I was so close and now I’m shut out

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Feel free to share any 2021 articles or clips of any news broadcast that suggested to buyers that they should buy ASAP before interest rates go up. What I saw in the news was more along the lines of: https://www.cnn.com/2021/06/16/homes/us-housing-market-offers/index.html

What do homebuyers have to do to get a house in this cutthroat real estate market? Offer sellers a Caribbean vacation? Bid $1 million over the asking price? Pay a competing bidder hundreds of thousands of dollars to walk away?

What about buying two homes just to live in one?

Here you go:
https://www.sfgate.com/realestate/article/Sound-Off-Why-are-interest-rates-so-low-and-how-15820006.php

The article literally ends with this sentence:
"If you haven’t taken advantage of these low rates I suggest you reach out to your lender and get the process started, you’ll be happy you did."

The one article from 2020 that you found includes the following:

Interest rates are likely to stay low for years as the economy fights its way back from the coronavirus pandemic, according to Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell. He was quoted as saying “We think that the economy’s going to need low interest rates, which support economic activity for an extended period of time—it will be measured in years. However long it takes, we’re going to be there—we’re not going to prematurely withdraw the support that we think the economy needs.”

It looks like buyers will have access to low rates for years to come......perhaps not as low as they are now, but very low from a historical standpoint.

They did stay low and they are still low by historical standards.

You're really reaching here. None of the above (including the one article you found from 2020 - when I asked for 2021 - from a local publication across the country, in which it clearly conveys that interest rates will remain low for "years") suggests buyers should have reasonably been able to predict the largest and most rapid increase in interest rates since the early 1980s.

By the end of 2021, the writing was on the wall. In early 2022, the fed signalled it would likely raise rates at each of the remaining meetings last year. If you were on the sidelines, should’ve jumped in. Many others did.

We did jump in and buy in 2021, thanks for your concern. As someone who made the right choice in your mind, I can tell you it had nothing to do with what we predicted with respect to the market or interest rates. We really just needed a house. We went in believing we were buying at the worst possible time. News reports about the market were all over the place. Many people thought once interest rates went up, prices would go down. That hasn't happened yet.

A close friend who sat out the market in 2021 was thinking of sitting it out again in 2022. I as a non-expert who happened to be reading a lot of articles about real estate didn't say "get in now, the fed has signalled they will raise interest rates". I said, "Unless you think there is going to be a large increase in housing supply in your city, things are not going to get better for buyers". I had zero awareness of what was going on with interest rates. I'm obviously not saying that to brag. It's just preposterous to expect regular buyers to be able to predict how rises in interest rates will impact their ability to buy a home, and when.

“Preposterous?” Really? As a buyer, one of my main considerations was interest rates!

Okay? If you can predict the exact timing and degree of rate increases and how specifically that will impact home prices in your target neighborhood, and when, then you are in a very, very small (nonexistent) group of buyers.

A lot of people knew that increased rates, which were telegraphed by the Fed, would lead to costlier mortgages. Rates were around what they are now before 2008, when the Fed started keeping the economy afloat with record low rates. A lot of people on here need to pay more attention to financial news than the latest news about Trump or Biden. Too much of people’s bandwith is consumed obsessing over things that are out of there control.

Exactly. Buying a house is most people’s biggest expense/asset, so to say “I paid no attention to interest rates and financial news” seems absurd.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Feel free to share any 2021 articles or clips of any news broadcast that suggested to buyers that they should buy ASAP before interest rates go up. What I saw in the news was more along the lines of: https://www.cnn.com/2021/06/16/homes/us-housing-market-offers/index.html

What do homebuyers have to do to get a house in this cutthroat real estate market? Offer sellers a Caribbean vacation? Bid $1 million over the asking price? Pay a competing bidder hundreds of thousands of dollars to walk away?

What about buying two homes just to live in one?

Here you go:
https://www.sfgate.com/realestate/article/Sound-Off-Why-are-interest-rates-so-low-and-how-15820006.php

The article literally ends with this sentence:
"If you haven’t taken advantage of these low rates I suggest you reach out to your lender and get the process started, you’ll be happy you did."

The one article from 2020 that you found includes the following:

Interest rates are likely to stay low for years as the economy fights its way back from the coronavirus pandemic, according to Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell. He was quoted as saying “We think that the economy’s going to need low interest rates, which support economic activity for an extended period of time—it will be measured in years. However long it takes, we’re going to be there—we’re not going to prematurely withdraw the support that we think the economy needs.”

It looks like buyers will have access to low rates for years to come......perhaps not as low as they are now, but very low from a historical standpoint.

They did stay low and they are still low by historical standards.

