Mortgage Rates Continue Downward Trend Amid Stock Market Plunge

The stock market may be on a rapid downward trend but not everyone is being hurt by the loss of stock value, customers looking to buy a home this week will notice that mortgage rates have fallen to a yearly low for 2011.

At the close of the market on Monday rates were sitting at just 4.39 percent for 30-year-fixed mortgages, the lowest they have been in months.

The rates are sparking huge interest in the home buyer and refinance markets where one bank manager told the Washington Post that they have been working 14-hour days and receiving up to 300 e-mails before noon with information being requested about locking in the rates, requests that have helped the mortgage banker secure $14 million in loans in the last seven days.

The low mortgage rates arrive after the Dow Jones industrial average lost 14 percent of its value (more than 1800 points) in the last two weeks.

The rapid decline in rates threw some analysts through a hoop after they expected the U.S. Debt rating downgrade to cause borrowing rates to move in the opposite direction, however investors fled to the U.S. Treasury which caused rates to be pushed down.

For comparative purposes rates in February had approached 5 percent for a 30-year fixed loan.

While the lower rates are great for customers Stan Humphries, chief economist for Zillow says consumers are worried about their jobs and the future of the U.S. economy which has eroded some purchases which may have occurred if the rate was low and the economy was strong.