Market Softens

The 30-year fixed-rate mortgage average nudged down 1 basis point from a week ago to 6.36%, Freddie Mac said its latest Primary Mortgage Market Survey showed. A year prior, the 30-year stood at 6.10%.

“Mortgage rates didn’t move much either way this week as the markets wait for the next scheduled [Federal Open Market Committee] meeting,” said Frank Nothaft, Freddie chief economist, in the announcement. “General consensus leans heavily toward the notion that the Fed will not raise rates at that meeting, taking upward pressure off mortgage rates this week.

“A rate change in either direction would impact short-term rates more directly, but what the Fed says in its statement can have an impact on long-term rates.”

While none of the 100 mortgage “experts” surveyed by Bankrate.com believe rates will fall over the next 35 to 45 days, nearly three-quarters of the panelists think they’ll remain relatively unchanged and the rest foresee an upturn.

Freddie Mac’s latest mortgage market outlook indicated the 30-year won’t move much, as it has it averaging 6.4% this and next quarter and rising to 6.5% until the second quarter 2007.

At 6.06%, Freddie said the 15-year was unchanged from last week.

The 10-year Treasury note yielded 4.78% late Thursday, up 0.01% from a week ago.

Up 1 BPS from last week, the 5-year Treasury-indexed hybrid adjustable-rate mortgage reportedly averaged 6.11%.

The 1-year Treasury-indexed ARM average also edged up by 1 BPS over the week to 5.57%. The 1-year T-Bill itself was at 5.04% on Wednesday, 2 BPS above the level a week earlier, Federal Reserve data indicate.

Mortgage application volume continued to decrease, by 2 percent for the week ending Oct. 13, as flat purchase money activity was overshadowed by a 5% downturn in refinance requests, the Mortgage Bankers Association reported Wednesday.

While ARMs continued to comprise about 27% of total applications, the refinance share edged down to 45%, MBA added.