NEW YORK (Reuters) — The average rate on 30-year U.S. home loans fell in the past week to retest record lows, helping stimulate housing demand, Freddie Mac said Thursday.
The most widely used long-term mortgage dropped 0.10 of a percentage point in the week ended Oct. 1 to 4.94%, the lowest since late May, and near the all-time low of 4.78% set in April.
A year ago, before government interventions aimed at cutting borrowing costs to stimulate housing and the economy, the rate was 6.10%.
Freddie Mac started tracking 30-year mortgage rates weekly in 1971.
The 15-year average mortgage rate, which it started tracking in 1991, set a record low of 4.36% in the latest week. A year earlier, this rate was 5.78%.
“Low mortgage rates are helping to stabilize home sales,” Frank Nothaft, chief economist at Freddie Mac, said in a statement.
New-home sales in August rose to the highest annualized pace since September 2007, while unsold inventory fell to the lowest since February 1983, he said.