You're really reaching here. None of the above (including the one article you found from 2020 - when I asked for 2021 - from a local publication across the country, in which it clearly conveys that interest rates will remain low for "years") suggests buyers should have reasonably been able to predict the largest and most rapid increase in interest rates since the early 1980s.

By the end of 2021, the writing was on the wall. In early 2022, the fed signalled it would likely raise rates at each of the remaining meetings last year. If you were on the sidelines, should’ve jumped in. Many others did.

We did jump in and buy in 2021, thanks for your concern. As someone who made the right choice in your mind, I can tell you it had nothing to do with what we predicted with respect to the market or interest rates. We really just needed a house. We went in believing we were buying at the worst possible time. News reports about the market were all over the place. Many people thought once interest rates went up, prices would go down. That hasn't happened yet.

A close friend who sat out the market in 2021 was thinking of sitting it out again in 2022. I as a non-expert who happened to be reading a lot of articles about real estate didn't say "get in now, the fed has signalled they will raise interest rates". I said, "Unless you think there is going to be a large increase in housing supply in your city, things are not going to get better for buyers". I had zero awareness of what was going on with interest rates. I'm obviously not saying that to brag. It's just preposterous to expect regular buyers to be able to predict how rises in interest rates will impact their ability to buy a home, and when.

“Preposterous?” Really? As a buyer, one of my main considerations was interest rates!

Okay? If you can predict the exact timing and degree of rate increases and how specifically that will impact home prices in your target neighborhood, and when, then you are in a very, very small (nonexistent) group of buyers.

Not saying I could predict it exactly, but when I started looking and paying attention to the fed, I knew I had to act quickly. All my friends and coworkers always talked about interest rates when we discussed buying real estate.

Everyone knew interest rates were going up by end-2021. The question was what prices would do in response. That still isn't totally clear

Even experts had no idea what would happen
Here is what an "expert" thought at the time:

Daryl Fairweather, chief economist for Redfin: After two years of unprecedented uncertainty in the housing market, we’re expecting 2022 to be just as unpredictable. We expect 30-year-fixed mortgage rates to slowly rise from around 3% to around 3.6 by the end of the year, mostly attributed to the pandemic subsiding and inflation continuing to linger.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/brendarichardson/2021/12/13/experts-predict-what-the-housing-market-will-look-like-in-2022/?sh=446f68743942

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Feel free to share any 2021 articles or clips of any news broadcast that suggested to buyers that they should buy ASAP before interest rates go up. What I saw in the news was more along the lines of: https://www.cnn.com/2021/06/16/homes/us-housing-market-offers/index.html

What do homebuyers have to do to get a house in this cutthroat real estate market? Offer sellers a Caribbean vacation? Bid $1 million over the asking price? Pay a competing bidder hundreds of thousands of dollars to walk away?

What about buying two homes just to live in one?

Here you go:
https://www.sfgate.com/realestate/article/Sound-Off-Why-are-interest-rates-so-low-and-how-15820006.php

The article literally ends with this sentence:
"If you haven’t taken advantage of these low rates I suggest you reach out to your lender and get the process started, you’ll be happy you did."

The one article from 2020 that you found includes the following:

Interest rates are likely to stay low for years as the economy fights its way back from the coronavirus pandemic, according to Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell. He was quoted as saying “We think that the economy’s going to need low interest rates, which support economic activity for an extended period of time—it will be measured in years. However long it takes, we’re going to be there—we’re not going to prematurely withdraw the support that we think the economy needs.”

It looks like buyers will have access to low rates for years to come......perhaps not as low as they are now, but very low from a historical standpoint.

They did stay low and they are still low by historical standards.

You're really reaching here. None of the above (including the one article you found from 2020 - when I asked for 2021 - from a local publication across the country, in which it clearly conveys that interest rates will remain low for "years") suggests buyers should have reasonably been able to predict the largest and most rapid increase in interest rates since the early 1980s.

By the end of 2021, the writing was on the wall. In early 2022, the fed signalled it would likely raise rates at each of the remaining meetings last year. If you were on the sidelines, should’ve jumped in. Many others did.

We did jump in and buy in 2021, thanks for your concern. As someone who made the right choice in your mind, I can tell you it had nothing to do with what we predicted with respect to the market or interest rates. We really just needed a house. We went in believing we were buying at the worst possible time. News reports about the market were all over the place. Many people thought once interest rates went up, prices would go down. That hasn't happened yet.

