Mortgage Rates Sideways to Slightly Lower

The average mortgage lender is quoting rates that are just a fraction of a hair lower today compared to last Friday.  Lenders were either closed or otherwise not able to update rates yesterday due to the Federal holiday.  Anything other than "higher" is a victory recently.  Rate jumped at the 2nd fastest pace of the year after the jobs report that was released on Friday, October 4th, and continued moving higher through last Wednesday.  They've calmed down since then, but they haven't made any meaningful progress back toward the lower levels seen a few weeks ago. Context matters.  In the short term, it would be easy to lament the fact that rates are up about 0.50% in about a month.  But if we merely look back to early April, rates are still down the better part of 1 percent. In year