It's been a remarkably calm week for mortgage rates, and a fairly decent one relative to several recent examples.  The average top tier 30yr fixed rate hovered just over 7% for most of November before breaking back into the high 6% range at the beginning of last week.  Since then,... Read more

Mortgage lenders generally try to avoid setting rates more than once per day, but they will make changes if the underlying bond market is moving enough.  Mortgage Backed Securities (MBS) are the bonds that directly dictate mortgage rate movement.  When they're stronger/higher, it implies downward pressure on rates and vice... Read more

The bond market is the primary driver of mortgage rate movement and normally, "weakness" equates to higher rates.  Bonds are slightly weaker today compared to yesterday afternoon, but mortgage rates nonetheless managed to move lower.  What gives? Timing is partly to blame.  Bonds may be weaker than yesterday afternoon, but... Read more

Mortgage rates remain elevated relative to the levels seen in September and early October, but they've definitely moved down a bit from their recent highs.  Thanksgiving week saw the lowest daily average rate in exactly a month, but there's never a guarantee the rate market will look the same on... Read more

The interest rate market continues the healing process after taking heavy damage in October.  During the course of that month, the average top tier conventional 30yr fixed rate increased more than 0.75% and broke above 7.0% for the first time since early July.  The first few days of November saw... Read more

Last Monday, mortgage rates were near the highest levels in more than 3 months.  A week later, and the average lender is right in line with the lowest levels in more than a month.  There are two reasons for this, or rather, one reason and one caveat. The caveat is... Read more

Starting in early October, mortgage rates experienced significant volatility, meaning the average day over day change was much bigger than normal.  While the term "volatility" technically allows for larger-than-normal moves in either direction, there was a clear winner in this case with rates moving almost a full percent higher. Rates... Read more

They may not be low.  In fact, they may still be a lot higher than you want, but at least they haven't been too volatility this week.  For the 7th day in a row, the top tier, conventional 30yr fixed mortgage rate ended the day in the same narrow range... Read more

Remember October and the first part of November--not because of the election, but rather because of the relentless rise in mortgage rates?  Would you rather forget?  You're not alone.  It was the fastest rate spike since 2022, and it was made all the more memorable because it put an end... Read more

Ask your favorite curmudgeonly old market watcher and they'll be happy to explain what "always" happens in financial markets when there's breaking news regarding large scale geopolitical risk.  It would be a surprise if you didn't hear a phrase like "flight to safety," the most common shorthand reference to selling... Read more

The average top tier conventional 30yr fixed rate was just a hair over 7% on Friday afternoon and the same is true at the start of the new week.  Rates are based on bonds, but while bonds move constantly throughout the day, mortgage lenders only adjust rates once per day... Read more

This afternoon's mortgage rates are higher than yesterday's latest levels.  That's a result of bond market weakness seen late yesterday and earlier this morning.  Why would yesterday's market movement matter?  Simply put, it was too late in the day for many lenders to go to the trouble of adjusting their... Read more

Losses... weakness... selling pressure...  When any of these things happen in the bond market, it puts upward pressure on interest rates.  Mortgage rates are primarily determined by bonds, after all.   Today started out well enough for the bond market.  This allowed mortgage lenders to set today's rates roughly in line... Read more

While there's been plenty of movement in the average mortgage rate on any given day recently, today was not one of them.  30yr fixed rates remained above 7%, but technically fell 0.01% (an amount so small that it may as well be considered an absence of change).   Despite the flat... Read more

Last Thursday and Friday offered some hope that the persistent move to higher rates was finally leveling off.  It wasn't necessarily a rational hope, but if nothing else, it was "nice" to see the average 30yr fixed move back below 7%.  Even then, we cautioned against viewing the recovery as... Read more