Stage presence during the holidays? Here’s an example . Christmas, and 2023, is roaring our way… What are you telling your bosses? If you’re working on projections for next year, next Thursday at 11AM PT join the MBA’s fabled chief economist Mike Fratantoni and me whilst we debate the future with Sales Boomerang and Mortgage Coach. Something for the whole family! “Rob, are you hearing that lender fallout is increasing, and with it costs that are incurred early in the process like running credit?” Absolutely. Lenders, in their zeal to lock in volume, seem to start processing and locking borrowers sooner, but then deals are falling out of contract for various reasons. And volume is not good: According to Curinos , November 2022 funded mortgage volume decreased 68% YoY and 20% MoM. In the retail channel, funded volume was down 73% YoY and 20% MoM. (The average 30-year conforming retail funded rate in November was 6.59%, 52bps higher than Octob
Robert K. writes, “My Mom always said, ‘Work until your bank account looks like a phone number. Well, I did it! ‘Available balance: $911.’” Speaking of numbers, thank you to those who wrote to me correcting the GDP of Mexico here as being $1.4 trillion and not $1.4 billion. Numbers certainly tell the story with vendors and lenders. Owners of vendors and third-party providers are looking at middle layers of management, cutting back, certainly cutting salaries, or ridding themselves of unproductive salespeople. Lenders continue to cut staff (Wells Fargo being the latest example) or furlough employees for a portion of their workweeks and implementing salary cuts. Meanwhile, managers report that end-of-year reviews are resulting in employees asking for raises due to inflation. On a lager scale, uh, larger scale, mergers and acquisitions continue. The latest to cross the tape is that "Guild Mortgage is excited to announce the acquisition of Inlant
“Rob, my capital markets gal eliminated our ability to lock overnight at yesterday’s rates. I think that she’s being unreasonable. Your thoughts?” No, she’s not. Overnight lock protection is one of the first things to go in a volatile rate environment, especially when developments in Ukraine, seven hours ahead of New York, contribute to our rate movement. Besides, who needs to lock loans at 3AM? It is tough enough to preserve pricing margins as it is. As packages of mortgage servicing rights continue to be sold by companies looking to raise cash, do you think it’s hard to make money doing mortgages these days? Try music. I was recently chatting with a musician in Nashville who told me that they earn .003 per stream on YouTube. There are varying deal structures, of course, but for someone just starting out this equates to $30 for 10,000 streams. Yikes. I hope that Bruce Willis, and his family, made some money as they’ve been selling off $
Demand for property loans usually slows in January. In that respect, residential mortgage lending this year will be more typical than 2020 or 2021, lending experts say. But in most