Skip to footer

Mortgage rates soar to pre-Brexit levels

After two weeks of uncertainty, mortgage rates gradually climb back to levels seen before Britain's Brexit vote.

|
John Bazemore/AP/File
A "For Sale" sign is seen near a home in Atlanta.

The Brexit interest rate discount has disappeared. Mortgage rates took a sudden turn higher Thursday and are now back to levels seen prior to Britain’s exit from the European Union, according to a NerdWallet survey of national lenders. Rates on 30-year mortgages have been gradually climbing higher over the past week and today most major lenders repriced their terms significantly higher.

In spite of today’s spike in interest rates, industry experts remain optimistic.

“We describe the last few weeks as A Tale of Two Rates,” Sean Becketti, chief economist of Freddie Mac, said in a release. “Immediately following the Brexit vote, U.S. Treasury yields plummeted to all-time lows. This week, markets stabilized and the 10-year Treasury yield rebounded sharply. In contrast, the 30-year mortgage rate declined after the Brexit vote, but only by half as much as the 10-year Treasury yield. This pattern suggests that mortgage rates are likely to remain low throughout the summer.”

The NerdWallet Mortgage Rate Index compiles annual percentage rates — lender interest rates plus fees, the most accurate way for consumers to compare rates. Here are today’s average rates for the most popular loan terms:

Purchase Mortgage Rates: July 14, 2016

(Change from 7/13)

30-year fixed: 3.64% APR (+0.05)

15-year fixed: 3.01% APR (+0.05)

5/1 ARM: 3.39% APR (+0.01)

 

Refinance Mortgage Rates: July 14, 2016

(Change from 7/13)

30-year fixed: 3.72% APR (+0.05)

15-year fixed: 3.04% APR (+0.06)

5/1 ARM: 3.41% APR (+0.01)

Homeowners looking to lower their mortgage rate can shop for refinance lenders here.

Wells Fargo, Chase and BOA mortgage rates

Three major components of the NerdWallet Mortgage Rate Index are leading lenders Wells Fargo, Chase and Bank of America. Their current purchase mortgage rates are:

Bank mortgage rates 7/14

  30-year fixed 15-year fixed 5/1 ARM
Wells Fargo 3.67% APR 2.98% APR 3.38% APR
Chase 3.44% APR 2.79% APR 3.36% APR
Bank of America 3.67% APR N/A 3.32% APR

NerdWallet daily mortgage rates are an average of the published APR with the lowest points for each loan term offered by a sampling of major national lenders. Annual percentage rate quotes reflect an interest rate plus points, fees and other expenses, providing the most accurate view of the costs a borrower might pay.

Hal Bundrick is a staff writer at NerdWallet, a personal finance website. Email:hal@nerdwallet.com. Twitter: @halmbundrick.

This article first appeared at NerdWallet.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.
editor@csmonitor.com
Subscribe
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

QR Code to Mortgage rates soar to pre-Brexit levels
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/Business/Saving-Money/2016/0718/Mortgage-rates-soar-to-pre-Brexit-levels
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe