Tag Archives: Investors

The National Association of Home Builders/First American Improving Markets Index reached its highest level on record in September with a little more than 80 percent of markets qualifying as improving. Of the 291 markets that made it onto the latest Improving Markets Index, 242 were repeats from the previous month, and 49 were new to the list. However, the association noted that September's result was largely due to a change to the way Freddie Mac measures home prices.

LRES, a national provider of commercial and residential valuations and appraisal management, announced the opening of a new operations facility in Phoenix to accommodate the company's growth and to serve as a key component of its disaster recovery plan.

The Mortgage Bankers Association's (MBA) Mortgage Credit Availability Index (MCAI) decreased 0.7 percent month-over-month in August.

Friday's report on the August employment situation at the same time confounded analysts twice with a less than robust 169,000 month-month increase in payrolls and a staggering 58,000 reduction in the initial report on payrolls for July. While it may not be easy to reconcile the numbers in the employment situation report with themselves, it is even more difficult to reconcile them with other economic indicators.

Mortgage rates rose from 3.57 percent to 4.07 percent over the second quarter, while total refinances completed through Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac fell from about 1.4 million to about 1.3 million.

Ascending mortgage rates are starting to weigh on homebuyers nearly as much as low inventory, according to Redfin's Real-Time Homebuyer Survey. Out of homebuyers polled, 63 percent said rates have impacted their ability to buy a home at least "somewhat." When asked how rates have affected their home search, 33 percent said they're speeding up their search before rates get too high, 20 percent said they're slowing their search, and 1 percent have stopped looking altogether.

Genworth Financial, Inc., announced Wednesday that the company is strengthening the senior leadership team of its U.S. Mortgage Insurance (USMI) unit with the addition of two key executives. Paul Gomez was recently promoted to COO of USMI, and George Reichert was named chief information officer (CIO).

Though the national unemployment rate continued to fall in August, disappointing payroll numbers over the last several months have analysts wondering what the latest jobs report might mean for the Federal Reserve's plan to taper its monthly asset purchases. "As it stands now, [the six-month payroll] average isn't much higher than it was a year ago when the Fed felt it necessary to launch QE3," commented Paul Ashworth, chief U.S. economist for the firm.

360 Mortgage Group, a privately owned mortgage banker headquartered in Austin, Texas, has entered the top-tier mortgage market with Conforming elite, an aggressive new pricing program.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) is putting on notice companies that furnish information to credit reporting firms, reminding them that they are responsible for investigating consumer disputes forwarded to them. "Credit reports play a critical role in the lives of consumers," said CFPB director Richard Cordray. "Given the importance of these reports, consumers need to know that their documents are being reviewed when they dispute what they believe is a mistake on a report."