Perhaps the BEST B1G Forum anywhere, here at College Football Fan Site, CFB51!!!

Being in the MortgageBanking business, let me add some additional color:

-we are seeing 25 to almost 50% of home purchases that are happening are cash buyers.( depending on which market) They won’t be affected by a rising interest rates or decrease in property values.

-For those getting a mortgage, approximately 80% or more of them are fixed rates, so interest rate changes will not affect them. Obviously they could be affected by a substantial decrease in income.

- the fundamentals of mortgage lending are substantially better than the crash.  There are far less speculative buyers, income and debt are much more accurately scrutinized, much more heavily documented, and reserves are much more prevalent.  No liar loans, no “no documentation loans“ and very few if any interest only loans.

-it is likely that we will start to see a movement to adjustable rates as we move through this year and see more rate hikes. Borrowers paying 4.5% now are shocked- despite the fact that those are still historically low rates. They can easily afford those rates. But first time homebuyers typically are very sensitive to these rates and are being priced right out of the market. The gap between haves and have nots is clearly widening in the housing market- which exacerbates things- as it leads to less people willing to sell and move up.

It is hard to accurately predict where this goes since it never been anything like this before. 

• Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, Texas (97,290)
• Phoenix-Mesa-Chandler, Ariz. (78,220)
• Houston-The Woodlands-Sugar Land, Texas (69,094)
• Austin-Round Rock-Georgetown, Texas (53,301)
• Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario, Calif. (47,601)
• Atlanta-Sandy Springs-Alpharetta, Ga. (42,904)
• Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater, Fla. (36,129)
• San Antonio-New Braunfels, Texas (35,105)
• Charlotte-Concord-Gastonia, N.C./S.C. (31,381)
• Raleigh-Cary, N.C. (28,186)

They could be growing, in theory, being big doesn't mean you can't grow.