Thursday’s bond market has opened flat, failing to recover any of yesterday’s post-FOMC losses. Stocks are extending yesterday’s selling with the Dow down 243 points and the Nasdaq down 160 points. The bond market is currently unchanged from Wednesday’s close (4.25%). However, weakness late yesterday should cause this morning’s mortgage rates to be higher than Wednesday’s early pricing by approximately .250 - .375 of a discount point. If you saw an intraday increase after the FOMC meeting adjourned yesterday, you may see little or no change in pricing this morning.

The final two relevant economic reports of the week were posted this morning. The weekly unemployment update at 8:30 AM ET showed only 205,000 new claims for jobless benefits were made last week. This is unfavorable for bonds and mortgage rates because it was a decline from the previous week’s 213,000 and fell well short of the 215,000 that was expected. Declining claims are a sign of strength in the employment sector, albeit just in a weekly snapshot.

January's New Home Sales report was released at 10:00 AM ET, revealing a surprising large drop in sales of newly constructed homes. The 17.6% decline was much larger than anticipated and signals weakness in the new home portion of the housing sector. This makes the report good news for bonds and mortgage rates, although it is not considered to be an influential report regardless of what it shows. Thay is the reason we haven’t seen a good reaction to the news.

Now that the FOMC meeting is behind us, so is the Fed’s mandatory quiet period that prevents members from speaking publicly about the economy and monetary policy approximately two weeks preceding the meeting. This means we will start to see some individual Fed-member speeches and public discussions on many topics, some being relevant to monetary policy, inflation and other topics related to mortgage rates.

None of those speeches appear to be scheduled for tomorrow though. Since there is no relevant economic data scheduled either, we can expect Iran news and the cost of oil and natural gas to drive bond trading and mortgage pricing. While tomorrow was expected to be the quietest day of the week for mortgage rates, that doesn’t mean we won’t see movement in them. The overall tone and momentum in the bond market is still negative for rates. Accordingly, the likelihood of seeing rates move higher tomorrow is much stronger than seeing a noticeable improvement, barring a major deescalation in the Middle East.

If I were considering financing/refinancing a home, I would.... Lock if my closing was taking place within 7 days... Lock if my closing was taking place between 8 and 20 days... Lock if my closing was taking place between 21 and 60 days... Float if my closing was taking place over 60 days from now... This is only my opinion of what I would do if I were financing a home. It is only an opinion and cannot be guaranteed to be in the best interest of all/any other borrowers.