If you waited a week to refinance your mortgage, it’s a week too late, at least for now.

That after 30-year fixed mortgage rates shot up from 5.097% last week to 5.53% early this week, according to the BankingMyWay.com weekly mortgage rate tracker.

Rates on 15-year mortgages vaulted over the 5% mark this week as well, to 5.08% compared to 4.76% last week.

Mortgage rates on one-, three-, and five-year Adjustable Rate Mortgages (ARMs) also shot up, after weeks of being comfortably ensconced in the low four-percent range, ultimately giving ARM mortgage holders a big break on their monthly mortgage payments. However, rates on one-year ARM’s rose from 4.08% to 4.99%; three-year ARM’s from 4.65% to 4.96%, and five-year ARM’s from 4.72% all the way up to 5.19%.

Economists and real estate market gurus mostly point to a continued uptick in consumer confidence numbers, along with a rise in U.S. Treasury yields on the long-end (notably on the 10-year US Treasury) as the reason mortgage rates have headed north.

As long as news points to a brightening economic landscape, expect mortgage rates to continue to rise. Core inflation levels, as measured by the Federal Reserve’s Personal Consumption Expenditure Index (which the Fed likens to somewhere between 1% and 2%), clocked in at 1.5% last Friday. The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) number was a lousy one for the first quarter of 2009, at -5.7%. But most economists have expected GDP to come in at over 6%, so even that was a sign that things were leveling off economically, or at least that the worst was behind us.

But other key economic benchmarks are not co-operating with the “green shoots” theory that things are starting to get better. Take the Chicago PMI, which tracks overall economic performance in the Chicago area. It’s a very useful indicator for economists and right now -- it’s trending downward, at 34.9% (any number under 50 indicates a weakening economy). Traders point to the Chicago number as a big reason for late week late sell-off in stocks.

Consequently, mortgage professionals are nervous this week, many of them no doubt working the phones to calm borrowers who failed to lock in recent low mortgage rates. However, that does not mean that bargain-hunting borrowers have missed the boat.

If the economy doesn’t cooperate, there’ll be another boat coming along soon bringing lower rates with it.

To find your best mortgage rate, use BankingMyWay’s Mortgage Rate Search.

—For more ways to save, spend, invest and borrow, visit MainStreet.com.