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Why Do Mortgage Rates Change?
To understand why mortgage rates change we must first ask the more general question, "Why do interest rates change?" It is important to realize that there is not one interest rate, but many interest rates!
- Prime rate: The rate offered to a bank's best customers.
- Treasury bill rates: Treasury bills are short-term debt instruments used by the U.S. Government to finance their debt. Commonly called T-bills they come in denominations of 3 months, 6 months and 1 year. Each treasury bill has a corresponding interest rate (i.e. 3-month T-bill rate, 1-year T-bill rate).
- Treasury Notes: Intermediate-term debt instruments used by the U.S. Government to finance their debt. They come in denominations of 2 years, 5 years and 10 years.