January 26, 2016
Mortgage rates made some gains on Monday, taking back some (but not all) of the losses incurred on Friday. Stock market woes are given credit for some of the gains, but oil prices also played a role.
It’s likely that as long as this up-and-down situation happens between stocks and oil, those two factors will have at least a small influence depending on the day and investor reaction to developments or breaking news in those areas. Some sources believe that as long as oil prices remain low or continue to move lower, there could be good news for mortgage rates in the short term.
30-year fixed rate conventional mortgages are in a best-execution range at the time of this writing between 3.75% and 3.85% though some may find 4.0% still being quoted by some lenders. FHA mortgage rates are settled at 3.5% at the time of this writing–FHA rates tend to find a best execution comfort zone, though you will notice greater variation among participating lenders than with conventional equivalents.
Best execution rates as listed here are not available to all borrowers or from all lenders–your FICO scores and other financial qualifications play an important role in your access to best execution rates. Your experience may vary.
With Wednesday being “Fed Day” some industry professionals are advising borrowers who haven’t done so to lock as Fed meetings and announcements do have potential to move rates depending on investor reaction to the news coming from those scheduled events. Others are not shy about floating, but doing so is never without a degree of risk.
Float only after getting sound advice from your lender and deciding the level of your “risk tolerance”, which is all about deciding how high rates can go before you decide to lock to avoid rates moving higher still.
Do you work in residential real estate? You should know about the free tool offered by FHA.com. It is designed especially for real estate websites; a widget that displays FHA loan limits for the counties serviced by those sites. It is simple to spend a few seconds customizing the state, counties, and widget size for the tool; you can copy the code and paste it into your website with ease. Get yours today:
http://www.fha.com/fha_loan_limits_widget
Joe Wallace has been specializing in military and personal finance topics since 1995. His work has appeared on Air Force Television News, The Pentagon Channel, ABC and a variety of print and online publications. He is a 13-year Air Force veteran and a member of the Air Force Public Affairs Alumni Association. He was Managing editor for www.valoans.com for (8) years and is currently the Associate Editor for FHANewsblog.com.
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