Falling Mortgage Rates Not Enough to Lure New Homebuyers

Despite the fact that 30-year fixed mortgage rates dipped below 4 percent in October, the number of buyers looking to tour homes cooled off.

At the same time, the rate drop triggered a hefty increase in signings last month, according to Redfin, which released its latest look at homebuying activity on Friday.

Redfin's monthly report showed that the number of clients requesting tours with the company was down 1.6 percent from September.

However, the first sub-4 percent rates since June 2013 sparked a late-month spike of 11 percent in signed offers.

This uptick belies a nation of patient buyers who seized the opportunity to make a great deal, the company says.

"Clients who had been casually house hunting amped up their searches and got under contract to lock in the low rates," said Tuniscia Okeke, a Redfin agent in Baltimore. "These are opportunistic buyers who don't necessarily need to move, but have been waiting for the right deal to come along."

Even with late jump, signed offers were essentially flat in October, Redfin reported. One year prior, signed offers were up 7.4 percent compared to September 2013.

While the jury's still out on November, Redfin is nevertheless seeing a flip of October's trend so far this month—a surge in tour requests accompanied by a drop in offers. For the first week or so of November, Redfin agents reported a 4.4 percent upswing in tour requests and a 2.5 drop in signed offers.

The latter is not necessarily cause for concern, as such a swell of buyers made offers immediately following the rate drop late last month.

"Time will tell," said Nela Richardson, Redfin's chief economist, "whether the early strength in tours holds through the month, and ultimately results in higher offers as well."

One month earlier, Richardson was more optimistic in her view of what the end of the year would bring. September's offers and tour requests were both up over August, which, she suggested, could "hold steady through November before the seasonal slowdown in home searches over the holiday."

If November's numbers do hold up, Richardson's hopes would usher in good news as the new year sets in.