| Weekly Recap (10/17/11-10/22/11)
Friday
“Will foreigners save the U.S. housing market?”
Back in July, our own Peter Miller introduced just how important foreign homebuyers were to the U.S. housing market. According to the National Association of Realtors, for the 12 month period ending March 2011, foreign buyers and recent immigrants accounted for a total of $82 billion in internationally oriented sales, representing 8 percent of total U.S. sales.
Understanding their influence on the market, two U.S. lawmakers have introduced a bill that encourages foreign buyers to purchase U.S. real estate.
Senators Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Mike Lee (R.-Utah) have co-sponsored a bill that is designed to grant a U.S. residence visa to any foreign borrower who spends at least $500,000 on residential real estate here in the U.S…
Thursday
“Will lenders add to reverse mortgage requirements?”
The FHA’s reverse mortgage program has undergone a number of changes in the past year, and now HUD says more are to be expected.
HUD is also telling reverse mortgage lenders they can add additional requirements above the FHA standard to help reduce program claims…or are they?…
Wednesday
“Mortgage rates rise for second straight week”
Mortgage rates have now risen for the second week in a row.
According to the latest weekly mortgage rate report from HSH.com, rates on two of the most popular types of mortgages rose the week ending October 18. Yet despite the increase, mortgage rates remain near record lows.
“Economic news continues to brighten, pushing mortgage rates upward somewhat,” said Keith Gumbinger, vice president of HSH.com. “But despite the increase this week, there are few reasons for rates to continue to climb”…
Tuesday
“Want to sell your home fast? List it on a Friday”
The last few years have been a buyer’s market, not a seller’s market. Falling home prices and strict lending conditions have left many sellers unable to find qualified borrowers willing to pay top dollar.
Sellers need to do everything they can these days, from making the proper repairs, to hiring a home stager, to deciding which day of the week to debut their home listing.
Wait, what’s that? You’ve never heard about that last part?
As it turns out, home sellers can help their cause by debuting their property on a specific day of the week…
Monday
“Mortgage rates on the rise. Why?”
We’ve noted many times that even mild improvements in the economic picture would likely turn mortgage rates upward a little bit.
After a less-dire tone to some key economic reports two weeks back (and even rumors of some improvement on the Euro-mess front), we got our first taste of that last week, as mortgage rates moved off record lows to former record-low levels seen just a few weeks ago, according to HSH.com’s latest Market Trends newsletter.
Over the past 10 days or so, most major stock indexes have moved considerably higher, with the Dow Jones adding about 1200 points. The money to push stocks higher has come from the selling of “safer” investments, like Treasuries, and that has pushed yields and mortgage rates a little higher…
|
