As my son Robbie and I prepare to head to Chicago this weekend for the “MBA National,” yesterday I was speaking with someone at the bar at Legs Inn in Northern Michigan. (Yeah, it’s somethin’.) We shouldn’t be afraid to talk about the economy, or politics, and I told her that I’ve been in capital markets for over 40 years and there are plenty of clever sayings about economics. One of them is, “The stock market is not the economy.” How good is the U.S. economy? You wouldn’t know it by stocks. Elliot F. Eisenberg, Ph.D. writes, “U.S. equity market performance is increasingly being led by the Magnificent Seven including the ‘hyperscalers’ (Amazon, Alphabet, Meta, and Microsoft) plus Apple, Nvidia, and Tesla. They have a combined market cap of almost $25 trillion, 77 percent of U.S. GDP. Moreover, Y-o-Y 26Q3 tech EPS growth is expected to be 65 percent, double the overall S&P 500. The market may be a one-trick pony, but it’s staggeringly large and profitable.” (Today’s podcast can be found here. This week’s ‘casts are presented by Floify, the mortgage industry’s leading point-of-sale platform. Dynamic Apps, which can be seen at booth 600 during MBA Annual next week, lets lenders create fully customizable loan applications for any loan type, including HELOCs, construction, agricultural lending, non-QM and more, without custom development. Today’s has an interview with Floify’s Maggie Swanson on creating fully customizable loan applications for any loan type, including HELOCs, construction, agricultural lending, non-QM, and more, without custom development.)
Lender and brokers products, services, and software
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Over $1 billion in originator production is already on mLOOP. Not because those LOs are leaving, but because they want to be informed about their options in the market. See your options anonymously. Join them on mLOOP.
Ready to spend less time reviewing paperwork and more time moving loans forward? Meet CLARAA, Stellar Innovations’ deterministic loan intelligence platform, powered by its proprietary UniDex engine. CLARAA classifies documents, extracts data, validates mortgage packages against lender-defined rules and overlays, and surfaces exceptions for review. Built-in tools include Document Fraud Analysis, which risk-rates manipulated documents, an Integrated Appraisal Rules Engine, an Income Calculator and an Integrated QC Engine for pre-funding, post-funding and servicing QC audits, plus on-demand title, tax, flood and AVM data through its Data Solutions Marketplace. Fully auditable, CLARAA offers configurable workflows that help lenders improve consistency while keeping lending decisions with their teams. Attending MBA Annual? Meet the Stellar Innovations team for a demo or stop by Booth #728. To schedule time in advance, contact Steve Greenfield, CMB®.
UAD 3.6 is adding time to traditional appraisals. Appraisers now have to capture more property data on-site, measuring every room, with more detailed condition and documentation tied cleanly to the new dynamic report format. That means longer inspections, slower pipelines, and real pressure on closing timelines. Class Valuation’s hybrid appraisals already meet that standard. Its property data collection process already follows the standardized protocols UAD 3.6 requires, so your appraisers can focus on analysis instead of additional fieldwork. Hybrid appraisals are delivered two to three days faster, at a lower cost, with more than 90 percent of loans eligible under the new requirements. Don’t let UAD 3.6 slow your pipeline. Talk with a specialist about hybrids for UAD 3.6.
“Home equity is getting a lot of attention, and so is MBA Annual in Chicago. Our Lakeview Correspondent team will be at the conference discussing our new HELOC program with correspondent partners. We’ll share where we’re headed with the product while gathering feedback on the guidelines, pricing, and features lenders need to compete in the growing home equity market. If HELOCs are on your product roadmap, schedule a meeting with us in Chicago. We’d like to hear what your needs are and learn where your biggest opportunities are.”
20 seconds. That’s the average time it takes Certified Credit’s Client Success team to pick up the phone, with 90 percent+ of calls answered in 30 seconds or less by a 100 percent onshore team. Plus, 75 percent of credit supplements are completed the same day. Now think about the last time you sat on hold with your credit provider while a borrower waited on you. Lenders are rightly scrutinizing credit costs as bureau pricing keeps climbing. But a lower per-report price may not tell the whole story if your processors are losing hours to slow support and stalled supplements. When you evaluate your provider, two questions can help: what am I paying, and what am I getting for it? Certified Credit, winner of TMC’s 2025 Lenders Choice Award for customer service, is ready to answer both. Meet our team at MBA Annual in Chicago, October 11-14. Book a meeting here.
