AM Mortgage & Real Estate Market Update

Thursday’s bond market has opened in positive territory following relatively uneventful economic data and early stock weakness. The major stock indexes are starting the new year off with noticeable losses, pushing the Dow lower 89 points and Nasdaq lower 29 points.

There were two pieces of economic data posted this morning that were relevant to mortgage rates. The first came at 8:30 AM ET when the Labor Department gave us last week’s unemployment figures. They announced that 339,000 new claims for unemployment benefits were filed last week, down slightly from the previous week’s revised total of 341,000. Analysts were expecting to see 333,000 initial claims filed, indicating that the employment sector was a little weaker last week than many had thought. That makes the data favorable for the bond market and mortgage rates. Unfortunately, since this data tracks only a single week’s worth of new filings its impact on the financial markets and mortgage pricing has been fairly minimal.

At 10:00 AM ET this morning the Institute for Supply Management (ISM) posted their manufacturing index for December. It came in at 57.0, nearly matching forecasts of 56.9. That was a slight decline from November’s 57.3, meaning manufacturer sentiment on business conditions slipped last month. Ideally, the bond market would prefer to see a larger decline, but the lack of further strength makes the news neutral-to-slightly positive for mortgage rates.

Tomorrow has no relevant economic data scheduled for release but there are a handful of speaking engagements from current Fed members. The most recent schedule shows the first at 10:15 AM ET and the last at 2:30 PM ET. None of them are considered to be highly important or likely to be market-moving, but whenever they speak publicly, particularly the Fed Chairman, their words have the potential to influence the markets. Chairman Bernanke is expected to speak in Philadelphia at 2:30 PM ET, so the best chance to see a noticeable reaction will come during afternoon trading.

Long story short if you have not already locked your loan you are probably safe to wait until next week. As always stay focused though because when there is public speaking the markets can sometimes be affected.
Continue to follow my blog for all your mortgage and real estate news everyday.
We serve the proud state of Texas including Houston, San Antonio, Dallas, Austin & The Woodlands just to name a few.