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Mortgage Rates Surge To 7 Year High - Time To Lock In a Mortgage

October 3, 2018 Kathleen Sullivan No Comments

http://bit.ly/2NiLnoh

Mortgage Rates Surge Well Into New 7-Year Highs

 

Mortgage rates skyrocketed today, in relative terms.  It was the single worst day in nearly 2 years, and among only a few days where effective rates moved more than 0.10%.  Typically, mortgage rates are offered in 0.125% increments.  We're able to track "effective rates" by examining the upfront costs associated with any given rate.  For instance, a quoted rate might not change from day today despite major changes in upfront costs/credits.  At a certain point, the upfront cost change is big enough that it makes more sense to jump up by the aforementioned 0.125% increment.

In other words, if you have a loan in process, an effective rate increase of 0.10% means there's a very good chance that you're looking at a 0.125% increase in rate today.  And if you're not, you'd instead be seeing this move in the form of higher upfront costs or lower lender credit.  Either way, it was a big, bad move.

So why did rates spike so much?  The simple answer is that this morning's economic data drove home some of the harsh realities that have been plaguing rates in general for the past few years--and especially over the past 2 months.  Simply put, when the economy is firing on all cylinders and when traders have reason to defend against the possibility of even faster growth and inflation (something today's data may well suggest), rates are forced to move higher.

The complicated part of the answer has to do with the extra momentum that can creep into underlying market movements on days like today.  To an undetermined extent, traders are definitely positioning for more unfriendly rate news with Friday morning's big jobs report.  That's our first major opportunity for reprieve, but reprieve should not be taken for granted.  Rates could go even higher if Friday's data strikes a similar chord to today's.


Loan Originator Perspective

Bond markets tanked today on robust economic and employment data.  We're looking at treasury yields that haven't been seen since 2011, with no end to the losses in sight.  I have been locking early for months, and today's a great illustration of why.  Since rate sheets don't yet reflect today's market losses, locking now (instead of waiting for tomorrow) is the move here. -Ted Rood, Senior Originator

Today's Most Prevalent Rates

  • 30YR FIXED - 4.875-5.0%
  • FHA/VA - 4.5%
  • 15 YEAR FIXED - 4.375-4.5%
  • 5 YEAR ARMS -  4.25%-4.75% depending on the lender


Ongoing Lock/Float Considerations 

  • Rates continue coping with several big-picture headwinds, including: the Fed's rate hike outlook (and general policy tightening), the increased amount of Treasury issuance to pay for the tax bill (higher bond issuance = higher rates), and the possibility that fiscal stimulus results in higher growth/inflation (which certainly seems to be the case so far in 2018).

  • While rates were able to recover and stay sideways in the summer months, September and October have seen a surge up to the highest levels in more than 7 years. 

  • Upward pressure can continue as long as economic growth and inflation continue running near long-term highs.  Stay defensive (i.e. generally more lock-biased).  It will take a big change in economic fundamentals or geopolitical risk for the big picture to change.  Such things tend to not happen as quickly as we'd like.
  • Rates discussed refer to the most frequently-quoted, conforming, conventional 30yr fixed rate for top tier borrowers among average to well-priced lenders.  The rates generally assume little-to-no origination or discount except as noted when applicable.  Rates appearing on this page are "effective rates" that take day-to-day changes in upfront costs into consideration.

Essex County Housing Reports: August 2017 vs August 2018

September 23, 2018 Kathleen Sullivan No Comments

Essex County Housing Reports: August 2017 vs August 2018; June - August 2017 vs June - August 2018

Inventory down and sales prices up. - breakdown by property type:

Single Family: August: Inventory Down 8.6% and Sale Prices Up 4.4%:  3 Months Inventory Down 4.6% and Sale Prices Up 4.2%

Condo: August Inventory Down 10.2% and Sale Prices Up 3.5%:  3 Months Inventory Down 5.7% and Sale Prices Up 7.7% 

Muilti-Family: August Inventory Down 11% and Sale Prices Up 8.2%: 3 Months Inventory Down 6% and Sale Prices Up 11.2% 

To view data for every Essex County town, go to:  http://www.sullivanteam.com/Properties/Reports/Public/Charts.php 

To dowload the full Housing Report go to: http://sullivanteam.com/pages/EssexCountyHousingReports

 

Consumers Can Now Request Credit Freezes for Free

September 21, 2018 Kathleen Sullivan No Comments

Consumers Can Now Request Credit Freezes for Free

 

It’s common advice to freeze your credit information when cybersecurity breaches potentially put your personal financial data into the hands of criminals who seek to exploit it. However, the three major credit-reporting agencies have routinely charged a fee to put that credit freeze in place—except in the handful of states that forbid such payments. Now all of that has changed.

