Mortgage Rates and the price of Mortgaged-Backed Securities (MBS) improved very slightly this week but remain on a downward slope. Rates are up from last year by approximately 1/8%
Jobs – The Bureau of Labor and Statistics (BLS) released their July Jobs Report which showed a loss of 23,000. The BLS further revised lower the previous two months of reports by a combined 103,000 jobs. Since May approximately 700,000 jobs have been removed, but over the same period 1 million people left the labor force, so even though the unemployment fell from 4.3% to 4.1% it is not due to job creations.
Productivity – the BLS released their Productivity and Labor Costs report and it showed that productivity rose 1.4% during Q2. In the same period labor costs rose by a softer 1.3%. This report was helpful to mortgage rates as it shows a deflationary result compared to recent readings.
Mortgage Applications to purchase and refinance homes remained unchanged over the last week. Purchase applications are down 3% year over year, and refinance applications are down 9%. This is the second week of negative year over year numbers, the first time that has happened in a while.
Oil Prices are at $78.22 down, $7.6, or nearly 9% from last Friday.