Economy

The Agency, a brokerage with a leading role in a Netflix show, names New American Funding their preferred mortgage provider, stripping that title away from CrossCountry Mortgage.

The cohort is outperforming the broader market — up more than 50% year-to-date versus the S&P 500's 18% gain. 

Denver-based Proprietary Capital, who offers a platform for institutional investors seeking returns from mortgage-related assets, agreed to purchase the New Jersey-based lender as it seeks to increase the number of opportunities it offers.

Their links to the Treasury have been considered a source of strength and still are, but less so, according to one rating agency. Others disagree.

But a Zillow economist argues that there's plenty of evidence suggesting strong GDP and job growth had more to do with the increase than what Fitch did.

The move was "not being driven by fundamental credit, capital or liquidity deterioration at the firms," the firm said.

But the government-sponsored enterprise is still concerned about the fiscal health of its lender counterparties as volumes are down considerably from last year.

The sector is well-positioned for further volume growth into next year, analysts led by Anthony Pettinari said in a note to clients Monday.

The association thinks this could simplify and manage the costs of two new pending credit requirements by allowing companies to add the one that's been through a price hike second.

There's divergence of opinions between one more rate hike this cycle and no further actions.

"I do believe you'll begin to see some improvement, or increases, in new housing as we head into the back half of the year," Chief Financial Officer Jim Peters said in an interview. "We're hearing optimistic stuff from the builders we deal with."

It's a toss-up between a recession or a soft landing, though some, including Fannie Mae's Doug Duncan, still believe a downturn is more likely than not.

The 30-year fixed, which was threatening going above 7% again according to Freddie Mac data, was 18 basis points lower this week.

Residential starts fell 8% last month to a 1.43 million annualized rate, according to government data released Wednesday.

Despite the improvement in sentiment, the homebuilder index remains below end-of-2021 levels, when mortgage rates were lower

The U.S. economy has a better chance of avoiding a recession in the next 12 months following recent positive data on economic activity and inflation, according to Jan Hatzius, the chief economist at Goldman Sachs Group Inc. 

The share of homeowners late by 30-59 days got slightly higher but remained below 1%, according to the Federal Housing Finance Agency.

However, both Zillow's and Optimal Blue put the 30-year fixed mortgage lower than where it was seven days prior.

Democratic senators including Banking Chair Sherrod Brown and Elizabeth Warren want to restrict tax breaks for large corporate investors that buy local homes and often drive up costs.

A resilient U.S. economy, lingering inflation and comments from the Federal Reserve contributed to a 10-basis-point hike in the 30-year fixed rate, Freddie Mac said.