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Attendees of next week’s MBA Secondary conference can look forward to… A giant hot dog in Times Square that spits out confetti at high noon. (Keep your risqué comments to yourself please.) They can obviously look forward to much more at the actual conference, including information about the economy, regulators, and seeing what the Agencies and aggregators are up to in terms of products. Every client is important, and originators want a full product suite from their companies and vendors. (The current STRATMOR blog is titled, “Down Payment Assistance Programs Helpful But Not a Universal Remedy.”) For good news, homeowner equity has hit almost $17 trillion, as values in March hit a historic all-time high according to a report from Intercontinental Exchange. But looking at units this year (a better measure than the estimated $1.5-2 trillion) the MBA expects the lowest production in decades. If recent conferences are any indication, look forward to atte ....
The other night, at the Bruce Springsteen concert in San Francisco (it was great), he did a crowd favorite, singing, “Baby I got my facts learned real good right now, you better get it straight darling: Poor man wanna be rich, rich man wanna be king, and a king ain't satisfied till he rules everything…” If you want to read a story with words like bullying, harassment, smear, empire, disgusting, and other similar “lyrics,” you can read this tale about Rocket’s Dan Gilbert and UWM’s Mat Ishbia. Not only that, but suddenly everyone is talking about some company called Hunterbrook, not only being tied into a hedge company (which, in theory, can short a stock, publish a negative story later, watch the stock go down, and then cover their shorts and make money) but putting a link into an expletive deleted-filled voice mail from Mat Ishbia to Anthony Casa. As the world turns… more below! Meanwhile, there are constructive things, l ....
“What do you call James Bond having a bath? Bubble 07.” In different bond matters, mortgage rates will always be higher than Treasury rates, in part because of the prepayment risk in mortgages that doesn’t exist with Treasury bonds. With the drop in rates, sales management personnel at lenders are busy figuring out how best to remind the staff about EPO (early payoff) penalties levied by investors while at the same time working on ways to save money besides furloughing, cutting staff, outsourcing, and re-doing vendor contracts. The recent decline in rates and increase in applications is welcome: According to Curinos, November 2023 funded mortgage volume decreased 11 percent YoY and 10 percent MoM. In the Retail channel, funded volume was down 22 percent YoY and 10% MoM. The average 30-year conforming retail funded rate in November was 7.45 percent, 25bps higher than October and 85bps higher than the same month last year. (Curinos sources a statistically significant ....
Yesterday I was driving across Northern California to the coast (Gualala), and in Sacramento I asked the McDonald’s drive-through clerk (hey, only the best for me!) why the medium French fries were 30 cents more than the double cheeseburger ($4.29 versus $3.99). She immediately launched into an explanation of farming inequalities and Keynesian economics, and how aggregate demand does not necessarily equal the productive capacity of the economy. I shot back with, “Whoa, sister, where’s my extra catsup packet?” Okay, that exact exchange didn’t take place, but it did remind me of supply and demand, and mortgage rates, and there is an explanation of the current forces is in the capital markets section. There are a myriad of other things that CEO and owners are watching, many of which will be discussed today at 11AM PT during the Mortgage Matters podcast (register here) when Mark Jones, President of Union Home Mortgage and Chairman of the MBA, is the guest ....
Originators: Want to add value for your potential current or previous clients who are veterans? Send them a link to Veteran’s Day discounts and free meals. LOs and brokers are good at staying in touch with potential clients and continue to prospect and talk to previous clients. (In fact, the current STRATMOR blog is titled, “Listening to Real Estate Agents Can Pay Off for Originators”.) A good reason to talk to previous clients is about their credit card balances. As noted in the Commentary recently, Americans' credit card debt hit a record $1.08 trillion in Q3, with delinquencies led by Millennials, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. So LOs, this means your previous clients are potentially paying 20-30 percent in non-tax-deductible interest on their outstanding credit card debt… A good reason to touch base. (Today’s podcast can be found here, and this week is sponsored by nCino makers of the nCino Mortgage Suite. With three pr ....