A federal law signed in May by President Donald Trump requires credit bureaus, starting Friday, to allow anyone in the United States to restrict access to their credit reports at no cost. Your clients also won’t have to pay a fee to unfreeze their credit so a mortgage provider, credit card issuer, or other entity can access their information in order to evaluate their creditworthiness. Reinstating the freeze after a credit inquiry will be free, too. Keep in mind that consumers need to individually approach Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion to freeze or unfreeze credit.

The new law, known as the Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief, and Consumer Protection Act, also allows you to freeze credit files belonging to children under 16 at no charge. In addition, the law requires credit bureaus to offer fraud alerts to victims of cybersecurity threats for a year rather than just 90 days. These alerts let businesses that examine your credit know that they should check with you before opening an account in your name.

—Sam Silverstein, REALTOR® Magazine  http://bit.ly/2MTuhwV

Essex County Housing Reports: July 2017 vs July 2018

August 14, 2018 Kathleen Sullivan No Comments

Essex County Housing Reports: July 2017 vs July 2018; May - Juily 2017 vs May - July 2018

Inventory down and sales prices up. - breakdown by property type:

Single Family: July: Inventory Down 9.2% and Sale Prices Up 4.6%:  3 Months Inventory Down 4% and Sale Prices Up 4.5%

Condo: July Inventory Down 11.4% and Sale Prices Up 10.7%:  3 Months Inventory Down 7.6% and Sale Prices Up 7% 

Muilti-Family: July Inventory Down 13.6% and Sale Prices Up 12.5%: 3 Months Inventory Down 3.9% and Sale Prices Up 12.6% 

To view data for every Essex County town, go to:  http://www.sullivanteam.com/Properties/Reports/Public/Charts.php 

To dowload the full Housing Report go to: http://sullivanteam.com/pages/EssexCountyHousingReports

                                                 

 

July Essex County Housing Report

July 23, 2018 Kathleen Sullivan No Comments

Essex County Housing Reports: June 2017 vs June 2018; April - June 2017 vs April - June 2018

Inventory down and sales prices up. - breakdown by property type:

Single Family: June: Inventory Down 9.9% and Sale Prices Up 3.3%:  3 Months Inventory Down 2.2% and Sale Prices Up 5.5%

Condo: June Inventory Down 14.2% and Sale Prices Up 10.1%:  3 Months Inventory Down 8.9% and Sale Prices Up  6.7% 

Muilti-Family: June Inventory Down 6.8% and Sale Prices Up 6.9%: 3 Months Inventory Down 0.8% and Sale Prices Up  7.5% 

To view data for every Essex County town, go to:  http://www.sullivanteam.com/Properties/Reports/Public/Charts.php 

To dowload the full Housing Report go to: http://sullivanteam.com/pages/EssexCountyHousingReports

 

 

Rising Demand Pushes Prices Higher - MA Average Home Equity Gain from Last Year + $24,000

July 18, 2018 Kathleen Sullivan No Comments

Wow! MA average gian in home Equity from last year to this year is + $24,000.

With home prices rising across the country because of low inventory, homeowners gained over a trillion dollars in equity over the last 12 months, with the average homeowner gaining over $16,000!

Across the United States, there is a severe mismatch between the low number of houses for sale and the high demand for those houses! First-time homebuyers are out in force and are being met with a highly competitive summer real estate market.

According to the National Association of Realtors (NAR), the inventory of homes for sale “has fallen year-over-year for 36 consecutive months,” and now stands at a 4.1-month supply. A 6-month supply of inventory is necessary for a balanced market and has not been seen since August of 2012.

Is There Any Relief Coming? 

According to the CoreLogic’s 2018 Consumer Housing Sentiment Study, four times as many renters are considering buying homes in the next 12 months than homeowners who are planning to sell, “which is the crux of the available housing-supply imbalance.”

