The National Association of Homebuilders reported this week that their “Housing Market Index”, a survey among its members to quantify builder sentiment about the housing market, rose three points in May to 22. While this is still well below the 50 mark which indicates builders feel optimistic about the housing market, it is the highest [...]

As a flood of first-time homebuyers rushed to take advantage of the $8,000 tax credit the Rural Development program has been strained to the limit with a year’s allocation of funds expected to be depleted sometime tomorrow. There has been little interest in Congress to extend funding and it now appears that without a last [...]

As the deadline looms for first-time homebuyers to qualify for the $8,000 Federal tax credit, lenders nationwide are fearful of a decline in loan originations as a result after a surge in recent months. Buyers must be under contract no later than April 30th and must close on or before June 30th to receive the [...]

After briefly touching an eight month high of 4.00% last week, the yield on the ten year Treasury note has eased some 20 basis points allowing the benchmark thirty-year mortgage rate to settle back near 5.125%. The spike in mortgage rates was due in large part to two massive government bond auctions over the past [...]

Mortgage rates continue to hover near record lows with the rate on the benchmark thirty year flirting with 4.875% this week. The rate on the fifteen year fixed rate has dipped below 4.50% coming in at 4.375%. Thirty year rates on most government loan programs including FHA. VA and Rural Development have eased to 5%. [...]

The National Association of Realtors reported on Monday that the September Pending Home Sales Index jumped 6.1% t0 110.1 after a 6.4% rise in August. The big rise far surpassed analysts’ expectations who anticipated a more modest rise of 1.2%. Most economists contributed the large increase to the estimated 200,000 to 400,000 first-time homebuyers rushing [...]

We have had some good news on the housing front over the past week as the National Association of Homebuilders reported that builder confidence rose in September for the third consecutive month to its highest level since May of 2008. The Census Bureau also released a report on August home starts that showed builders broke [...]

The National Association of Realtors reported Tuesday that its index of pending home sales rose 3.2% in July from June marking the sixth consecutive month of increases. Though not quite as high as the 3.6% increase reported in June, July’s increase marks the first time the index has posted six months of increases since NAR [...]

Mortgage rates have eased since last week with the rate on the benchmark thirty-year, fixed-rate falling back below 5.50% to settle in at 5.375%. That’s a .25% improvement since last week’s spike up to 5.625%. Rate shave been benefiting form some profit taking in the stock market which has cooled a bit in August following [...]

Mortgage Rates have managed to survive some significant volatility in both the equity and bond markets over the past week to remain at 5.50% for thirty-year, fixed-rates. Stocks reacted positively last week after some better than expected initial corporate earnings but have since pulled back on more sober earnings reports and a second monthly decline [...]