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DENVER, CO – A recent surge in demand for mortgage refinances due to interest rates that had dropped to historically-low levels due to an initial scare caused by the COVID-19 Omicrom variant caused borrowers to rush to lenders in droves. However, those interest rates – along with the stock market – have resumed their climb after approximately a four day lull, and are currently see-sawing, indicating that if borrowers want to, in fact, borrow… the time to do so is now before rates jump again.

The swings in mortgage interest rates in recent days have resulted in the average contract rate for a 30-year fixed rate mortgage with conforming loan balances of up to $548,250 or less to hang on currently at 3.30 percent, with points remaining at 0.39, including the origination fee when it comes to loans with a 20 percent down payment.

The amount of applications submitted for home refinancing loans dropped 6% this week, and represented a decrease of 41% from the same period in time one year prior; in 2020, interest rates were approximately 45 basis points lower. As a result, experts say, fewer homeowners have as strong of an incentive to refinance, given the current rates.

About one-third of borrowers have been refinancing loans with interest rates lower than 3%, reports say, with a larger number having rates between 3 and 3.5%; on average, in order to make home loan refinancing worth the cost, borrowers need to cut approximately 50 basis points off of the rate they currently have.

Week to week, mortgage applications in order to purchase a home jumped only 1% week to week, which represents a 9% decrease over the same period of time in 2020. Housing supply nationwide is currently low and prices continue to drive upward, but regardless demand continues. However, it remains to be seen if that trend continues if the degree that both mortgage rates and home prices are increasing do not abate at some point, especially when you take into consideration the limited resources that first-time homebuyers typically have at their disposal.

As of Wednesday, mortgage rates have remained stable and steady, but this afternoon the Federal Reserve is set to make an announcement on monetary policy, which can be the catalyst for significant change when it comes to home loan rates. Mortgage rates don’t normally align with the fed funds rate, but they can indeed be heavily influenced by the government’s purchases of bonds that are backed by mortgages. Support for those bonds in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic caused several periods of historically-low mortgage interest rates that, in turn, spiked a rash of home purchases across the nation. However, experts anticipate that will not be the case as of this upcoming announcement.

Coming up! The Federal Reserve is expected to set the stage for the first interest rate hike next year. https://t.co/zkT57o6ZsE

— Jessica Dickler (@jdickler) December 15, 2021

Instead, experts foresee an announcement that will signal an immediate wind-down of the Fed’s bond-buying programs. Whatever the announced end-date will be for bond-buying will likely signify the frame of time in which the Fed is anticipating increasing rates for the first time since slashing them to zero when the pandemic first started.

From that point, interest rates will only go up, so if you’re thinking about getting a mortgage for a home purchase or to refinance an existing loan, it’s probably better to do so sooner rather than later.

CHICAGO, IL – The ever-increasing crime and violence in Chicago continue to claim victims as a Christmas tragedy unfolded over the weekend, when a daughter who was helping her father hand up holiday decorations was instead forced to watch him beaten to death in a senseless attack.

The attack happened about 6:30 p.m. Saturday in the 3500 block of West 58th Street, when Jose Tellez – an immigrant who had reportedly come to America to better provide for his family – was attacked by two unidentified individuals while hanging up Christmas lights with his daughter.

Chicago dad, Jose Tellez, is beaten to death outside of his home. He was hanging Christmas decorations.

Crime is soaring because it’s not being punished, and elected Democrats are still lying about it. https://t.co/2UnSDEwhtp

— Bart Marcois (@bmarcois) December 14, 2021

A neighbor, who preferred to remain anonymous, said that she heard Tellez’s daughter scream, rushed to the scene of the attack, where she discovered the victim lying on the ground, bleeding profusely from the head.

“My dad, my dad, he’s hurt,” the neighbor said. “I told [the daughter] to get a blanket to put on his head. There was a lot of blood.”

Tellez, who was married with three children, was rushed to Christ Medical Center, where he died at 10:32 p.m., according to the Cook County medical examiner’s office.

