Amid a relatively weak U.S. jobs report, the number of non-bank mortgage jobs retreated for the third consecutive month.
As of year-end 2017, nonfarm payroll employment stood at 147.380 million people, according to data reported Friday by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
U.S. employers added 148,000 jobs compared to the prior month, plunging from a upwardly revised 252,000 increase in nonfarm employment during November.
Job growth was little changed, however, from December 2016, when nonfarm payroll employment was up a downwardly revised 155,000.
Unemployment ended last year at 4.1 percent, unchanged for two months
and lower than 4.7 percent as of Dec. 31, 2016.
The data indicate that the
labor force participation rate was 62.7 percent as of December 2017, also unchanged for two consecutive months.
“The December jobs report was modestly positive, as employment gains were below expectations but still strong enough to keep the unemployment rate steady,” National Association of Federally Insured Credit Unions Chief Economist Curt Long said in a written statement. “Wage growth remains low, but did tick up slightly to 2.5 percent.”
In just the mortgage industry, non-bank employment, which the BLS reports one month later, was 339,800 as of Nov. 30, 2017. Mortgage staffing retreated from 340,600 a month earlier but has expanded from an upwardly revised 331,300 a year earlier.
The most-recent non-bank mortgage total was made up of 242,300 employees classified as “real estate credit” and 97,500 “mortgage and nonmortgage loan brokers.”
Extrapolating the BLS data based on origination market share, Mortgage Daily estimates that mortgage staffing — including jobs at financial institutions — was 652,700 in November. Comprising the total were 249,200 home-lending positions at banks, 63,700 mortgage employees at credit unions and the 339,800 non-bank jobs reported by the BLS.
