If you are selling a house you have owned for a while in Brighton or Pittsford and buying the next one, you are in a different conversation than a first-time buyer. You are not scraping for a down payment. You are deciding what to do with a chunk of equity and how long you want to carry a loan. That decision changes when the two main loan terms are priced 71 basis points apart.

Here is what this post covers: the exact rates from the most recent Freddie Mac survey, what the 71 basis point gap actually buys you, the four situations where the 15-year is the better call, the situations where it is a mistake even for a well-capitalized buyer, and the local pricing backdrop you are selling into. Every number below is attributed with its reporting period. Where I do not have a number, I say so.

The rates, exactly as published

Freddie Mac's Primary Mortgage Market Survey for the week ending August 13, 2026:

• 30-year fixed: 6.67%, down from 6.69% the prior week
• 15-year fixed: 5.96%, down from 6.01% the prior week
• A year earlier: 30-year at 6.58%, 15-year at 5.71%

Two things worth sitting with. First, the 6.67% reading ended a streak of five consecutive weekly increases, according to Trading Economics. Second, the 30-year is essentially where it was twelve months ago: 6.67% now against 6.58% then. That is a nine basis point difference over a full year. Freddie Mac chief economist Sam Khater described rates as having "remained relatively stable," with affordability improved versus a year ago and both purchase and refinance applications increasing.

So the story is not a rate cliff. The story is that the spread between terms is 71 basis points, and if you are bringing real equity to closing, that spread is one of the few levers you actually control.

What 71 basis points buys and what it costs

The trade is simple and it is not a trick. Taking the 15-year fixed at 5.96 percent instead of the 30-year at 6.67% lowers your rate. It also compresses the repayment schedule from 360 payments to 180. The rate savings do not come close to offsetting the shorter amortization, so the monthly payment goes up substantially, not down.

Roughly speaking, on the same loan amount, a 15-year payment at these rates lands in the neighborhood of 40 to 45 percent higher per month than the 30-year. Your lender will give you the exact figures on your actual loan amount, and you should ask for both scenarios side by side in writing before you commit to either. What you get in return is a loan that is retired in fifteen years and a dramatically smaller total interest bill, because you are borrowing the money for half as long at a lower rate.

The 30-year versus 15-year mortgage decision for a move-up buyer

Here is the part that matters for someone selling a Brighton colonial or a Pittsford four-bedroom and buying up. You have two independent dials, not one:

• How much equity you put down. This sets the loan amount.
• Which term you choose. This sets the rate and the repayment clock.

Most move-up sellers I work with treat these as a single decision. They are not. A larger down payment on a 30-year and a smaller down payment on a 15-year can produce a similar monthly payment with very different risk profiles. The 30-year with more equity down gives you a lower required payment and less cash reserve. The 15-year with less down keeps more cash liquid but locks you into a higher obligation every month for fifteen years.

That second point is the one people underweight. A 15-year mortgage is not a savings plan you can pause. It is a contract. You can always pay a 30-year loan down faster on your own schedule. You cannot ask a 15-year lender for a lighter month.

Four cases where the 15-year at 5.96 percent is the right call

1. The next house is your last house, and you want the loan gone before you stop working. If you are fifteen years or fewer from the end of full-time income, matching the loan term to that horizon is clean math. The 5.96% rate makes it cheaper than it was for most of the past three years to do this.
2. You are downsizing in price but not in quality. Brighton and Pittsford both have inventory where a smaller, well-built house costs meaningfully less than the one you are leaving. If your sale proceeds cover most of the purchase, the residual loan is small, and 40 percent more on a small payment is an easy yes.
3. Your income is stable and your reserves are deep. Not "we could make it work." I mean six months of the higher payment sitting in an account you do not touch, on top of the down payment and closing costs. If that is true, the higher payment is a discipline, not a risk.
4. You have no competing debt at a higher rate. If you are carrying anything above 5.96 percent, that gets paid first. The 15-year is for people whose balance sheet is already clean.

Three cases where the 30-year at 6.67% is the better instrument

I say this as someone who bought and renovated houses before I was licensed: cash flexibility during the first two years in a house is worth more than most buyers think.

• You are buying a house that needs work. Roofs, boilers, and 1960s electrical panels do not wait for your amortization schedule. If the inspection turns up real capital items, the lower 30-year payment is what funds them. I have walked through plenty of Brighton and Pittsford homes where the bones were excellent and the mechanicals were on borrowed time. Budget for that before you shorten your loan.
• Your income has variable components. Commission, bonus, self-employment, or two incomes where one is likely to change. Take the 30-year and make extra principal payments in the good months. Same outcome, no obligation.
• You are keeping the current house as a rental. If you are not liquidating all your equity, your reserve requirements go up, not down. Do not stack a 15-year payment on top of that.

The market you are selling into

Your term decision sits on top of a sale, and the sale side is where I need to be careful about numbers, because the widely circulated Rochester figures describe the city, not the towns south and southeast of it.

Here is what I have from primary and near-primary sources:

The May 2026 county median of $308,500 was reported as another new high. Brighton, Pittsford, Mendon and Honeoye Falls sit above that county figure, not at it. I do not have town-level median prices, days on market, or inventory counts for any of those towns for any 2026 month, and I am not going to publish estimates dressed up as data. When you and I sit down, we build your number from actual comparable sales on your street and in your school district, which is the only pricing method that survives an appraisal anyway.

One more caution on research you may run into. Aggregator pages published mutually contradictory figures for the city of Rochester in July 2026: one showed 51 median days on market, another showed 13, for the same month. One reported sales up roughly 79 percent, another reported sales down. One page listed homes selling at 120.57% of asking alongside a 51-day marketing time, which cannot both be true of the same market. Treat those numbers as artifacts. They are why "is the market cooling?" produces such confused answers.

The order of operations

For a Brighton NY move-up buyer, the sequence that keeps you out of trouble:

1. Get a real net-proceeds figure on your current house, based on comparable sales, minus payoff, commissions, transfer tax and any concession you are likely to make.
2. Ask your lender to price the purchase both ways, 15-year at the current 5.96% and 30-year at 6.67%, at two different down payment amounts. Four scenarios, in writing.
3. Subtract your true reserve requirement from your available cash before you decide how much to put down. Include a repair budget based on what the inspection is likely to find in a house of that age.
4. Then, and only then, pick the term.

Most people do this in reverse. They fall for a house, get a payment quote, and back into the term. That is how a good buyer ends up with a payment that works on paper and not in February.

If you want that mortgage term comparison run against your actual Rochester-area numbers, including a defensible list price for your current house, I will do it with you line by line and show you where every figure came from. Schedule a time with me here.

Khem Kadariya

About this data

The figures in this post were compiled from publicly available sources including Houzeo, Movoto, Redfin, RochesterFirst and Zillow, along with other public market data. Real estate numbers change quickly, and these were accurate as of August 2026. For current figures on a specific home, street, or town, ask me directly rather than relying on a published average.