AMB Blog

Historically low mortgage interest rates and recovering labor markets should be enough to shore up sales and housing starts once an expected dip due to the expiration of the federal home buyer tax credit passes, according to the State of the Nation’s Housing report, released Monday by the Joint Center for Housing [...]

The Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) Market Composite Index – a measure of mortgage loan application volume – increased 17.7% on a seasonally adjusted basis from June 4-11.

On an unadjusted basis, the index increased 29.7% compared with the previous week, which was a shortened week due to the Memorial Day holiday.

The Refinance Index [...]

The Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) has directed Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to delist their common and preferred stock from the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) and any other national securities exchange. Once the delisting is completed, each enterprise’s common and preferred stock is expected to be quoted on the Over-the-Counter Bulletin Board.

“FHFA’s determination [...]

U.S. home prices were trending up in 155 out of 384 metro areas in the fourth quarter of last year, including in markets in Ohio and Michigan, Fiserv Inc. reports, based on its analysis of the Fiserv Case-Shiller Indexes.

Despite the positive performance in these regional markets from recent lows, average U.S. home [...]

REQUIRED READING: John Walsh does not need to be convinced that underwriting standards are tight

- he discovered that the hard way when a home loan that he originated on a condominium unit was rejected for a reason that left him baffled and astonished.

“We had a loan questioned by a [...]

How large will the decline in the homeownership rate ultimately prove to be? That’s the question that three authors raise in a new study published by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

To address this question, authors Andrew Haughwout, Richard Peach and Joseph Tracy propose the concept of a “homeownership gap” [...]

The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) has released its Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending June 4. According to the MBA, its Market Composite Index, a measure of mortgage loan application volume, decreased 12.2% on a seasonally adjusted basis from one week earlier. This week’s results include an adjustment to [...]

The 90+ day delinquency rate for mortgages insured by the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) fell slightly in April, totaling 8.5% (527,504 loans), according to the FHA’s monthly report. A month earlier, seriously delinquent loans backed by the agency totaled 536,858, for an 8.8% delinquency rate.

So far this fiscal year, the agency has [...]

REQUIRED READING: We all like a good deal. The trick is to know a good deal when you see one and then take the appropriate action.

Suze Orman, “The Antiques Roadshow,” and even Jim Cramer’s “Mad Money” all stress the importance of wise investments that can yield future dividends or increases [...]

Lender Processing Services Inc.’s (LPS) latest Mortgage Monitor report indicates that signs of stabilization in the nation’s home loan delinquency and foreclosure rates remain largely neutralized by the more than 7 million loans in distress.

According to the report, the number of loans 90 or more days delinquent (including pre-sale foreclosure) declined [...]