Interest Rates Edge Down Slightly

Interest rates for buying a home on the Palos Verdes Peninsula moved down slightly this week.The following are excerpts from the newsletter on interest rates published by HSH Associates :

“Mortgage rates mostly continued a slow drift in the direction of least resistance this week amid a light slate of new economic data. To be fair, rates have been mostly moving in a sideways pattern for weeks, with just the barest of down trends in place despite signs that the economy is picking up strength.

Rates are mostly anchored in place by a number of factors, including slow growth (if any) in Europe and Asia, and lately, by intensifying deflationary forces from a plummet in oil prices. Falling energy and materials costs are countering the Fed’s and other central bank efforts to produce a desired level of inflation; however, the sharp and ongoing slump in gasoline prices is producing an unexpected (and welcome) windfall for consumers which should buttress economic growth now and in the weeks and months ahead. For many folks, it is the pay raise (or tax cut, if you prefer) they have been waiting for, even if it may complicate monetary policy for the Federal Reserve. If the economy is growing but inflation is waning, the Fed can afford to keep rates lower for longer, but they have already expressed a desire to start to lift rates pretty soon.

The Fed meets next week to discuss such things, and changes to their message (if not to policy itself) could change the direction for mortgage rates to some degree.

The Fed meeting next will will stir markets somewhat, as it usually does, and the Fed will likely point to the strengthening of the economy as it changes its choice of words describing how long it will be before rates will start to move. With regards to inflation, the Fed is likely to acknowledge both the stimulative effect of lower gas prices even as they present what are probably transient deflationary pressures.

Aside from the Fed meeting, we’ll get a glance at some housing numbers from November, the Consumer Price Index, Industrial Production, Leading Economic Indicators, and more. It’s a fair bet that all these will be varying shades of green, and that the path of least resistance for mortgage rates will remain downward for the moment.”

The following are interest rate quotes from American California Financial: