As of June 2, the rate borrowers were quoted on Zillow for 30-year fixed mortgages was 2.85%.

As of June 2, the rate borrowers were quoted on Zillow for 30-year fixed mortgages was 2.85%.

Mortgage rates rise slightly as market looks toward May Jobs data.

“Mortgage rates trended up slightly this week, as markets digested inflation data and set their sights on the upcoming jobs report,” said Zillow Economist Matthew Speakman. “Data released on Friday showed that the Federal Reserve’s preferred measure of inflation increased from April to May by more than it had in any month since 2001. The market’s initial reaction to the news was more muted than this type of report would normally warrant – something that may indicate investors believe that the rising price pressures are temporary and largely due to pandemic-driven shortages. However, mortgage rates moderately moved upward in the days that followed and are just slightly above where they were a month ago. But the modest rate movements may give way to more substantial shifts depending on May employment figures which are due on Friday. Last month’s report was universally viewed as a disappointment — signaling to markets that the economic recovery may play out at a slower pace than previously anticipated – and the uncertainty it injected has helped prevent mortgage rates from moving meaningfully higher in the weeks since. very likely that Friday’s jobs figures will force mortgage rates to deviate from this generally sideways trend, with an upward move in rates appearing more likely than a meaningful downturn.”

Additionally, the 15-year fixed mortgage rate was 2.08%, and for 5/1 ARMs, the rate was 2.18%.

Check Zillow for mortgage rate trends and up-to-the-minute mortgage rates for your state, or use the mortgage calculator to calculate monthly payments at the current rates.

The weekly mortgage rate chart above illustrates the average 30-year fixed interest rate for the past week. Here’s a comprehensive look at the current mortgage rates for all loan types:

Today’s Average Rates for Conventional Loans

Program	Interest Rate	APR	1 Wk Change
30-Year Fixed	2.79%	2.85%	0.13%
20-Year Fixed	2.64%	2.72%	0.01%
15-Year Fixed	2.08%	2.17%	0.04%
10-Year Fixed	2.06%	2.16%	-0.03%
7/1 ARM	2.29%	2.96%	0.01%
5/1 ARM	2.26%	3.08%	-0.02%
3/1 ARM	2.92%	3.56%	0%

A 30-Year Fixed loan of $300,000 at 2.79% APR with a $75,000 down payment will have a monthly payment of $1,231. A 20-Year Fixed loan of $300,000 at 2.64% APR with a $75,000 down payment will have a monthly payment of $1,610. A 15-Year Fixed loan of $300,000 at 2.08% APR with a $75,000 down payment will have a monthly payment of $1,941. A 10-Year Fixed loan of $300,000 at 2.06% APR with a $75,000 down payment will have a monthly payment of $2,768. A 7/1 ARM loan of $300,000 at 2.29% APR with a $75,000 down payment will have a monthly payment of $1,152. A 5/1 ARM loan of $300,000 at 2.26% APR with a $75,000 down payment will have a monthly payment of $1,147. A 3/1 ARM loan of $300,000 at 2.92% APR with a $75,000 down payment will have a monthly payment of $1,251. All monthly payments displayed assume a maximum Loan to Value (LTV) of 80% and 740 credit score, and do not include amount for taxes and insurance. The actual monthly payment may be greater.

Today’s Average Rates for Government Loans

Program	Interest Rate	APR	1 Wk Change
30-Year Fixed FHA	2.36%	3.04%	-0.07%
30-Year Fixed VA	2.5%	2.67%	0.17%
15-Year Fixed FHA	2%	2.72%	0.08%
15-Year Fixed VA	2.41%	2.76%	0.2%
5/1 ARM FHA	2.35%	2.88%	0.04%
5/1 ARM VA	2.36%	2.35%	0.24%

A 30-Year Fixed FHA loan of $300,000 at 2.36% APR with a $75,000 down payment will have a monthly payment of $1,164. A 30-Year Fixed VA loan of $300,000 at 2.5% APR with a $75,000 down payment will have a monthly payment of $1,184. A 15-Year Fixed FHA loan of $300,000 at 2% APR with a $75,000 down payment will have a monthly payment of $1,929. A 15-Year Fixed VA loan of $300,000 at 2.41% APR with a $75,000 down payment will have a monthly payment of $1,988. A 5/1 ARM FHA loan of $300,000 at 2.35% APR with a $75,000 down payment will have a monthly payment of $1,162. A 5/1 ARM VA loan of $300,000 at 2.36% APR with a $75,000 down payment will have a monthly payment of $1,163. All monthly payments displayed assume a maximum Loan to Value (LTV) of 80% and 740 credit score, and do not include amount for taxes and insurance. The actual monthly payment may be greater.

