Why are mortgage rates above 7% again?

SALT LAKE CITY — Homebuyers are grappling with mortgage rates that have once again risen above seven percent.

Those rates had fallen noticeably, as KSL TV reported at the end of September. But since then, they’ve shot back up. The national average as of Friday was 7.09%, according to Mortgage News Daily.

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In just a few weeks, that’s an increase of nearly $300 a month for a typical mortgage payment, according to an analysis by Momentum Loans in Sandy.

Pam Greenspon recently bought a house in Lehi in a new neighborhood that’s still under construction. While she benefitted from quite a bit of equity when she sold her previous home, Greenspon said the rate for her new home was higher than she would have liked.

“I was hoping by the time I closed on the loan that rates would come down,” she said. “They came down a skosh bit, but they didn’t come nearly as much as I was hoping.”

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Christian vom Lehn, an economics professor at Brigham Young University, said the reason for the roller coaster rates comes down to economic indicators.

“It really reflects the fact that the U.S. economy is doing pretty well,” said vom Lehn, noting strong performance in gross domestic product, unemployment, and the labor market.

Because of that, he said, there’s doubt about how much the Federal Reserve will cut rates in the future. Beyond that, vom Lehn said there’s turbulence in the markets because of the election.

Read the full story at KSLTV.com.