Reported by Star-Bulletin staff & wire
Thursday, December 5, 1996
Reported by Star-Bulletin staff & wire
Thursday, December 5, 1996
WASHINGTON - Thirty-year, fixed rate mortgages averaged 7.44 percent this week, down from 7.52 percent last week, according to a national survey released today by the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corp. Thirty-year mortgages
fall to 7.44 percentIt was the lowest since March 7, when rates averaged 7.38 percent. The low-point for the year was 6.94 percent in early February, while the high was 8.42 percent in early July.
On one-year adjustable rate mortgages, lenders were asking an average initial rate of 5.47 percent, down from 5.50 percent last week. Fifteen-year mortgages, a popular option for those refinancing mortgages, averaged 6.96 percent this week, down from 7.04 percent a week earlier.
The rates do not include add-on fees known as points.
America Online Inc. reached an agreement with 19 states, including Hawaii, requiring it to get customers' consent before switching them to a new flat-rate plan, according to Hawaii's Office of Consumer Protection. America Online agrees to refund
over rate planThe online service also agreed to retroactively refund customers who had been switched to the company's new $19.95 rate without their consent, according to Jo Ann Uchida, executive director of the Office of Consumer Protection. The customers have to ask to switch back to their old pricing plan by April 10.
AOL drew complaints from the states' attorneys general after it said it would automatically convert its subscribers to the new flat rate on Dec. 1, according to Bloomberg Business News.
The switch occurred unless customers chose another pricing option. The Dulles, Va.-based company's previous fee was $9.95 a month for five hours of access, plus $2.95 for each additional hour.
For more information on the agreement, consumers can call 888-265-8888 or visit the "member services" site of AOL, or enter the keyword "New Pricing", the state office said.
DENVER - Tele-Communications Inc., the nation's biggest cable system operator, said today it is cutting 2,500 jobs and will freeze or cut senior executive salaries to reduce costs. TCI will cut 2,500 jobs
to reduce costsThe job cuts represent a 6.5 percent reduction in TCI's 38,500-person work force. They come one day after the company's board met and decided to move ahead with plans to spin off TCI's Liberty Media programming arm and its international business unit.
The cuts will have no impact in Hawaii, said Williet Medeiros, administrative assistant at the local subsidiary, TCI of Hawaii Inc., the former Chronicle Cablevision operation. She said TCI in the islands has some 65 employees and about 36,000 cable television subscribers, mostly on Maui but also in Hawaii Kai and parts of other islands.