Because I do mortgages, a lot of people ask me about interest rates.  Often times you will hear in the news that the Fed lowered or raised interest rates.  When you hear that, that doesn’t mean you should go out and refinance your home loan or thank your lucky stars for your low interest rate.   The Federal Funds Rate (which is usually what you hear about in the news) directly effects short-term interest rates like bank loans, credit card interest rates, adjustable rate mortgages and not long term fixed mortgages.  So the next time you hear that the Fed dropped the rates (which will most likely happen again by the end of the month) know that it will have more of an influence on your credit card interest rates or your home equity line of credit and not on fixed mortgages.