Mortgage Rates Today, Sep. 19, 2024: Rates Dodged a Bullet (We Hope)
The average 30-year fixed rate mortgage is 6.08% today, an increase of 0.46% since yesterday. The 15-year fixed mortgage rate stands at 5.05%, up by 0.4%. The 30-year FHA mortgage now averages 5.43%, having risen by 0.41. Meanwhile, the 30-year jumbo mortgage rate is 6.6%, reflecting an increase of 0.43%.
In brief
The Federal Reserve seemed to do a good job yesterday. Its large, half-point cut to general interest rates sweetened the pill of less welcome news.
And mortgage rates moved only modestly higher in response.
The unwelcome news was that markets and the Fed were on different pages regarding future cuts.
"Interest-rate projections show officials penciled in the equivalent of another four cuts of a quarter-point next year, assuming the unemployment rate doesn’t jump and inflation continues to decline," reported The Wall Street Journal. That's six cuts at most between now and the end of 2025.
On Saturday, the Journal said that investors were pricing in 10 cuts over that period. And those dashed hopes explain the modest rise in mortgage rates yesterday afternoon.
Is that the end of markets' reactions to yesterday's Fed events? We'd better hope so.
Mortgage Rate Trends: Past 90 Days
Purchase Rates
| Loan Type | Rate | APR | Daily Change | Monthly Change |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 30-Year Fixed | 6.08% | 6.12% | +0.46% | -0.35% |
| 15-Year Fixed | 5.05% | 5.12% | +0.4% | -0.48% |
| 30-Year Fixed FHA | 5.43% | 6.28% | +0.41% | -0.38% |
| 30-Year Fixed VA | 5.41% | 5.56% | +0.43% | -0.35% |
| 30-Year Fixed USDA | 5.44% | 5.58% | +0.49% | -0.37% |
| 30-Year Fixed Jumbo | 6.6% | 6.63% | +0.43% | -0.4% |
| 5/6 Year ARM | 6.56% | 6.62% | +0.31% | -0.23% |
Refinance Rates
| Loan Type | Rate | APR | Daily Change | Monthly Change |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 30-Year Fixed | 6.08% | 6.12% | +0.37% | -0.47% |
| 15-Year Fixed | 4.94% | 5% | +0.29% | -0.59% |
| 30-Year Fixed FHA | 5.41% | 6.26% | +0.4% | -0.41% |
| 30-Year Fixed VA | 5.41% | 5.56% | +0.41% | -0.33% |
| 5/6 Year ARM | 6.46% | 6.5% | +0.11% | -0.4% |
Coming up
Mortgage rates today and tomorrow
Yesterday, we brought you market expectations for this morning's four economic reports. Those are unchanged, according to MarketWatch, so we'll repeat the information:
- Weekly initial jobless claims for the week ending Sep. 14 — Expected to inch down to 229,000 from 230,000 the previous week
- September Philadelphia Fed manufacturing survey — Expected to improve to a poor -1.1 from a dire -7.0 in August
- August existing home sales — Expected to slow imperceptibly to 3.90 million from 3.95 million in July
- August leading economic indicators — Expected to grow worse more slowly, at a rate of -0.3% compared to -0.6% in July
Remember, mortgage rates tend to fall on worse-than-expected economic news and rise on better. So, we'd like all these numbers to be worse than forecast.
We'll be surprised if all of today's reports together move mortgage rates today far. These data rarely have much impact on them. Any appreciable movement today is more likely to be down to a continuing hangover after yesterday's Fed events.
No economic reports are scheduled for tomorrow.
Peter Warden has been covering mortgage, real estate, and personal finance for 15 years. He has appeared on The Mortgage Reports, Credit Sesame, Bills.com, and other publications.
