The Reserve Bank has held the official cash rate (OCR) at a record low 2.5%, for the eighth consecutive time in today's announcement. It also indicated a rate hike is now in sight in the next couple of months with the economy's recovery on track.
As for mortgage rates, TSB Bank has made the first change in two weeks, slashing 21 basis points from its one-year fixed home loan rate to 5.99%, which is well below all the major bank one-year rates.
In news this week we had many OCR predictions with a Good Returns survey of 12 economists showing that all were expecting the Reserve Bank to leave the OCR unchanged.
In Expert Views economists look at where "the middle of 2010" is and BNZ economist Tony Alexander says borrowers need to acknowledge that we are not going to see low long-term fixed housing rates until some completely unknown year down the track.
