Friday, May 13, 2022

Primary Mortgage Market Survey – Mortgage Rate Meltup!

The most recent Primary Mortgage Market Survey® published by Freddie Mac® shows that mortgage rates are simply exploding higher with the average rate for a 30-year fixed rate mortgage jumping over 50 basis points since just last week and rising a whopping 80% since this time last year to stand a 5.3% while the average rates for both the 15-year fixed rate mortgage and 5/1-year adjustable rate mortgage followed similar trends.

This uptrend in mortgage rates is truly unprecedented with the year-on-year increase far surpassing any prior period including the early 1980s when then-Fed Chair Paul Volcker was fully engaged in battling persistent inflation by bringing the Fed Funds rate up to 22% (... more deep historical macro analysis). 

The following data visualization shows the Average Rate for a 30-Year Fixed Rate Mortgage since 2017 with the index value (in blue) on the left axis and the year-over-year change (in red) and month-to-month change (in green) on the right axis.

The following data visualization shows the Average Rate for a 30-Year Fixed Rate Mortgage since 1971 with the index value (in blue) on the left axis and the year-over-year change (in red) and month-to-month change (in green) on the right axis.