Parky60 Loc: People's Republic of Illinois

Mortgage rates are pushing even higher this week and are now clocking in at their highest level since the turn of the century.

As of Monday, the average rate on a 30-year, fixed-rate mortgage had soared to 7.48%, more than double the average before the Federal Reserve started raising interest rates, according to Mortgage News Daily. The last time rates were this high was in November 2000.

That marks a nearly half-percentage-point increase in just the past month alone, with a sizable chunk coming in the past week, meaning that a $925 monthly payment on a 30-year $200,000 mortgage that was taken out as the Federal Reserve started raising interest rates will now be $1400, an over 50% increase.

Bond yields have pushed higher recently as investors fear that the Fed might keep its interest rate target, which is now 5.25% to 5.50%, higher for longer.

Matthew Graham, the chief operating officer of Mortgage News Daily, told CNBC that the Fed likely wants to see the rate hikes having some more profound effects on the economy before pivoting its monetary policy.

“Investors just aren’t seeing the kind of deterioration in economic data that they expected,” Graham said.

Mortgage rates have soared since the central bank started tightening its monetary policy back in March of last year. During parts of 2020 and 2021, when the Fed cut its interest rate target to near-zero, homebuyers were able to lock in historically low mortgages at below 3%.

Median mortgage payments for a typical single-family home hovered at just over $1,000 per month in 2020, according to the National Association of Realtors. Presently, the median mortgage payment is at $2,234, representing a mammoth 116% increase in just a few years.

While most investors don’t expect the Fed to raise its rate target again at its next meeting in September, they do expect it to be months before the central bank pivots and starts cutting rates. However, some economists think that the Fed might end up conducting one more rate hike before the year is out.

Stephen O’Connor, a research professor of real estate at the George Washington University School of Business, told the Washington Examiner that notes from recent Fed meetings and indicators such as “core inflation” make him think another hike might be in store.

Inflation (as gauged by the consumer price index) is now running at 3.2%, although core inflation, which does not include volatile food and energy prices, rose to 4.7% in the year ending in July.

“Are they done raising those rates? I don’t think so,” O’Connor said. “I think [Fed Chairman Jerome] Powell is still very much concerned with core inflation, and even though a lot of the other metrics look good relative to the number of jobs, unemployment rate, things of that nature, there are other types of markers in the ether there that are raising concerns relative to wage inflation, things of that nature.”

All eyes are on Powell’s annual speech from Jackson Hole, Wyoming, this week. The yearly economic conference is one of the most closely monitored ones in the world and brings together economists, academics, and government representatives, with the central focus being on the Fed chief’s address.

Last year, Powell delivered a hawkish speech in which he warned of economic “pain” and caused the stock market to tumble, given the hint of more rate hikes.

This year, though, Powell is likely to strike a bit of a different tone. Inflation has meaningfully fallen since the 2022 address, and the labor market has remained shockingly resilient despite the predictions of economists.

Nevertheless, investors and Fed watchers will hang on Powell’s every word in an effort to glean whether the central bank is finished tightening or if there is another rate increase in the works.

Liberty Tree

More benefits of Bidenomics

woodguru

It was actually understood by economics experts that a slow increase in the interest rate should have been started under Obama to curb housing price inflation, tiny little incremental increases over a longer period of time. It became more necessary under trump, but trump rejected the slowing of the housing market even as it took on the optics of being runaway inflation as new home buyers were having homes they were trying to buy snapped right out from under them with bigger cash offers. Out of control home price inflation can only be curbed by increasing the cost of loans.

JR-57 Loc: South Carolina

“You will own nothing and be happy about it.” | Claus Schwab at The World Economic Forum

BIRDMAN

If it was broken why didn’t the democrats fix it when they ran everything for 2 years

Parky60 Loc: People's Republic of Illinois

If "slow increase(s) in the interest rate should have started under Obama to curb housing price inflation", why did mortgage rates go from 6.06% in 2008 to 3.65% in 2016?

son of witless

Way to go in shifting the blame away from Brandon. Inflation is not just housing. Most of it is wage inflation, which for most people is still not keeping up with inflation. Some labor groups are still getting big raises which shows wage inflation is still roaring.

The Fed likely will still need to keep hiking rates because of Joe's imbecilic policies. Brandon royally screwed the pooch when he flooded the economy with money. His idiot bitch Yellen still has no clue what she is doing.

Inflation ain't going away as long as Brandon is President. Countries that debase their currencies eventually fall.

Thanks Joe voters for being stupid.