The regular monthly release of the New Residential Construction report from the Census Bureau is typically fairly dry. To be fair, this month's update is no exception outside the housing nerd community. But even amid the seemingly soporific data, we can find some interesting themes. First off, there's the fact that construction activity continues to operate near its best levels since before the housing meltdown more than a decade ago. Building permits technically dropped 3.2% from last month, but that's after an upward revision of 1.2%. More importantly, despite the drop, the outright pace of 1.819 million units per year means the last 5 months been over 1.8 million. January 2021 was the only other month over 1.8m going back to 2006. The story is similar for the next construction phase, Housing Starts (a measure of when construction actually begins). Starts held fairly steady at 1.724m, making April the 4th best month since 2006. The gap between permits and starts highlights the first aspect of the current challenges faced by the industry. It's a lot easier to file some paperwork than it is to actually break ground. Moving on to "Housing Completions," we see it's even harder to finish construction. Completions have flat-lined in a range centered on April's level of roughly 1.3 million--the same level as early 2019. Back then, there were almost 600k fewer Housing Starts and Building Permits.
| Housing News | | Purchase and Refinance Applications Tumble | | Mortgage application activity, which had been on the rebound this month, suffered its largest loss since mid-February during the week ended May 13. Applications for both refinancing and home purchase took double digit hits. The Mortgage Bankers As... (read more) |
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| Mortgage Rate Watch | | Rates Started Higher, But Recovered by The Afternoon | | There has been a lot of volatility in the bond market recently. Because bonds drive interest rate changes, that's meant plenty of volatility in the mortgage market as well. The month of May has been less universally awful compared to Marc... (read more) |
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| Rob Chrisman | | Non-QM, Underwriting, Appraisal Products; MBA's Compliance Offering; Higher Rates Hitting Apps | | As the MBA’s Secondary Marketing Conference wraps up in Manhattan, and the 1,200 or so registered head home and face post-conference life, Rob B. asks, “What was the mood of the attendees: Denial, anger, bargaining, depression, or acceptance?” The ta... (read more) |
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| 30 Yr. Fixed Rate | | 5.44% -0.01% |
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| Rate | Change | Points |
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| Mortgage News Daily | | 30 Yr. Fixed | 5.44% | -0.01 | 0.40 | | 15 Yr. Fixed | 4.85% | +0.01 | 0.40 | | 30 Yr. FHA | 5.12% | +0.07 | 0.00 | | 30 Yr. Jumbo | 4.78% | -0.02 | 0.00 | | 5/1 ARM | 4.65% | +0.05 | 0.50 | | Updates Daily - Last Update: 5/18 |
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| 15 Yr. Fixed Rate | | 4.85% +0.01% |
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| Rate | Change | Points |
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| Freddie Mac | | 30 Yr. Fixed | 5.27% | +0.17 | 0.90 | | 15 Yr. Fixed | 4.52% | +0.12 | 0.80 | | 5/1 Yr. ARM | 3.96% | +0.18 | 0.20 | | Updates Weekly - Last Update: 5/5 |
| Rate | Change | Points |
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| Mortgage Bankers Assoc. | | 30 Yr. Fixed | 5.49% | -0.04 | 0.74 | | 15 Yr. Fixed | 4.73% | -0.06 | 0.82 | | 30 Yr. Jumbo | 5.03% | -0.05 | 0.61 | | Updates Weekly - Last Update: 5/18 |
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| Price / Yield | Change |
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| MBS | | UMBS 4.0 | 99.28 | +0.30 | | UMBS 4.5 | 101.03 | +0.17 | | GNMA 4.0 | 99.97 | -0.38 | | GNMA 4.5 | 101.34 | -0.25 | | Pricing as of: 5/18 5:21PM EST |
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| 10 Year US Treasury | | 2.8877 -0.1075 |
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| Price / Yield | Change |
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| US Treasury | | 2 YR Treasury | 2.672 | -0.039 | | 5 YR Treasury | 2.891 | -0.075 | | 7 YR Treasury | 2.919 | -0.097 | | 10 YR Treasury | 2.888 | -0.108 | | 30 YR Treasury | 3.067 | -0.127 | | Pricing as of: 5/18 5:21PM EST |
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