A close friend who sat out the market in 2021 was thinking of sitting it out again in 2022. I as a non-expert who happened to be reading a lot of articles about real estate didn't say "get in now, the fed has signalled they will raise interest rates". I said, "Unless you think there is going to be a large increase in housing supply in your city, things are not going to get better for buyers". I had zero awareness of what was going on with interest rates. I'm obviously not saying that to brag. It's just preposterous to expect regular buyers to be able to predict how rises in interest rates will impact their ability to buy a home, and when.

“Preposterous?” Really? As a buyer, one of my main considerations was interest rates!

Okay? If you can predict the exact timing and degree of rate increases and how specifically that will impact home prices in your target neighborhood, and when, then you are in a very, very small (nonexistent) group of buyers.

A lot of people knew that increased rates, which were telegraphed by the Fed, would lead to costlier mortgages. Rates were around what they are now before 2008, when the Fed started keeping the economy afloat with record low rates. A lot of people on here need to pay more attention to financial news than the latest news about Trump or Biden. Too much of people’s bandwith is consumed obsessing over things that are out of there control.

Exactly. Buying a house is most people’s biggest expense/asset, so to say “I paid no attention to interest rates and financial news” seems absurd.

It is really easy to make up a statement nobody said and call it absurd. Good job.

It is one thing to look up interest rates to figure out what your monthly payment will be. It is another to claim to have said" I definitely need to buy in 2021 because the market will go bananas in early 2022 when the Fed starts raising interest rates which will double by 2023."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can we all agree that it's majorly tone deaf to complain that you can't afford a $1.7 Million dollar house? I mean COME ON. There are plenty of houses that someone can afford $1.3 Million at these interest rates (OP DID say that she could afford a $1.3 Million house now, not a $1.7 Million one) can buy that are still very nice and decent commuting distance to DC.

Yes, this is exactly the point. Sure, you can be sad that you can't get as much as before, but you can still get a house if that is your priority.

Ding, ding, ding. And this is why so many people on this board are annoyed. OP's not complaining that she only has $500K to spend and can't find a SFH within a 30 minute commute of DC because she's a single mom and needs to be able to easily get home for her kids. I would have so much sympathy for someone in that situation complaining about being shut out of the market. It's a tough situation. The reality is that for $1.3 Million, OP can find a decent house within easy commuting distance of DC. I know she can, I'm doing it now -- finding decent options around $1 Million where my commute will be 30 minutes. Are they new construction 5BR,4BA with a gourmet kitchen and sunroom? No, but they're solidly built, four bedrooms plus a rec room, new-ish kitchens and bathrooms and plenty of space for my family of four in good school districts.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So much of this thread reeks of UMC people who could "only" afford $700k in 2020, were locked out of the White schools - oops, sorry I meant W schools - and are insecure and lashing out at someone who has a little more money than they do.

I don’t really even know what this comment is trying to say or who it’s directed to.

But that is one of the points being made - OP is complaining to people who have far less than she does, saying a $1 million house is not good enough, which is what is rubbing folks the wrong way, especially if they live in a $700k house and are doing just fine.

It’s just over the top dramatic to whine that those people all live in hovels she would never deign to buy, therefore she is destined to be middle class forever (boo hoo).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So much of this thread reeks of UMC people who could "only" afford $700k in 2020, were locked out of the White schools - oops, sorry I meant W schools - and are insecure and lashing out at someone who has a little more money than they do.

I don’t really even know what this comment is trying to say or who it’s directed to.

But that is one of the points being made - OP is complaining to people who have far less than she does, saying a $1 million house is not good enough, which is what is rubbing folks the wrong way, especially if they live in a $700k house and are doing just fine.

It’s just over the top dramatic to whine that those people all live in hovels she would never deign to buy, therefore she is destined to be middle class forever (boo hoo).

What is over the top dramatic is to claim OP ever said anyone is living '"in hovels".

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Feel free to share any 2021 articles or clips of any news broadcast that suggested to buyers that they should buy ASAP before interest rates go up. What I saw in the news was more along the lines of: https://www.cnn.com/2021/06/16/homes/us-housing-market-offers/index.html

What do homebuyers have to do to get a house in this cutthroat real estate market? Offer sellers a Caribbean vacation? Bid $1 million over the asking price? Pay a competing bidder hundreds of thousands of dollars to walk away?

What about buying two homes just to live in one?

Here you go:
https://www.sfgate.com/realestate/article/Sound-Off-Why-are-interest-rates-so-low-and-how-15820006.php

The article literally ends with this sentence:
"If you haven’t taken advantage of these low rates I suggest you reach out to your lender and get the process started, you’ll be happy you did."

The one article from 2020 that you found includes the following:

Interest rates are likely to stay low for years as the economy fights its way back from the coronavirus pandemic, according to Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell. He was quoted as saying “We think that the economy’s going to need low interest rates, which support economic activity for an extended period of time—it will be measured in years. However long it takes, we’re going to be there—we’re not going to prematurely withdraw the support that we think the economy needs.”

