Morning Report: Home Prices holding up

Posted on May 5, 2020 by Brent Nyitray

Vital Statistics:

 

Last Change
S&P futures 2863 30.1
Oil (WTI) 23.15 2.79
10 year government bond yield 0.66%
30 year fixed rate mortgage 3.43%

 

Stocks are higher this morning as earnings continue to come in. Bonds and MBS are down.

 

Despite the COVID-19 crisis, home price appreciation is holding up. Prices rose 1.3% MOM in March and are up 4.5% YOY. April might be a better read, but still… D.R. Horton mentioned on its earnings call that pricing is holding up, and while they are offering some incentives (free fridge friday), they aren’t cutting prices to move inventory.

 

Here are the cities with the biggest drop in new listings. Allentown PA, Milwaukee WI, Scranton, PA, Detroit MI, and Buffalo NY. The Northeast and Upper Midwest seem to have been hit the hardest.

 

If you look at the CoreLogic map, most of these areas are on the undervalued side.

 

CoreLogic overvalued metros

 

Ex-MBA President Dave Stevens weighs in on how the CARES Act drove a massive tightening of mortgage credit. Comments from Mark Calabria about letting servicers fail and musing that borrowers might be better off with a bank servicer were unhelpful to say the least. The added LLPAs on first payment forbearance requests basically killed the cash-out market. He makes a point that Fannie has the liquidity (between its own net worth and the Treasury facility) to extend lines of credit. He makes a great point as well – Fannie was created during the New Deal to smooth the mortgage market during disruptions, and this one is probably the biggest since the New Deal days.

Filed under: Economy, Morning Report | 10 Comments »

%d bloggers like this: