According to the latest data released Thursday by Freddie Mac, the 30-year fixed-rate average was unchanged this week at 4.19 percent with an average 0.5 point. (Points are fees paid to a lender equal to 1 percent of the loan amount.) It was 3.72 percent a year ago.

The 15-year fixed-rate average inched up to 3.41 percent with an average 0.5 point. It was 3.4 percent a week ago and 3.01 percent a year ago. The five-year adjustable rate average ticked up slightly to 3.23 percent with an average 0.4 point. It was 3.2 percent a week ago and 2.85 percent a year ago.

“In its first meeting of 2017, the Federal Reserve voted unanimously to maintain their current monetary policy stance, keeping short-term rates unchanged, and maintaining their reinvestments for MBS and longer-term Treasuries,” said Michael Fratantoni, chief economist at the Mortgage Bankers Association. “Given the continued improvements in the job market and the increases in inflation, we are holding to our forecast of three Fed rate hikes for 2017, with the first hike most likely coming in June, but [it] could happen as early as their next meeting in March. We also expect that Federal Reserve officials will be talking much more in 2017 about tapering or stopping reinvestments, which could lead to wider mortgage-Treasury spreads.”

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A strong jobs report on Friday would signal increased economic growth and likely push rates higher. Bankrate.com, which puts out a weekly mortgage rate trend index, found that the experts it surveyed were almost evenly split on where rates were headed. Forty percent said they were going up, another 40 percent said they would remain unchanged and the rest said they would fall.

Meanwhile, mortgage applications decreased last week, according to the latest data from the Mortgage Bankers Association. The market composite index — a measure of total loan application volume — fell 3.2 percent from last week. The refinance index slipped 1 percent, while the purchase index dropped 6 percent.

The refinance share of mortgage activity accounted for 49.4 percent of all applications, the first time refinances have been under 50 percent since July 2015.