risk to the borrower, while the FRM sticks the lender with long-term interest rate risk. Hence, we have Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the Government Sponsored Enterprises (GSEs) that allow lenders to originate FRMs and sell them to F&F. We are the only country with twin GSEs.
So, while most consumers would be better-off with an adjustable-rate mortgage, the structure of the mortgage market (particularly after the financial crisis) encourages lenders to originate FRMs and sell them to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
But FEAR drives many US mortgage borrowers into the FRM space rather than getting an ARM with a lower interest rate, even if ARM caps would prevent the mortgage rate from rising more than 100 basis points over the life of the loan.
Mortgage applications decreased 1.2 percent from one week earlier, according to data from the Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending March 11, 2022.
The seasonally adjusted Purchase Index increased 1 percent from one week earlier. The unadjusted Purchase Index increased 2 percent compared with the previous week and was 8 percent lower than the same week one year ago.
The Refinance Index decreased 3 percent from the previous week and was 49 percent lower than the same week one year ago.
Bankrate’s 30-year mortgage rate has surged to 4.46%.
Here is a photo of alligators in Great Falls, Virginia, up-river from Washington DC. They are likely congregating for the Fed Open Market Committee (FOMC) announcement today.
While Corelogic’s January home price index was hot, hot, hot (UP 19.1% YoY), today’s mortgage applications index for the week ending February 25, 2022 was not, not, not.
Mortgage applications decreased 0.71 percent from one week earlier, according to data from the Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending February 25, 2022.
The seasonally adjusted Purchase Index decreased 1.76 percent from one week earlier. The unadjusted Purchase Index increased 1.16 percent compared with the previous week and was 9 percent lower than the same week one year ago.
The Refinance Index increased 1 percent from the previous week and was 56 percent lower than the same week one year ago.
Yes, the mortgage industry is going through some difficult times. But not as difficult as trying to understand Biden’s State of the Union address: “Putin may circle Kyiv with tanks, but he’ll never gain the hearts and souls of the Iranian people.” Huh?
And then Biden’s closing remark was “Go get ’em!” What? Go get whom? The Russians? Inflation? Trump supporters?? I feel like Biden thought the SOTU was the annual Army-Navy football game.
The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) released their weekly mortgage application survey this morning. Mortgage applications decreased 8.1 percent from one week earlier, for the week ending February 4, 2022.
The Refinance Index decreased 7 percent from the previous week and was 52 percent lower than the same week one year ago. The seasonally adjusted Purchase Index decreased 10 percent from one week earlier. The unadjusted Purchase Index decreased 3 percent compared with the previous week and was 12 percent lower than the same week one year ago.
And mortgage refinancing applications are down 50% since the same week last week.
Here are the stats. Pretty much down across the board.
US 30-year mortgage rates are up 100 basis points and climbing since January 4, 2021. Most of the increase has occurred since the turn of the year into 2022. According to the Bankrate 30-year mortgage rate index, the 30-year rate is up 57 basis points just since December 31, 2021 as the benchmark 10-year Treasury yield rises.
Bear in mind that the REAL 30-year mortgage rate is now -3.2%. Get it while you can!!
Given today’s surprise jobs report, The Fed now has a green light to raise rates.
US new home sales spiked in December by 11.9% from November, but were down 14% year-over-year.
But the median price of new home sales (YoY) declined to 3.4%.
The Midwest saw a surge in new home sales (+56%).
The MBA’s mortgage applications index shows declining purchase applications (-1.83%) and declining refinancing applications (-12.60%) as mortgage rates increased from 3.64% to 3.72% for the week of 01/21.
Now, mortgage purchase applications rose for the week of 01/21 if we used non-seasonally adjusted data.
Confounded Interest - Anthony B. Sanders 