U.S. mortgage rates fell for a second straight week to the lowest on record as unemployment hovered near a 26-year high, depressing home sales.
Rates for 30-year mortgages declined to 4.27% in the week ended Thursday, from 4.32%, Freddie Mac said in a press release. It's the lowest rate since the McLean, Va., mortgage finance company began tracking the data in 1971. The average 15-year rate was 3.72%.
Low borrowing costs have done little to spur homebuying with the U.S. jobless rate at 9.6%.
"You're going to get some people enticed to buy new homes," said Scott Brown, chief economist at Raymond James & Associates Inc. in St. Petersburg, Fla. "But people are still a bit shellshocked by the downturn in prices and they're going to be a lot more careful than they were before."