Chicago police have not yet released descriptions of the two assailants, stating only that they were identified as two males; a motive for the attack is currently unknown, but the victim was reportedly not robbed, and had been beaten with blunt objects.

The anonymous neighbor who responded to the attack stated that Tellez “was a good man who mostly kept to himself,” and that she “couldn’t imagine anyone wanting to hurt him.”

Another neighbor, Silverio Nodal, said that he had known Tellez for a decade and said that he was an avid gardener who worked as a landscaper, and was “a family man, a hard-working guy.”

“He came here to provide the best for his family, you know as all of us do, the American dream,” Nodal said. “But this is not the American dream.”

A GoFundMe page has been established to assist the Tellez family with funeral expenses; to date, it has raised over $46,000, far exceeding its original $10,000 goal.

POMPANO BEACH, FL – A man was shot to death in Pompano Beach, and Broward Sheriff’s Office homicide detectives are investigating the circumstances surrounding his death. According to authorities, at around 7 a.m. Monday, December 13, Broward Sheriff’s deputies and Pompano Beach Fire Rescue responded to a shooting call near the 900 block of Northwest Fifth Avenue in Pompano Beach. On arrival, emergency crews located a bleeding adult male, later identified as 27-year-old Calvin Brown. Brown, who had sustained multiple gunshot wounds to his body, was pronounced deceased on scene at 7:08 a.m. 

Broward Sheriff’s crime scene and homicide detectives responded to investigate. A representative with the Broward County Medical Examiner’s Office also responded, and the victim was transported to the M.E.’s office for post-mortem examination. The investigation continues. 

Anyone with information on this shooting is urged to contact Broward Sheriff’s Homicide Detective Tiberio Barbosa at 954-321-4278. If you wish to remain anonymous, please contact Broward Crime Stoppers at 954-493-TIPS (8477) or online at browardcrimestoppers.org. Anonymous tips that lead to an arrest are eligible for a reward of up to $5,000.

PALM BEACH, FL – On Wednesday, former president Donald Trump released a statement accusing New York Attorney General Letitia James of ‘prosecutorial misconduct’ and saying she dropped out of governor’s race because her campaign was ‘a complete failure’ and her polling was poor.

The statement comes days after The Washington Post reported James wants Trump to testify in person as part of her investigation into potential tax and financial fraud inside the Trump Organization. The AG plans to depose Trump on whether he overvalued the Trump Organization’s assets to obtain loans and then undervalued them for tax purposes.

Coincidentally, James said she was ending her campaign for governor the same day the subpoena surfaced citing “a number of important investigations and cases that are underway,” and that intends to finish them.

I have come to the conclusion that I must continue my work as attorney general. There are a number of important investigations and cases that are underway, and I intend to finish the job. I am running for re-election to complete the work New Yorkers elected me to do.

New York Attorney General Letitia James

I have come to the conclusion that I must continue my work as attorney general.

There are a number of important investigations and cases that are underway, and I intend to finish the job.

I am running for re-election to complete the work New Yorkers elected me to do.

— Tish James (@TishJames) December 9, 2021

“Letitia James wants to politically weaponize her position as Attorney General instead of exemplifying impartiality and protecting the interests of all New Yorkers. While she pretends that she suspended her short-lived campaign for New York Governor to go after me, she conveniently fails to mention that she couldn’t garner any support and her poll numbers were abysmal—she had no chance of even coming close to winning despite weeks of campaigning, she was losing to Governor Hochul by what would have been a massive landslide. She didn’t drop out of the race for a higher purpose, or to “finish existing business” (I wonder hat that would be?) She dropped out because her campaign was a complete failure, possibly because citizens of New York saw how unfairly and viciously she and other highly partisan New York Democrat prosecutors were treating President Donald J. Trump. It’s called Prosecutorial Misconduct. Rather than continue to waste her time and taxpayer resources on a long continuing Witch Hunt against the Republican Party and me, she should focus her attention on helping to resurrect the once Great State of New York were crime and poverty continue to wreak havoc, with murder, rape, drug sales, and just about every other form of crime at record levels, and now with a just-announced highest unemployment rate the Nation. New York is dying before our very eyes, and all the Democrat Prosecutors are focused on Is how we can get and punish Donald Trump, who many would say has done, over the years, a spectacular job for New York.

