Mortgage rates increased more than 20 basis points this week, but remained below the 7% mark, according to Freddie Mac.
The gain matches that in the latest Mortgage Bankers Association’s Weekly Application Survey, but other rate trackers, which posted gains last week, moved in the other direction.
The 30-year fixed-rate mortgage averaged 6.83% on April 17, the Freddie Mac Primary Mortgage Market Survey reported. This was up from last week when it averaged 6.62%, but below one year ago, when it averaged 7.1%.
A similar gain was seen in the 15-year FRM, which was 6.03%, for the week, up from 5.82% in the prior period. A year ago, it averaged 6.39%. It is the first time since the end of February that this product is over 6%.
“The 30-year fixed-rate mortgage ticked up but remains below the 7% threshold for the 13th consecutive week,” said Sam Khater, Freddie Mac’s chief economist in a press release. “At this time last year…purchase application demand was 13% lower than it is today, a clear sign that this year’s spring home buying season is off to a stronger start.”
The rate snapshot does not tell the story, however, of what mortgage bankers have been dealing with.
“Since the ‘Tariff Tantrum,’ we have seen an extremely volatile rate environment which has not only been impacted by rising Treasury yields but also by credit spreads that have been widening to compensate investors for the additional risk in the marketplace due to this volatility,” said David Adamo, CEO of Luxury Mortgage.
The 7% level is “a key psychological threshold for many buyers,” just looking at the headlines, said Samir Dedhia, CEO of One Real Mortgage.
“This week’s movement follows continued volatility in the bond and equity markets, driven by persistent inflation concerns, uncertainty around proposed tariffs, and shifting expectations about future Federal Reserve policy,” Dedhia said. “After last week’s stronger-than-expected inflation data pushed rates higher, we’ve seen some easing in recent days.”
The good news for the markets is that the 10-year Treasury, which is considered in pricing 30-year FRMs, has backed down from its post-tariff announcement highs, but is still elevated compared with the sub-4% level on April 4.
The yield on the 10-year was at 4.29% as of 11 a.m. on Thursday morning, down 30 basis points from the April 11 high point of 4.59%.
Zillow’s rate tracker on Thursday morning was at 6.93%, unchanged from Wednesday and down from last week’s average of 7.05%.
Lender Price data for the 30-year FRM posted on the National Mortgage News website put the rate at 6.861%, compared with 6.947% a week ago.
Optimal Blue’s latest data is for Wednesday, when the 30-year FRM averaged 6.774%, versus 6.895% on April 11, the last of the three-day period where this tracker was over 6.8%.
“Mortgage rates are still moving in reaction to the news of the day, though with smaller swings than in the aftermath of the liberation day on-again/off-again tariff announcements,” said Kara Ng, senior economist at Zillow Home Loans in a Wednesday evening statement. “While daily mortgage rates seem to have eased in the last few days, rates are off the recent dip and back up to the levels from mid-February.”
Ng reiterated her statement of the past few weeks, saying recent events make it hard to predict which way mortgage rates will move in the future with any conviction.
Zillow still expects rates to end the year in the mid-6% range. The MBA just raised its outlook to 7% for the second quarter and for 6.7% in the fourth quarter.
March’s dip in mortgage rates brought more sellers in than buyers, Ng added.
“Buyers have plenty of options and more time to decide, but the recent reversal in mortgage rates presents new challenges for buyers,” Ng said. “Smaller stock portfolios may make high down payments more difficult to reach.”
The stock market gyrations are not just impacting the ability or need to use portfolios to fund down payments but also overall buyer confidence in the housing market, a recent Redfin study found.
