Tag: finance

As multifamily dragged down completed construction, it was responsible for pushing up new housing permits and driving housing starts to the highest level since 2016.

Data jointly reported Friday by the Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development indicate that permits were issued for 98,100 housing units in January.

That put last month’s seasonally adjusted annual rate of residential units that were authorized in permit-issuing places at 1.396 million.

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From:: Financing

Bids are currently being accepted on more than $400 million in non-performing government-sponsored enterprise home loans.

The offering includes four pools of Freddie Mac single-family mortgages that have an aggregate unpaid principal balance of $420 million.

The seasoned loans are being auctioned on a whole-loan basis. All of the loans are currently being serviced by Shellpoint Mortgage Servicing.

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From:: Financing

Interest rates on residential loans continued to rise, this time to the highest level in nearly four years. The outlook is for continued escalation over the next week.

Freddie Mac’s Primary Mortgage Market Survey for the seven days that finished on Feb. 15 had thirty-year fixed rates averaging 4.38 percent.

That was the highest fixed interest rate for 30-year mortgages
since the week ended April 3, 2014, when long-term mortgage rates averaged 4.41 percent.

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From:: Financing

Increased sales expectations among home builders offset diminished confidence about current sales conditions. The Northeast was the only region with deterioration.

This month’s Housing Market Index has been calculated at 72. An index in excess of 50 is an indication that more builders view conditions as good than poor.

No change was noted for the index compared to one month previous. The index reached an 18-year high of 74 in December 2017.

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From:: Financing

The Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corp. provided financing for 110,000 fewer housing units last year than it did in 2016. Quarterly earnings deteriorated.

For the quarter ended Dec. 31, 2017, income before income tax expense came to $3.8 billion, according to Freddie Mac’s fourth-quarter earnings data.

Income sank from a $7.4 billion profit during the final-three months of 2016 and also deteriorated from $7.2 billion the previous three-month period.

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From:: Financing

Securitizations on behalf of the Government National Mortgage Association decreased to the lowest level in 10 months. The company’s book of business is nearing $2 trillion.

The first month of 2018 ended with $1.9242 trillion in Ginnie Mae mortgage-backed securities that were outstanding, according to monthly operational data.

Ginnie’s book of business increased from $1.9134 trillion as of year-end 2017. At the same point in 2017, outstandings were $1.7865 trillion.

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From:: Financing

America’s book of single-family loans expanded last year, though the balance of home-secured credit lines outstanding declined. Serious mortgage delinquency dropped.

Among all U.S. households, aggregate household debt balances amounted to $13.15 trillion as of Dec. 31, 2017, expanding from $12.58 trillion at the end of 2016.

Mortgage debt outstanding accounted for $8.88 trillion of the most-recent total. The nation’s mortgages outstanding grew from $8.48 trillion as of Dec. 31, 2016.

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From:: Financing

The final month of last year saw refinances of government-sponsored enterprise loans climb to a 10-month high. But annual refinance production tumbled.

Based on an analysis of data reported by the Federal Housing Finance Agency, 155,911 Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac mortgages were refinanced during December 2017.

In addition to increasing from 147,699 transactions the previous month, GSE refinance volume was the strongest it’s been since February 2017, when the total was 157,920.

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From:: Financing

A pair of reports suggest that sales of single-family properties this year are not likely to be impacted much from the rising trend for interest rates.

Over the past four months, mortgage rates have increased by 50 basis points — with the average for the week ended Feb. 8 reported at 4.32 percent.

But research indicates that when the underlying economy is strong, increases of a least 100 BPS in mortgage rates have had little impact on home purchases.

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From:: Financing

A pair of reports suggest that sales of single-family properties this year are not likely to be impacted much from the rising trend for interest rates.

Over the past four months, mortgage rates have increased by 50 basis points — with the average for the week ended Feb. 8 reported at 4.32 percent.

But research indicates that when the underlying economy is strong, increases of a least 100 BPS in mortgage rates have had little impact on home purchases.

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From:: Financing