Scott Fowler's (sfowler) Blog

For the first time in 4 weeks, mortgage rates closing a week lower than where they opened it Markets shrugged off uncertainty about Hurricane Gustav and chose to rally on the backs of strong economic data. Overall, rates were down by about 0.125 percent, or $96 per year per $100,000 borrowed. Mar...

Three years to the week after Hurricane Katrina caused $81.2 million in damages, Tropical Storm Gustav is charting a similar Gulf of Mexico path. Memories of Katrina are making oil traders nervous.  The 2005 storm shut down 30 platforms and 9 refineries.  And, this week, oil prices are up nearly ...

According to the June 2008 Case-Shiller Home Price Index, home prices in 15 of the 20 largest U.S. real estate markets either improved, or showed growth from the month prior.  This is the fourth straight month in which that happened which means that a national housing recovery may already be und...

When a homeowner buys a new home, he has 3 options of what to do with his current residence: Sell the home, paying off the mortgage in full Keep the home as a second/vacation home Convert the home to an investment property The most common action plan is the first one -- sell the home and pay off ...

According to the latest Zillow Real Estate Market Report, home values in Simpsonville increased 1.40%% in the second quarter of 2008, compared to the second quarter of 2007. Nationally, home values decreased 9.9% during this same period.  Further proof all markets are local. 

Momentum carried mortgage markets through a week of low trading volume and few economic releases.  Rates were volatile, but ended the week unchanged overall. Don't let the word "unchanged" fool you, however. From day-to-day last week, mortgage rates covered a huge range and it was only coincidenc...

Stories on TV about the national real estate market are misleading to Americans.  This is because there is no such thing as a "national real estate market". Consider the latest American Housing Survey.  It found that there are 124,377,000 homes in America spread across: 50 states, with More than ...

Private Mortgage Insurance (PMI) is an insurance policy paid to a lender in the event that a homeowner defaults on his home loan.  With the growing number of mortgage defaults nationwide, mortgage insurers are finding their balance sheets under attack and their revenues in the red. So far this ye...

The Producer Price Index is a business inflation meter and it's now up 9.8 percent annually. This is a huge number for PPI and represents the highest year-over-year rate of inflation since 1981. Normally, blowout inflation like this would be terrible for mortgage rates but mortgage markets are ac...

Housing Starts measure the number of new housing "units" on which construction has started and in July, Housing Starts fell to its lowest levels since March 1991. For homeowners, this is a welcome bit of good news because as fewer homes are built, there is less inventory from which home buyers ca...