Jon Ritter at Ritter Mortgage Group

06/02/2026

This one costs people money at the worst possible moment — in the middle of a transaction, often right before closing.

Here's what happens: someone gets a rate quote. It's a good number. They feel relieved, maybe a little excited. They tell their friends, factor it into their budget, maybe use it to make a purchase decision.

And then, somewhere between that conversation and the closing table, the rate or terms, or both, change.

Because a quote is not a lock. And until it's locked, it's an estimate on a specific day — and that day's pricing moves with the market.

A few things worth understanding here:

→ Mortgage rates can move daily — sometimes intraday on volatile days. A quote on Monday tells you Monday's pricing. It doesn't protect you on Thursday.
→ You can verify whether your rate is locked — and most borrowers don't. Your Loan Estimate is required to disclose this. Top right corner of page one: locked or not locked, and if locked, the expiration date. Most people never check. Their lender may not have volunteered it.
→ Even after a lock, the rate can change if the loan changes. A credit score that drops between application and closing, an appraisal that comes in below purchase price, or a property issue that affects eligibility can all reprice a locked loan. The lock protects you from market movement — not from qualification changes.
→ There's a rate cycle worth knowing about. Over roughly a two- to three-week window, rates tend to move within about a quarter-point range — rising toward a peak and falling to a low — unless something significant disrupts the market. Quoting and locking on a day near the top of that cycle, without knowing where you are in it, means you may have locked at a worse moment than was available.

The borrowers who navigate this well know when to lock, how to verify it, and what to watch for. That's something your loan officer should be managing — and communicating — on your behalf.

One of five mortgage mistakes I see cost people real money in 2026. Link to full article in the comments.

Did you know the Loan Estimate tells you whether your rate is actually locked? 👇








Jon Ritter | NMLS #210106 | Ritter Mortgage Group, Inc. | Equal Housing Lender

06/01/2026

📊 Here's where things stand on rates this week — with a lot still unresolved:

➡️ The 30-year fixed came down to around 6.45%, from 6.53% last week. The move wasn't Fed-driven. It came from oil markets responding to ceasefire progress — which means it can reverse just as fast.

➡️ The tentative Iran deal isn't signed. This morning Iran paused negotiations. That's why rates ticked back up slightly today — the market is trading the same headline in both directions.

➡️ PCE inflation hit 3.8% annually in April — the highest since May 2023. Core is at 3.3%. The Fed has no room to ease, and a rate hike is now priced as more likely than a cut by year-end.

➡️ The May jobs report drops Friday. Wage growth is the number that matters — it's one of the few remaining inputs the Fed is watching closely before the June 17 meeting.

If you're weighing a move this summer and have questions, please reach out. We're happy to talk through your situation.

05/29/2026

🏠Three home loan programs, three qualification paths — Learn which one is for you in under a minute.

Confused about which mortgage is right for you? You’re not alone.VA, FHA, and Conventional loans all offer different benefits depending on your credit score,...

05/26/2026

📊The 30-year slipped just under 6% back in February — the first time since 2022 — and it's 6.51% now, the highest since last August.

Oil continues its volitility following the news headlines about the Strait of Hormuz, which is still largely closed. The resultant energy spike has carried headline inflation back to 3.8%, and the Fed won't cut into an inflation print moving the wrong direction. Mortgage rates track the 10-year Treasury, and the 10-year tracks where investors think inflation is headed — so until the oil picture changes, the rate picture doesn't.

The variable that resolves this is the one nobody sets from a desk in the U.S. There's a 60-day ceasefire framework on the table to de-mine and reopen the strait, and if it holds, oil retreats, inflation eases, and rates have room to come back toward February. If it slips, they stay. That's the binary.

05/26/2026

Most people pick a mortgage the same way they pick a gas station — they go with the lowest number they can find. I understand the instinct. But it doesn't actually work that way.

A lower rate doesn't automatically mean a better loan. What determines whether a loan is actually good for you comes down to three things:

1️⃣ Breakeven — how many months until the upfront costs are recovered by the monthly savings? If you sell or refinance before you break even, the "better" rate may never save you a dollar.

2️⃣ Cash flow vs. net worth — some loans improve your monthly payment but increase what you pay over time. Others do the opposite. Neither is wrong. But confusing the two leads to decisions that feel good now and disappoint later.

3️⃣ Risk — does this loan improve or weaken your financial position overall? A lower rate can come with tradeoffs that aren't visible in the rate itself.

When you evaluate a mortgage this way, the rate becomes one variable in a bigger equation — not the answer.

This is one of five ways I see people leave real money on the table in 2026. Full breakdown in the comments.

Which of these three factors do you think most buyers overlook? 👇

05/22/2026

Did you know that Memorial Day was originally called Decoration Day, named for the practice it described — visiting cemeteries and placing flowers on the graves of the war deceased?

Local observances began before the holiday's national recognition. On April 25, 1866, a group of women in Columbus, Mississippi decorated the graves of Confederate soldiers killed at Shiloh and, finding nearby Union graves untended, placed flowers on those as well. A year earlier, in May 1865, an estimated 10,000 people — most of them formerly enslaved residents of Charleston, South Carolina — gathered at a former Confederate prison camp to honor 257 Union soldiers reburied at the site.

