The effective federal funds rate charted over ...
Image via Wikipedia

According to Private Mortage Advisors, an affilate of Alain Pinel Realtors, mortgage rates are rising due to pressure on the 10 year US TBond which is the result of a huge debt auction by the federal government. This $123 billion offering is bigger than the demand out there for treasuries and is causing the pricing on them to go down and the yield to rise thereby making interest rates go up.  Rising oil prices and continued improvement in the macroeconomic indicators is also contributing.

Specifically, the rate for high balance conforming loans ($417K to $729.75K) jumped from 5.375% last week to 5.5% yesterday.

“The bottom line is rates are rising and will continue to rise so the sooner homebuyers can get a rate locked in the better off they will be.” says John Shapiro, PMA.

Keeping things in perspective, per the chart above, the cost of federal funds is historically low and mortgage interest rates too

Reblog this post [with Zemanta]