Home Equity Rates Held by Inflation Data Tame, But Likely to Hit New 52-Week High Soon.
It’s been a good week for mortgage rates thanks to lower inflation data.
I use the term “good” loosely because mortgage rates don’t really go down during the week.
However, they did not go very high, so we can call it a victory at the moment.
We got a lot of inflation data this week, and luckily it came in cooler than we expected.
If it were hot or consistent, prices could have reached a 52-week high. But maybe we’re delaying the inevitable anyway.
Soothing Data on Declining Energy Prices Gives Housing Credit Ratings a Much-Needed Breathe
As noted, this week was a big week for inflation data, with both the CPI and PPI released.
Both reports indicated cooler-than-expected inflation, which is consistent with the bond.
When economic data comes in cold, mortgage rates tend to drop. The opposite is also true.
You don’t want high inflation because bond investors will want high yields, which are interest rates, in return.
The good news is that inflation was less than many thought, as consumer prices in June fell by the most since April 2020.
Similarly, the Producer Price Index (PPI) fell 0.3% in June, the biggest drop in 14 months and well below the 0.0% expected.
The result was slightly lower mortgage rates, which matched their wartime highs on Monday due to renewed violence in the Middle East.
So any hot reports would have been more than enough to push mortgage rates up to the next level, even if it was 6.875% or higher.
We’ve managed to get away from the dreaded 7 handle all year, but that doesn’t mean it won’t pop up again.
And either way, we’ll probably hit the 52-week high again.
Mortgage Rates Don’t Need More Bad News to Hit New 52-Week Highs
The 52-week high for the 30-year fixed rate is 6.82%, according to Mortgage News Daily. It was accessed back on July 17, 2025, actually a year ago.
However, mortgage rates fell sharply after that, falling to around 6.50% that August. It then fell slightly to 6% in September.
We all know that they finally went below 6% in February of this year, before the war with Iran suddenly drove them higher.
They have ebbed and flowed since then, but have remained high due to uncertainty in the Middle East.
A key issue has been oil prices, which have risen sharply and put pressure on inflation.
There’s also the issue of all the military spending, which could result in more government debt (and bond issuance). Also, they are not good for bonds and so are interest rates.
The point here is that mortgage rates were slightly lower in the second half of 2025, so the new 52-week high will come down to 6.75%, which we saw as recently as Monday. That’s also the peak for the 2026 calendar year.
If things don’t improve miraculously soon, we could be at the 52-week high.
If nothing else, we will fall above our levels last year. When that happens is not 100% clear, but it looks like sometime in early August.
Last year, the 30-year default fell by about 25 basis points (0.25%) after the July jobs report came in below expectations and big May and June revisions.
So we will probably be above August 2025 levels at least. Not good optics for home buyers.
Lately, employment has been steady and the story has been about war-driven inflation.
But if jobs take a turn for the worse, mortgage rates could gain again as they did last year.
More importantly, if this fight is actually resolved, we could see a big downward movement again.
However, before all that, mortgage rates will reach a new 52-week high and can even dance to the 7 handle.
So be careful!
Before creating this site, I worked as an account manager for a real estate broker in Los Angeles. My experiences in the early 2000s inspired me to start writing about mortgages 20 years ago to help prospective (and current) home buyers better navigate the mortgage process. Follow me on X for the hottest.
