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Mortgage Rates Tick Higher: Freddie Mac
By Leslie Cook MONEY RESEARCH COLLECTIVE
According to Freddie Mac’s benchmark survey, the average rate on a 30-year fixed-rate mortgage has increased to 6.71%.
This week’s mortgage rates moved higher.
According to Freddie Mac, the average rate on a 30-year fixed-rate mortgage increased by 0.04 percentage points to 6.71%.
The average rate on a 15-year fixed-rate loan also increased and is now averaging 6.06%, a change of 0.03 percentage points.
Mortgage rates edge higher
Mortgage rates rose modestly as the Federal Reserve sent mixed signals on future rate hikes.
At its scheduled meeting earlier this month, the Fed announced it was holding steady on rates — at least for now.
Inflation is cooling, but not as fast as the central bank would like. The Fed is taking a wait-and-see approach before its next meeting in July; holding the Fed funds rate at its current range of 5% to 5.25%.
In recent comments at a monetary policy meeting in Portugal, Fed Chair Jerome Powell said more restrictions were coming, ratcheting up the likelihood that a rate increase is on the table for July.
Market analysts are now waiting for the release of the personal consumption expenditure price index on Friday — the Fed’s preferred measure of inflation — for clues as to the central bank’s next move.
Mortgage rates aren’t directly tied to the Fed fund but are influenced by it. Right now, any hope for significant relief from rates hovering close to 7% hinges on “cooling inflation and a general economic slowdown,” Orphe Divounguy, senior macroeconomist at Zillow Home Loans, said in a statement.
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Leslie Cook is the Lead Mortgage Reporter covering mortgages and the housing market for Money. She has been a guest on the This Morning with Gordon Deal radio show and served as moderator for ServiceLink's State of Homebuying webinar. Her career started as a business reporter over 30 years ago, covering the computer and human resources beats for Caribbean Business newspaper in San Juan, Puerto Rico. She graduated Cum Laude from Bryn Mawr College in Pennsylvania with a bacheloru2019s degree in history.