Friday's bond market has opened well into positive territory following the release of this morning's employment numbers. The stock markets are showing gains again with the Dow up 35 points and the Nasdaq up 11 points. The bond market is currently up7/32, which will likely improve this morning's mortgage rates by approximately .125 of a discount point.

Today's big news came from the Labor Department who said that 88,000 new jobs were added to the economy, which fell short of the 100,000 that was forecasted. The unemployment rate did rise to 4.5% as expected. The best news came in the average earnings that rose only 0.2% compared to the 0.3% that was expected. That eased some wage inflation concerns and led to this morning's gains in bonds.

With this week's gains in bonds and improvement in mortgage rates, it may be a good opportunity to extend the Lock recommendations. The yield on the 10 year Note is approaching the bottom end of its recent trading range. This doesn't mean that I think rates will move significantly higher during those periods, just that I don't expect rates to improve much.

Next week brings us the release of a couple of important pieces of data, but they due to be posted on Friday. The next FOMC meeting is Wednesday, so the markets will be preparing for it the first day or two of the week. There is no relevant economic data until Friday, so Wednesday and Friday are the important days. Look for more details on next week's events in Sunday's weekly preview.

If I were considering financing/refinancing a home, I would.... Lock if my closing was taking place within 7 days... Lock if my closing was taking place between 8 and 20 days... Float if my closing was taking place between 21 and 60 days... Float if my closing was taking place over 60 days from now... This is only my opinion of what I would do if I were financing a home. It is only an opinion and cannot be guaranteed to be in the best interest of all/any other borrowers.