The 30-year fixed-rate mortgage averaged 7.09% in the week ending August 17, up from 6.96% the week before. Rates have been above 6.5% since the end of May and climbing higher since mid-July. This week’s average rate is the highest the 30-year, fixed-rate mortgage has been since April 2002 when it was 7.13%.
Sheesh, you could barely floss between those houses!
Yea, that’s suburbia hell for you. I don’t understand the appeal either.
The appeal is being within an hour of your workplace. I live in the burbs but my subdivision has much more space than the picture here.
This is why holding the line on remote work is incredibly, incredibly important.
I’d rather have a town house or condo than a separate house with almost no separation between neighbors.
In fact, when I was looking for a house, we looked at one of these and I straight up noped out. We then looked at townhouses and almost made an offer until a more traditional house in an area we preferred became available, and that’s where we live today.
I’m thinking we’ll probably move to a townhouse or condo at some point when the kids move out.
Nah fuck townhouses and condos. I lived in apartments for almost a decade and I never want to share walls or floors/ceilings with other people again.
I don’t want to pay a quarter million plus to still here my neighbor walking around or playing music in their living room or anything else. Even the few feet of space plus exterior walls in OPs picture eliminate so much noise
I lived in three apartment buildings before buying my house, and each had very different noise characteristics. The first (old but remodeled) was very quiet, the second terrible (old and poorly maintained), and the third was acceptable (new-ish). It all has to do with how it’s built, and that’s something that can usually be figured out before buying if you talk to the neighbors.
So if you can find a good townhouse or condo where noise isn’t really an issue, then you get the benefits of a more compact living area, like being closer to downtown. Getting downtown from my current house takes 20-30 minutes, but for my coworkers who live in townhouses in the city, it’s like a 5 min train ride.
So when the kids leave the house, I’ll be more interested in being close to things than the benefits of a house (space, quiet, etc).
Yeah, but you’ll have to deal with an HOA with a townhouse. At least with this it’s your property.
Most of those have an HOA too. My house doesn’t, which was a huge selling point.
Almost every American suburb has an hoa just like condos, cities make the HOAs take care of common ground like street lights, roads, minor water features, etc so they don’t have to. My HOAs is responsible for our road, sidewalks, retaining walls on the hills surrounding the subdivision, the creek running through our subdivision, streetlights, and a bunch more. So the city collects our tax dollars as residents but spends very little on infrastructure we use. And I guess technically it’s my land, I consider it as belonging to the bank until I pay it off in another 27 years lol
You should see NYC boroughs. Smaller than that, attached, no yard or parking space. $900K!
The “suburban dream” looks to be dying out for capitalism reasons (not to mention the exaustion of land a commutable distance by car from cities) and the yard is becoming inceasingly vestigial. Soon they’ll reinvent townhomes
So glad I got 2.5% on my 30 year fixed a couple of years ago when I refi’d.
I NEVER thought I would see a rate that low. I am still amazed at it.
Purchased a house at about the same interest rate weeks before the rates went up. I am also still amazed at the timing and where we are.
I unfortunately wasn’t able to refinance, but I’m still significantly below 4%. I don’t think I could afford to buy my own house today with current rates and house values because my mortgage would more than double.
Below 4% is a huge win. I bought my house in 2007 at 6.5%. Refinanced after the financial meltdown at 5% then again in 2012 at 3.25%.
It’s been an absolute gift to build equity with such a low rate, but I’m also lucky that I didn’t have to move.
My wife wants to build a house, and I told her we’ll think about it once rates come down a bit, otherwise we’ll just build with cash later in life.
2.75 on a 20 year when I refinanced in…2020 I think. You can bet your ass I have zero plans to sell. I would like some more land but not right now.
Over 7.25% for some loans today. Definitely making an impact on the market as a whole right now
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Buying a home is more expensive because of the added cost of financing the mortgage, and homeowners who previously locked in lower rates are reluctant to sell.
“The economy continues to do better than expected and the 10-year Treasury yield has moved up, causing mortgage rates to climb,” said Sam Khater, Freddie Mac’s chief economist.
Treasuries moved higher as investors reacted to the release of the Federal Reserve’s meeting minutes on Wednesday, which said members are worried that inflation will linger longer than expected at an elevated level, said George Ratiu, Chief Economist at Keeping Current Matters, a real estate market insights and content company.
“With the view of the late 1970s’ twin inflation peaks firmly in its monetary lens, the central bank remains determined to bring price growth to the 2.0% target,” he said.
While this strong economic data might cool worries about an imminent recession, it could give rise to concerns that interest rates might stay elevated for an extended period, she said.
“As a result, the Fed may opt to take another ‘wait-and-see’ strategy in its upcoming meeting, which may help potentially mitigate the recent upward trajectory of mortgage rates,” Xu said.
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