Editor’s Note: The Mortgage Mix is RISMedia’s weekly highlight reel of need-to-know mortgage-industry happenings. Watch for it each Friday afternoon.
- The latest Primary Mortgage Market Survey® from Freddie Mac, released January 18, 2024, comes with big news: mortgage rates are at their lowest since May 2023. The 30-year fixed-rate mortgage currently sits at 6.6%, while the 15-year rate is at 5.76%.
- According to the latest weekly survey from the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA), mortgage applications increased 10.4% from one week earlier, carrying on the upward trajectory from the previous week’s 9.9% rise.
- Fannie Mae’s Economic and Strategic Research (ESR) Group predicts that mortgage rates will fall below 6% before the end of 2024.
- The MBA also found that new home purchase mortgage applications increased 22.2% from December 2022 to 2023. However, this was a 4% drop from November 2023.
- MBA President and CEO Bob Broeksmit argued that there was a direct correlation between the declining rates and application increases, concluding that “The continuing decline in mortgage rates is promising for households looking to buy a home in the coming months.”
- Federal Reserve Governor Chris Waller recently said that he is optimistic that inflation is trending toward the Fed’s goal of 2%—and that rate cuts could be coming in 2024.
