Florida Home Loan Rates Slip Further

As investors’ fears continue to subside, average Florida home loan rates slipped for the second week in a row, falling nearly a tenth of a percent from last week.

Rates on 30-year fixed-rate mortgages fell to an average of 6.63 percent state- and nationwide, down from 6.72 percent last week, mortgage company Freddie Mac reported.

Rates on 15-year fixed-rate mortgages, a popular choice for consumers refinancing a Florida home loan, fell to 6.27 percent from 6.34 percent last week. Rates on one-year adjustable-rate mortgages (ARMs) dropped to 5.69 percent from 5.78 percent.

The mortgage rates quoted here do not include add-on fees known as points. The 30-year and 15-year mortgages each carried a nationwide average fee of 0.3 points last week, while one-year ARMs carried an average fee of 0.7 point.

In the mercurial Florida housing market and across the country, economists are viewing the back-to-back dips as a nice reprieve from rates that have slowly moved up this year, and believe that for the rest of 2006, the 30-year mortgage (the industry benchmark) will probably hover below 7 percent.

“Although lower rates are a welcome sight, we still feel that the 30-year fixed-rate mortgage rate will drift up and down somewhat over the next few months, but will average less than 7 percent for the year,” said Frank Nothaft, Freddie Mac’s chief economist.

Two weeks ago, rates on 30-year Florida home loans climbed to 6.80 percent, the highest in more than four years. Home sales, which set record highs for five years running, have slowed this year as higher loan borrowing costs, coupled with rising insurance premiums and energy prices, have made it too expensive for some people to buy. A year ago, rates were hovering between 5.5 and 6.0 percent for 30-year, fixed-rate mortgages.