Posted on: Friday, December 19, 2003
Mortgage rates decline for 2nd straight week, survey shows
| • | Current mortgage rates |
By Jeannine Aversa
Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Rates on 30-year and 15-year mortgages declined for the second week in a row, offering more good news for the red-hot housing market.
For the week ending today, the average rate on 30-year mortgages slid to 5.82 percent, down from 5.88 percent the previous week, Freddie Mac, the mortgage giant, reported yesterday in its weekly nationwide survey of mortgage rates.
Rates on 30-year mortgages dropped to 5.21 percent, the lowest level in more than four decades, in the middle of June. Since then, rates on these benchmark mortgages have fluctuated.
For 15-year mortgages, a popular option for refinancing, rates fell to 5.14 percent this week, down sharply from 5.24 percent last week.
Rates for one-year adjustable mortgages, meanwhile, averaged 3.77 percent, unchanged from the previous week. It marked the fourth straight week that rates on one-year ARMs held steady.
A year ago, rates on 30-year mortgages averaged 6.03 percent, 15-year mortgages were 5.42 percent and one-year adjustable mortgages stood at 4.07 percent.
The nationwide averages for mortgage rates do not include add-on fees known as points.
Thirty-year and 15-year mortgages each carried an average fee of 0.7 point this week.
One-year ARMs carried an average fee of 0.6 point.
The housing market has been the economy's bright spot through hard economic times as well as during the recovery.
Separately, the Mortgage Bankers Association of America said refinancing accounted for 51.8 percent of all home-mortgage applications filed last week, up from 49.4 percent the previous week.