Navigate Today’s Market with Pennymac TPO at NAMB National. Heading to NAMB National? Don’t miss Pennymac’s Chief TPO Production Officer, Kim Nichols, and Head of Public Policy, Isaac Boltansky, for their exclusive session on Saturday, October 17 (11:00–11:30 AM) at Caesars Palace in the Augustus Ballroom. Gain an inside look at the macroeconomic forces and policy shifts driving the mortgage industry, along with key strategies you need to stay ahead of the curve. Plus, be sure to stop by our booth and meet the Pennymac team while you’re at the show! Ready to connect? Click here to join our interest list and schedule a meeting with leadership. (Equal Housing Lender, NMLS #35953)
“Come meet MOZAIQ at Booth 411 at MBA Annual26, October 11–14 at the Hyatt Regency Chicago, where we’ll be showcasing the LoanAssist platform. Built by mortgage insiders and deployed by mortgage leaders, LoanAssist automates end-to-end loan fulfillment for enterprise lenders. Its AI agents autonomously complete the work and hand it off to a processor or underwriter at exception thresholds set by the lender. Book a time to see LoanAssist in action and learn how a top five wholesale lender cut cost per loan by 40 percent, how a modular rollout delivers ROI step by step, and why change management and adoption are built into the solution, not dealt with afterward. Because automation is the easy part.”
Save 35 percent on CE: Renewal Season Is Less Than 25 Days Away! “I still have to finish my CE.” Sound familiar? With renewal season approaching, now’s the time to check it off your list—and save 35 percent on MaxClass CE courses through October 17 with code CHRISMAN35. Not sure what’s required or when it’s due? Check Your State’s CE Requirements. MaxClass offers self-paced courses taught by licensed loan originators, plus a CE Selector to identify what you need in every state where you’re licensed. Backed by hundreds of 5-star reviews, it’s practical education that fits your schedule. Choose Your CE Courses and enter CHRISMAN35 at checkout. Your discount ends October 17.
“Meet Arc Home at MBA Annual and NAMB National! Heading to MBA Annual? Schedule a meeting with our correspondent team. Or, if you’re attending NAMB in Vegas be sure to stop by booth 205 to connect with our wholesale team. Let’s talk about building your business with second liens and non-QM in 2027. Our Closed-End Seconds offer fixed payments and bank statement or one-year full doc options, creating more ways to help clients consolidate revolving debt or fund major expenses. HomeEQ HELOCs provide flexibility for borrowers who need ongoing access to equity. Both give you a reason to reconnect with past clients. We hope to see you there.”
“Ready for some Extra Credit? CIC Credit just launched Extra Credit, a new quarterly video series featuring Don Clement, AVP of Strategic Partnerships, with sharp, timely takes on the credit decisions shaping mortgage lending today. First up: The bi-merge debate. Is pulling fewer credit bureaus really a smarter move? And what could lenders be missing in the process? In Episode 1, Don takes a closer look at what’s at stake when lenders prioritize the most favorable score over a more complete picture of borrower creditworthiness. Watch Episode 1 here. Let’s keep the conversation going! The CIC Credit team is heading to MBA Annual in Chicago and the NCRA Conference in New Orleans. Find us there or reach out at sales@ciccredit.com.”
Three out of four borrowers use a different lender next time. Your customer. Your relationship. Someone else’s loan. As rates rise, recapturing this business is more critical than ever. Milo turns your past client database into a consistent stream of repeat business, engaging clients every month with branded home value reports and monitoring them at every step of their journey to flag the exact moment they’re back in the market. Know the exact moment your clients shop online, explore using their equity, get married or divorced, list their home for sale, stack up high interest debt, or get their credit pulled. Start online in minutes or book a call to learn more. No contracts. No adoption required. Just more loans from the clients you already earned.
The next Chrisman Demo Day is October 15 and is a free perk for all Chrisman Marketplace members. If you’re a technology or service provider and haven’t joined the Marketplace yet, reach out to Jake Perkins at info@chrismancommentary.com to learn more.
The Chrisman Marketplace is a centralized hub for vendors and service providers across the industry to be viewed by lenders in a very cost-effective manner. We’re adding new providers daily, so check back often to see what’s new. To reserve your place or learn more, contact us at info@chrismancommentary.com.
Mergers and acquisitions won’t and don’t pause
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M&A is not confined to lenders, and no one expects them to stop given the drive for efficiency and aging workforce. Dart Appraisal acquired ACT Appraisal. ACT is known to be very strong with TPO and hard money lenders which compliments Dart’s credit union and community bank business. Congratulations to both.
How were your fundings in September?
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According to Curinos proprietary application index, September 2026 funded mortgage volume decreased 15 percent Y-o-Y and decreased 10 percent M-o-M. In the Retail channel, funded volume decreased 15 percent Y-o-Y and decreased 7 percent M-o-M. The average 30-year conforming retail funded rate in September 2026 was 6.58, 8bps higher than August 2026 and 10bps higher than the same month last year. Purchase rates were 7bps higher M-o-M and 10bps higher Y-o-Y, while refinance rates were 15bps higher M-o-M and 20bps higher Y-o-Y. Curinos sources a statistically significant data set directly from lenders to produce these benchmark figures, and drills into this data further here.
