Daily Rate Lock Advisory

Indexes Affecting Rate Lock

Medium

Unknown

Treasury Auctions (5,7,10,20,30 year)

We don’t have anything scheduled this morning that is likely to affect rates, but we do have an afternoon event when results of the 20-year Treasury Note auction are posted at 1:00 PM ET. These auctions show what type of demand investors have for long-term securities. If demand is strong in the sale, particularly from international buyers, we could see the broader bond market improve this afternoon like we did last week with the 10-year Note and 30-year Bond sales. On the other hand, lackluster interest in the securities may lead to an upward revision to rates before the end of the day.

Low

Unknown

Housing Starts (New Residential Construction)

Tomorrow has two pieces of data for the markets to digest, starting with December's Housing Starts at 8:30 AM ET. It will tell us how many new home groundbreakings took place during the month. While this data gives us a small indication of housing sector strength, it is not known to be highly influential on mortgage rates. Accordingly, it will take a large variance from forecasts for the report to have a direct impact on mortgage rates. Forecasts show an increase in new home sales. A decline in sales would be favorable to mortgage rates.

Medium

Unknown

Weekly Unemployment Claims (every Thursday)

Also coming early tomorrow morning will be last week’s unemployment figures. They are expected to show 870,000 new claims for unemployment benefits were filed last week, down from the previous week’s surprisingly high 965,000. Rising claims is a sign that the employment sector is weakening, not improving. Therefore, the higher the number of new claims, the better the news it is for the bond market and mortgage rates.

Rate Lock Advisory

Mortgage Rate Trend

Indexes Affecting Rate Lock

Treasury Auctions (5,7,10,20,30 year)

Housing Starts (New Residential Construction)

Weekly Unemployment Claims (every Thursday)

Float / Lock Recommendation