It looks like buyers will have access to low rates for years to come......perhaps not as low as they are now, but very low from a historical standpoint.

They did stay low and they are still low by historical standards.

You're really reaching here. None of the above (including the one article you found from 2020 - when I asked for 2021 - from a local publication across the country, in which it clearly conveys that interest rates will remain low for "years") suggests buyers should have reasonably been able to predict the largest and most rapid increase in interest rates since the early 1980s.

By the end of 2021, the writing was on the wall. In early 2022, the fed signalled it would likely raise rates at each of the remaining meetings last year. If you were on the sidelines, should’ve jumped in. Many others did.

We did jump in and buy in 2021, thanks for your concern. As someone who made the right choice in your mind, I can tell you it had nothing to do with what we predicted with respect to the market or interest rates. We really just needed a house. We went in believing we were buying at the worst possible time. News reports about the market were all over the place. Many people thought once interest rates went up, prices would go down. That hasn't happened yet.

A close friend who sat out the market in 2021 was thinking of sitting it out again in 2022. I as a non-expert who happened to be reading a lot of articles about real estate didn't say "get in now, the fed has signalled they will raise interest rates". I said, "Unless you think there is going to be a large increase in housing supply in your city, things are not going to get better for buyers". I had zero awareness of what was going on with interest rates. I'm obviously not saying that to brag. It's just preposterous to expect regular buyers to be able to predict how rises in interest rates will impact their ability to buy a home, and when.

“Preposterous?” Really? As a buyer, one of my main considerations was interest rates!

Okay? If you can predict the exact timing and degree of rate increases and how specifically that will impact home prices in your target neighborhood, and when, then you are in a very, very small (nonexistent) group of buyers.

A lot of people knew that increased rates, which were telegraphed by the Fed, would lead to costlier mortgages. Rates were around what they are now before 2008, when the Fed started keeping the economy afloat with record low rates. A lot of people on here need to pay more attention to financial news than the latest news about Trump or Biden. Too much of people’s bandwith is consumed obsessing over things that are out of there control.

Exactly. Buying a house is most people’s biggest expense/asset, so to say “I paid no attention to interest rates and financial news” seems absurd.

It is really easy to make up a statement nobody said and call it absurd. Good job.

It is one thing to look up interest rates to figure out what your monthly payment will be. It is another to claim to have said" I definitely need to buy in 2021 because the market will go bananas in early 2022 when the Fed starts raising interest rates which will double by 2023."

If you were sitting on the sidelines in 2021 and you heard in early 2022 that the fed was going to raise rates multiple times throughout the rest of the year, why not buy?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So much of this thread reeks of UMC people who could "only" afford $700k in 2020, were locked out of the White schools - oops, sorry I meant W schools - and are insecure and lashing out at someone who has a little more money than they do.

I don’t really even know what this comment is trying to say or who it’s directed to.

But that is one of the points being made - OP is complaining to people who have far less than she does, saying a $1 million house is not good enough, which is what is rubbing folks the wrong way, especially if they live in a $700k house and are doing just fine.

It’s just over the top dramatic to whine that those people all live in hovels she would never deign to buy, therefore she is destined to be middle class forever (boo hoo).

What is over the top dramatic is to claim OP ever said anyone is living '"in hovels".

Well clearly they aren’t good enough for her, however she wants to describe them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can we all agree that it's majorly tone deaf to complain that you can't afford a $1.7 Million dollar house? I mean COME ON. There are plenty of houses that someone can afford $1.3 Million at these interest rates (OP DID say that she could afford a $1.3 Million house now, not a $1.7 Million one) can buy that are still very nice and decent commuting distance to DC.

Yes, this is exactly the point. Sure, you can be sad that you can't get as much as before, but you can still get a house if that is your priority.

Ding, ding, ding. And this is why so many people on this board are annoyed. OP's not complaining that she only has $500K to spend and can't find a SFH within a 30 minute commute of DC because she's a single mom and needs to be able to easily get home for her kids. I would have so much sympathy for someone in that situation complaining about being shut out of the market. It's a tough situation. The reality is that for $1.3 Million, OP can find a decent house within easy commuting distance of DC. I know she can, I'm doing it now -- finding decent options around $1 Million where my commute will be 30 minutes. Are they new construction 5BR,4BA with a gourmet kitchen and sunroom? No, but they're solidly built, four bedrooms plus a rec room, new-ish kitchens and bathrooms and plenty of space for my family of four in good school districts.

