HR 3221, The Foreclosure Prevention Act of 2008, passed the House of Representatives Thursday, July 24 and passed the Senate Saturday, July 26 by majority votes—the president is expected to sign it into law this week. Below are highlights of the 694-page bill that are most relevant for consumers. No More $729,750 Conforming Loans As [...]

Tomorrow Fed chairman Ben Bernanke will give his economic outlook on Capitol Hill to the Joint Economic Committee. The statement shouldn’t diverge from what we’ve heard so far: recent monetary policy moves are made in a crisis mode, inflation is still a concern, they might hike rates back up just as aggressively if inflation becomes [...]

Rates open this week down about .125, with the 30yr jumbo fixed notably below 7%. As I reported already, rates were up slightly last week after the Fed cut the bank-to-bank Fed Funds Rate and the Fed-to-bank discount rate by .25% each. Also the economy added 166,000 jobs in October, more than twice what was [...]

Fixed and ARM rates open this week down about .125% this week, but the rest of the week isn’t likely to trend downward. Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke gives his semiannual testimony on the economy before the House Financial Services Committee on Wednesday and the Senate Banking Committee on Thursday – and he’ll have fresh inflation [...]

Fixed and ARM rates have been even for about a month despite all of the trouble with the sub-prime sector. A spill-over into the rest of the mortgage industry seems unlikely, especially if lawmakers can stop themselves from making new laws after the fact. In the face of new regulations, sub-prime borrowers wouldn’t stand a [...]

Fixed and ARM rates are down about .125% over last week due mostly to violence in the Middle East causing investors to move into bonds for safety. The reason rates dropped is because when bond prices rise in a buying rally, bond yields (or rates) move down. We’re on inflation watch this week, with Producer [...]

Rates open even this week, but are still about .25% higher than they’ve been in the past 4 to 5 weeks. This was unexpected given last week’s flat inflation data. Usually benign inflation reports are good for rates. Low inflation signals that the Fed might be toward the end of its tightening cycle, and bond [...]

Rates/Commentary, for the week of June 6, 2005. 30-yr and ARM rates are down .125% from last week. And it wasn’t the dismal May jobs report that came out Friday as many might expect. It was comments from the new Dallas Federal Reserve Bank president Richard Fisher who said mid-week that the Fed’s June 30 [...]