Capital markets: who’s prepaying what
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Mandatory execution captures margin that best-efforts delivery leaves behind, and for years it has required a dedicated capital markets team to run. Polly announced a partnership with F9 Advisors, a newly launched capital markets execution and advisory firm led by some of the most recognized operators in mortgage hedging, including Brandon Story and Virgil Caselli Jr., former Managing Director and Partner at Compass Analytics. Rob Kessel, founder and former CEO of Compass Analytics and founder of Panoramic Capital Academy, serves in an advisory role. F9 runs pipeline hedging, lock desk operations, and loan sales as the lender’s agent, inside the lender’s own PollyOS environment. Data, pricing, and positions never leave the lender’s platform, and the numbers F9 acts on are the same numbers leadership sees. Expand F9’s role as you enter new channels, scale it back as you build expertise in-house, or adjust the mix at any point, all without changing systems. Headed to #MBAAnnual26? Email events@polly.io to meet the Polly and F9 teams in Chicago. Full announcement at polly.io.
September mortgage prepayments continued to slow sharply, with Fannie Mae speeds falling 7 percent month-over-month to 6.7 CPR (the slowest since April 2025) and Ginnie Mae speeds declining 10 percent to 7.6 CPR, as mortgage rates climbed to 7.28 percent by October 1 from 6.43 percent in early July and 5.98 percent at the February low. With only about 0.5 percent of mortgages currently estimated to be economically attractive to refinance, prepayments are likely to decline further as year-end seasonality approaches. However, a meaningful drop in rates could quickly expand the refinance opportunity, with roughly 29 percent of mortgages potentially in the money if rates fell 2 percentage points. My advice? Favor more selective positioning. Servicing-heavy originators such as RKT and RITM offer relatively attractive risk-reward given the value of their mortgage servicing portfolios in a higher-rate environment. With rates still biased higher and limited near-term catalysts for a reversal, prepayment speeds are likely to remain subdued, supporting mortgage servicing valuations but reducing refinancing activity.
The latest prepayment data shows clear and persistent differences in servicer behavior. Rocket/Quicken stands out as the consistently fastest payer across both UMBS 30-year and 15-year loans, while Freedom and Fifth Third also rank among the fastest in 30-year mortgages. At the other end, BofA, loanDepot and Provident are frequently among the slowest 30-year servicers, while Lakeview, JPMorgan Chase, and Provident lag in 15-year loans. By loan age, AmeriHome and Rocket/Quicken lead the early-stage 30-year universe, with the fastest speeds concentrated in the 24–36 WALA buckets. Conversely, Idaho HFA has remained among the slowest for 14 consecutive months, highlighting meaningful and persistent servicer-level differences in prepayment speeds.
U.S. Treasuries and Agency MBS reversed early losses Thursday to finish in “rally territory” across the yield curve, despite pressure from rising oil prices, geopolitical concerns around Iran, and continued weakness in global sovereign markets. The turnaround accelerated after President Trump said there were no plans for additional attacks on Iran ahead of the midterms, easing fears of further escalation. Initial jobless claims fell to 197k for the week ending October 3, below expectations. Layoffs remain historically low and labor demand continues to hold up despite some softening in continuing claims. Wholesale inventories rose 0.5 percent in August, below expectations but following a revised 1.4 percent increase in July, suggesting inventory accumulation remains elevated but is moderating.
Bond prices, and thus yields, are driven by supply and demand. Strong demand at yesterday’s 30-year Treasury sale followed Wednesday’s solid 10-year reopening, and the Treasury’s $6 billion long-end buyback provided additional support, pushing longer maturities prices higher. The auction was solid, with a 2.54x bid-to-cover, a 0.1-basis point stop-through, and 93.2 percent of awards going to non-dealers (well above the 90 percent six-auction average), reflecting strong demand, particularly from indirect bidders. Treasuries rallied into the auction as oil prices fell on reduced Iran-war concerns, but the market gave back some of those gains afterward as bonds cheapened in the follow-through.
Today sees an extremely light economic calendar, with Preliminary University of Michigan Consumer Sentiment the main release. Boston Fed President Collins will also deliver remarks. We begin Friday with Agency MBS prices little changed from Thursday’s close, the 2-year yielding 4.79, and the 10-year yielding 5.25 after closing yesterday at 5.23 percent.
Here in upper Michigan local police hunting the “knitting needle nut case” who has stabbed six people in the rump in the last 48 hours!
They believe the attacker could be following some kind of pattern.
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qoɹ & ǝᴉqqoɹ
(Market data provided in partnership with MBS Live. For free job postings and to view candidate resumes, visit the Chrisman Job Board. This newsletter is intended for sophisticated mortgage professionals only. There are no paid endorsements by me. For the latest mortgage news, visit Mortgage News Daily. For archived commentaries, or to subscribe, go to www.ChrismanCommentary.com. Copyright 2026 Chrisman LLC. All rights reserved. Paid job & product listings do appear. This report or any portion hereof may not be reprinted, sold, or redistributed without the written consent of Rob Chrisman. The views and opinions in this newsletter are mine alone unless otherwise specifically stated herein.)
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