Finance Friday: A good week for rates

The wild ride in interest rates continued this week, but for a change it is positive.  No point thirty year fixed loans are back to 6.00% after hitting 6.5% last week.  The amount and speed of rate changes has been overwhelming in the past four weeks.  This is due in part to the uncertainty of all the financial markets along with the decline in the housing market.  Sales of new and existing homes continue to slide, with a decline in the median home price of 4.00% for all of 2007. 

People are paying for necessities with credit cards and dipping into retirement accounts to remain solvent.  Delinquencies are increasing for both automobile loans and credit cards.  The economic news of the week including a hefty jump in new claims for unemployment and huge drop in durable goods amplified the problems. Oh, by the way, oil hitting $103 per barrel and the Euro hitting $1.52, both all time records, didn't help.

Guest Author Randy Kelly is a Mortgage Banker and Finance Author with Boulder West Financial Services. He can be reached on-line at http://www.boulderwest.com/.