Both observances were acts of honoring the sacrifice across the line of the war that had just ended.

The first widely observed national Decoration Day took place on May 30, 1868, following a proclamation by General John A. Logan of the Grand Army of the Republic. The name shifted to Memorial Day over the following decades. In December 2000, Congress passed the National Moment of Remembrance Act, which encourages Americans to pause for one minute of silence at 3 p.m. local time on Memorial Day.

The original act of the holiday — visiting graves, placing flowers, observing silence — remains its foundational practice.

Thanks to all who have sacrificed for this country.

05/19/2026

Here's something that costs homeowners money quietly — and almost no one talks about it.

At some point, most homeowners get a letter, an email, or a call from their mortgage servicer about a refinance offer or a loan modification. It seems reasonable. They already have your loan. They know your balance and your rate. It can feel like they're looking out for you.

They're not. And I don't mean that cynically — I mean it structurally.

Your servicer's job is to manage payment processing, handle escrow, and keep your account current. That's it. They are not analyzing your full financial picture. They are not evaluating whether their offer optimizes your position. They are presenting a product they can sell — and the fact that you have a prior relationship with them doesn't change what that product is.

A few things worth knowing:

→ Your loan has probably been sold. Most mortgages are sold in the secondary market shortly after origination. The company servicing your loan is often not the company that originated it — and has no particular loyalty to your long-term outcome.
→ The offer they're presenting may be competitive. Or it may not. Without independent math — your breakeven, your total cost over the time you'll realistically keep the loan, your specific risk profile — you have no way to evaluate it accurately.
→ Most people who accept servicer offers without independent analysis never know what they paid for the convenience of trust. Not because anyone deceived them, but because no one ran the full numbers.

The fix is simple. Before acting on anything from your servicer, get an independent analysis. See what it actually costs over the time you'll keep it. That's what a Financing Snapshot does — and it takes the guesswork out.

One of five mortgage mistakes I see cost people real money in 2026. Full breakdown in the comments.

Request a Home Finance Snapshot to see if an offer you receive is the best for you: https://teamritter.typeform.com/to/qTa0wkRM?typeform-source=jonritter.com

Have you ever gotten a servicer refinance offer and wondered if it was actually good? 👇








Jon Ritter | NMLS #210106 | Equal Housing Lender

05/18/2026

📊Inflation re-accelerated in April. Headline CPI hit 3.8% — up from 3.3% in March — and core came in hotter than expected at 2.8%. Wholesale prices ran even hotter, with PPI up 1.4% for the month, almost triple what forecasters expected.

The story behind both numbers is the same one we've been watching for months. Energy and gas accounted for more than half of the monthly inflation increase. And with talks between the U.S. and Iran stalled, oil pushed back above $107 a barrel this morning after a drone strike on a UAE nuclear plant over the weekend.

That combination is what economists are now calling a serious concern of stagflation — sticky inflation, softening labor data, and a Fed without a clean path either way. Mortgage bonds responded last week by breaking below several support levels. The 10-year Treasury cleared 4.58% and is now eyeing 4.65%.

What that means for buyers and sellers who've been waiting for lower rates: the wait just got longer than it looked a week ago. The path to rate cuts ran through a cooling oil price. That path is narrower this morning than it was Friday.

Housing held up despite the pressure. Existing home sales ticked up 0.2% in April, and inventory rose almost 6%. Buyers are getting a bit more breathing room, and bidding wars have eased compared to recent years.

05/14/2026

Sixty seconds, three red flags, three green flags. If you're about to list your house, watch this:

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/Htnm2LDpT-I

05/12/2026

I hear some version of this almost every week: "I'm just waiting for rates to come down a little more before I do anything."

Here's the framing error I see behind almost every expensive mortgage mistake:

People optimize for the rate. They should be optimizing for the total cost.

They're related — but they're not the same thing.

The rate tells you the price of borrowing money today. The total cost tells you what this loan will actually cost you, given how long you'll realistically keep it. Those two numbers can look very different depending on your situation.

Here's where it gets costly:

→ Most people don't keep a mortgage as long as they think they will. The average hold time on a 30-year fixed is about 8 years right now. Life changes — people refinance, move, pull equity. If your loan has upfront costs you won't live long enough to recover, the "better rate" was never actually better for you.

→ On refinances, fees and points are often rolled into the new loan balance. The rate looks great. The balance quietly went up. That's a cost — even if it didn't come out of your pocket at closing.

→ Cash to close, monthly payment, and total cost all look at different things. Conflating them leads to choosing the loan that wins in one category while losing in two others.

The fix isn't complicated. It's just a different frame: total cost over the time you'll actually keep the loan, not just the rate on day one.

That's the foundation of how I think about every loan. Full article in the comments — and if you want to see your numbers this way, I can put together a Financing Snapshot for you.

What's the one number you focus on most when evaluating a mortgage? 👇






Ritter Mortgage Group Inc. | NMLS #1436890 | Equal Housing Lender