Repeat after me: Fed Funds are set by the Federal Open Market Committee, don’t vary daily, and have no direct bearing on 30-yr mortgage rates. 30-yr mortgage rates are set by supply and demand through the bond markets, vary every day, and prices are adjusted by what investors & servicers want to see flowing into [...]

The scene from this movie was obviously a horrible period in history, but this take on it cracks me up every time: My uncle used to say, “Do not corner something that you know is meaner than you.” Or bigger, for that matter. Speaking of big, the numbers yesterday show that the Fed’s purchases dipped [...]

It is well known that big investors, who are servicing large portfolios of home equity loans, are seeing increasing delinquencies. If home equity loans start having more major problems, is the US Government going to come out with HEMP (Home Equity Modification Program)? (I can’t take credit for that one – it came from Rich [...]

Ah, inflation – at all levels. During the life of a 30-yr fixed-rate mortgage, there are bound to be periods of inflation. It is debatable, in the market of mortgages, whether or not borrowers and lenders take inflation into account. Certainly ARM loans do to some extent. But bond prices (aside from TIP securities, some [...]

Over the weekend I was in the express lane at the store quietly fuming. Completely ignoring the sign, the woman ahead of me had slipped into the express check-out line pushing a cart piled high with groceries. Imagine my delight when the cashier beckoned the woman to come forward looked into the cart and asked [...]

I was driving along the other day with my son and daughter, listening to the radio about yet another company that was laying-off employees. My son said, “The economy is so bad that McDonalds is now selling the ¼ ouncer, and parents in Beverly Hills fired their nannies and learned their children’s names.” Not to [...]