Home prices continue to gain as the FHFA House Price Index for July rose a more than expected 1.0 percent after increasing 0.6 percent in June. Analysts expected only a .7 percent increase. If you wanted to chart the progression of the Home Price Index you would see that for 18 straight months the index has been rising.  The largest ...

The Federal Open Market Committee dropped an unexpected gift on the stock market and mortgage markets when they announced on Wednesday that they will not be cutting back on the government stimulus program at the present time.  Virtually everyone in the mortgage, real estate and stock markets all believed for sure that this meeting is when the stimulus cutting announcement would come ...

by: Fred Arnold Voyager 1 has indeed left our solar system and Home values increase. After 36 years of space travel and months of heated debate among scientists, NASA confirmed Thursday that Voyager 1 has indeed left our solar system and had entered interstellar space more than a year ago. It has good company, as I think that 30-yr fixed 3.25% home ...

Mortgage rates are rising again.  Although we are not experiencing large increases in a single day, there is certainly a rising trend.  There have not been any major headlines that mainstream news has reported that would explain the increase, however there is some less popular economic data that reinforces the notion that the economy is continuing to improve.  An improving ...

By: Fred Arnold Existing home sales jumped 6.5% in July which was far beyond any analysts expectations.  The National Association of Realtors believes that the jump was primarily due to panic in the market over rising interest rates.  It is believed that many fence sitting home buyers have been jumping into the market to make their purchases because of the belief ...

By: Fred Arnold Coming up on August 24th, 17th Annual Heart of The West Dinner, Auction & Children’s Demonstration-for Carousel Ranch, See attached interview with Denise Tomey, the Executive Director of Carousel Ranch about the Ranch. Equestrian Therapy at Carousel Ranch with Denise Tomey Rising mortgage rates combined with rising home prices are reducing the sales of existing homes according to ...

Home prices for existing home sales continue to remain firm despite that a little more inventory is coming on the market.  There is slight concern however in that the number of existing home sales declined by 1.2% in the month of June. Some experts tend to think that the decline is due to rising interest rates for mortgage financing however, ...

By Fred Arnold Without much fanfare the stock market has resumed its climb into record territory.  Twice this week the stock market hit record highs.  The main driver for the continued rise is investors feeling comfortable that the Fed is still quite a ways off from tapering the economic stimulus program. American companies are as lean as they have ever been and flush ...

By: Fred Arnold With the belief that the Fed is not rushing to begin the tapering of their economic stimulus program the stock market moved into record territory this week. Additionally the panic that has gripped the bond market has subsided and interest rates have been dropping. Although rates are not heading anywhere close to record lows, they are at ...

It is simply amazing that there used to be a time that the stock market would drop at any economic report that was negative and indicated a less than strong economy.  However this week the exact opposite happened.  The markets rallied on Wednesday when the GDP report came in worse than expected. You may be reading this newsletter and think that investor ...