Mortgage Rate Price Tracker 🏠📉🔍 (JAN 5 – 23)
Monitoring the change in price of specific mortgage rates
Included in this post are the following:
THE TRACKER 🔭
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Most mortgages are sold into mortgage-backed securities (MBS) and the price of these bonds determines rates for all banks and lenders.
However, mortgage rates DO NOT rise or fall. Instead, the price of each rate changes while the rates available to you remain the same.
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The Mortgage Rate Price Tracker (MRPT) illustrates this dynamic by showing how the price of each rate changed within the time series.
The higher the rate, the lower the fee (points). Some higher rates pay a rebate; this is illustrated on the tracker with negative (-) points.
When the “total change” is negative it means a reduction in the price of the rate.
The MRPT is a “rate and loan program” specific example of the LendZen Index, which monitors a much broader set of rates and mortgage bond coupons.
Both are effective for visualizing how the PRICE of mortgage rates has changed, while the LendZen Index is published daily at LendZen.substack.com
WEEK 3 📉
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Since the LendZen Index has a variety of time series, the MRPT will focus on just the current month’s activity.
Attached are the results for January Week 3.
You can also explore the results for Week 2 on this previous Substack post.
RATE RECAP ⏪
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If the breakout move in precious metals (Gold $5000, Silver $100) is what the narrative suggests, a rejection of fiat money and fear of inflation, then why are bonds holding their ground so well?
Despite all the geopolitical drama this year, including last week’s carry trade volatility, bonds have consistently found a bid.
Recent outsized performance from mortgage bonds was due mostly to Trump’s proposal to spend a $200B Fannie/Freddie cash pile on Agency MBS.
Although the initial knee jerk reaction to that news has reversed, mortgage rate prices were still better Friday than the 2025 low on October 21, giving us plenty to celebrate in mortgage world.
Insight into next week’s events, including the latest Rate Impact Calendar, will be posted in Sunday’s Week Ahead.
Meanwhile, the latest Lock-O-Meter risk scores and detailed rate lock recommendations with be posted Monday in the Data Deluge.
Thanks for reading.
If you want to shop real-time mortgage rates and get instant qualification results without providing any contact information visit LendZen.com
LendZen provides a fully automated mortgage shopping experience that gives you anonymous access to all mortgage rates with full transparency of costs upfront as bond prices change.
DISCLOSURES
LendZen Inc. is an equal opportunity mortgage lender, NMLS 375788.