The map below shows the breakdown by state:

 

 

https://www.mykcm.com/2018/07/18/demand-for-homes-to-buy-continues-to-climb/

June Essex County Housing Reports: Inventory Down and Sales Prices Up

June 9, 2018 Kathleen Sullivan No Comments

Essex County Housing Reports: May 2017 vs 2018 and March - May 2017 vs March - May 2018

Inventory down and sales prices up. - breakdown by property type:

Single Family: May: Inventory Down 15.5% and Sale Prices Up 8.2%:  3 Months Inventory Down 8.7% and Sale Prices Up 7.2%

Condo: May Inventory Down 17.4% and Sale Prices Up 3.6%:  3 Months Inventory Down 8.5% and Sale Prices Unchanged  0% 

Muilti-Family: May Inventory Down 14.6% and Sale Prices Up 11.1%: 3 Months Inventory Down 2.6% and Sale Prices Up  9.9% 

To view data for every Essex County town, go to:  http://www.sullivanteam.com/Properties/Reports/Public/Charts.php 

To dowload the full Housing Report go to: http://sullivanteam.com/pages/EssexCountyHousingReports

 

        

Rent VS Buy June 2018

June 9, 2018 Kathleen Sullivan No Comments

        

American 6.7 Million Job Openings Now Outnumber the 6.3 Million Jobless

June 7, 2018 Kathleen Sullivan No Comments

American Job Openings Now Outnumber the Jobless

 

U.S. job openings rose to 6.7 million at the end of April, compared with the 6.3 million Americans who were unemployed

 
Wall Street Journal: Updated June 5, 2018 3:28 p.m. ET

For the first time since such record-keeping began in 2000, the number of available positions exceeded the number of job seekers, the Labor Department said Tuesday, a shift that is rippling across the economy and affecting the behavior of employers and workers.

U.S. job openings rose to a seasonally adjusted 6.7 million at the end of April, a record high, and more than the 6.3 million Americans who were unemployed during the month. Openings had exceeded the available labor pool beginning in March, according to revised figures released Tuesday.

The figures are the latest sign the U.S. is facing a historically tight labor market. The jobless rate ticked down further in May to a seasonally adjusted 3.8%, the lowest since April 2000, the Labor Department said last week. The last time the rate was lower was in 1969, when young men were being drafted into the Vietnam War.

 

The labor market is forcing employers to rethink their approach to hiring, said Terri Greeno, owner of an Express Employment Professionals office in Crystal Lake, Ill. She is asking clients if they are being realistic in their demands for workers with clean criminal histories and higher levels of education.

“Is it a health and safety issue? If not, you have to ask if those demands are really related to the outcome on the job,” Ms. Greeno said. “When the unemployment rate is this low, you’re really competing for workers who already have jobs.”

Her staffing firm is taking extra steps to fill light industrial and office jobs, reaching out to 45,000 people it has placed in positions in the past 15 years and asking if friends or family would be willing to take on work.

“This is a very tight labor market,” said Adam Kamins, a senior economist at Moody’s Analytics. “Most everyone who wants a job has one.”

For workers, that’s good news. On the other hand, a tighter labor market presents several challenges to businesses. If they can’t find workers to meet the demand for their products, they can’t help the economy grow. They may instead opt to close the restaurant early or not run a third shift at the factory.

Firms may need to pay more to attract workers, and some already are. That raises costs and would cut profit margins if higher prices can’t be passed on to customers. If prices are raised, that stokes stronger inflation, which already has been accelerating in recent months.

Federal Reserve policy makers are watching closely. Emergence of worker shortages and stronger inflation could signal the economy is overheating, raising the need to lift interest rates more aggressively than the slow, moderate path they have signaled.

For now, the market is opening up possibilities for those who have struggled in recent years. Geremy Mincey, 26 years old, had bounced between temporary jobs since dropping out of college seven years ago, working at factories, fast-food restaurants and even as the mall Easter Bunny. He would often go months between paychecks.

Earlier this year, he landed a temporary job as a saw operator at Williams Metals and Welding Alloys in Birmingham, Ala. Last month, the firm asked him to take a full-time position with health benefits and retirement savings.

“I feel like I broke the cycle,” he said.

There are, however, still an elevated number of Americans who are stuck in part-time jobs and would prefer full-time work. And others are employed but not in the jobs they want.

Those include John Matous, a 38-year-old who works at a McDonald’s in Mason City, Iowa. He is an Army veteran with an associate degree in medical administration from a local community college. He would like to work at doctor’s office but so far has been turned down.

“I just need a chance to prove myself,” he said.

Meanwhile, the share of Americans who are working or seeking work has generally declined for almost two decades. That gives employers fewer potential workers to draw from, but also suggests there remain hundreds of thousands of Americans who could be drawn back into the labor force.

And they may be waiting for better wages. Hourly pay for nonsupervisors rose 2.8% in May from a year earlier, the best annual gain since mid-2009. But the last time unemployment was as low, wages for those workers rose 3.9% from a year earlier.

