How is it that there are only three weeks until the summer solstice? Three more weeks of the amount of daylight increasing in the Northern Hemisphere, and then, if you want more sun time, head to the Southern half of the globe. If you think presidential administrations or Federal Reserves eliminate business cycles, they don’t. If your business model is based on lower rates, don’t look at this graph from the Federal Reserve. If you want some insight into builder business and builder associations, today’s “Rundown” has Christy Beck, Corporate Director of Sales and Marketing for Caruso Homes and ..read more

Hey, there is plenty of competition among lenders and among vendors. But, to the best of my knowledge, vendors and lenders aren’t doing this to one another. “There oughta be a law against it!” At the MBA Secondary Conference last week, MBA CEO Bob Broeksmit railed about the regulatory knots that bind the mortgage industry. Attorney Brian Levy agrees that’s a big problem, but disagrees with Bob’s solution in his Mortgage Musings. (Levy also gives some more thoughts on the CFPB funding case.) Regulations, and complying with them, certainly add to the cost of home loans, which in turn are pa ..read more

“I just saw three people jogging outside, and it inspired me to… get up and close the blinds.” Are you inspired to fly somewhere on vacation this summer? Hopefully your ride is smooth, unlike the recent Singapore Airlines flight; here is a riveting interview with one of the passengers about what it was like. In terms of your travel, good luck: Airlines are cutting back on routes across the U.S. even as consumer demand grows due to plane shortages, recalls, and the lack of financial viability for low-cost carriers like Spirit and Frontier Airlines. Atlanta and Orlando saw some of the biggest cu ..read more

“Scientists got together to study the effects of alcohol on a person’s walk, and the result was staggering.” The news impacting human life and property over the weekend was truly staggering, ranging from one (Bill Walton, basketball player) to possibly thousands (buried alive from a landslide in Papua New Guinea, north of Australia). More than 40 were killed in an Israeli strike against Hamas. Tornadoes tore through the middle of the United States, killing more than 20 and destroying thousands of structures. We talk about climate change, and global warming, yet now an airline has begun just to ..read more

There is often more to life than mortgages. (I know… once in a while.) As has been mentioned in this Commentary, everyone with a pet should know that private equity firms have been buying up vets and jacking up the prices. (My cat Myrtle, apex predator who enjoys line-caught seafood and is not above using cunning tactics, suggests, “Ask your vet who owns the practice!”) Speaking of seafood, does Red Lobster have aficionados? Maybe “fans” is more appropriate… When a private-equity firm bought the iconic seafood chain in 2014, it sold the real estate under the restaurants for $1.5 billion. Then ..read more

“Abandon all hope ye who enter here.” (Dante’s words, not Disney’s.) That could be the slogan of Times Square, but for those who just spent days at the Secondary conference in Times Square, trying to avoid everything in Times Square, you can look forward to the same event at the same place in the same hotel next year, May 18-21, 2025. Manhattan has so, so much more to offer. In a year, will groups still be discussing Attorney Opinion Letters, offering a savings on refis and new construction for Agency loans? What about LOs coming real estate agents, and vice versa? (For lenders considering tha ..read more

Some people say, “You’re crazy to stay in residential lending in this environment, and it’s not going to improve dramatically in the near future.” No, this is crazy. Owners of vendors and lenders who are barely eking by, or losing money quarter after quarter, aside, there is plenty of sanity remaining. Given what I heard in Manhattan, we can expect many, many offerings of 2nd mortgage programs and HELOCs from investors and therefore the lenders that sell to them, given the amount of equity that’s out there. LOs know that these are homes, not houses, and many owners focus on their life there at ..read more

As many from the conference fly home, there was a lot of information flying around the conference this week. (Check out the climate and catastrophe notes below). My son Robbie and I had the pleasure of sitting with the co-founders of nonprofit CapitalW Collective, Amy Creason, Pat Peters, and Leslie Winick, while in New York this week for the MBA Secondary. They’re on a mission to create a more inclusive and dynamic mortgage capital market through the Collective, looking to engage with everyone in our industry. But all is not peachy. The CFPB is very interested in more details on the rising co ..read more

Overheard walking through Times Square: “Daddy, I want ice cream!” “Believe me, honey, I do too. But Mommy only gave us enough money for three beers.” Here at the MBA’s Secondary Conference, there’s the official news, and the unofficial news. Heard or asked in the hallways… “What does it mean for lenders, if anything, when Martin Gruenberg steps down as head of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. after findings of a toxic work environment put the regulator at the center of a heated political fight?” “Rather than more regulations, how about better or more relevant regulations?” “If you’re looki ..read more

How is it that there are only three weeks until the summer solstice? Three more weeks of the amount of daylight increasing in the Northern Hemisphere, and then, if you want more sun time, head to the Southern half of the globe. If you think presidential administrations or Federal Reserves eliminate business cycles, they don’t. If your business model is based on lower rates, don’t look at this graph from the Federal Reserve. If you want some insight into builder business and builder associations, today’s “Rundown” has Christy Beck, Corporate Director of Sales and Marketing for Caruso Homes and ..read more