employment

by Calculated Risk on 8/20/2025 07:00:00 AM From the MBA: Mortgage Applications Decrease in Latest MBA Weekly Survey Mortgage applications decreased 1.4 percent from one week earlier, according to data from the Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending August 15, 2025. The Market Composite Index, a measure of mortgage…

by Calculated Risk on 8/19/2025 07:51:00 PM Note: Mortgage rates are from MortgageNewsDaily.com and are for top tier scenarios. Wednesday:• At 7:00 AM ET, The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) will release the results for the mortgage purchase applications index. • During the day, The AIA’s Architecture Billings Index for July (a leading indicator for commercial…

by Calculated Risk on 8/19/2025 01:11:00 PM This is something I check occasionally. The Department of Transportation (DOT) reported: Travel on all roads and streets changed by +1.5% (+4.1 billion vehicle miles) for April 2025 as compared with April 2024. Travel for the month is estimated to be 277.3 billion vehicle miles. The seasonally adjusted…

by Calculated Risk on 8/19/2025 09:15:00 AM Today, in the Calculated Risk Real Estate Newsletter: Housing Starts Increased to 1.428 million Annual Rate in July A brief excerpt: Total housing starts in July were well above expectations and starts in May and June were revised up. The third graph shows the month-to-month comparison for total…

by Calculated Risk on 8/19/2025 08:30:00 AM From the Census Bureau: Permits, Starts and Completions Housing Starts: Privately-owned housing starts in July were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1,428,000. This is 5.2 percent above the revised June estimate of 1,358,000 and is 12.9 percent above the July 2024 rate of 1,265,000. Single-family housing…

by Calculated Risk on 8/18/2025 08:31:00 PM From Matthew Graham at Mortgage News Daily: Rates Trickle to Another Higher Low Mortgage rates are as high as they’ve been on almost any other day this month. You’d have to go back to August 1st to see anything higher. On the other hand, rates are still noticeably…

by Calculated Risk on 8/18/2025 03:28:00 PM Container traffic gives us an idea about the volume of goods being exported and imported – and usually some hints about the trade report since LA area ports handle about 40% of the nation’s container port traffic. The following graphs are for inbound and outbound traffic at the…

by Calculated Risk on 8/18/2025 10:00:00 AM The National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) reported the housing market index (HMI) was at 32, down from 33 last month. Any number below 50 indicates that more builders view sales conditions as poor than good. From the NAHB: Builder Confidence Plateaus at Relatively Low Level Elevated mortgage…