Mortgage rates bounced up this week.<\/p>\n
The average rate<\/a> for a 30-year, fixed-rate mortgage in the United States rose to 6.3% for the week that ended Thursday, according to the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation, better known as Freddie Mac.<\/p>\n That\u2019s up from 6.23% for the previous week. A post on the Freddie Mac site noted purchase applications have risen more than 20% above where they were a year ago, thanks to rates having \u201cmodestly declined<\/a> the last few weeks.\u201d<\/p>\n The average rate for the typical mortgage had been heading down from a seven-month high of 6.46% at the start of April. Just before the U.S. and Israel launched a war against Iran<\/a> at the end of February, that rate had dipped below 6%<\/a> for the first time since 2022.<\/p>\n The war is still impacting rates, according to Mortgage News Daily, which listed a 30-year, fixed-rate mortgage at 6.44% midday Friday. Wednesday, the site\u2019s daily index showed rates spiking to 6.5% on news that the blockade<\/a> of Iran\u2019s Straight of Hormuz would likely continue.<\/p>\n \u201cAs has been the case for most of the past 2 months, interest rate movement was clearly correlated with oil prices,\u201d Mortgage News Daily\u2019s Matthew Graham said in a Thursday post<\/a> on the site.<\/p>\n Friday, he noted mortgage rates saw \u201cmoderately big increases\u201d <\/a>at the start of the week, but that volatility had calmed down, a resilience \u201cmost easily attributed to a slew of headlines suggesting that peace negotiations are at least being attempted by the U.S. and Iran.\u201d<\/p>\n What comes of that \u201cis the most likely source of volatility for rates next week,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n