Category Archives: Consumers

Is Our Housing Supply Catching Up?

The Mortgage Corner Nationwide housing starts rose 13.7 percent in October to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.29 million units after a slight upward revision to the September reading, according to newly released data from the U.S. HUD and … Continue reading →

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New-Home Sales-Ownership Rate Rising

The Mortgage Corner New home sales shot up 19 percent in September to a consensus crushing annualized rate of 667,000. This is the largest percentage gain in 28 years and the highest level of the cycle, since October 2007. In … Continue reading →

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A Gangbusters Employment Report

Popular Economics Weekly Payrolls rose 261,000 in October following an 18,000 rise in September, easily weathering the season’s hurricane disruptions, the government said Friday. But 765,000 dropped out of the labor force, which is why the unemployment rate fell to … Continue reading →

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Increasing Growth Ahead, But Watch for Bubbles!

Financial FAQs Maybe it’s the natural disasters plaguing U.S. Or the fact businesses haven’t been investing in future growth until now. But the times they are a’changin, as GDP grew 3 percent in Q3 for the second quarter in a … Continue reading →

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Who Needs a Tax Cut?

Popular Economics Weekly It turns out very few of us need a tax cut. Marketwatch economist Rex Nutting calculates that those in the 60 percent middle-income brackets—from $32,000 to $140,000 per year—pay just an average 2.5 percent in income taxes. … Continue reading →

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Rising Existing-Home Sales Not Enough

The Mortgage Corner WASHINGTON (October 20, 2017) — After three straight monthly declines, existing-home sales slightly reversed course in September, but ongoing supply shortages and recent hurricanes muted overall activity and caused sales to fall back on an annual basis, … Continue reading →

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Republicans Killing the Housing Market

The Mortgage Corner The Trump administration and Republicans’ anti-immigration policies will kill the housing market. Why? Trump wants to cut immigration quotas by 50 percent when there aren’t enough qualified workers to fill current job openings. And congress can’t agree … Continue reading →

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JOLTS Report – Too Many Job Openings!

Financial FAQs The Labor Department reported today that there were 6.1 million job openings in August in its JOLTS report, or Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey, which was “little changed” from July, while hirings remained far behind at 5.430 … Continue reading →

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A Poor Employment Report?

Popular Economics Weekly What does it mean when 33,000 nonfarm payroll jobs were lost in September? Not much, when many of the losses came from the hurricanes that threw 1.5 million out of work, according to Marketwatch’s Jeff Bartash, and … Continue reading →

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Time to Build More Homes!

The Mortgage Corner The National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) analysis of Census Construction Spending data shows that total private residential construction spending is soaring, as it rose to a seasonally adjusted annual rate (SAAR) of $520.9 billion in August, … Continue reading →

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