Just looking back at mortgage interest rates from October 2022 and how wild that period was. The 30-year fixed was sitting at 7.20% back then, up from 7.12% the week before. If you wanted to go shorter with a 15-year mortgage, you were looking at 6.40%. Pretty brutal compared to where rates had been earlier in the year.

What struck me about those mortgage interest rates in October 2022 was how fast things were moving. Over that 52-week stretch, the 30-year had ranged from a low of 5.43% all the way up to 7.24%. For someone with a $100,000 loan, that 7.20% rate meant roughly $679 monthly in principal and interest, which adds up to like $144k in total interest over the life of the loan.

The jumbo mortgages weren't much better at 7.21%, and even the 5/1 ARM rates were at 5.45%. People were definitely feeling the pressure on affordability that fall. The APR was actually slightly higher than the stated rate too since it factored in all the lender fees. Comparing those numbers across different loan types really showed how much the mortgage interest rates in October 2022 were squeezing borrowers at every level.