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30-Year Mortgage Rates Dip Again, to 6.63%
Mortgage rates around the country dipped for the second week in a row, a dose of encouraging news for people thinking about buying a home.
Mortgage company Freddie Mac, in its weekly survey released Thursday, said that rates on 30-year fixed-rate mortgages dropped to a nationwide average of 6.63 percent for the week ended Aug. 2. That was down from the previous week's rate of 6.72 percent and was the lowest since mid-June.
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Mortgage Defaults Surge
Aug. 3--Lenders filed 80 percent more notices of default on homes in Ventura County during the second quarter this year than last, DataQuick Information Systems reported Wednesday.
The possible reasons cited for missed payments is a slowdown in the real estate market that makes it more difficult for people to eke out as much money as hoped for from a sale and adjustable-rate mortgages that get more expensive as interest rates escalate over time.
In Ventura County, notices of default -- the first step in the long foreclosure process that serves as a warning to homeowners -- jumped to 452 in the second quarter from 250 last year.
Statewide, there were 20,752 notices filed, a 67.2 percent increase. The year-over-year increase was the highest for any quarter in DataQuick's 14 years of record keeping.