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Mortgage rates hit their highest level in just over 3 months yesterday with financial markets generally protesting the absence of more serious spending cuts in the spending bill.  Rates care about fiscal spending because higher spending requires higher Treasury issuance which, in turn, pushes rates higher, all else equal. Although the House passed the bill […]

Two days ago, mortgage rates began the day at 7.04% before mid-day improvements brought the average back down to 6.99%.  Today started out in a similar vein with the average lender at 7.05%, but the mid-day movement only made things worse. In terms of catalyst events, the bond market (and stock market, for that matter)

Mortgage rates ultimately managed to hold steady on Tuesday despite some underlying market volatility. Rates change day to day (and sometimes intraday) based on movement in the bond market, and there’s been plenty of that. Yesterday’s market movement was good for rates after starting out near the worst levels since February. This allowed most lenders

Mortgage rates jumped sharply over the weekend as financial markets reacted to Moody’s credit rating downgrade of the U.S.  News of the downgrade broke with only minutes left in Friday’s market/business day, so most of the response played out when global markets opened again late last night. The initial reaction involved stock prices moving lower

Mortgage rates have done almost nothing but move higher in the month of May. The latest bump–seen yesterday–took the average top tier 30yr fixed rate to 6.99%. While this is fairly uneventful in the bigger picture, it was a noticeable increase from the 6.81 seen at the end of April, or the slightly lower range 

In early April, amid the most volatile portion of the market’s reaction to the tariff announcement, mortgage rates were officially over 7% for a single day. By the middle of the following week, they were well on their way lower, ultimately ending the month just over 6.8%. Since then, it’s been tough sledding for bonds

Tuesday brought the release of an economic report that has frequently been responsible for big swings in mortgage rates. The Consumer Price Index (CPI) is the earlier of the two big inflation reports from the US government, and inflation is a big deal for interest rates.  In general, higher inflation coincides with higher rates and

Tariffs and trade policy have been a new and important consideration for the bond market for just over a month now. That matters to mortgage rates because mortgage pricing is primarily determined by bond prices.   The reaction function for rates is a bit complicated at first glance because tariffs can exert influence in opposite directions.