Clark, an air show performer and retired airline captain, lives 30 miles east of Sacramento, Calif., in a neighborhood where airplanes have the right of way. At Cameron Airpark Estates, hangars replace garages and roads are 75-feet wide to allow for airplane traffic.

According to Clark, it's a close-knit community made up of 120 homes where neighbors, many retired and active airline pilots, share their love of aviation and almost everyoneowns an airplane.

Clark has lived in Cameron Airpark since 1983 and says she can't imagine living in a traditional neighborhood where cars and garages are the norm. She loves walking out of her kitchen into the attached hangar in order to climb into one of her two planes.

The community boasts a domestic airport for smaller aircraft replete with a runway, command center office and refueling station.

But to live here isn't cheap. According to Gary Stout, a local real estate broker, the average home in this neighborhood will cost around half a million dollars, not to mention the cost to buy and upkeep an airplane.

The 30-year fixed mortgage, the most popular mortgage product, dipped by 0.04 percentage points to 3.79%, according to a weekly survey by Freddie Mac. Last year, 30-year loans averaged 4.64%. The new low can save borrowers $50 a month for every $100,000 borrowed. Over a 30-year term, that comes to $21,874.

The 15-year fixed mortgage, which is popular among those looking to refinance, inched down 0.01 percentage points to 3.04%, according to Freddie Mac's survey. That's down from 3.82% a year ago. The new 15-year rate would lower borrowing costs to $693 a month for every $100,000 borrowed, a $38 savings compared to last year.

Ongoing economic turmoil in Europe is, in part, responsible for the continued slide in mortgage rates, according to Freddie Mac's chief economist, Frank Nothaft.

"The European debt crisis overshadowed improving economic indicators for the U.S. and allowed Treasury bond yields and fixed mortgage rates to ease for another week," he said.

As for economic conditions here in the U.S., Nothaft pointed to recent reports that showed improvements in industrial production, consumer sentiment and new home construction.

Affordable mortgages, combined with much lower home prices, should also help to bolster the housing market.

Rates are almost half what they were at the peak of the housing bubble in mid-2006. At the time, the median price of a U.S. home was about $250,000, according to the National Association of Home Builders, and the average interest rate was about 6.75% for a 30-year loan.

A person who bought a home in 2006 with 20% down would have made payments of $1,300 a month. Today, a person who buys a median priced of home of about $162,000, would pay less than half that amount, about $600 a month. 

Billionaire investor Howard Marks, the co-founder of Oaktree Capital Management, and his wife Nancy purchased the property for $52.5 million, according to public records.

The former owner was Courtney Sale Ross, the widow of Steven Ross, who was the co-chairman of Time Warner (TWX, Fortune 500) (the parent company of CNNMoney). The more than 20-room apartment, which was sold by real estate firm Brown Harris Stevens, was initially listed for $60 million a year ago.

The May 4th sale marks the highest co-op purchase price in the history of Manhattan real estate, according to Jonathan Miller, president and CEO of Miller Samuel, a New York appraisal firm.

With eight bedrooms, 10 bathrooms, formal and informal dining rooms and sweeping terraces, there is about 10,000 square feet of interior space -- valued at about $5,250 per square foot, Miller said. The real estate taxes alone on the transaction came to nearly $1.5 million.

The Marks' neighbors will include billionaire David Koch and Blackstone CEO Stephen Schwarzman. Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis and John D. Rockefeller Jr. have also lived in the 31-unit building.

"Up until the opening of 15 Central Park West, it was the trophiest piece of trophy real estate in the city," said Michael Gross, author of 740 Park.

Sales at the very high end of the market have thrived in recent months, mostly due to foreign buyers seeking safe investments in the midst ofglobal economic turmoil, Miller said.

In December, Citigroup founder Sanford Weill sold his penthouse condo in 15 Central Park West for $88 million to a Russian billionaire, making it the most expensive apartment ever sold in Manhattan. Prices for co-operatives, like the units in 740 Park, generally lag condominium prices because of the difficulty buyers often have getting the required board approval.

Activity in the very high end of the real estate market often happens in clusters, Miller said. "The market has a light switch; it's either on or off."

Overall, Manhattan home prices averaged just under $1.5 million in the first quarter of 2012, which included the $88 million sale at 15 Central Park West, according to Brown Harris Stevens' most recent data. The median price, which measures the middle of the market and is less impacted by the very high end, rose 4% to $821,500. 

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, created as part of the Dodd-Frank financial reform law, said Wednesday that the new rules will focus on mortgage points and fees, the current complexity of which can make it difficult for home-buyers to assess different loan offers. The rules would also include new standards for officials in charge of mortgage origination.

"We want to bring greater transparency to the market so consumers can clearly see their options and choose the loan that is right for them," CFPB head Richard Cordray said in a statement.

Mortgage origination is thought to have played a key role in the housing crisis, as so-called"predatory lenders" steered borrowers into complicated loans that they couldn't afford, which later went bust in large numbers. Originators are a focus of the Obama administration's mortgage crime task force, announced in January.

Among other things, the rules under consideration would prohibit incentive payments to mortgage originators who steer customers into higher-priced loans, following on a similar rule issued by the Federal Reserve Board in 2010.

Origination officials, such as mortgage brokers and loan officers, would be required under the new rules to go through training and undergo background checks. Origination charges that vary with the size of a borrower's loan would be banned.

The rules will likely be proposed formally this summer before being finalized in January of next year, the CFPB said.

Last month, the bureau outlined a set of new rules under consideration formortgage servicers. These regulations would require clearer mortgage statements for borrowers and better disclosures about any fees or changes in a loan's interest rate.