The Magnolia Standard in 5 Minutes
Realistic Money, September 26: Mortgages cross 7 percent

This is Realistic Money from The Magnolia Standard, the Saturday column, read aloud. It's Saturday, September twenty-sixth.

Mortgage rates crossed seven percent this week. Stocks rose anyway. Oil gave back eight percent. And property tax bills go out next month, so we'll walk through the ways to pay them.

We'll start with the number that matters most to a household here.

It wasn't a stock price. It was the ten-year Treasury yield, which climbed to about five point one percent. That's the highest since two thousand seven. Home loans follow that yield.

On Thursday, Freddie Mac's weekly survey put the average thirty-year mortgage at seven point oh three percent. A week earlier it was six point nine five. A year ago, six point three.

What that does to a payment. Principal and interest only. On a two hundred sixty thousand dollar loan, a year ago the payment was about sixteen hundred and nine dollars a month. This week it's about seventeen thirty-five. That's about a hundred and twenty-six dollars more every month, for the same loan.

If your mortgage is fixed and already signed, none of that changes your payment. And card balances and home equity lines didn't move this week either. Those follow the prime rate, which moved with the Fed on September seventeenth and hasn't moved since.

Now the stock market. It shrugged at the bond market.

The S and P five hundred closed Friday at seven thousand seven hundred forty-three, up one point two percent for the week. The Nasdaq gained two point one percent. The Dow, a third of a percent. Smaller companies went the other way. The Associated Press said cooler oil prices did much of the lifting.

Oil. West Texas crude settled Friday at ninety-two dollars and forty-one cents a barrel. That's down about eight percent from a hundred dollars and thirty cents last Friday. The National reported that American and Iranian negotiators were exploring a deal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz.

Brent, the global benchmark, finished near a hundred and four, about where it started the week. The American barrel fell on the prospect of a deal. The global one held, because its supply still runs past Yemen.

Gold closed at about forty-two eighty-five an ounce, down about two percent for the week. Silver was down about three percent. The reason given was higher yields. Gold pays no interest, so it looks less attractive when bonds pay more.

Bitcoin was near eighty-four thousand dollars Friday morning, about a fifth below where it was a year ago.

On the calendar. Wednesday brings the August reading of the inflation measure the Federal Reserve targets. The Fed's next meeting is October twenty-seventh and twenty-eighth.

Now this week's resource. Property tax bills.

The Montgomery County Tax Office mails statements every October. The single payment is due January thirty-first. Penalty and interest start February first.

There are a few ways to pay. One payment, by January thirty-first, open to anyone. A quarter payment plan, for homesteads with a sixty-five or over, disabled, or disabled veteran exemption. Pay at least a fourth by January thirty-first to enroll, then the rest by March thirty-first, May thirty-first and July thirty-first, with no penalty.

There's also a pre-payment plan for next year's bill, for owners without a mortgage escrow account. It opens October first. And partial payments are accepted any time.

Most homeowners with a mortgage pay through escrow, so the lender pays the county. The mortgage statement shows which kind you have.

What does missing January thirty-first cost? State law sets it. Seven percent in February. It climbs two points a month. Eighteen percent by July. And on July first, a collection fee of up to twenty percent can be added.

On a six thousand dollar bill, that's four hundred twenty dollars more in February. About a thousand and eighty more in July. And close to twenty-five hundred more if the account goes to the collection attorney.

Paying online by e-check costs nothing. A debit card costs one percent. A credit card, just over two percent.

That's Realistic Money. It's not financial, tax or legal advice, and the paper holds no position in anything mentioned. Every number, with its source, is at the magnolia standard dot news.

Written by our newsroom, voiced by computer.