Today’s Average Rates for Jumbo Loans

Program	Interest Rate	APR	1 Wk Change
30-Year Fixed Jumbo	3.22%	3.28%	0.21%
20-Year Fixed Jumbo	3.53%	3.61%	-0.07%
15-Year Fixed Jumbo	2.83%	2.92%	0.06%
10-Year Fixed Jumbo	2.39%	2.48%	0.74%
7/1 ARM Jumbo	2.79%	3.17%	0.02%
5/1 ARM Jumbo	2.7%	3.17%	-0.01%
3/1 ARM Jumbo	0%	0%	0%

A 30-Year Fixed Jumbo loan of $600,000 at 3.22% APR with a $150,000 down payment will have a monthly payment of $2,602. A 20-Year Fixed Jumbo loan of $600,000 at 3.53% APR with a $150,000 down payment will have a monthly payment of $3,489. A 15-Year Fixed Jumbo loan of $600,000 at 2.83% APR with a $150,000 down payment will have a monthly payment of $4,095. A 10-Year Fixed Jumbo loan of $600,000 at 2.39% APR with a $150,000 down payment will have a monthly payment of $5,624. A 7/1 ARM Jumbo loan of $600,000 at 2.79% APR with a $150,000 down payment will have a monthly payment of $2,462. A 5/1 ARM Jumbo loan of $600,000 at 2.7% APR with a $150,000 down payment will have a monthly payment of $2,432. A 3/1 ARM Jumbo loan of $0 at 0% APR with a $0 down payment will have a monthly payment of $0. All monthly payments displayed assume a maximum Loan to Value (LTV) of 80% and 740 credit score, and do not include amount for taxes and insurance. The actual monthly payment may be greater.

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Move Forward. Stay Safe.

Zillow Group’s Move Forward. Stay Safe. initiative combines industry-leading health and safety standards with virtual technologies designed to keep real estate moving forward, and give our employees, customers and partners confidence and support to stay safe.

 
Former U.S. Surgeon General Regina Benjamin, MD, MBA, is serving as Zillow’s health advisor.

We’re providing free resources and access to deals on virtual tools and services to help our partners keep their businesses moving.

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Bring your banjo and a thirst for strong home value growth.

In the same year renting becomes more affordable and the homeownership rate bounces back from historical lows, the country’s housing market superstar will be — drumroll, please — Nashville!

Music City has moved beyond its country roots to become a fast-growing economy with employment by the healthcare industry and big corporate names including Nissan, Randstad and Kroger — plus the popular chain of diners, Shoney’s.

Home appreciation is expected to rocket in Nashville this year by 4.3 percent, while incomes recently grew by 1.1 percent and unemployment is a healthy 4 percent.

Nashville is followed in housing market hotness by Seattle; Provo, UT; and Orlando on Zillow’s list of hottest markets for 2017.

“These hot markets are experiencing change as more people discover them,” said Zillow Chief Economist Svenja Gudell.

Zillow’s economic predictions for 2017 include a warning about a possible worsening of labor shortages for new construction if President-elect Trump follows through on his hard-line stances on immigration and immigrant labor.

Other predictions for the year ahead:

• Cities will focus on denser development of smaller homes near public transit and urban centers.
• More millennials, who made up more than half of first-time buyers in 2016, will become homeowners this year, increasing the racial and ethnic diversity of homeowners overall.
• Rental affordability will improve as incomes rise and escalating rents slow.
• The share of people driving to work will increase for the first time in a decade, as homeowners move into the suburbs for more affordable housing.

For more insights into U.S. real estate and rentals, check out the Zillow Group Report on Consumer Housing Trends.

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Check out which team is running to daylight in the real estate game.

While we wait to see Sunday which football team wins the season, here’s a telling snapshot of how Atlanta and Boston match up when it comes to homes.

Atlanta, sometimes known as “Hotlanta” for its lively nightlife and steamy summer temperatures, is wide open down the middle of the field with housing affordability. Its homeowners spend 11.7 percent of their incomes on mortgages, and its renters spend 25.5 percent of their incomes on rents.

Although Bostonians spend a greater share of their incomes on housing — 21.3 percent for homeowners and 34.3 percent for renters — they muscle their way through with gorgeous, historical housing stock.

