As we enter the fourth week of the partial government shutdown, the mortgage business has been mostly unaffected but concerns around FHA, verifying income, and funding all loom.

The shutdown is causing delays in the release of some government economic reports, which are coming out more sporadically than normal.

Good news on the inflation front as the latest inflation figures indicate that inflation continues to track close to the Fed’s target level of 2%.

Minutes released from the Fed’s most recent meeting eased investor concerns that the Fed may increase short-term rates too aggressively or too quickly.

Mortgage denial rates are at the lowest point since 2004.  CoreLogic estimates that only about one in ten mortgage applications were denied in 2017, the most recent year reviewed.

Thanks largely to affordability issues, an excessive Debt Ratio is now the number one reason for mortgage denials (30.3% of all denials) surpassing poor credit.