Friday saw mortgage rates move back up near the highest levels of the week, and thus the highest levels of the past 3 months. Thus ends another week where mortgage rates end higher despite a Fed rate cut. We've beaten this horse to death, but here are the two key reasons Fed rate cuts don't […]

“What happened with the DSCR appraisal issue in Baltimore earlier this year?” Good question. Baltimore is not alone: This week we have investors either pricing themselves out of, or ceasing loans from, the Philly market for certain non-owner loans.) The whole Baltimore thing seems to have […]

There's a noticeable divergence between long and short term bonds since the Fed announcement, and it's becoming more pronounced today.  We can consider a few different reasons with the most basic being that the Fed rate cut outlook keeps shorter-term yields locked down at lower levels thus forcing […]

Two-Way Trading But Not Much Day-Over-Day Movement Bonds had a solid morning, adding moderately to yesterday's rally and taking yields well into the lowest levels since last Friday. But from just after the 9:30am NYSE open, bonds leaked slowly weaker, […]

As is sometimes the case on the day following a Fed day, the bond market carried a bit more momentum in the same direction as yesterday afternoon. Fortunately, the momentum was toward lower rates this time around--a nice break from the past two Fed days which resulted in several days (and weeks) of […]

Lender and Broker Services, Products, and Software For some servicers, the idea of implementing workflow automation is both appealing and overwhelming. Often, knowing where to start is the most challenging part, especially when the path forward isn’t always obvious. Clarifire’s latest blog, […]

Bonds are adding moderate to yesterday's post-Fed gains. Most of today's rally has followed this morning's jobless claims data, but we wouldn't necessarily give it all the credit. This is a tricky week to try to make sense of jobless claims due to the very late Thanksgiving holiday this year. It […]

Powell Avoided Throwing Cold Water on Rate Outlook. Bonds Approved Today's gains ended up being all about Powell's press conference. While there were a few potentially friendly comments (current rates in high end of neutral range, recent job gains […]

The Fed cut its policy rate by 0.25% today and mortgage rates moved lower after the announcement. That said, those two developments are not related. In fact, there was no movement in the bonds that underlie mortgage rates when the rate cut was announced. Instead, the market (and rates) moved in […]

Seasonally adjusted mortgage application activity rose 4.8% last week, according to MBA’s Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending December 5. Unadjusted applications jumped 49% from the prior week, reflecting a rebound following the Thanksgiving-related slowdown. The Refinance […]