Good News For Sellers : Housing Starts Fall To 1-Year Low In May 2010
Single-family housing starts plummeted to a one-year low in May, just 30 days after soaring to a 20-month high. It’s no wonder home builders are confused.
Loan Application Alert : Conforming, Interest Only Mortgages Guidelines Change Next Week
If you plan to finance your home with a conforming interest only mortgage, get your loan application submitted no later than this Friday, June 18. Starting next week, Fannie Mae is clamping down on the popular loan product.
Shopping And Paying Bills Online? Here’s Methods To Protect Your Online Financial Identity
In May 2010, Retail Sales at non-store retailers — a category that includes Amazon and eBay — topped $29 billion, up 16 percent from May 2009. Clearly, Americans are doing an increasing amount of shopping online. And we’re paying our bills online, too. But how well are we protecting our identities? In this 5-minute piece [...]
What’s Ahead For Mortgage Rates This Week : June 14, 2010
Mortgage markets posted four good days last week and one awful one. Unfortunately for rate shoppers , that one bad day outweighed the gains of the other four and mortgage rates worsened on the week overall. Despite re-touching all-time lows on Tuesday and Wednesday, Conforming and FHA mortgage rates moved higher on the week. There [...]
FHA Mortgage Insurance Premiums Approved To Triple In Cost
Starting sometime later this year, the monthly cost to carry an FHA-insured mortgage is expected to rise. In a near-unanimous vote, the House of Representatives gave the FHA power to raise the monthly mortgage insurance premiums it charges to its borrowers. Currently, monthly mortgage insurance premiums are 0.55% of the unpaid loan balance, divided by [...]
Bank Reposessions Reach Record Levels For The Second Straight Month
According to foreclosure-tracking firm RealtyTrac.com, bank repossessions reached record levels for the second straight month in May, topping 93,000 properties nationwide. As compared to May 2009, all 50 states now show an increase in annual REO activity. Data like that won’t surprise today’s active home buyers. Foreclosed homes are prevalent, available and accounted for one-third [...]
Conforming Loan Costs Are Rising, Says Freddie Mac
Mortgage rates may be dropping, but mortgage costs are not. According to Freddie Mac, the average required discount points on a conforming mortgage rate are higher by 0.1 percent since early-May. A “discount point” is prepaid mortgage interest; an up-front fee paid by a borrower in exchange for a lower mortgage rate. In most cases, [...]
Fannie Mae’s Loan Quality Initiative : Repulling Your Credit Just Before Closing
A new loan quality initiative from Fannie Mae is making it harder for home buyers and refinancing homeowners everywhere to close on a mortgage. Beginning June 1, 2010, with all new applications, Fannie Mae wants lenders to verify that borrowers have not taken on new debt during the underwriting phase of the mortgage. If new [...]
What’s Ahead For Mortgage Rates This Week : June 7, 2010
Rate shoppers caught another break last week as mortgage markets improved on weak jobs data. The May Non-Farm Payrolls report fell well short of expectations while ongoing jobless claims rose. The two combined to cast doubt on the speed of the U.S. economic recovery, hurting stocks and helping bonds. Conforming and FHA mortgage rates dropped [...]
May 2010 Jobs Report Gives A Temporary Boost To Home Affordability
On the first Friday of each month, the Bureau of Labor Statistics releases its Non-Farm Payrolls data from the month prior. The release is more commonly called “the jobs report” — a major factor in mortgage rates and monthly payments. Especially now. With the recession officially over and growth returning to the U.S. economy, the [...]