The weekly average for a 30-year fixed-rate mortgage in the U.S. rose slightly this week.
The Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation, better known as Freddie Mac, posted Thursday that a 30-year fixed-rate mortgage averaged 6.22% for the week, a 0.05 percentage point increase.
Mortgage rates had been dropping over the past month. Last week’s 6.17% average for a 30-year fixed-rate mortgage, down 0.02 percentage points, marked four consecutive weeks of decreases.
The Freddie Mac post Thursday suggested this week’s average was still a good deal for buyers. Mortgage rates had climbed to just below 7% in June and had been even higher at the start of the year.
“This week the 30-year fixed-rate mortgage averaged 6.22%. On a median-priced home, this could allow a homebuyer to save thousands annually compared to earlier this year, showing that affordability is slowly improving,” the post stated.
The Mortgage News Daily rate for the same type of mortgage was slightly higher, at 6.29% Thursday. That’s a 0.08 percentage point drop from Wednesday’s daily index on the site, which was nearing a two-month high.
On Monday, Mortgage News Daily had 30-year fixed rates at 6.34%, compared to a low of 6.13% during the prior week ahead of the Federal Reserve’s Oct. 29 decision to cut interest rates for a second time in two months.
A similar “mortgage rate spike” was seen following the Fed’s September action.
“Although these past 2 post-Fed episodes have resulted in somewhat volatile bounces, rates are still far closer to long-term lows than they are to the summertime highs,” Mortgage News Daily’s Matthew Graham posted Monday.
The Fed’s next meeting is in December, but a third cut this year is not a given amid a lack of labor and other data used in decision making, due to the U.S. government shutdown, now the nation’s longest.
Cuts by the Fed lower the interest rate that banks charge one another for short-term loans while mortgage rates track the yields on long-term U.S. Treasury bonds, although both are influenced by inflation, job growth and other economic factors.