With Fixed Rates This Low, Who Needs ARMs?

" Adjustable-rate mortgages — or ARMs — used to be a popular product for refinancing: A borrower paying a high rate would trade in the remainder of a long-term fixed-rate mortgage for an ARM with a low introductory rate. But with the Federal Reserve having slashed its federal funds rate — the target rate for overnight bank lending — by more than four percentage points over 2008 to a range of zero to 0.25 percent and interest rates on 30-year fixed-rate mortgages effectively averaging 5.1 percent last week, refi options have migrated away from ARMs, according to the results of Freddie Mac’s 25th annual ARM survey."