“I don’t always go the extra mile, but when I do, it’s because I missed my exit.” And that extra mile costs more every week. Higher gasoline prices certainly hit service workers and commuters much harder than other segments of the population, namely higher wealth individuals. (Thank you to a reader in Utah who sent, “Breaking News: gas prices are now so high, it is actually cheaper to buy cocaine and run everywhere.” And there’s “Beer is cheaper than gas. Drink, don’t drive.”) Gas prices don’t show much inclination to slow down, unlike residential lending. U.S. lenders issued a record $4.4 trillion in mortgage originations in 2021, topping the previous mark of $4.3 trillion from 2020, so there is almost no place to go but down in 2022. So lenders are laser-focused on production. At the recent SimpleNexus user’s conference, someone told the assembled group that there is a 77 percent higher chance of fund
I flew into San Diego yesterday for the MCT Exchange, and it is hard not to notice the number of boats in the harbor. For some quick “fun with numbers” on recreational boating: The U.S. state of Florida has the highest number of registered recreational boating vessels in 2020, with almost 959 thousand, closely followed by California. Hawai’i has half as many as Wyoming. In contrast, the District of Columbia had the smallest number of registered boating vessels, with just over two thousand in 2020. Keeping with the “numbers” theme, I receive my share of questions regarding mortgage-backed security statistics. Anyone doing research on them should check out FINRA’s Reporting of Mortgage and Asset Backed Securities (Securitized Products), a little dry but packed with information. I mention this because, as we know, soon the Fed is scheduled to stop buying MBS every week, and for those of you who like graphs, here is the link to the Federal Reserve&