With interest rates and prices high, Americans are postponing their home searches by years, not months...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:40 percent of homes have zero mortgage on the United States. So what is their reason for not moving?

And home prices really only shot up the last three to ten years. My section very few homes turn over and even the 60 percent with mortgages most of my neighbors have smaller mortgages.

I myself am down to $385k on a $1.5 million home.

Only people trapped by rates are 20-22 peak buyers with little down who locked in generational low rates. My neighbor who bought a fixer upper my block in 2016 is hardly locked in. Already paid 8 years of mortgage and bought it cheap,

We feel "trapped" because we are in a condo which we would struggle to sell right now -- high interest rates are scaring off first time buyers, which is who would buy our condo in a popular neighborhood for young professionals near metro.

At the same time, high prices and high rates mean we can't just sell our condo for less. I would like to, because I want out of it, but we wouldn't get enough to cover the extra costs associated with our having right now.

So instead we're staying in our condo while we save more money so that we can supplement existing equity with more cash.

So no, you are wrong that the only people trapped by high rates are people who bought in 2020-2022. There are more far reaching impacts of higher rates on supply and demand that affect many of us.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The public will get frustrated and will demand that rates go down to below 5-6%, especially in the election year.

That will just make house prices and all necessities skyrocket in price. The issue is that the dollar is easy to print but necessities require capital, labor and valuable resources. The FED doesn’t get into politics but appears to be willing to allow saving the currency to bring incredible discipline and actual reality to politicians

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:40 percent of homes have zero mortgage on the United States. So what is their reason for not moving?

And home prices really only shot up the last three to ten years. My section very few homes turn over and even the 60 percent with mortgages most of my neighbors have smaller mortgages.

I myself am down to $385k on a $1.5 million home.

Only people trapped by rates are 20-22 peak buyers with little down who locked in generational low rates. My neighbor who bought a fixer upper my block in 2016 is hardly locked in. Already paid 8 years of mortgage and bought it cheap,

They aren't moving from their paid off houses because they can't afford to downsize.

We could sell our house and make money, but just enough to pay cash for a smaller house in worse condition in a worse neighborhood. Or maybe an out of date condo in a decent neighborhood.

A lot of older people are in your same situation. It just doesn't make sense to downsize with the transaction costs and insanely high realtor fees.