Category Archives: Housing

Home Builder’s Confidence at High

The Mortgage Corner This is very big news. Builder confidence in the market for newly built, single-family homes rose for a fifth consecutive month in September to a level of 40 on the National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo Housing … Continue reading

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Pending Home Sales, Prices Up For the Year

The Mortgage Corner Home prices are finally rising nationally, according to same sales in the S&P Case-Shiller Home Price Index. It showed that all three headline composites ended the second quarter of 2012 with positive annual growth rates for the … Continue reading

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Real Estate Leading Recovery—Part II

The Mortgage Corner Further evidence that real estate is recovering is the drop in both vacancy rates and so-called Real Estate Owned (REO) properties—i.e., that banks have taken back in foreclosure. Several analysts, including Calculated Risk, believe this is absorbing … Continue reading

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Consumer Spending Continues to Improve

FINANCIAL FAQs The most recent retail sales show consumers continue to spend, as consumer borrowing is increasing. Add to that credit card delinquencies are at an 18-year low, according to credit reporting company Transunion Corp., and we have a picture … Continue reading

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Real Estate Now Leading Recovery

The Mortgage Corner Can it be that real estate will give a boost to the next stage of the U.S. recovery? Exports, and so manufacturing has stalled due to the China and European slowdown. Multiple indexes show rising real estate … Continue reading

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Housing Values Jump in Q2 2012

The Mortgage Corner Consumers, perk up, as I said last week. Housing values are finally rising nationally. In fact, housing prices in all 20 city-metro areas in the Case-Shiller Home Price Index rose for the first time in years, before … Continue reading

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HARP 2.0 Leads Mortgage Refinance Higher

The Mortgage Corner There is growing optimism that the real estate bust is finally at an end. The cause is a combination of record low interest rates leading to more refinance activity and increasing confidence of consumers in the economic … Continue reading

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What Do June Jobs Numbers Mean?

Financial FAQs Is history repeating itself? Once more the June jobs numbers don’t look so good, but once more they will probably be misleading. Because, once more, it looks like the so-called seasonal adjustments (SA) are overestimating the summer jobs … Continue reading

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Home Prices Up, New-Home Sales Surging

The Mortgage Corner Sales of newly built, single-family homes rose 7.6 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 369,000 units in May, according to newly released data from HUD and the U.S. Census Bureau. Why are new-home sales important? … Continue reading

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Builder Confidence Highest Since 2007

The Mortgage Corner Builder confidence in the market for newly built, single-family homes gained one point in June from a slightly revised level in the previous month to rest at 29 on the National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo Housing … Continue reading

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