While The Federal Reserve finally did increase interest rates by a quarter-percent this week, the increase it does not appear to have had much affect in the housing market. Perhaps history will be repeated: In the early 2000s, after the tech bubble popped, the Fed lowered its benchmark rate to 1 percent. Then, in the summer of 2005, it began raising it by 0.25 percent. At the time of the first increase, interest on a 30-year fixed rate home mortgage was about 6.68 percent- less than half a percentage point, even though the benchmark rate had climbed from 1.25 to 5.25. Experts say that today’s mortgage rates could possibly follow the same course this time as economic uncertainty in the global economy continues to put downward pressure on long-term rates. The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) predicts that the fixed home loan rate will be roughly 4.8 percent at the end of 2016, an increase of less than 1 percent.