This Boston duplex, for example, is a touchdown for anyone who loves the charm of 1800s interiors. The price tag: $5.49 million.

Photo from listing on Zillow.

Not to be outdone, Atlanta offers its share of gracious living. Here’s a $3.2 million condo that’s quite a catch. Built in 2008, it offers the high ceilings and detailed woodworking that call to mind an earlier time.

Photo from listing on Zillow.

Both these homes are well outside the median value in their metro areas, based on the Zillow Home Value Index. The median home value for the Boston metro area  (population 4.6 million) is $412,300, while the median for the Atlanta metro area (population 5.3 million) is $173,300.

Rents are a different story. The median rent in Boston is $2,329 a month, compared with $1,333 a month in Atlanta.

Here’s a 1-bedroom apartment in Boston with 11-foot ceilings and a rooftop pool for $2,300 a month:

Photo from listing on Zillow.

And here’s a $1,350 a month 1-bedroom apartment in Atlanta that’s near downtown and offers a community pool:

Photo from listing on Zillow.

Whether the Falcons or the Patriots win on Sunday, both metros come out winners in the housing arena.

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Singles are buying more homes together than apart, which could make this a particularly handy list.

While people who buy homes are typically married — in 2015, married couples represented almost 60 percent of home buyers — the share of unmarried couples buying homes together has been on the rise.

The power of two incomes, along with changing social norms, helped catapult their share of the home buying market to 14.6 percent in 2015, from 11.2 percent a decade earlier. (At the same time, singles are losing ground, dropping from 30.6 percent to 25.4 percent of the market from 2010 to 2015.)

We can’t be sure these unmarried couples are romantically involved — but for those who are, the economics of home buying appears to play a role in getting them together. Which brings us to Valentine’s Day, and the best 10 metro areas for finding love.

There are options all over the country, but the top two — Boston and New Orleans — offer a nice contrast in scenery and climate.

Looking for someone to snuggle with amid all the snow and freezing temperatures in Boston? You’re in luck!

A whopping 66 percent of the people who live in the Boston area are single, helping make it one of the country’s best metro areas for love. With a median income of $25,000, those singles also have a little dough to spend at Boston’s 159 places to date per 10,000 people.

So pull on that parka and grab a hot toddy! Beantown awaits with an apartment like this one, which rents for $2,300 a month — just $29 below the average for a single in the Boston metro area (with roommates):

Photo from Zillow listing.

However, if frigid temps and Paul Revere are just not your thing, cast an eye toward warmer climes — because the second-best metro for love is balmy New Orleans.

In the Big Easy, 59 percent of residents are single. Compared with Boston, they have fewer date spots — just 51 per 10,000 people — but the ones they have are world class: music venues on Frenchmen Street, gorgeous parks everywhere you look, and, of course, the quintessential year-round party that is Bourbon Street.

Singles in the New Orleans metro area earn a median income of $17,000 a year and pay median rent of $1,388, which would put you in a nice place like this one:

Photo from Zillow listing.

Whether love is in the air or not, these are metros that singles — and everyone — can cherish.

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Newcomers escalated values in many markets, but prices are expected to cool in the next few years.

Owning a home in San Francisco comes with 99 problems, but selling ain’t one.

Among the problems: San Francisco’s median home values are among the highest in the country, topping $800,000, according to Zillow Research. The city is cold and foggy in the summer, as Mark Twain noted. You also have to keep an ear to the ground for earthquakes.

But when it comes time to sell, you can’t beat San Francisco. Its homes are listed on Zillow for just 51 days on average, and only 5.4 percent of listings take price cuts — making it the best market for sellers in 2016.

The top markets for buying have the inverse situation: more days listed and greater price cuts.

By those measures, the best market for buying is Baltimore, where listings spend an average of 104 days on Zillow, and 12.7 percent of listings take a price cut.

Here’s a look at the top 10 markets for selling and buying.

Many of the metros on the top markets for sellers list have seen huge influxes of newcomers, sending home prices into the stratosphere. Portland had the fastest rising home values in 2016 — up 13.8 percent.

Six of the 10 top buyers’ markets have home values that are appreciating more slowly than the national average — which in 2016 was 6.8 percent. For example, Baltimore home values rose less than 4 percent during 2016.

Home inventories also play a role. Markets with more homes going on the market — for example, Miami, where 14.6 percent more listings hit the market in December 2016 than a year earlier — often lean toward buyers. Miami is the second-best buyers’ market, based on listing days and percentage of listings with price cuts.

