Mortgage rates by city

The same 30-year fixed loan doesn’t cost the same in every city, and the gaps you see in the table above aren’t random. A handful of structural forces push a metro’s median above or below the national number — and understanding them is the difference between reading this table and using it.

Loan size and the jumbo line. The single biggest driver is how many loans in a metro cross the conforming limit into jumbo territory. High-cost coastal metros write far more large loans, and jumbo pricing swings differently from conforming — so an expensive housing market and an expensive rate median often travel together, even when the underlying borrower is just as strong.

Lender competition and mix. A metro dense with credit unions, local banks, and brokers tends to show a tighter, lower spread than one dominated by a few large retail lenders — more shops competing for the same loan compresses the median. The product mix matters too: areas with heavy FHA or VA volume carry the pricing quirks of those programs into the blended picture.

Borrower and property profile. HMDA medians pool everyone who borrowed — so a metro’s number reflects its typical credit tier, down-payment norms, and share of condos vs. single-family. None of that is visible in a national headline rate, which is exactly why a regional view like this one is worth keeping around. For how a single borrower’s rate is actually built, see how mortgage rates are set and what moves your personal number in credit score & your rate.

Read the table as a map of where the market sat last year, not a forecast. The spread between the cheapest and priciest metro above is the real-world reminder that where you borrow — and which lenders you make compete — moves the number as surely as when you borrow.