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slash donate. Does all the holiday music make your heart sore or sink? I'm David

Brancaccio in New York. First, mortgage rates have dropped from 8 to below 7%

and are down further in the last day. This will cheer homebuyers if they can find a house for sale, Marketplace's Nancy Marshall-Genser reports.

Freddie Mac is predicting a gradual thawing of the housing market.

Freddie is a public-private agency that buys up mortgages. It says as of yesterday a 30-year

mortgage averaged 6.95 percent. That follows the Federal Reserve's two-day

meeting earlier this week when it decided to leave interest rates unchanged.

Fed Chair Jerome Powell said Fed officials are now discussing the possibility of cutting interest rates,

and new projections from those officials point to around three rate

cuts next year. The Fed doesn't directly control mortgage rates but it does

influence them. Mortgage rates track the 10-year Treasury bond which moves based on predictions of what the Fed will do.

There's still a shortage of houses for sale because many homeowners are paying just 4% or less on their mortgages.

They're reluctant to sell and buy a new home

at today's higher rates.

I'm Nancy Marshall Genser for Marketplace.

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