There were no major economic reports or news headlines in play today. Movement in the bond market (which underlies mortgage rate changes) was orderly and moderate. There were no major changes in high level lending costs or any other costs that would impact mortgage rates. Despite all that, rates improved appreciably compared to recent days, ultimately hitting the best levels in almost exactly 3 months.
For some context, those levels from 3 months ago were very close to multi-decade highs at the time. After that, rates simply added insult to injury through the end of October. November, on the other hand, has moved reasonably quickly to push top tier 30yr fixed rates back into the high 6% range.
Officially, we’re not there yet. The average lender is still in the low 7% range, but that is a huge improvement from several weeks ago. If tomorrow were to turn out as good as today, the index would break below 7%.
Whether or not tomorrow is as good as today is completely unknowable. Actually, perhaps it’s somewhat knowable. We can say that, all other things being equal, it is tremendously uncommon for two successive days to be as good as today. It does happen, but typically only with obvious motivations.
The bigger questions, risks, and opportunities remain in the week ahead when we’ll have multiple opportunities to see obvious motivations among several highly consequential economic reports.
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