The largest number of April openings, 1.3 million, were in the broad business-services sector, which includes everything from accountants and software developers to temporary staffers and clerical workers.

There were also ample job openings in some of the lowest-paying fields. There were 844,000 accommodation and food-service jobs open in April and 735,000 unfilled retail positions.

To attract workers, the Saladworks restaurant chain has raised its starting wages about 5%. It also has relaxed standards on tattoos and piercings, allowed employees to wear jeans and bandannas, and gotten more flexible about schedules.

“If you tell someone they can’t have Friday off for prom, they’ll quit,” Chief Executive Patrick Sugrue said. “They know they can find another job on Monday.”

https://www.wsj.com/articles/american-jobs-outnumber-the-jobless-1528212776

Write to Eric Morath at eric.morath@wsj.com

        

WOW, Fabulous May Jobs Report, Unemployment Rate, 3.8% !

June 2, 2018 Kathleen Sullivan No Comments

WOW, Fabulous Jobs Report, Unemployment Rate, 3.8% !
Good news for driving demand for housing.

Highlights:

Unemployment Rate 3.8%; For Women 3.6%, lowest since 1953; Blacks, 5.9%, a record low (https://cnnmon.ie/2J1DzKd) : 

Latinos, 4.9%, at record lows;  https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS14000009

Labor Participation Rate dropped to 62.7%, still large pool of workers who could step into the job market.

Wages Up 2.7% From Last Year;

Fed expected to Raise Interest Rates;

 

Unemployment Rate Falls to 18-Year Low; Solid Hiring in May

Nonfarm payrolls rose seasonally adjusted 223,000; unemployment rate at 3.8%

https://on.wsj.com/2xyBpwt.    Updated June 1, 2018 11:12 a.m. ET

 

WASHINGTON—The U.S. labor market was firing on all cylinders in May: the unemployment rate fell to an 18-year low, employers added jobs at a faster pace and wages modestly improved.

The unemployment rate ticked down to a seasonally adjusted 3.8%, matching April 2000 as the lowest reading since 1969, the Labor Department said Friday. Nonfarm payrolls rose a seasonally adjusted 223,000 in May, a jump from gains from March and April. Average hourly earnings ticked up to a 2.7% from a year earlier—and raises were even stronger for nonmanagers.

“It’s pretty hard argue that the labor market is anything but right in the sweet spot,” said Dan North, chief economist at Euler Hermes North America. “There is tremendous demand for labor right now.”

U.S. employers have added to payrolls for 92 straight months, extending the longest continuous jobs expansion on record. And those gains are extending to all corners of the labor market.

The unemployment rate for women, 3.6% last month, was the lowest since 1953, when far smaller share of women sought jobs. The jobless rates for blacks, Latinos and those without high-school diplomas are trending near record lows.

A tighter labor market should also produce better wage growth, but overall gains have remained modest. Average hourly earnings for all private-sector workers increased 8 cents last month to $26.92.

Wages for nonsupervisor workers are rising at a faster rate than overall wage increases for the first time since 2014. The nonsupervisor increase, 2.8% in May from a year earlier, was the best annual gain since mid-2009, when the recession just ended.

Still, in April 2000 wages for those workers rose 3.9% from a year earlier.

“The tight labor market is putting employers under enormous pressure to invest as much as necessary to retain their best employees and attract the best talent,” said Rebecca Henderson, chief executive of employment firm Randstad Sourceright.

The historically low unemployment rate and growing wages should keep Federal Reserve policy makers in line to raise the central bank’s benchmark interest rate at a meeting later this month. Consumer inflation has strengthened in recent months to reach the Fed’s 2% annual target, another factor likely keeping the central bank in line to gradually lift rates further in an effort to make sure the economy doesn’t overheat.

One factor holding wage gains in check is the ability of employers in the past year to bring Americans who have been out of the labor market back into the workforce and dissuade existing employees from retiring or otherwise exiting.

In May, the share of American adults working or looking for a job edged down to 62.7%, but the share with jobs ticked up to 60.4%. Labor-force participation is up slightly from a recent low in 2015, but still near the smallest share of adults participating since the late 1970s

 

 

A broad measure of unemployment and underemployment that includes Americans stuck in part-time jobs or too discouraged to look for work fell to 7.6% from 7.8% the prior month. That rate, known as the U-6, remains somewhat elevated compared with the last time unemployment was similarly low. In April 2000, the broader measure was 6.9%.

        

 

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