With mortgage rates falling to their lowest levels🐬 in more than a year, homeowners jumped at🔴 the chance to refinance, leading to a surge in demand for mortgage loans last week.

Refinancing activity was higher by 16% from the week prior and comprised a greater share of total mortgage applications, which increased 6.9% for the week ending Aug꧙ust 2, data fro🥃m the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) showed Wednesday.

The jump in demand was spurred by a drop in the 30-year, fixed-rate mortgage to 6.55%, sending 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:home borrowing costs to their lowest levels since May 2023. 

“As a result of lower rates, refinance applications increased across all loan types, particularly for VA loans, and were almos🔯t 60 percent higher than it was at this time last year and were at its highe♊st level in two years,” said Joel Kan, MBA vice president and deputy chief economist.

Purchase Activity Rises Only Slightly

However, purchase activity moved higher by only 1% last week versus the previous week, as potential homebuyers wait for more homes to come on the market and prices to 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:become more affordable.

“Despite the downward movement in rates, purchase activity only saw small gains, with an increase꧋ in conventional purchase applications offset by decreases in government purchase applications,” Kan said. “For-sale inventory is beginning to increase gradually in some parts of the country and homebuyers might be biding their time to enter the market given the prospe🍃ct of lower rates.”

The Federal Reserve for the past year has kept its benchmark lending rate, which influences rates on mortgages and all sorts of other loans, at its highest level since 2001 in an effort to combat inflation. With inflation falling and concerns about the labor market rising, Fed chair 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:Jerome Powell said last week that the central bank could start cutting the influential rate as♎ soon as September.