The market has stabilized and buyers are stepping in. Street talk is that the Fed will have to step on the gas, keeping Austin mortgage rates low for an extended period of time “no matter what it takes.”
A slow economic recovery and the possibility of a Fed policy change helped Austin mortgage rates move a little lower again this week. As a result of recent weak economic data, the Fed is reportedly considering the purchase of additional mortgage-backed securities (MBS) to replace maturing securities. These factors, along with limited inflation, make current economic conditions supportive of low Austin mortgage rates.
With Austin mortgage rates/pricing at the best levels of the year and the 10 year note hitting 2010 low yields, the time is right for borrowers to lock in their Austin mortgage rates. Perfect time for Austin borrowers to use the exclusive float down program offered by Max Leaman at PrimeLending Austin. Call Max at (512) 293-1239.
While inflation remained low, stronger than expected economic data released this week was negative for mortgage markets. As a result, Austin mortgage rates ended the week a little higher.
February housing starts were down 5.9%, to an annual rate of 575,000 units, but this was higher than consensus expectations and almost all the drop came from multi-family units. Single-family homes were off only 0.6% in February and are still up 39.8% over their low a year ago. Meanwhile, new building permits for February fell 1.6%, to an annual rate of 612,000, but that was also better than estimates and permits are still up an estimated 11.3% from a year ago. The experts all thought we'd see a MAJOR drop in home building given the record snow storms on the East Coast. But we didn't. The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) estimates we'll see 694,000 housing starts in 2010, a 20% hike from 2009 numbers.
As you can see, our best case is for Austin mortgage rates to hold steady so use this time to be a little defensive into the FOMC announcement.
During a very light week for economic news, the economic data and Treasury auctions contained few surprises and produced little reaction in mortgage markets. Austin mortgage rates ended the week nearly unchanged.
Most U.S. business economists expect the Federal Reserve to raise benchmark interest rates within six months by between a quarter and a half percentage point, according to a survey released on Monday.
Looking at last week’s rally, most of the trade was on short covering which means that traders were not initiating new long positions (expecting the market to continue to rally). We buy that argument and if correct, we would suggest that you “buy the rumor, sell the news”. In English, this means that mortgage pricing should remain relatively stable for most of the week and then worsen post Unemployment Report data on Friday
New home sales fell 11.2% in January to a record low level. Existing home sales weren't very pretty either, down 7.2%, though they're UP 11.5% over a year ago. Let's remember that last Fall we all thought the tax credit was going away at the end of November. Many sales got pushed into October and November, causing sales drops the next two months. But the median new home price is down just 2.4% year over year and the average price is now UP 3.7%. For an existing home, the median price is unchanged from a year ago and the average price is UP 2.6%. More evidence home prices are stabilizing, with some analysts expecting modest gains for the year. Supporting this, the Case-Shiller home price index was UP 0.3% in December, its seventh straight monthly rise.
