Mortgage Market is Still a Mess, But a Hopeful One

There is a LOT of misinformation flying around out there about the mortgage market, the Fed, and the various impacts on rates from the government’s coronavirus response.  If you’re in the market for big-picture overviews of all the relevant considerations with links to excruciating levels of technical detail, check out this compendium of the Fed’s current mortgage bond buying efforts. If you’re just here to find out what the heck is going on with mortgage rates, read on.
Rates are legitimately all over the place in a way we haven’t seen, ever.  I’m including a significant amount of personal experience analyzing the financial crisis and more than a careless amount of research into historically similar levels of volatility as seen in April 1987.  March 2020 wins, period.  The sudden, unexpected, massive economic shift associated with the most serious global pandemic of our lifetimes is a big deal.  Could we say that the Spanish Flu or Great Depression were bigger deals?  Sure, maybe.  But those events happened in a different world.  In fact, the rise of the internet and rampant globalization of the economy in the 90’s arguably makes even 1987 a poor comparison (and yes, I know there technically was internet back then, but were you able to liquidate your 401k from your cell phone’s mobile app after reading a coronavirus headline in the bathroom in 1987?  Like I said… different world).
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Source: mortgagenewsdaily.comNew feed