Mortgage rates posted mixed results this week as lackluster economic growth and housing kept borrowing costs within a predictable range, Freddie Mac and Bankrate.com reported today in their surveys.
Freddie Mac reported the average rates on both the 30- and 15-year fixed mortgages were unchanged this week, holding at 6.16 percent and 5.87 percent, respectively. Points, which are fees lenders charge for loan processing expressed as a percent of the loan, averaged 0.5 on the 30- and 15-year loans.
Adjustable-rate mortgages (ARMs) become slightly more affordable, as the five-year Treasury-indexed hybrid ARM dipped from 5.88 percent to 5.87 percent and the one-year ARM sank from 5.43 percent to 5.42 percent. Points on these loans averaged 0.6 and 0.7, respectively.
“The recently advanced report of first-quarter Gross Domestic Product (GDP) was weaker than expected, growing only 1.3 percent. The housing market alone shaved a full percentage point off real GDP growth,” Frank Nothaft, Freddie Mac vice president and chief economist, said in a statement. “Additionally, both consumer spending and price increases in consumer expenditures were quite tame in March. These contributing factors allowed mortgage rates to hold steady this week.”
In Bankrate.com’s survey, mortgage rates inched higher, with the average 30-year fixed mortgage rate rising to 6.28 percent, and discount and origination points averaged 0.26.
The average 15-year fixed-rate mortgage popular for refinancing returned to the 6 percent mark, according to Bankrate.com. With larger loans, the average jumbo 30-year fixed rate fell to 6.54 percent. On adjustable-rate mortgages, the average 5/1 ARM and the average one-year ARM both nosed higher, to 6.13 percent and 6.02 percent, respectively.
Bankrate.com reported that mortgage rates were largely unchanged this week, as the economic tug-of-war between inflation concerns and slower economic growth has been keeping bond yields and mortgage rates confined to a narrow range. The average 30-year fixed mortgage rate has remained with a range of just 6 basis points, or 0.06 percentage point, in the past month.
Two items of significance on the horizon are this week’s report on April employment, and next week’s meeting of the Federal Open Market Committee. Either one could be the catalyst for some movement in rates that has recently been lacking, Bankrate.com reported.
The following is a sampling of Bankrate.com’s average 30-year-mortgage interest rates this week in some U.S. metropolitan areas:
New York – 6.26 percent with 0.05 point
Los Angeles – 6.31 percent with 0.39 point
Chicago – 6.4 percent with 0.06 point
San Francisco – 6.24 percent with 0.45 point
Philadelphia – 6.28 percent with 0.23 point
Detroit – 6.34 percent with 0.03 point
Boston – 6.33 percent with 0.04 point
Houston – 6.26 percent with 0.42 point
Dallas – 6.18 percent with 0.45 point
Washington, D.C. – 6.21 percent with 0.44 point
