Ellie Mae – The Daily Tearsheet

Morning Report: 2019 best year since 2006?

Vital Statistics:

	Last	Change
S&P futures	3033	12.25
Oil (WTI)	56.61	0.04
10 year government bond yield		1.84%
30 year fixed rate mortgage		4.00%

There is definitely a risk-on feel to the tape as strong earnings continue to come in, and some positive trade developments over the weekend. Bonds and MBS are down after the UK was granted an extension to achieve an orderly Brexit.

We have a big week ahead, with a lot of important data and the Fed meeting. We will get the advance estimate for Q3 GDP on Wednesday, the FOMC decision on Wed afternoon, the jobs report on Friday, along with construction spending and the manufacturing ISM. We will also get Case-Shiller and pending home sales on Tuesday, and personal income / spending on Thursday. So definitely, a big week.

In other economic data, the Chicago Fed National Activity Index fell to -.45 on weakness in the manufacturing sector. Retail inventories rose 0.3%, while wholesale inventories fell 0.3%. Not sure how the inventory numbers will affect Q3 GDP, but it can be sensitive to inventory builds and liquidations. The forecasts for Q3 GDP seem to be in a range of +1.5% to +1.9%.

What a difference a year makes. Lenders extended $700 billion in mortgage loans in the second quarter as falling rates improved refinance activity. This was the highest quarter since the bubble years, and 2019 could be the best year since 2006. I think many people imagined 2019 was going to be good, but not that good. Note that HELOCs have lagged.

Ellie Mae has agreed to acquire Capsilon, which makes AI-powered automation software. “With the delivery of our next generation lending platform, we are accelerating our mission to automate everything automatable for the residential mortgage market. This includes making strategic acquisitions of best-in-class solutions to bring more value to the platform and the ecosystem faster,” said Jonathan Corr, president and CEO of Ellie Mae. “This is a significant day for the mortgage industry, as with the acquisition of Capsilon we are bringing together two market-leading companies and adding to our platform the pioneer of AI-powered intelligent automation leveraged by some of the largest lenders and servicers in the industry. As lenders and servicers continue to shift toward data-driven automation, we are excited to provide automated document recognition, classification and data extraction to further drive down costs and time of loan origination, acquisition and servicing.”

Morning Report: Existing home sales disappoint again

Vital Statistics:

	Last	Change
S&P futures	2777.25	9.25
Eurostoxx index	362.75	1.51
Oil (WTI)	69.26	0.14
10 year government bond yield		3.20%
30 year fixed rate mortgage		4.93%

Stocks are higher this morning after Chinese and Italian markets rallied on benign political comments. Bonds and MBS are flat.

Existing home sales fell 3.4% in September, according to NAR. Pretty much every part of the country saw a decline. Rising rates are affecting affordability and this is dampening sales. That said, the median home price did still rise 4.2% to 258k. Inventory improved a hair, increasing to 4.4 months’ worth from 4.2 months worth in August. Lawrence Yun, NAR chief economist, says rising interest rates have led to a decline in sales across all regions of the country. “This is the lowest existing home sales level since November 2015,” he said. “A decade’s high mortgage rates are preventing consumers from making quick decisions on home purchases. All the while, affordable home listings remain low, continuing to spur underperforming sales activity across the country.” Days on market rose to 32 days, and the first time homebuyer accounted for 32% of sales. Historically that number has been closer to 40%.

Refis dipped to 29% of all originations in September, according to the Ellie Mae Origination Insight report. As rates rise, you are seeing an increase in ARM origination, which rose to 7.2%. Credit quality also ticked up, with the average FICO rising to 727.

Bank of America is teaming up with the Neighborhood Assistance Corporation of America (NACA) to offer no-downpayment, no MI, below market rate mortgage loans to people with bad credit. BOA has promised to allocate $10 billion in mortgage credit to the program. The only requirements are the home has to be owner-occupied, and the borrower has to go through a counseling process where they learn about budgeting and getting the required documents in. The company is betting that borrowers will act like they have skin in the game, even if they don’t have any equity in the home. So far, no foreclosures in the past 6 years (which corresponds to the bottom of the real estate market. Not sure why Bank of America is hot to lend money at below market rates to uninsured low FICO borrowers without a down payment, but I suspect they are doing it for the PR or to keep the fair lending types off their back.

With the bankruptcy of Sears, and the latest housing starts data, it is interesting to look back on the company’s involvement in homebuilding. Yes, you could order a house via the Sears catalog. The heyday of the movement was the early 20th century – between 1908 and 1940, Sears sold about 75,000 kit homes. Prices were anywhere from $1,200 to $5,000 for 10 room quasi-mansions.

Morning Report: REO-to-Rental trade earned 9% over the past 5 years

Vital Statistics:

	Last	Change
S&P futures	2718.5	-4.5
Eurostoxx index	394.21	1
Oil (WTI)	72.15	0.66
10 Year Government Bond Yield		3.10%
30 Year fixed rate mortgage		4.65%

Stocks are lower this morning on bad earnings from Cisco. Bonds and MBS are down small.

The US and China will enter trade talks over the next couple of days. Both sides have signaled willing to make some compromises, so this could potentially be good for interest rates.

Initial Jobless Claims came in at 222k last week, while the Philly Fed improved to 34.4 which is a strong reading. The Index of Leading Economic Indicators rose a respectable 0.4%.

One of the reasons why starter homes have been so tough to find has been the REO-to-rental trade, where professional investors scooped up REO properties early in the crisis and rented them out. CoreLogic crunched the numbers and it turns out the trade made about 9% per year for the past 5 years. Impressive return in an environment of financial repression. Most of the return came from home price appreciation however, so if prices begin to level out, some of these professional investors will turn sellers. This is especially true if they had these properties in funds with a life. As short term interest rates rise, the low single-digit rental return will have more competition.

While longer-term bonds can be used as a proxy to estimate future inflation, Treasury Inflation Protected Securities represent a direct measure of inflationary expectations. The Fed invariably mentions TIPS in their meeting minutes. The breakeven rate of inflation has hit a 4 year high in this market at 2.2%. This means that an investor would need 2.2% in the consumer price index to be indifferent between buying Treasuries and TIPS, which pay a return equal to the interest imputed in the bond plus the consumer price index.

2/3 of the mortgage originated in April were purchase loans, according to Ellie Mae’s Origination Insight Report. Fewer loans in the pipeline is speeding up processing times, as the average time to close fell to 41 days. The average FICO score ticked up to 723.

CSFB thinks 3.5% on the 10 year will be the level to trigger a stock market exodus, although rates could stall out somewhere south of that for a while.

The hits just keep coming for Wells. The WSJ reports they added or changed information for some business customers during an anti-money laundering audit. Wells states that it was an internal matter only: “This matter involves documents used for internal purposes. No customers were negatively impacted, no data left the company, and no products or services were sold as a result.” This is only going to increase the voices in DC calling for the bank to be broken up. It already is not allowed to increase its balance sheet. At some point, it might make sense for Wells to spin off Wachovia and its securities unit.

GoBankingRates calculated what you can get for $300k in every state. The best value? West Virginia, where $300k will get you 3,347 square feet. Worst? Washington DC, which gets you 581 square feet.

The CFPB recently issued new rules to fix the TRID “black hole” issue.

CFPB Interim Chairman Mick Mulvaney reiterated his commitment to tame the CFPB by ending regulation by enforcement at NAR’s Legislative Trade Meeting and Expo. Student loan debt was also discussed, and while the CFPB doesn’t have a magic wand to make the debt go away they will continue to ensure that students understand the risks they are taking and also will go after predatory student loan collection practices.