Rates up. So house prices have to go lower!

The higher Treasury yields had a further negative impact on mortgage rates, with the 30-year fixed rate increasing by 19 basis points to 5.46% on the week and the 15-year fixed rate by 15 basis points to 5.02%, as indicated by Bankrate.com. “That’s quite a jump,” said Donald Rissmiller, chief economist at New York-based Strategas Research Partners, in a Bloomberg interview. “The more rates go up, the more we need home prices to go down to equalize consumers’ payments. It’s those payments that have brought about a level of stability in housing unit sales.”