45th U.S. President, Donald J. Trump

Statement by Donald J. Trump, 45th President of the United States of America pic.twitter.com/wxFPu5GrjH

— RSBN

Posted on 2021-12-16

Opinion: A Tuition-Free CUNY is an Investment in New York’s Recovery

‘Winning a New Deal for CUNY would benefit literally hundreds of  thousands of New Yorkers—an affordable high quality education right here in NYC can lift up families while creating a long term, sustained boon for our local economy.’

I would not be standing where I am today without our city’s public university system. As the representative of thousands of CUNY students, parents, and faculty in Southern Brooklyn, I believe that everyone should receive the same opportunity I did—the chance to get a high quality, affordable education in the best city in the world. 

The COVID-19 pandemic created an economic crisis of immense proportions and as we work towards a just recovery, it’s clear that a high quality public education is an investment in our students and our city’s recovery as a whole. That’s why I’m standing with the CUNY Rising Alliance to see that 2022 is the year we deliver for hard working college students by passing a New Deal for CUNY. 

The New Deal for CUNY (S4461/A5843) is a bill that Assemblymember Karines Reyes and I sponsor along with 55 of our colleagues that would not only make CUNY free again, but make sure that also means students have access to a first-class education. The funding will restore dilapidated buildings and mandate ratios of full-time faculty, mental health counselors and academic advisors to students. 

We know that higher education can propel people into the middle class. A person with a bachelor’s degree earns, on average, 65 percent more per week than a person with no college degree. The unemployment rate is nearly double for a person with no college versus a person with a bachelor’s degree. 

CUNY’s role in this is significant. CUNY colleges are consistently ranked among the most successful in lifting students into the middle class nationwide, and almost 80 percent of CUNY students stay and work full time in our state after graduating. That means that the 1.4 million alumni who graduated over the past 50 years are earning collectively tens of billions of dollars and are investing it right back into our local economy. We know that if we invest in our students that we’ll get a real return on this investment—and we know how to do it. 

While a true public education is the pathway to the American dream and middle class, decades of chronic underfunding has put CUNY’s original mission, to be a college for the “children of the whole people” and not only a “privileged few,” at risk. Where CUNY was once free for all, now a patchwork approach to programs like the Excelsior scholarship creates anxiety and uncertainty for students. And where CUNY was once appropriately funded to provide core services, today CUNY students are increasingly unlikely to encounter full-time faculty to receive the mentorship or support they need while on their educational path. The average building at CUNY is more than 50 years old, and decades of deferred maintenance have led to unsafe working conditions and crumbling infrastructure. Library, computer lab and writing center hours and staff have been reduced and class sizes have increased CUNY-wide. The list of preventable problems goes on and on. 

After years of Albany divesting our education system, we finally have an opportunity to make life better for New Yorkers. Last year, in the midst of the on-going pandemic, we finally made good on the state’s obligation to fully fund New York City’s public schools. This year we must turn our attention to CUNY. Investing in CUNY is the fiscally prudent thing to do and when I say that this is the moment to invest in CUNY, that is exactly what I mean. As we recover from the economic perils caused by the COVID19 pandemic, expanding economic opportunities is exactly what we should be thinking about.

With the New Deal for CUNY we can start to turn this ship around. At a time when our city and state is focused on economic recovery, an affordable and world class university education is more important than ever. Winning a New Deal for CUNY would benefit literally hundreds of  thousands of New Yorkers—an affordable high quality education right here in NYC can lift up families while creating a long term, sustained boon for our local economy.

State Senator Andrew Gounardes represents New York’s 22nd State Senate District. 

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