A check of Bankrate.com shows that mortgage rates continue to fall as the housing economy continues to stall. In the past week the benchmark 30-year fixed-rate mortgage fell 7 basis points to 6.42 percent. This compares to the even lower 6.31 percent at this time last year, but the higher 6.5 percent from four weeks ago. The 15 year fixed-rate mortgage fell to 6.1%. 
There had been a lot of questions as to what mortgage rates would do after the Federal Reserve raised interest rates by 50 basis points last month, and it seems like the initial move is lower. It is hard to tell if the move lower is actually due to the lowering of the fed funds rate or not, but it will be interesting to see what future Fed moves do to mortgage rates.
The housing market continues to be an unknown even to the most astute economists. The market is clearly terrible at this time, but there really are no signs of an impending turnaround that many are hoping for.
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