Seattle Mortgage Rates Today 9/14/12:  “It’s the Great Quantitative Easing 3, Ben Bernanke!”  Yesterday, as markets waited in anticipation of the Fed’s statement on monetary policy, the announcement of QE3 did not come as a surprise at all.  What was unanticipated was the assertiveness of the plan; the Fed announced the ongoing purchasing of Mortgage-backed Securities to the tune of $40 Billion per month.  The “ongoing” part of this equation is unprecedented as the bond-buying will continue until the labor market improves and reflects continual growth.  Some say that this round of easing does not address the real problems in the labor market.  Also stated was the Fed Funds Rate—the rate at which lending institutions lend each other money typically on an overnight basis—will continue to stay at its current .25% rate until mid-2015; previously, the Fed indicated that the rate would remain until 2014.  The Federal Open Market Committee’s (FOMC) stance on the stimulus will be accommodative even after the economy strengthens.

As bonds rallied higher after the announcement yesterday, some of those gains were lost today. However, bonds are still up.  Investor confidence has moved from the safe-haven of bonds in to stocks—evidenced by the slight uptick in equities this morning.

With all of this easing hype, can mortgage rates get any lower?  Probably not.  Remember that QE1 and QE2 instilled a knee-jerk reaction in the market but rates stabilized.  Markets may be experiencing fatigue and leading up to the latest QE announcement, they may have already considered the outcome as rates hold their ground.

Yes, we’re sure we’ll see some rate price improvement but it’s nothing to write home about…