Mortgage Industry Blog

  Mortgage markets improved last week as Wall Street's concerns about the Middle East trumped its fears of inflation. Conforming and FHA mortgage rates in South Carolina fell to a 3-week low. Last week marked the second straight week in which mortgage rates fell, a streak that follows four straig...

Not all housing reports are sunny, it seems. In its monthly New Home Sales release, the U.S. Department of Commerce showed a 13 percent drop-off in annualized new construction sales between the months of December and January. It's the biggest one-month drop in New Home Sales since May 2010. In ad...

Home resales rose another 2.7 percent last month, according to the National Association of REALTORS® monthly Existing Home Sales report. An "existing home" is a home that's been previously occupied and is not considered new construction. The number of existing homes sold on a rolling 12-month bas...

Mortgage rates are up 0.875% since mid-November, causing home buyer purchasing power across Oconee to fall more than 10 percent since. Persistent concerns over inflation are a major reason why and this week's Consumer Price Index did little to quell fears. CPI rose for the third straight month la...

Mortgage markets improved slightly last week, rebounding from the worst 1-week loss in recent history. The gains were geopolitical, however; the result of instability in the Middle East region. Economic data was overlooked as investors made a broad-based flight-to-quality. For just the second tim...

Did you know non-depository mortgage lenders and brokers must have a NMLS approved license in order to originate loans?  Yes, each loan originator who is not employed by a depository institution must now be licensed by the National Mortgage License System.  In South Carolina, an originator must h...

Annualized Single-Family Housing Starts dropped 1 percent in January to 413,000 units nationwide, it's lowest reading almost 2 years. A "Housing Start" is defined as a home on which construction has started.  Now, if you had only seen the Housing Starts story in the headlines today, you wouldn't ...

The Federal Reserve released its January 25-26, 2011 meeting minutes Wednesday afternoon. South Carolina mortgage rates have been in flux since. Fed Minutes are comprehensive recaps of Federal Open Market Committee meetings; a detailed look at the debates and discussions that shape our nation's m...

Homebuilder confidence in the market for newly-built, single family homes appears stable as the spring buying season gets underway in Greenville. The confidence reading is recorded and reported monthly by the National Association of Homebuilders. For the 4th straight month, the group's Housing M...

If consumer spending is a keystone element in the U.S. economic recovery, a full-on rebound is likely underway. Tuesday, the Census Bureau released its national January Retail Sales figures and, for the seventh straight month, the data surpassed expectations. Last month's retail figures climbed ...