+1

Still don’t see the issue with OP buying a $1 mil house now.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Feel free to share any 2021 articles or clips of any news broadcast that suggested to buyers that they should buy ASAP before interest rates go up. What I saw in the news was more along the lines of: https://www.cnn.com/2021/06/16/homes/us-housing-market-offers/index.html

What do homebuyers have to do to get a house in this cutthroat real estate market? Offer sellers a Caribbean vacation? Bid $1 million over the asking price? Pay a competing bidder hundreds of thousands of dollars to walk away?

What about buying two homes just to live in one?

Here you go:
https://www.sfgate.com/realestate/article/Sound-Off-Why-are-interest-rates-so-low-and-how-15820006.php

The article literally ends with this sentence:
"If you haven’t taken advantage of these low rates I suggest you reach out to your lender and get the process started, you’ll be happy you did."

The one article from 2020 that you found includes the following:

Interest rates are likely to stay low for years as the economy fights its way back from the coronavirus pandemic, according to Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell. He was quoted as saying “We think that the economy’s going to need low interest rates, which support economic activity for an extended period of time—it will be measured in years. However long it takes, we’re going to be there—we’re not going to prematurely withdraw the support that we think the economy needs.”

It looks like buyers will have access to low rates for years to come......perhaps not as low as they are now, but very low from a historical standpoint.

They did stay low and they are still low by historical standards.

You're really reaching here. None of the above (including the one article you found from 2020 - when I asked for 2021 - from a local publication across the country, in which it clearly conveys that interest rates will remain low for "years") suggests buyers should have reasonably been able to predict the largest and most rapid increase in interest rates since the early 1980s.

By the end of 2021, the writing was on the wall. In early 2022, the fed signalled it would likely raise rates at each of the remaining meetings last year. If you were on the sidelines, should’ve jumped in. Many others did.

We did jump in and buy in 2021, thanks for your concern. As someone who made the right choice in your mind, I can tell you it had nothing to do with what we predicted with respect to the market or interest rates. We really just needed a house. We went in believing we were buying at the worst possible time. News reports about the market were all over the place. Many people thought once interest rates went up, prices would go down. That hasn't happened yet.

A close friend who sat out the market in 2021 was thinking of sitting it out again in 2022. I as a non-expert who happened to be reading a lot of articles about real estate didn't say "get in now, the fed has signalled they will raise interest rates". I said, "Unless you think there is going to be a large increase in housing supply in your city, things are not going to get better for buyers". I had zero awareness of what was going on with interest rates. I'm obviously not saying that to brag. It's just preposterous to expect regular buyers to be able to predict how rises in interest rates will impact their ability to buy a home, and when.

“Preposterous?” Really? As a buyer, one of my main considerations was interest rates!

Okay? If you can predict the exact timing and degree of rate increases and how specifically that will impact home prices in your target neighborhood, and when, then you are in a very, very small (nonexistent) group of buyers.

A lot of people knew that increased rates, which were telegraphed by the Fed, would lead to costlier mortgages. Rates were around what they are now before 2008, when the Fed started keeping the economy afloat with record low rates. A lot of people on here need to pay more attention to financial news than the latest news about Trump or Biden. Too much of people’s bandwith is consumed obsessing over things that are out of there control.

Exactly. Buying a house is most people’s biggest expense/asset, so to say “I paid no attention to interest rates and financial news” seems absurd.

It is really easy to make up a statement nobody said and call it absurd. Good job.

It is one thing to look up interest rates to figure out what your monthly payment will be. It is another to claim to have said" I definitely need to buy in 2021 because the market will go bananas in early 2022 when the Fed starts raising interest rates which will double by 2023."

If you were sitting on the sidelines in 2021 and you heard in early 2022 that the fed was going to raise rates multiple times throughout the rest of the year, why not buy?

Again, I am someone who bought in 2021. Why didn't I buy in 2019 when interest rates were historically low?

- we didn't quite know what we wanted
- we wanted to save a little long to have enough cushion for unpredictable repairs
- we didn't like what we were seeing (low supply) and felt prices were too high
- it had been over a decade since the last recession, we thought another one was coming and the housing market would crash

Obviously, not buying in 2019 was a mistake. But it shows that there are a multitude of factors that drive whether and when people decide to buy a home

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can we all agree that it's majorly tone deaf to complain that you can't afford a $1.7 Million dollar house? I mean COME ON. There are plenty of houses that someone can afford $1.3 Million at these interest rates (OP DID say that she could afford a $1.3 Million house now, not a $1.7 Million one) can buy that are still very nice and decent commuting distance to DC.

Yes, this is exactly the point. Sure, you can be sad that you can't get as much as before, but you can still get a house if that is your priority.

