Homebuilders say mortgage rates have a ways to rise before they hurt sales

After touching an all-time low for the week ended Dec. 24, 2020, mortgage rates have been creeping up over the past three months, which begs the question: At what point will higher mortgage rates hurt home sales growth?For much of the past year, housing demand has been strong — surprisingly strong during a pandemic — as both mortgage rates and housing inventory remained low.The 30-year mortgage rate fell to a low of 2.66% in December; for the week ended March 18, 2021, it averaged 3.09% (up from 3.05% in the previous week but still down from 3.65% at the same time a year ago).Evercore ISI surveyed homebuilders for their opinions of how high rates would need to go before it flattens sales on a Y/Y basis.Their answer: 3.8%, when averaging the midpoints of ranges that homebuilders offered; the lowest midpoint was 3.5% and the highest was 4.25%.Seeing that mortgage rates