May 10, 2011 Home values showed the sharpest quarterly declines since 2008, falling 3% in the first quarter this year, according to Zillow’s real estate market report. Zillow said national prices were down 8.2% year-over-year to $169,000. Since peaking in June 2006, home values have fallen 29.5%. Out of the 132 markets covered by Zillow, [...]
Category | Fixed Rate Mortgage
April 1, 2011 As analysts expected, the unemployment rate decreased slightly to 8.8%. While the employment numbers still have a long road to travel before getting to lower ground, the economy is slowly showing signs of life. Unfortunately, this comes at the cost of interest rates. The lower this number goes, the higher the rates [...]
The freefall continues. According to many leading forecasters, home prices are expected to drop further in the first half of this year, then rebound later in the year. The expectation is that unemployment will slide a bit, sparking purchases in housing. Forecasters are looking for a 5-8% increase in home sales by the end of [...]
November 10, 2009 Ever wonder why there is such a disparity from lender to lender when it comes to rates and fees? It really comes down to two things, marketing and their compensation. You see, most lenders are compensated by the companies they sell the loans to and therefore the higher the rate, the more [...]
November 10, 2009 Ever wonder why you can get a better deal going through a mortgage broker than you can if you go directly to a lender? After all, the mortgage broker just turns around and sells it to a major national lender anyway? So logic dictates that cutting out the “middle man” should yield you [...]
November 10, 2009 It used to be that a 720 was considered an excellent credit score, however that’s no longer the case. The new benchmark for excellent credit when it comes to mortgage rates is now a 740 or better. When we obtain a credit report, we go off the middle score (not average) when [...]
November 10, 2009 Although the President’s “Housing and Affordability Plan” was announced on February 17th, it wasn’t until yesterday that we got the details of what it actually means to homeowners. We are finally seeing some changes in guidelines, starting today with a major announcement by Fannie Mae. It was announced that over the next [...]