Ding, ding, ding. And this is why so many people on this board are annoyed. OP's not complaining that she only has $500K to spend and can't find a SFH within a 30 minute commute of DC because she's a single mom and needs to be able to easily get home for her kids. I would have so much sympathy for someone in that situation complaining about being shut out of the market. It's a tough situation. The reality is that for $1.3 Million, OP can find a decent house within easy commuting distance of DC. I know she can, I'm doing it now -- finding decent options around $1 Million where my commute will be 30 minutes. Are they new construction 5BR,4BA with a gourmet kitchen and sunroom? No, but they're solidly built, four bedrooms plus a rec room, new-ish kitchens and bathrooms and plenty of space for my family of four in good school districts.

+1

Still don’t see the issue with OP buying a $1 mil house now.

Because OP doesn’t want to compromise on location, schools, size, or condition of the home. OP is “dream home or bust.” But that only works when you are rich enough to pay all cash and are not sensitive to interest rates.

For the rest of us plebes, we need equity gains in order to trade up to the dream home.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So much of this thread reeks of UMC people who could "only" afford $700k in 2020, were locked out of the White schools - oops, sorry I meant W schools - and are insecure and lashing out at someone who has a little more money than they do.

I don’t really even know what this comment is trying to say or who it’s directed to.

But that is one of the points being made - OP is complaining to people who have far less than she does, saying a $1 million house is not good enough, which is what is rubbing folks the wrong way, especially if they live in a $700k house and are doing just fine.

It’s just over the top dramatic to whine that those people all live in hovels she would never deign to buy, therefore she is destined to be middle class forever (boo hoo).

What is over the top dramatic is to claim OP ever said anyone is living '"in hovels".

Well clearly they aren’t good enough for her, however she wants to describe them.

Why don't you live in a $300k home? Clearly by living in something more expensive you are implicitly calling all cheaper homes "hovels"

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Feel free to share any 2021 articles or clips of any news broadcast that suggested to buyers that they should buy ASAP before interest rates go up. What I saw in the news was more along the lines of: https://www.cnn.com/2021/06/16/homes/us-housing-market-offers/index.html

What do homebuyers have to do to get a house in this cutthroat real estate market? Offer sellers a Caribbean vacation? Bid $1 million over the asking price? Pay a competing bidder hundreds of thousands of dollars to walk away?

What about buying two homes just to live in one?

Here you go:
https://www.sfgate.com/realestate/article/Sound-Off-Why-are-interest-rates-so-low-and-how-15820006.php

The article literally ends with this sentence:
"If you haven’t taken advantage of these low rates I suggest you reach out to your lender and get the process started, you’ll be happy you did."

The one article from 2020 that you found includes the following:

Interest rates are likely to stay low for years as the economy fights its way back from the coronavirus pandemic, according to Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell. He was quoted as saying “We think that the economy’s going to need low interest rates, which support economic activity for an extended period of time—it will be measured in years. However long it takes, we’re going to be there—we’re not going to prematurely withdraw the support that we think the economy needs.”

It looks like buyers will have access to low rates for years to come......perhaps not as low as they are now, but very low from a historical standpoint.

They did stay low and they are still low by historical standards.

You're really reaching here. None of the above (including the one article you found from 2020 - when I asked for 2021 - from a local publication across the country, in which it clearly conveys that interest rates will remain low for "years") suggests buyers should have reasonably been able to predict the largest and most rapid increase in interest rates since the early 1980s.

By the end of 2021, the writing was on the wall. In early 2022, the fed signalled it would likely raise rates at each of the remaining meetings last year. If you were on the sidelines, should’ve jumped in. Many others did.

We did jump in and buy in 2021, thanks for your concern. As someone who made the right choice in your mind, I can tell you it had nothing to do with what we predicted with respect to the market or interest rates. We really just needed a house. We went in believing we were buying at the worst possible time. News reports about the market were all over the place. Many people thought once interest rates went up, prices would go down. That hasn't happened yet.

A close friend who sat out the market in 2021 was thinking of sitting it out again in 2022. I as a non-expert who happened to be reading a lot of articles about real estate didn't say "get in now, the fed has signalled they will raise interest rates". I said, "Unless you think there is going to be a large increase in housing supply in your city, things are not going to get better for buyers". I had zero awareness of what was going on with interest rates. I'm obviously not saying that to brag. It's just preposterous to expect regular buyers to be able to predict how rises in interest rates will impact their ability to buy a home, and when.

“Preposterous?” Really? As a buyer, one of my main considerations was interest rates!

