The Federal Open Market Committee adjourns from its two-day meeting this afternoon and is widely expected to lower the Fed Funds Rate. This does not mean that mortgage rates are being lowered, too.

The definition of Fed Funds Rate from the Federal Reserve:

The federal funds rate is the rate charged by one depository [...]

When a loan officer locks a mortgage rate for you, that rate is tied to an expiration date.

The expiration may be 30 days, or 75 days, or 90 days, or more into the future, but so long as the rate is “locked”, the bank is committed to delivering that rate to you [...]

If you bought your home sometime since March and your mortgage is a conforming home loan, you may be able to take advantage of the current mortgage market conditions.

As of Friday, mortgage rates were near their lowest levels of the year.

Of course, not every conforming borrower is eligible. For example, if you [...]

The Federal Open Market Committee is widely expected to lower the Fed Funds Rate next week.

For holders of credit cards and home equity lines of credit, this is good news.

Both of these financial products feature interest rates tied to Prime Rate. Prime Rate is tied to the Fed Funds Rate. [...]

The Wall Street Journal used a lot of ink this morning on September’s Existing Home Sales data, including the chart below. It’s frightening to the lay person who may not know how to interpret data like this.

Remember: real estate is local.

Yes, on a national level the number of homes for sale [...]

Adjustable Rate Mortgages are mortgages for which the interest rate is subject to change over time according to pre-defined rules.

ARM is a common acronym for Adjustable Rate Mortgage and every ARM has similar features:

An initial fixed period during which the mortgage rate doesn’t change An initial interest rate that is charged [...]

Monday was a flat day for stocks, and it was a flat day for bonds, too. Mortgage rates idled.

Tuesday, with no economic data hitting the wires, market participants will be looking for direction elsewhere.

Some likely candidates include:

The price of oil. If oil prices continue to rise, it will place inflationary pressure [...]

Could we be running out of names for United States cities?

Did you know that the most common city name in America is a tie between Franklin and Salem? There are 36 instances of each.

According to Wikipedia, here are the most common city names in America.

Franklin (36) Salem (36) Washington (32) [...]

According to the Wall Street Journal, the number of Americans taking loans against their 401(k) plans is increasing because most plans allow participants to borrow funds to purchase a home or to avoid foreclosure.

But just because the avenue is there, though, doesn’t mean that borrowing from a 401(k) is a good idea.

[...]

Once again, the headlines may be misleading you. It’s a good thing that Housing Starts dropped last month — despite what the papers say.

A “housing start” is a new residence on which construction has started. Yesterday, the government released September 2007′s Housing Starts data for the country.

There was a 10.2% drop [...]