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| @thecltmortgageguy |
Vol 1 · Iss 20 · Aug 7, 2026 |
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| The Weekly |
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| THE WEEKLY WRAP |
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| Rates. Market intel. What it means for you. |
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| Welcome Back |
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| A Mistake Can Look Exactly Like the End of a Client Relationship. |
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| If you are waiting for me to bury that line or bury the story behind it, keep waiting. That is the instinct most people have when something goes wrong: smooth it over, hope nobody notices. This month gave my team a real gut check on that exact instinct. We made a mistake that affected a client's closing timeline, the kind of error that could have easily turned into a defensive phone call and a client who never trusted us again. Instead, we sat down with them, walked through exactly how it happened, no spin, no shifting blame, and stayed on the phone until every piece was fixed. That client is committed to working with me again, and is already sending my info to a friend who is looking to buy. It confirmed something true about this business that is easy to forget when you are moving fast. People do not expect perfection. They expect honesty when things go sideways, and how you handle the sideways moment is what they actually remember. Credit where it's due, Trace Manning made a similar post this week about staying open, and it was a good reminder that we are all human, in this business and everywhere else. We are now into August and fall buying season is right around the corner, and there is a lot to be excited about heading into it with this community. |
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| Market Update |
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| The Jobs Report Missed Big, and Rates Rallied This Morning. |
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| 30-yr Fixed |
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| 6.69% |
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| ↑ Up from 6.66% |
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| Rate Direction |
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| Down |
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| Weak jobs, rates rally |
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| Rates ground higher for most of the week and then jumped on Thursday, when the benchmark interest rate that mortgages track climbed to its highest level in several weeks. Two things pushed it there. Weekly jobless claims came in a little lower than expected, which tells markets the job market is still holding firm, and a firm job market usually means higher rates. On top of that, one very large company came to market with a big new round of borrowing, and that added supply put extra upward pressure on the part of the market where mortgage rates live. |
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| Then this morning's jobs report landed, and it came in much weaker than anyone expected. Instead of adding jobs, the economy actually lost about 23,000 of them in July, the first monthly decline in years, and the prior months were revised down on top of that. Wage growth cooled too. The one bright spot was the unemployment rate ticking down to 4.1 percent, but markets mostly looked past it given how soft the rest of the report was. A cooling job market takes some pressure off inflation, and that is good news for rates. |
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| Mortgage bonds rallied sharply on the news, fully erasing Thursday's selloff and pulling rates back toward the low end of where they have been recently. Traders now think the Fed is more likely to cut later this year than to raise, which is a real shift in tone. Keep in mind the Freddie Mac weekly average still reads 6.69%, up from 6.66%, because that number was set earlier in the week before the report came out, so it has not caught up to this morning's improvement yet. Pair better pricing with inventory that keeps improving, and this is an encouraging setup for your buyers heading into fall. Check my Instagram for where rates settle as the day goes on. |
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| This Tuesday · Noon ET |
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| The Golden Handcuffs. Why Sellers Stay Put, and What You Can Do About It. |
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| You know the seller who wants to move but will not list because they are sitting on a 3 or 4 percent rate. This Tuesday we are going to unpack why that mindset is keeping so much inventory off the market, and more importantly, what you can actually do about it. We will walk through the real math behind the golden handcuffs, why the old rate is not always the full story once you run the numbers, and how tools like a home equity line or a bridge loan can let a seller buy their next home before they list the current one. That is the difference between a seller who feels stuck and a seller who feels free to move, and it is a conversation you can bring straight to your most reluctant listings this fall. |
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| Drop in Tuesday at noon. No booking needed. Zoom link at linktr.ee/thecltmortgageguy. Bring your toughest they-will-never-sell listing to the call. Have a topic for a future call? Just reply to this email. |
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| See you Tuesday. For daily rate updates follow @thecltmortgageguy on Instagram. |
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| Book a consult or grab the Zoom link at linktr.ee/thecltmortgageguy. |
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| Ian Smith · VP of Lending · Rate · [email protected] · linktr.ee/thecltmortgageguy · @thecltmortgageguy · NMLS #1465241 · Equal Housing Lender |
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| © 2026 Guaranteed Rate, Inc. D/B/A Rate | NMLS ID 2611 |
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