Good Morning and Happy Columbus Day.
Bond markets are closed today, while stocks and futures markets are open. Rates were much lower last week until Friday when they increased significantly due to comments by Mr. Bernanke that seemed to imply the feds are thinking about raising bank lending rates, which will most likely increase mortgage rates, too. Corporate earnings announcements will be in full swing this week. Better than expected corporate earnings will give the feds one more reason to start raising those rates.
Have you had any bad experiences due to the new HVCC appraisal requirements? If so, please go to www.thingbigworksmall.com and sign the HVCC Petition. Look for it on the right side of the page about half way down. Brian and Frank will be headed to Washington with the petition of over 100,000 signatures in an attempt to get the HVCC requirements temporarily halted until an intelligent and useful program can be put in place.
A bill was introduced in Congress last week calling for FHA to increase the minimum downpayment from 3.5% to 5%. We think this is another bad idea from our congressmen.
Word is, Texas legislators may try to require sales tax on all services in the loan process during their legislative term next year. This would mean lenders, brokers, loan officers, realtors, etc. would pay sales tax on their commissions & income. Borrowers and sellers would see their closing costs increase. Some estimates would increase closing costs $600 to well over $1000, depending on your sales price and/or loan amount. This would give the state a lot more money to through away, but I don’t see how it will help the consumer or the housing/real estate industry, aka, the economy. Let’s hope wiser minds will prevail.
More later. Have a great week.