Record Low for Mortgage Rates

Lenders are offering 30-year loans at an average rate of 4.57%, with upfront fees averaging 0.7% or the loan amount.

The rates are down from 4.58% last week and 5.2% last year this time.

The average rate for a 15-year loan rose from 4.04% to 4.07%.

Mortgages that are fixed for 5 yrs, but become variable, the average initial rate fell to 3.75% from 3.79%, taking it to the lowest in 5 years.

Well qualified borrowers, who understand the advantage of what is known as "buying points", often can get better rates.

Foreclosure Filings Drop; Bank Seizures Rise

Foreclosure activity in the U.S. continued to level off this quarter with some stage of the process falling 3%.

Last month close to 323,000 properties received some kind of foreclosure filings - either default notices, scheduled auctions or bank repossessions.

While the overall number of filings was down, and the number of homes entering the first stage of the process fell 7% from April, the pace of homes exiting foreclosure and being seized by banks hit a record high in May.

The increase in repossessions suggests that lenders are beginning to work through a backlog of properties developed after many foreclosures were frozen last year. In addition, there's been government pressure on lenders to work with defaulting homeowners.

California continued to be a hotbed of foreclosures, accounting for 22% of the national total with around 72,000 filings in May. California was fourth behind Nevada, Arizona and Florida.