Okay? If you can predict the exact timing and degree of rate increases and how specifically that will impact home prices in your target neighborhood, and when, then you are in a very, very small (nonexistent) group of buyers.

A lot of people knew that increased rates, which were telegraphed by the Fed, would lead to costlier mortgages. Rates were around what they are now before 2008, when the Fed started keeping the economy afloat with record low rates. A lot of people on here need to pay more attention to financial news than the latest news about Trump or Biden. Too much of people’s bandwith is consumed obsessing over things that are out of there control.

Exactly. Buying a house is most people’s biggest expense/asset, so to say “I paid no attention to interest rates and financial news” seems absurd.

It is really easy to make up a statement nobody said and call it absurd. Good job.

It is one thing to look up interest rates to figure out what your monthly payment will be. It is another to claim to have said" I definitely need to buy in 2021 because the market will go bananas in early 2022 when the Fed starts raising interest rates which will double by 2023."

If you were sitting on the sidelines in 2021 and you heard in early 2022 that the fed was going to raise rates multiple times throughout the rest of the year, why not buy?

Again, I am someone who bought in 2021. Why didn't I buy in 2019 when interest rates were historically low?

- we didn't quite know what we wanted
- we wanted to save a little long to have enough cushion for unpredictable repairs
- we didn't like what we were seeing (low supply) and felt prices were too high
- it had been over a decade since the last recession, we thought another one was coming and the housing market would crash

Obviously, not buying in 2019 was a mistake. But it shows that there are a multitude of factors that drive whether and when people decide to buy a home

To be fair, interest rates were 4% in 2019 prior to COVID.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Feel free to share any 2021 articles or clips of any news broadcast that suggested to buyers that they should buy ASAP before interest rates go up. What I saw in the news was more along the lines of: https://www.cnn.com/2021/06/16/homes/us-housing-market-offers/index.html

What do homebuyers have to do to get a house in this cutthroat real estate market? Offer sellers a Caribbean vacation? Bid $1 million over the asking price? Pay a competing bidder hundreds of thousands of dollars to walk away?

What about buying two homes just to live in one?

Here you go:
https://www.sfgate.com/realestate/article/Sound-Off-Why-are-interest-rates-so-low-and-how-15820006.php

The article literally ends with this sentence:
"If you haven’t taken advantage of these low rates I suggest you reach out to your lender and get the process started, you’ll be happy you did."

The one article from 2020 that you found includes the following:

Interest rates are likely to stay low for years as the economy fights its way back from the coronavirus pandemic, according to Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell. He was quoted as saying “We think that the economy’s going to need low interest rates, which support economic activity for an extended period of time—it will be measured in years. However long it takes, we’re going to be there—we’re not going to prematurely withdraw the support that we think the economy needs.”

It looks like buyers will have access to low rates for years to come......perhaps not as low as they are now, but very low from a historical standpoint.

They did stay low and they are still low by historical standards.

You're really reaching here. None of the above (including the one article you found from 2020 - when I asked for 2021 - from a local publication across the country, in which it clearly conveys that interest rates will remain low for "years") suggests buyers should have reasonably been able to predict the largest and most rapid increase in interest rates since the early 1980s.

By the end of 2021, the writing was on the wall. In early 2022, the fed signalled it would likely raise rates at each of the remaining meetings last year. If you were on the sidelines, should’ve jumped in. Many others did.

We did jump in and buy in 2021, thanks for your concern. As someone who made the right choice in your mind, I can tell you it had nothing to do with what we predicted with respect to the market or interest rates. We really just needed a house. We went in believing we were buying at the worst possible time. News reports about the market were all over the place. Many people thought once interest rates went up, prices would go down. That hasn't happened yet.

A close friend who sat out the market in 2021 was thinking of sitting it out again in 2022. I as a non-expert who happened to be reading a lot of articles about real estate didn't say "get in now, the fed has signalled they will raise interest rates". I said, "Unless you think there is going to be a large increase in housing supply in your city, things are not going to get better for buyers". I had zero awareness of what was going on with interest rates. I'm obviously not saying that to brag. It's just preposterous to expect regular buyers to be able to predict how rises in interest rates will impact their ability to buy a home, and when.

“Preposterous?” Really? As a buyer, one of my main considerations was interest rates!

Okay? If you can predict the exact timing and degree of rate increases and how specifically that will impact home prices in your target neighborhood, and when, then you are in a very, very small (nonexistent) group of buyers.

A lot of people knew that increased rates, which were telegraphed by the Fed, would lead to costlier mortgages. Rates were around what they are now before 2008, when the Fed started keeping the economy afloat with record low rates. A lot of people on here need to pay more attention to financial news than the latest news about Trump or Biden. Too much of people’s bandwith is consumed obsessing over things that are out of there control.

