Mortgage rates continued to rise for the past two weeks as good news about the housing markets continues to trickle in. This week new home sales were reported up with the biggest single month increase in 8 years.

Expect the mortgage rates to continue to edge upwards. Today's information regarding sales of new homes showed an 11% increase in units sold after home prices had fallen.

New housing permits are on the rise as well as existing home sales. Don’t expect that the new home you are looking to buy will be on the market much longer. In fact, there are documented cases where people are out bidding the original asking price. This is a sure sign of renewed economic growth in the housing market. Rising mortgage rates cannot be far behind.

Economy is at the state where every small development is a big deal for this country. Mortgage rates could help this economy or hurt it. Today it is story about rising fears in our economy.

Mortgage rates improved yesterday on news from the Federal Reserve Board chairman Ben Bernanke. Bernanke said “The FOMC anticipates that economic conditions are likely to warrant maintaining the federal funds rate at exceptionally low levels for an extended period”.

The 30 year fixed mortgage rates are not a mathematical science as Wall Street would have us believe. There are many forces that create cause and effect in today’s market trends. In this unusual world wide economic environment we are encountering trends never before seen. Where do we go from here and how do we move forward so as to regain economic stability?

The average current mortgage rates in Russia are very high compared to European and U.S. rates. In Russia they are in the range or 20% in Russian rubles and around 15% in U.S. if the loans are given in U.S. dollars. This is when in Europe and U.S. today's mortgage rates range from 3 to 6 percent. Western governments lowered the rates to stimulate the the credit markets and make housing affordable. Russia chose it's own way.

The 2 most frequent questions I am asked by prospective borrowers are what is your rate and where do I think mortgage rates are going? Because interest rates are a constantly moving commodity, my answer today may not hold true tomorrow. My best indicator of future mortgage rates is to look at the past.

Today Bank of America and Citigroup made news by reporting some healthy profits. Bank of America reported a $3.2 billion profit for the second quarter. Citigroup said it earned $4.3 billion during the same period. This follows other good news earlier this week issued by Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan Chase. This may not be good news for current mortgage rates.

While the past couple days have seen a slight increase in current mortgage rates, mainly due to stronger than expected wholesale inflation reading in the Producer Price Index and better than expected retail sales reports, interest rates are still at historic lows and refinance applications have increased.

Today's mortgage rates are on the rise, following stronger than expected data. The producer price index rose 1.8%, higher than the expected increase of 0.9%. The core, which excludes volatile food and energy, rose 0.5%, higher than the 0.1% increase expected. As well retail sales rose 0.6%, when 0.4% increase was expected.

On July 9 Bank of England decided to maintain the the current interest rates at .05 level, but the borrowers are paying mortgage rates that are hovering around 8 percent. Now the British banks are accused of "mortgage rip-off" as the current rates are too high compared with the Bank of England interest rates.