As fixed rates and hybrid adjustable rates moved higher, one-year adjustable rates declined. Fixed rates, however, could move significantly lower by the next report.
Thirty-year fixed rates averaged 4.37 percent in Freddie Mac’s Primary Mortgage Market Survey for the week ended Feb. 13.
That was up 9 basis points from last week. Compared to the same week last year, average 30-year rates have risen by 74 BPS.
“Mortgage rates edged up amid a week of light economic reports,” Freddie Mac Chief Economist Frank Nothaft said in the report. “Of the few releases, the economy added 175,000 jobs in February, which was above the market consensus forecast and followed an upward revision of 25,000 jobs for the prior two months. Meanwhile, the unemployment rate nudged up to 6.7 percent, the first rate increase in over a year.”
Fixed rates, however, are poised for a 10-basis-point drop by the time Freddie delivers its next rate survey, according to an analysis of Treasury market activity.
Data from the Department of the Treasury indicate that the yield on the 10-year Treasury note — which is tracked by fixed mortgage rates — averaged 2.76 percent during the period Freddie surveyed primary mortgage lenders this week. The 10-year yield closed at 2.66 percent Thursday.
But a majority — 60 percent — of panelists surveyed by Bankrate.com for the week March 13 to March 19 saw it differently and predicted that mortgages rates won’t move more than 2 BPSÂ over the next week. The rest were evenly split between rising and falling rates.
Jumbo mortgage rates were 8 BPS higher than conforming rates in the U.S. Mortgage Market Index report from LoanSifter and Mortgage Daily for the week ended March 7, increasing from the 6-basis-point jumbo-conforming spread seven days prior.
Freddie reported average 15-year fixed rates at 3.38 percent, 6 BPS worse than in the week ended March 6. The disparate increase between short- and long-term mortgages pushed the spread between 15- and 30-year mortgages to 99Â BPS from the 96-basis-point spread in the previous report.
At 3.09 percent, five-year, Treasury-indexed, hybrid, adjustable-rate mortgages averaged 6 BPS more than last week, Freddie said.
But one-year ARMs were lower than in the last report from Freddie, falling 4 BPS to 2.48 percent. The one year was also down from the week ended March 14, 2013, retreating 16 BPS.
The yield on the one-year Treasury note, an index used to determine rate and payment changes on one-year ARMs, closed at 0.12 percent Thursday, the same as a week earlier, according to the Treasury Department.
|There was also no change over the past week with the six-month London Interbank Offered Rate, which Bankrate.com reported at 0.33 percent as of Wednesday.
ARM share in the most recent Mortgage Market Index report was 13.6 percent, off from the previous week’s 13.7 percent.
