Mortgage Rates Again Show Little Movement

Mortgage rates moved slightly or not at all in the past week, which saw conflicting signals about the direction of the housing market.

The benchmark 30-year fixed-rate mortgage didn’t change over the past week, according to Freddie Mac’s weekly survey of mortgage lenders.

The mortgage remained at 6.16 percent for the week ending March 29. The 30-year mortgage loan averaged 6.35 percent a year ago.

“Despite concerns about possible spillovers from the troubles in the [bad credit mortgage loan] market, rates on 30-year fixed-rate mortgages remained stable,” said Frank Nothaft, Freddie Mac V.P. and chief economist.

Meanwhile, data on both existing and new home sales sent conflicting messages about where the housing market is heading.

“The rise in existing home sales in February to a 6.69 million unit pace, the highest level since last April, offered some hope of firming housing demand. In contrast, February’s new home sales fell, unexpectedly, to 848,000 units, the slowest pace since June 2000. That suggests more time will be needed before a housing recovery takes place,” Nothaft said.

The 15-year fixed-rate mortgage averaged 5.86 percent, a decline from last week’s 5.90 percent average. The mortgage averaged 6.00 percent a year ago.

Five-year Treasury-indexed hybrid ARMs averaged 5.88 percent, down from last week’s 5.91 percent. The ARMs averaged 6.02 percent a year ago at this time.

One-year Treasury-indexed adjustable-rate mortgages averaged 5.43 percent, up from last week’s 5.40 percent, and down from 5.51 percent a year ago.

To obtain the mortgage rates listed above, the 30- and 15-year fixed-rate loans required payment of an average 0.4 point. The 5-year ARM required the payment of an average of 0.5 points and the 1-year ARM required an average 0.6 points.

A point is 1 percent of the amount of the home loan, charged as prepaid interest.

In a separate survey, the Mortgage Bankers Association reported that mortgage application volume decreased 0.2 percent during the week of March 23. Volume was up by about 17 percent compared with the same week in 2006.

SOURCE: MarketWatch