Mortgage rates for the week ending March 6th are out. Yahoo Finance's Claire Boston joining us now with those numbers. Claire, what do we have?

Hi, Mandy. This week, we have the 30-year mortgage rate at 6.63%. That is down from 6.76% last week. 15-year mortgage rates are now at 5.79%, down from 5.94% a week ago. Now, this is a 13 basis point move in a single week. It's the biggest one-week slide since September. And that's pretty significant for home buyers and sellers. A lot of what is happening right now is in response to market volatility that we've saw this seen this week. You know, it's related to tariff policies, concerns about the overall health of the economy, and if we're going to see slower growth. So, you know, maybe mortgage rates are not moving down for the right reasons, but it does really help buyers who may be struggling to get into this market, just given high prices, any drop in rates does help them.

It's such a great explanation, Claire, because there is this idea of the Trump administration wanting to keep yields lower. No surprise when you have a real estate mogul in the White House, but then you can have those yields move lower for a reason that is sinister for the economy. And I know that that's a key question. But talk to us about what this means just in terms of this spring home buying season. How could we see activity picking up off this?

Right. So it kind of remains to be seen how home buyers are weighing that economic uncertainty versus the fact that rates are lower and maybe that does give them more purchasing power. Uh, Sam Khater, who's Freddie Mac's chief economist, said in his statement this week that this should provide a strong incentive to make a move in the market. And we are already seeing, um, that refinancing applications and purchase applications are going a little bit higher. Uh, so suggesting that as rates fall, buyers and sellers really are ready to make a move in this market.

That's really interesting because I was going to ask you how we see these lower rates actually impacting that activity just in the context of a more longer-term view. These are still high rates for a lot of people who grew up with parents who had near zero rates on their on their mortgages. So just what are you hearing about the impact of the fact that we still have higher rates?

Right. I think, um, a lot of people that I talk to say that there's an understanding now that we're not probably going to go back to that, you know, 3%, 2% mortgage rate. You know, something really bad would have to happen in the economy for that to happen. Uh, and so basically, um, buyers and sellers are really looking, when can I make a move into the market? Can I stomach this higher rate knowing that if rates fall further, they could refinance.

Yeah, absolutely. And it's it's so interesting too just in the context of the reporting that I know you've already been doing about buyers and sellers in this market. What do you think the outlook is going to look like for buyers over the next, say, six months? I know I'm asking you to put a crystal ball on, but what have your sources told you about that?

Yeah, I mean, it's really hard to say. Um, generally speaking, uh, the people I talk to say that they're expecting a better spring and summer home buying season than last year. But last year was the worst year for home sales in 30 years. So, you know, any potential growth we see is coming off of a really, really low base. And, uh, it may take a while to kind of move us out of this really intense housing slump that we're stuck in.

All right. Claire, great overview of all the challenges of the housing market. Really appreciate it. Thank you so much.