Not only have mortgage rates pushed past their year-ago level, but fees attached to the home loans have also gone up, making a home loan not the bargain it was just a matter of weeks ago.

Fannie Mae, the country’s largest home lending source, will begin charging an “adverse market delivery charge” March 1, though lenders started pricing the charge into loans about a month ago, said David Erickson, president of the Washington Association of Mortgage Brokers. (Freddie Mac’s version is a “market condition delivery charge.”) The fees are 0.25 percent of a home loan, which would amount to $700 on a $300,000 house – not the kind of money likely to dissuade most prospective buyers. But such a fee could make a difference for first-time home buyers and, perhaps, for homeowners looking to refinance into a more affordable mortgage.

Why would Fannie Mae add such a fee? The company’s announcement cites “an accelerated deterioration of market conditions,” including price declines and the number of unsold homes. These figures no doubt are for the nation as a whole but markets doing better than others, such as Pierce County, aren’t being spared the fee.

And perhaps even more problematic for borrowers, Fannie Mae has tiered pricing tied to credit scores. So while borrowers were previously approved or not for a rate, Fannie Mae’s standards now attach additional charges to ranges of certain scores. For example, a credit score of 650 on a 30-year loan for at least 70 percent of the home’s value would see an additional fee amounting to 1.25 percent of the loan. A score of 675 would be charged a .75 percent fee.

Fannie Mae and Feddie Mac are the backbone of the secondary mortgage market, ultimately purchasing most home loans. So lenders tend to follow guidelines from both on standard home loans.

While the fees do mean more expensive loans for consumers, Erickson said of bigger concern to him is the nearly full-point swing in mortgage interest rates.

“The fee hits are a drop in the bucket compared to the fluctuation we’ve seen in the rates in the last month or so,” he said.

Still, Erickson said rates remain historically low and can be a good deal for home buyers and homeowners with adjustable-rate mortgages.

Interest rates for a fixed, 30-year mortgage, by the way, was 6.37 percent, according to last week's national Bankrate survey. That’s a big jump from the previous week’s rate of 5.96 percent and above the rate one year ago of 6.29 percent.