The Expert Podcast

Interest rates, interest rates—what is happening with interest rates? So, we had a little bit of a head fake, like we knew we would. We talked about it last year when rates went down a little bit. They were up at 8.5%, almost 9%, and then they dropped to the low to mid sixes. I'm talking about mortgage rates now. It seemed like maybe rates were coming down. Well, that was a head fake.

Now they're back over 7% again, and it looks like they're going to keep going up. Some very high-profile real estate people are saying that interest rates are high. Even the government says that interest rates aren’t going anywhere. The rates did little to slow the economy. That means they’re going to have to do more interest rate hikes, right? They're going to have to jack them up even higher because the rate hikes they already did didn’t slow down the economy. And you don’t want to have more inflation.

I suspect that mortgage rates will be back up around 8% again by mid-year. They might try to hold them off a little bit before the election, but as soon as we get to the end of the year, they’ll be back up again. That’s the normal range for rates.

So, factor that into what you think is going to happen with your potential real estate purchases. Maybe buy something now if you can get anywhere near 7% because it’s probably going to go up again. Upper single-digit rates are in our future for the foreseeable horizon. They’re not going to get much lower than that.