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Mortgage rates ease
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July 8, 1999: 12:54 p.m. ET
30-year rate falls to 7.65% as refinancing activity slips
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NEW YORK (CNNfn) - Mortgage rates retreated this week after experiencing several increases in recent weeks, mortgage firm Freddie Mac reported Thursday.
For the week ending July 9, the average rate on U.S. 30-year fixed-rate mortgages was 7.65 percent, down from last week's 7.71 percent. One year ago, the rate was 6.91 percent.
Fifteen-year loans slipped to 7.30 percent from 7.34 percent the week before. The rate for these mortgages averaged 6.60 percent for the same period last year.
One-year adjustable-rate mortgages dropped to 5.96 percent from last week's 6.05 percent. A year ago, the rate was 5.60 percent.
(Click here to see a breakdown of average mortgage rates by U.S. region.)
"Although interest rates declined slightly this week, current mortgage rates have choked off much of the refinancing activity in the housing market," said Frank Nothaft, Freddie Mac's deputy chief economist. "We have seen refinancing slip from 63 percent in October of 1998 to only about a quarter of the market today."
Nothaft predicts the refinancing share will drop to about 20 percent for the rest of the year, despite a robust housing market. 
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