Thursday’s bond market has opened in negative territory despite weaker than expected economic news. The stock markets are showing losses with the Dow down 21 points and the Nasdaq down 12 points. The bond market is currently down 10/32, which will likely push this morning’s mortgage rates higher by approximately .125 - .250 of a discount point.
The Lab or Department posted last week’s initial unemployment claims, saying 308,000 new claims were filed. This was close to the 305,000 that was expected and has filed to influence bond trading or mortgage rates this morning.
The Conference Board released its Leading Economic Indicators (LEI) for May late this morning. The New York-based business research group said that the indicators fell 0.6%, indicating that economic activity may slow over the next three to six months. This was a little weaker than the 0.5% drop that was expected, but wasn’t enough of a difference to lead to a bond rally or mortgage rates improvements.
The Commerce Department will announce May’s Durable Goods Orders early tomorrow morning. This data gives us an indication of manufacturing sector strength. It is known to be quite volatile from month to month and is expected to show an increase of 0.4% in May’s new orders after April’s 4.4% drop. A larger than expected increase would likely pu sh stock prices higher and mortgage rates lower. A smaller than expected increase would be an ideal scenario for the bond market and could lead to an improvement in mortgage pricing tomorrow.
If I were considering financing/refinancing a home, I would…. Lock if my closing was taking place within 7 days… Lock if my closing was taking place between 8 and 20 days… Float if my closing was taking place between 21 and 60 days… Float if my closing was taking place over 60 days from now… This is only my opinion of what I would do if I were financing a home. It is only an opinion and cannot be guaranteed to be in the best interest of all/any other borrowers.
a la mode
Genalytics, a provider of data solutions that helps organizations better target its customers, recently unveiled ProspectDirect. Built upon Genalytics patented analytics technology, ProspectDirect reportedly helps mortgage brokers, marketers, direct marketing agencies, list consultants and marketing services providers determine prospects for a campaign.
According to Genalytics, ProspectDirect allows marketers to obtain leads at a lower net cost per response, offer demographic customer profile reports and improve its direct marketing response rates by 10-25 percent.
“With ProspectDirect, our goal is to democratize sophisticated analytics,” said Ray Kingman, Genalytics CEO. “Every marketing campaign can now realize the 10-25 percent lift in results that comes from a predictive model applied to list selection without investing in sophisticated technology or expertise.”
The company claims that ProspectDirect can provide marketers access predictive models in the categories of finance, real estate, automotive and consumer products and services. Individualized models for specific products or service campaigns are also built and can be added to the platform in the form of a custom Prospect Universe for marketers who prefer a private labeled version of ProspectDirect.
According to Genalytics, the product automates the predictive modeling process by dissecting more than 500 demographic, geographic and affluence variables associated with known customers and then scoring other households in the targeted geography as to their similarities and propensity to respond to an offer.
ProspectDirect is priced competitively with traditional bulk lists, the company said. All selects and modeling are free. Users pay a single flat rate for names rented, which is typically competitive with the cost of compiled names. For more information, visit www.genalytics.com.
STUART, FL - The National Community Reinvestment Coalition (NCRC) filed a civil rights complaint with the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) against Allied Home Mortgage Capital Corporation, the nation’s largest privately held mortgage broker/banker.
The complaint states that several Allied branches quoted less favorable rates and fees to minorities, displayed disrespect, and made racists comments to African Americans.
NCRC conducted the first-ever Broker Fair Lending Audit where mystery shoppers "tested" over 100 mortgage brokers from February 2005 to June 2006 in Atlanta, Georgia; Baltimore, Maryland; Chicago, Illinois; Los Angeles California; St. Louis, Missouri and the Washington, D.C., metro areas.
NCRC’s complaint alleges that Allied and it’s brokers engaged in racially discriminatory lending practices against African Americans and inhabitants of African-American communities by 1) Quoting different interest rates & fees on the basis of race; 2) Steering African American Consumers to more expensive non-prime products; 3) Not treating African-American applicants for mortgages as seriously as their white counterparts, despite their being more qualified; 4) Providing African-Americans with substandard & discourteous treatment; 5) Limiting access to credit on the basis of race; 6) Differential treatment on the basis of race in representing policies & practices; and 7) making inappropriate comments regarding the characteristics of communities.
Hilary Shelton, director of the NAACP Washington Bureau, called upon HUD to investigate the audit results.