Exactly. Buying a house is most people’s biggest expense/asset, so to say “I paid no attention to interest rates and financial news” seems absurd.

It is really easy to make up a statement nobody said and call it absurd. Good job.

It is one thing to look up interest rates to figure out what your monthly payment will be. It is another to claim to have said" I definitely need to buy in 2021 because the market will go bananas in early 2022 when the Fed starts raising interest rates which will double by 2023."

If you were sitting on the sidelines in 2021 and you heard in early 2022 that the fed was going to raise rates multiple times throughout the rest of the year, why not buy?

Because pricaes were at all-time highs and many people thought they would crash and that rising rates would more than offset by the drop in prices. That could still happen, but it hasn't so far

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Feel free to share any 2021 articles or clips of any news broadcast that suggested to buyers that they should buy ASAP before interest rates go up. What I saw in the news was more along the lines of: https://www.cnn.com/2021/06/16/homes/us-housing-market-offers/index.html

What do homebuyers have to do to get a house in this cutthroat real estate market? Offer sellers a Caribbean vacation? Bid $1 million over the asking price? Pay a competing bidder hundreds of thousands of dollars to walk away?

What about buying two homes just to live in one?

Here you go:
https://www.sfgate.com/realestate/article/Sound-Off-Why-are-interest-rates-so-low-and-how-15820006.php

The article literally ends with this sentence:
"If you haven’t taken advantage of these low rates I suggest you reach out to your lender and get the process started, you’ll be happy you did."

The one article from 2020 that you found includes the following:

Interest rates are likely to stay low for years as the economy fights its way back from the coronavirus pandemic, according to Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell. He was quoted as saying “We think that the economy’s going to need low interest rates, which support economic activity for an extended period of time—it will be measured in years. However long it takes, we’re going to be there—we’re not going to prematurely withdraw the support that we think the economy needs.”

It looks like buyers will have access to low rates for years to come......perhaps not as low as they are now, but very low from a historical standpoint.

They did stay low and they are still low by historical standards.

You're really reaching here. None of the above (including the one article you found from 2020 - when I asked for 2021 - from a local publication across the country, in which it clearly conveys that interest rates will remain low for "years") suggests buyers should have reasonably been able to predict the largest and most rapid increase in interest rates since the early 1980s.

By the end of 2021, the writing was on the wall. In early 2022, the fed signalled it would likely raise rates at each of the remaining meetings last year. If you were on the sidelines, should’ve jumped in. Many others did.

We did jump in and buy in 2021, thanks for your concern. As someone who made the right choice in your mind, I can tell you it had nothing to do with what we predicted with respect to the market or interest rates. We really just needed a house. We went in believing we were buying at the worst possible time. News reports about the market were all over the place. Many people thought once interest rates went up, prices would go down. That hasn't happened yet.

A close friend who sat out the market in 2021 was thinking of sitting it out again in 2022. I as a non-expert who happened to be reading a lot of articles about real estate didn't say "get in now, the fed has signalled they will raise interest rates". I said, "Unless you think there is going to be a large increase in housing supply in your city, things are not going to get better for buyers". I had zero awareness of what was going on with interest rates. I'm obviously not saying that to brag. It's just preposterous to expect regular buyers to be able to predict how rises in interest rates will impact their ability to buy a home, and when.

“Preposterous?” Really? As a buyer, one of my main considerations was interest rates!

Okay? If you can predict the exact timing and degree of rate increases and how specifically that will impact home prices in your target neighborhood, and when, then you are in a very, very small (nonexistent) group of buyers.

A lot of people knew that increased rates, which were telegraphed by the Fed, would lead to costlier mortgages. Rates were around what they are now before 2008, when the Fed started keeping the economy afloat with record low rates. A lot of people on here need to pay more attention to financial news than the latest news about Trump or Biden. Too much of people’s bandwith is consumed obsessing over things that are out of there control.

Exactly. Buying a house is most people’s biggest expense/asset, so to say “I paid no attention to interest rates and financial news” seems absurd.

It is really easy to make up a statement nobody said and call it absurd. Good job.

It is one thing to look up interest rates to figure out what your monthly payment will be. It is another to claim to have said" I definitely need to buy in 2021 because the market will go bananas in early 2022 when the Fed starts raising interest rates which will double by 2023."

If you were sitting on the sidelines in 2021 and you heard in early 2022 that the fed was going to raise rates multiple times throughout the rest of the year, why not buy?

OP, and you clearly did not participate in the 2022 market. SFHs at $1M closed at $1.4M. Those at $1.2M closed at $1.6-1.8M.