Portland Mortgage Market Update — October 2, 2025

It was jobs week! At least, it was until it wasn't. All eyes were on the BLS labor report that was supposed to drop…today. Problem is, when the government shut down on Wednesday that included the BLS, so there was no bureau available to issue said report. However, ADP issued their report on Wednesday showing private payrolls have lost 32,000 jobs in September and revised the previous month downward by 3,000. This provided ballast for rates which could have worsened amidst the uncertainty surrounding the shutdown.

Speaking of the shutdown, what can you expect? How will the shutdown impact the real estate economy? Well, for the loan side of things there will be some adjustments, but nothing too major. Government loans (FHA/VA loans) could take longer to process and USDA loans are no longer available. It will likely take longer to process tax return transcripts, with that delay growing the longer the shutdown goes on. Verifications of employment of borrowers who are government employees may be impossible if the employee is furloughed, so they would no longer be able to obtain a loan. But for the most part it will continue to be business as usual unless this shutdown grows from weeks to months.

NEW LOAN LIMIT UPDATE! We are now accepting increased conventional loan limits! The conforming loan limit for 2025 has been $806,500, but we are now accepting up to $819,000 for single family residences. This assumes that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will increase the loan limit in 2026, but we don't know what that new loan amount will be yet.