Beware of the news and its interpretation!
We need to take a minute and talk about the news we hear and the reaction there might be from it. We also must be very careful to look at the facts and the analysis by a variety of sources to be sure we have a clear view of what things actually mean and how they might impact the markets we serve.
I say this because we all know there is a significant media bias against the housing market. No matter what happens, there is always some outlets who are going to frame everything in the most negative light, even when an obvious upside is staring them in the face. The best example continues to be the complaint about inventory of homes for sale. YES, the number of homes on the market is falling, but that hasn’t stopped record numbers of home sales in 2018, 2019, & 2020. How can there be record breaking sales if there isn’t any inventory? Just yesterday there was a number of articles about falling purchase mortgage applications and a 3% drop in those mortgage applications accounting for lower home sales. Well, that may be true, but in this case, it isn’t; there were actually more contracts last week as there was a HUGE increase in the number of homes sold for CASH! Cash buyers don’t apply for mortgages!
Now, there is some pending data that will be reported tomorrow, June 4th, and next Thursday, June 10th, that you just need to be aware of. June 4th we will get the May jobs report and June 10th we will see important inflation data. These two reports could impact the interest rate markets either good or bad, depending on the news and how that news is viewed. I say this not to create fear or to say what will or won’t happen, I say this because you need to be prepared if any or all of the data puts pressure on interest rates, the possibility of wild fluctuations could be very real. So be prepared, and as always, if you like it, lock it; if the customer wants to gamble, get it in writing that they chose to float and accepts the outcome of doing so.
As always, questions or comments can be directed to: [email protected]
