Mortgage rates were sharply higher today as the underlying bond market faced heavy selling pressure for a variety of reasons.  When investors are more interested in selling bonds, prices move lower and yields (aka RATES) move higher.  By the end of the day multiple lenders had recalled their rate sheets and reissued higher rates.  The average lender was easily at the highest rates of the month.

Despite all of the above, multiple sources claim rates fell significantly this week and are now at the lowest levels since September 12th.  Sadly, that's not true.  It's the product of confusion that often happens on Thursdays when Freddie Mac's weekly mortgage rate survey is released.  The survey mainly reflects lenders' rate offerings from Monday and Tuesday.  Because mortgage rates can also move quite a bit on the other 3 days of the week, the recipe for confusion is obvious--especially with the report being released right in the middle of those 3 days.

Long story short, Monday and Tuesday had the highest rates last week.  Monday and Tuesday of this week had the lowest rates.  That made for a great drop in Freddie's rate survey.  Today's rates, however, were much higher than those seen at the end of last week.  You'd have to go all the way back to last Monday (Sept 30th) to see anything higher.  Bottom line: highest rates of the month of October today!