“I used to brag about how late I stayed up at conferences. Now I brag about how early I went to bed.” Have you ever seen a group of mortgage lenders on the last morning of a 3-day conference? Well, here is the equivalent in the animal kingdom, and it’s not even iguanas plummeting from trees. Besides the end of the quick lived shutdown, and the continued M&A environment ( Own Up to be acquired by Experian being the latest example) one of the topics in the hallways at the IM

Our meat prices have gone up… Cattle herd numbers at a 75-year low. There ain’t nothing Jerome Powell or the Fed can do about drought and high grain prices. To deal with rising operating costs, many U.S. cattle farmers reduced the size of their herds, and some got out of the business altogether. As a result, the U.S. cattle inventory is the smallest it’s been since 1951. Regarding rate movement, the bond markets often do the Fed’s job for it, and so whatever the Fed’s Open Ma

Wasn’t it just New Years Eve? Time flies, this morning Punxsutawney Phil "saw" six more weeks of winter, and “the IMB” is already here. What is the chatter in the hallways at the MBA’s Independent Mortgage Banker’s conference in Florida? “Holy smokes it's cold in Florida (Jacksonville’s low is 26 F today; everyone is bundled up to even go to the hotel lobby). The Ritz is relatively small, so the room block sold out quickly. As a result, many people are staying at hotels in th