“While refinances also increased on a holiday-adjusted basis, refinance activity was down 38 percent relative to a year ago when rates dove below four percent”.
Advertisement
New data from Mortgage Choice found 19.44 per cent of all loans that were given by lenders during December were fixed-rate products, rising from 17.4 per cent in November. However, this is higher than a year ago at this time when the 30-year FRM averaged 3.66%. The effective rate decreased from last week.
The average rate for a 30-year FRM backed by the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) was 3.90%, down from 3.95%.
This week brought similar news, according to Sean Becketti, chief economist with Freddie Mac.
Mortgage rates slipped as turbulent markets sparked a flight to quality that held yields down, mortgage provider Freddie Mac said.
The average contract interest rate for 30-year fixed-rate mortgages with conforming loan balances ($417,000 or less) fell eight basis points to 4.12%.
The report noted a week-over-week increase of 21.3% in the group’s seasonally adjusted composite index for the week ending January 8.
The average contract interest rate for 30-year fixed-rate mortgages with jumbo loan balances (greater than $417,000) decreased to 4.02 percent from 4.09 percent, with points decreasing to 0.30 from 0.35 (including the origination fee) for 80 percent LTV loans.
The hottest real estate markets of 2016 are …… These are not marketing rates, or a weekly survey.
For instance, Omaha has the lowest unemployment rate (2.9%) of the 10 hottest markets, and Dallas-Fort Worth home values are predicted to rise by 5.6% (the highest increase of all cities on the list).
Advertisement
This was the largest increase since a 25.5 percent gain in early October, according to MBA data.
