Tag Archives: mortgage rates

Lower Household Debt, Housing, Now Boosting Growth

Posted on August 19, 2014 by Popular Economics Weekly

The Mortgage Corner In another sign that this could be a better growth year, builder confidence in the market for newly built, single-family homes rose two points to 55 on the National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index … Continue reading →

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Restricted Credit Will Impede Housing Recovery

Posted on July 24, 2014 by Popular Economics Weekly

Financial FAQs As if we need more evidence that the Consumer Protection Finance Bureau and government regulators have listened to the wrong people when drafting their Qualified Mortgage requirements (that lowers the maximum debt-to-income ratio to 43 percent for non-agency … Continue reading →

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Will Housing Now Lead the Recovery?

Posted on June 24, 2014 by Popular Economics Weekly

The Mortgage Corner There is still hope that housing may help this economic recovery, as it has in past recoveries. But that is only if Fed Chairman Janet Yellen succeeds in keeping interest rates—mortgage rates in particular—at their current low, … Continue reading →

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Home Sizes Ballooning Again

Posted on June 6, 2014 by Popular Economics Weekly

The Mortgage Corner Housing sizes are ballooning, after a slight pause due to the Great Recession, reports the U.S. Census Bureau and Marketwatch. In 2013 the median floor area of new single-family homes sold in the U.S. rose 4 percent … Continue reading →

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Where Is Housing Affordable Anymore?

Posted on May 23, 2014 by Popular Economics Weekly

Financial FAQs How much salary do you need in order to afford the principal and interest payments on a median-priced home in your metro area? To find out, HSH.com, a mortgage data service, took the National Association of Realtors’ first-quarter … Continue reading →

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New-Home Sales Answer to RE Recovery?

Posted on April 17, 2014 by Popular Economics Weekly

The Mortgage Corner Privately-owned housing starts in March were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 946,000. This is 2.8 percent above the revised February estimate of 920,000, but is 5.9 percent below the March 2013 rate of 1,005,000. Single-family … Continue reading →

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No Relief Yet With Pending Sales

Posted on March 31, 2014 by Popular Economics Weekly

The Mortgage Corner We can’t yet count on Pending Home Sales, a predictor of closings in 60 to 90 days, to predict a boost to this year’s sales. They have been falling since last July, and the last spike in … Continue reading →

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2014 Mortgage Volumes (and Delinquencies) Lower

Posted on March 4, 2014 by Popular Economics Weekly

The Mortgage Corner It looks like the housing market still has to play catch up in 2014. Both mortgage volume and existing-home sales have declined drastically. But new-home sales and housing construction have picked up, even with the Polar weather, … Continue reading →

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New-Home Sales In Seasonal Decline?

Posted on January 28, 2014 by Popular Economics Weekly

The Mortgage Corner Sales of newly built, single-family homes fell 7 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 414,000 units in December, according to newly released figures from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and the U.S. … Continue reading →

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2013 Home Sales Highest Since 2006

Posted on January 23, 2014 by Popular Economics Weekly

The Mortgage Corner The National Association of Realtors (NAR) just reported that for all of 2013, there were 5.09 million sales, which is 9.1 percent higher than 2012. It was the strongest performance since 2006 when sales reached an unsustainably … Continue reading →

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