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This 90-second video discusses gives some rate-locking strategies in advance of this Friday's jobs report. With the housing market seemingly on the mend and Wall Street cutting the week short because of Labor Day, national employment statistics are about to take center stage.

In housing, the basic law of Supply and Demand bestowed upon buyers an unbelievable amount of negotiation leverage. Want a lower sales price? Just ask for it. Need your closing costs paid for? Write it into your offer letter. Want a quick closing? Sure, whatever you need. But the Buyer Heyday may be over. At least, that's what recent data suggests.

Are mortgage rates going up? Are mortgage rates going down? I am a regular participant in the Bankrate.com Mortgage Rate Trend survey and this week's survey may point you in the right direction. Here's what I told Bankrate.com: "Demand for dollars-denominated bonds helps rates to ease lower."

Effective Tuesday, September 1, conforming mortgage approvals are due to toughen up again. Fannie Mae is imposing strict new lending guidelines that should slow down purchase and refinance activity in Cincinnati and parts elsewhere. It's the first major conforming mortgage guideline change since April and this one is a big one -- 15 separate underwriting areas are affected.

Maybe now we can say that housing has bottomed? After 3 years of disastrous data, 19 of the 20 markets tracked by Case-Shiller improved last month -- the 5th straight month of strong data and the index's strongest showing in 3-plus years. This is definitely something for the news van.

The $8,000 First-Time Home Buyer Tax Credit expires November 30, 2009. In order to claim the tax credit, the IRS requires that you've closed on or before that date. December 1, 2009 is too late. But that doesn't mean that first-time home buyers should target November 30, 2009 as a closing date. In fact, there may not be a worse day in 2009 on which to try to close on a home. The optimal time is during the week of November 16, 2009 and the earlier in the week, the better.

Are mortgage rates going up? Are mortgage rates going down? I am a regular participant in the Bankrate.com Mortgage Rate Trend survey and this week's survey may point you in the right direction.
The Bankrate.com survey is for conforming mortgages only. It does not apply to FHA mortgages, VA mortgages, jumbo mortgages, or super jumbo mortgages. [...]

A 1-minute video discussing today's mortgage rates, "pattern" trading, and why today may be a good day to get locked in.

Since May, just one-fifth of the Fed's responding banks said mortgage guidelines had tightened. This number is dramatically less than last quarter's results when the survey posted a 50 percent figure. It's just one more sign that banks are warming to the economy and that may portend the end of the recession.

It doesn't take an elephant's memory to remember that Prime Rate was 8 percent-plus just 2 years ago. A few years before that, Prime Rate neared 10 percent. These are the facts that the banks aren't selling. Instead, banks and credit unions are dangling low "start rates" as bait and looking for homeowners to bite.