However, Boston — No. 10 on the top markets for selling list — saw a 21.6 percent drop in listing inventory in December 2016 from the prior year.

If you’re trying to buy in a hot market, take heart: Most experts in a recent Zillow survey said they expect the overall housing market to switch from a sellers’ market to a buyers’ market in 2018 or 2019 as the market begins to slow.

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List your home at the right time, and it could sell faster and at a higher price.

When it comes time to sell a home, every seller wants the same outcome: to sell quickly, for as much money as possible.

According to a new Zillow analysis, listing a home toward the end of spring significantly increases a seller’s chances of making this happen.

In all but five of the country’s 25 biggest metro markets, the best month to put a home on the market is April or May. Homes listed in the first half of May sold nine days faster and for almost 1 percent more money than average listings. (You may have even better luck if you’re in one of the best U.S. markets for home sellers.)

 

The low supply of homes on the market has pushed the ideal window later in the spring. Many shoppers who start searching for a home in early spring may need to look at several homes and make multiple offers, and may still be shopping a few months later.

By May, some buyers will be anxious to avoid more disappointment or eager to get settled into a new home before the next school year — and will be more willing to pay a premium to close the deal.

The May sales boost was particularly notable in Seattle and Portland where sellers who listed in the first half of the month stand to gain the biggest price boost — 2.5 percent in Seattle, 2 percent in Portland — over the area’s average.

On the other end, typically warm weather regions like Miami, Tampa and Phoenix tend show very little variation in sales price or time on market based on listing months. Sellers in these markets will find themselves with more flexibility in choosing when to sell their home.

To apply this analysis to their own home, sellers can use Zillow’s Best Time to List tool to estimate how much listing timing will influence the final sale price in their neighborhood. Registered Zillow users access the tool by clicking the “Sell Your Home” tab on the home details page of their home, and obtain valuable information to pair with the expertise of a local real estate agent when determining the best time to put their home on the market.

Here’s a look at ideal times for listing in some of the top U.S. metros.

Thinking about selling? Check out our Home Sellers Guide.

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Basic living expenses skyrocket in the urban core, according to a new analysis from Zillow and Care.com.

Urban living has its perks, but they come at a cost: It turns out families spend $9,073 more a year to cover basic living expenses in the city than in the suburbs, according to a new analysis from Zillow and Care.com. Those costs include mortgage payments, property taxes and child care.

The urban-suburban disparity varies considerably depending on the metro area.

In the New York City metro area, families spend $71,237 more a year to cover living expenses in the city than in the suburbs. That’s nearly $6,000 extra each month. In Chicago, the city costs $18,472 a year more, and in Dallas, it’s $14,128 extra.

For some metros, the opposite is true. The cost of living in the suburbs of Philadelphia, for example, is $13,849 a year less than living in the city. In Baltimore, living expenses in the suburbs are $10,790 less, and in Cleveland, they’re $9,034 less.

Home costs are a big part of the equation. Nationally, the median property taxes and mortgage payments on an urban home totals more than $22,000 a year, which is $7,000 more than the median homeowners would spend on a suburban home.

Lower child care costs in the suburbs can offset the mortgage and taxes. In Minneapolis, for example, the annual cost of housing is similar between urban and suburban areas, at just under $15,000. But in the suburbs, families with two children can save $4,119 a year on a child care center or $1,759 a year on a nanny.

Most homeowners live in the suburbs, with just 23 percent choosing urban settings, according to the Zillow Group Housing Trends Report. Millennials lean more heavily toward city living (33 percent), but nearly half of them live in the suburbs — where they are making their mark by opening high-end restaurants and other businesses.

Check out more insight into metro-level child care data from Care.com.

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Although owning is nearly twice as affordable as renting, monthly payments alone don’t tell the full story.

Shirleen Holt’s relief at returning to renting is typical of many former homeowners.

No more fixing leaky faucets; no more time-consuming projects.

A marketing consultant who recently moved to Ashland, OR, Holt expects to own again, but for now she is thoroughly enjoying the renter’s life.

“When something goes wrong, I just call the landlord,” she says. “That right there is worth an extra $100 a month.”

It’s a practical reflection of the added bother and expenses that accompany owning a home.

Although owning is nearly twice as affordable as renting when it comes to monthly payments, those figures don’t tell the whole story. Some people say they’ve made more money – and even become millionaires – because they switched from owning to renting. They invested down payments and other money that went toward mortgages, taxes, insurance and maintenance, and they came out ahead.

