Good Thursday morning from your Hometown Lender,

Not a lot of economic news was released today.

The ECB had a meeting today and after cutting last month, decided to keep rates on hold today. I suspect that is some coordination with our Fed although no one would admit it. We had unemployment claims that were higher than expected and the highest in a year. Philly Fed came in higher than expected which was the only unfriendly news for Bonds.

Not much of a reaction to any of it today.

As I shared, when we fail to break through resistance, the typical reaction is for rates to leak higher. If we do not see any additional buying to push rates lower, I expect that rates will worsen a bit over the next week (before PCE next Friday). President Trump will speak tonight at the RNC and markets will listen to hear his promises for new policies. How inflationary they appear will have a direct impact on rates. There is no news tomorrow and I don’t think it is a bad idea to lock.

U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown, Chair of the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs, and Sen. Mike Braun have announced the Senate passage of their legislation, the VA Home Loan Awareness Act, to help inform veteran homebuyers of their eligibility for the VA home loan program, which will assist more veterans in achieving the dream of homeownership. The VA home loan program was designed to assist veterans and their spouses achieve homeownership by offering perks for financing home purchases, including no down payment, no private mortgage insurance (PMI), and oftentimes, lower interest rates than conventional FHA loans. Despite these benefits, only 13% of veterans ever utilize their VA home loan benefit. Among veterans who choose not to use the VA loan when purchasing a home, 33% of them say it was because they were not aware of the program. This rate is even higher among surviving spouses as 46.3% of them said they did not know they were eligible for a VA loan at the time of their purchase.

Stay safe, make today great!