Correcting a ‘no-cost refis are a scam’ article on Zillow.

When people are financing homes with less than 20% down, they must have mortgage insurance. It comes in the form of government-backed FHA mortgage insurance or private mortgage insurance which is controlled by a few large companies. Those companies have had a rough road during the housing bust. Here’s the latest good news and bad [...]

Once upon a time, you could have a 10 minute phone call with a lender and get a mortgage funded within 10-20 days. Now loan approvals are back to normal. And by normal, I mean painstaking—as the loan approval process should be. But it doesn’t have to be miserable for the borrower. I’m linking below [...]

Rates are up .25% in the past three weeks, and this chart offers perspective. It uses Freddie Mac data that’s the source for weekly rate headlines. The October 2011 bar is a month-to-date average through today. Below the chart is a required reading list for rate watchers. CLICK CHART TO ENLARGE. ___ Further reference: -Mortgage [...]

Ever apply for a home loan then suddenly you’re inundated with new solicitations for credit? Don’t be too quick to blame the mortgage lender who ran your credit. It’s most likely not them. It’s the credit bureaus themselves—Equifax, Transunion, and Experian. Once an inquiry is made to them, they sell the data. Conversely, your data [...]

A big percentage of closing costs on purchase and refinance loans is title insurance. So here’s a quick primer. On a purchase, the borrower must buy two title insurance policies: one to protect them as the owner of the property, and one to protect the lender they’re using. All lenders require this. On a refinance, [...]

Rates rose .125% last week after a .25% climb the week before. Rates are up .375% in the past two weeks, but still extremely low. My WeeklyBasis prediction last week was even rates as markets “start with rates up slightly on perception of progress in Europe, then fade.” It didn’t fade yet but I also [...]

Here’s an updated chart showing new rate lows touched briefly in the past week. As of today, the 2011 average rate for single family home loans to $417k is 4.54% with 0.7 points—this is the number in the 2011 bar. The record low is also shown below the chart. CLICK CHART TO ENLARGE. ___ Further [...]

Rates held under 4% again last week. The link shows how rates closed Friday in the three mortgage price tiers: loans to $417k, to $625k, and to $2m. But rates change in real time. Example: they rose and fell .25% last week as Eurozone optimism did the same and U.S. home prices, jobless claims, and [...]

Mortgage traders are drowning in volatility, and it’s not because of Operation Twist. The surprise earlier this week is that the Fed will also start reinvesting maturing cash flows from existing mortgage holdings back into mortgage bonds (it was buying Treasuries) to support housing. Stocks were hit on the FOMC’s gloomy economic outlook and bonds [...]