Carl Rizzuto's (crizzuto) Blog

Cost of Living Reaches An All-Time High, Pressures Mortgage Rates Higher   Mortgage rates are up 0.875% since mid-November, causing home buyer purchasing power across Jupiter to fall more than 10 percent since. Persistent concerns over inflation are a major reason why and this week's Consumer Pri...

Going On Vacation? Don't Tell The Burglars!   Want to help keep your home safe from burglars while on vacation? One smart way is to refrain from announcing your plans on various social networks such as Facebook.  There's other common-sense tips, too, as shared in this 4-minute video from NBC's Th...

Fed Minutes Show Lower Unemployment And Higher Growth For 2011 and 2012   The Federal Reserve released its January 25-26, 2011 meeting minutes Wednesday afternoon. New York mortgage rates have been in flux since. Fed Minutes are comprehensive recaps of Federal Open Market Committee meetings; a de...

Single-Family Housing Starts Fell In January, Despite What The Headlines May Have Told You   Annualized Single-Family Housing Starts dropped 1 percent in January to 413,000 units nationwide, it's lowest reading almost 2 years. A "Housing Start" is defined as a home on which construction has start...

Mortgage Rates Return To April 2010 Levels   Mortgage rates are surging. Over the last 7 days, conventional, 30-year fixed rate mortgage rates have jumped 24 basis points, or 0.24%, according to Freddie Mac's weekly Primary Mortgage Market Survey. It's the largest 1-week spike in mortgage rates i...

Mortgage Rates Rise For The 7th Straight Day   Mortgage markets worsened for the 7th straight day Tuesday, equaling the longest losing streak of the last 5 years. Conventional, 30-year fixed mortgage rates are now scratching 5 percent, with FHA mortgage rates running roughly the same. This is a h...

Unemployment Rate Drops To Lowest In 2 Years   Americans are getting back to work. Sort of. This morning, at 8:30 AM ET, the Bureau of Labor Statistics released its Non-Farm Payrolls report for January 2011. More commonly called "the jobs report", the government's data showed a large decrease in ...

Mortgage Guidelines Starting To Loosen?   Mortgage lending appears to be loosening. At least for now. In its quarterly survey of member banks, the Federal Reserve asks senior loan officers around the country whether their "prime" residential mortgage guidelines had tightened within the last 3 mon...

Pending Home Sales At The Highest Levels Since April 2010   Another day, another strong report for housing. The Pending Home Sales Index climbed 2 percent in December, according to the National Association of REALTORS®. A "pending home sale" is an existing home under contract to sell, but not yet...