California exodus, mad dash for second homes impacting Nevada mortgage industry like never before

by Kaleb Roedel

Shivani Peterson has one word to describe what it’s been like working in the mortgage industry since the pandemic hit.

“It’s a circus,” said Peterson, a mortgage advisor at All Western Mortgage in Reno. “In 2020, I don’t think I saw my family or slept.”

Peterson likely speaks for most mortgage advisors across the country. Last year, lenders extended a record-setting $4.3 trillion in mortgages, according to Black Knight Inc., a technology and mortgage data company. The previous record was set in 2003, when the Federal Reserve cut interest rates and spurred a boom in refinancing that led to $3.8 trillion of new mortgages that year.

In 2020, home lending skyrocketed as an unexpected byproduct of the COVID-19 recession. While the pandemic put millions of people out of work and made it tougher to show homes to prospective buyers, it also ushered in record-low interest rates that prompted millions to refinance and lower their monthly payments or trim the length of their loans.

The 30-year fixed mortgage rate plunged below 3% last July and stayed put for seven months before creeping above 3% in March. As a result, a flood of homeowners — more than 9 million — saved money by refinancing last year, per Black Knight Inc.

Read the entire article in the NNBW: https://www.nnbw.com/news/2021/may/10/its-circus-california-exodus-mad-dash-second-homes/