The American Dream?

It’s a point of view not often heard in the United States. Although the U.S. homeownership rate has been about 65 percent for the past three decades, lower than in many other countries, our culture continues to value homeownership as a component of the American Dream and a way to reach financial stability.

That’s worth reconsidering, Zillow CEO Spencer Rascoff and Chief Economist Stan Humphries argue in their book, “Zillow Talk: The New Rules of Real Estate.” An entire chapter is devoted to the idea that homeownership should be uncoupled from the American Dream.

“Buying a home is a gamble,” they write. “It’s a gamble that we will want to keep living in one place – and keep making the mortgage payments that come with it – for years and even decades into the future.”

For low-income people, in particular, homeownership can pose too much risk. Rascoff and Humphries say that’s why subsidies for low-income families to buy homes in low-income neighborhoods, where housing values can be more volatile, often hurt the people they say they’re helping.

The risk also doesn’t make sense for people in other situations – for example, those who lose a job and are more likely to move to take another position than to get by on savings until they find work where they live, and those who do not have the savings to sustain a financial hit without downsizing, Rascoff and Humphries explain.

Money matters

Staying put long enough to gain equity is the key to making homeownership a good financial choice – something Zillow lays out in its breakeven analysis, and which strongly influences savvy renters.

“Because mortgages these days are very heavily front-loaded with interest, many homeowners are throwing money away just like they say renters are,” says Kelly Phillips Erb, a tax attorney who rents an old farmhouse outside Philadelphia.

It’s true that homeowners can deduct interest and property taxes, but only if they are itemizing their deductions. That tends to be most beneficial in the early years of homeownership, when the interest portion of mortgage payments is more likely to exceed the standard deduction. That’s also when people are gaining the least amount of equity.

Additionally, home improvement costs are not recouped as frequently as some people think via capital gains breaks after a home is sold, Phillips Erb explains.

A difference in perspective

Owning a home made sense for earlier generations in part because they took out 30-year mortgages and actually lived in their homes for 30 years, gaining enough equity to make the purchase worthwhile, says Phillips Erb, who writes a column for Forbes.com.

That plan can still work – but people do not stay put the way they used to. They move, they restart the 30-year clock by refinancing and they spend their home-sale gains on new cars and vacations rather reinvesting them into another home.

Brian Stoffel, a writer for The Motley Fool who preaches the pro-rent word, rents in Wisconsin and Costa Rica, but says he and his wife might yet buy a home. They believe their down payment would fare better in the stock market (something “Zillow Talk” refutes), but they want a stronger sense of community.

“When we think about why we put money in the stock market anyway – to provide what we want or need in our life – it seems silly to not own a home just so we can have more money,” Stoffel says.

Phillips Erb, the happily renting tax attorney, thinks renters could save money by shopping around and even negotiating with landlords.

“People will search two years for a house but one month for an apartment,” she notes. “I don’t think the market is so inelastic at this point – depending on where you are – that you can’t research where you want to be and figure out what you’re willing to pay.”

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When it comes to finding the right balance of jobs, salaries and housing costs, not all areas are created equal.

With Silicon Valley workers living in vans and RVs and interns squatting in corporate offices, it’s clear that even a tech salary does not shield some workers from the vagaries of sky-high housing costs.

The good news is, there are tech jobs outside the Bay Area — and, in some places, workers have thousands of dollars left over each month after paying income taxes and housing costs.

The same is true for finance workers, who no longer have to brave New York City rents to build their careers. And health care workers can do well in markets where jobs in their field are as plentiful as the housing is affordable.

Zillow and LinkedIn analyzed a host of housing and employment data — from salaries to hiring to income tax rates — to determine which markets are well suited to technology, finance and health care workers.

The results held surprises. While the Bay Area doesn’t offer the best mix of employment and affordable housing, tech workers in San Francisco do manage to make up for the stratospheric cost of housing — the median home there is $833,600 — with their higher salaries. The average San Francisco tech worker ends the month with $140 more in disposable income than the average tech worker in Denver, where the median home value is $356,900. Tech renters also fare better in San Francisco than in Denver, with $591 more in monthly disposable income.

Still, Seattle is a better bet overall, with tech workers keeping $5,987 as disposable income if they own their homes, and $5,493 if they rent. Austin and Pittsburgh also pencil out better than the Bay Area.

Charlotte, Dallas-Fort Worth and Phoenix are sweet spots for finance workers, while Phoenix, Indianapolis and Boston are the best bets for health care workers.

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