by Calculated Risk on 5/16/2016 05:52:00 PM

Tuesday:
• At 8:30 AM ET, Housing Starts for April. Total housing starts decreased to 1.089 million (SAAR) in March. Single family starts decreased to 764 thousand SAAR in March. The consensus for 1.135 million, up from the March rate.

• Also at 8:30 AM, The Consumer Price Index for May from the BLS. The consensus is for a 0.3% increase in CPI, and a 0.2% increase in core CPI.

• At 9:15 AM, The Fed will release Industrial Production and Capacity Utilization for April. The consensus is for a 0.2% increase in Industrial Production, and for Capacity Utilization to increase to 74.9%.

From Matthew Graham at Mortgage News Daily: Mortgage Rates Surprisingly Steady Despite Market Volatility

Mortgage rates held surprisingly steady today, even though underlying bond markets were in noticeably weaker territory. As bonds weaken, rates normally move higher, but there's been a bit of a disconnect recently. In light of our discussion last week, perhaps it isn't so surprising. We had anticipated that mortgage rates would start out with an advantage this week because they didn't move much lower at the end of last week even though bond markets were stronger. In other words, bond markets are suggesting rates should be right about where they were on Thursday afternoon, and that's exactly where they are.

Naturally, this means that we no longer have the same sort of implicit advantage we enjoyed on Friday afternoon heading into the weekend. As such, it's definitely safer to lean back toward locking. The most prevalently-quoted conventional 30yr fixed rate remains 3.625% on top tier scenarios, with a smattering of lenders still down at 3.5%.
emphasis added