Small potatoes. Won’t make much difference.

I personally know multiple people who are sitting on the sidelines including a 40ish couple with 2 small kids and $200k+ in savings stuffed in a rental waiting for rates to go down to buy a SFH, a small family who would like to upgrade to a home with more than 1 bathroom, etc. Rates under 5 will make these folks move.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The rates need to get low enough that people who feel trapped by their good rate will be willing to sell. If you have a 3% mortgage, 5.99 isn’t going to do that for you. The question is, what number will?

Why would people want to move in the US? To where? The job market sucks. There is no manufacturing boom. Unemployment is rising, and inflation is holding steady.

the unemployment rate is 4.5% and the inflation rate is 2.7%. Not bad, really.

From where are you getting your numbers?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The rates need to get low enough that people who feel trapped by their good rate will be willing to sell. If you have a 3% mortgage, 5.99 isn’t going to do that for you. The question is, what number will?

Why would people want to move in the US? To where? The job market sucks. There is no manufacturing boom. Unemployment is rising, and inflation is holding steady.

the unemployment rate is 4.5% and the inflation rate is 2.7%. Not bad, really.

I trust any number coming out of this administration. Boots on the ground says both are up, wildly so.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The rates need to get low enough that people who feel trapped by their good rate will be willing to sell. If you have a 3% mortgage, 5.99 isn’t going to do that for you. The question is, what number will?

Why would people want to move in the US? To where? The job market sucks. There is no manufacturing boom. Unemployment is rising, and inflation is holding steady.

the unemployment rate is 4.5% and the inflation rate is 2.7%. Not bad, really.

40 percent of people have no mortgage. And I work at a bank in 2020 and 2021 a lot of refinances on existing property holders were into 10 and 15 year mortgages.

For instance in spring 2020 I almost refinanced to a 10 year 1.99 mortgage. If I did by now it is already becoming mainly principal and 2020 gone.

Yea folks who put down 3-20 percent in an expensive home in 2020-2021 and got a 2.99 percent 30 year loan are locked in.

But today they announced there are more 6 percent mortgages outstanding than 3 percent mortgages. My block for instance the last home purchased was in 2018. Average owner on block has lived here 20-30 years. It is not like low rates will cause homes to sell. No home on my block has sold since 2018.

And you be suprised at amount of 5/5s and 7/1s out there. My bank even has a 10/1 and a few people in 2021 did the 10/1 even at lower rates than the 30 at all time lows. I say a 10/1 we did at 1.99 percent in 2021.

It is great news for Credit unions in particular they hold a boat load of non mark to market 30 year mortgages from spring 2020 to Spring 2022 that are way underwater. They will pop in value thank god or they can now sell them without taking a huge loss

We got a mortgage at 7% in early 2024. If the rates drop enough we will refinance to a 15-year mortgage.

Anonymous wrote:Housing will become nationalised if you have a mortgage. My advice? Pay it off ASAP. Google what happened in Eastern Europe (Hint: Romania) when the housing became nationalised. Good luck!!

Uh, what?

Anonymous wrote:The rates need to get low enough that people who feel trapped by their good rate will be willing to sell. If you have a 3% mortgage, 5.99 isn’t going to do that for you. The question is, what number will?

Why would people want to move in the US? To where? The job market sucks. There is no manufacturing boom. Unemployment is rising, and inflation is holding steady.

Housing will become nationalised if you have a mortgage. My advice? Pay it off ASAP. Google what happened in Eastern Europe (Hint: Romania) when the housing became nationalised. Good luck!!

Anonymous wrote:The rates need to get low enough that people who feel trapped by their good rate will be willing to sell. If you have a 3% mortgage, 5.99 isn’t going to do that for you. The question is, what number will?

Under 5% (like 4.9%, 4.7% etc) starts to make it more appealing for lots of people to move.

Only 20% of current mortgage holders have sub-3% rates.

The rates need to get low enough that people who feel trapped by their good rate will be willing to sell. If you have a 3% mortgage, 5.99 isn’t going to do that for you. The question is, what number will?

Uh…ok. Not sure about all that.

If rates drop a bit more I will definitely re-fi!

it is better news for people and banks that hold long dated mortgage back bonds.

Flagstar Bank, Dime Community Bank, Bank of America have a lot of long date mortgages on their books that now have a big pop in value.

And places like Opendoor, Rocket Mortgage that do mortgage refinancings great news.

And not everyone refinances. I noticed in Spring 2020 to Spring 2022 a lot of higher coupon mortgages were not refinanced among well off people at a few banks that did a lot of CD specials in 2015-2020. As those CDs matured Spring 2020 to Spring 2022 a lot of customers just started prepaying mortgages rather than roll it over at near zero. Not a bad problem to have. But kinda silly to refinance when you have 5 year 100k jumbo CDs you took out in 2015, 2016 and 2017 maturing in March 2020, 2021 and 2022 at near zero you can just put towards mortgage.

I myself had a 150K one year CD maturing Fall 2020 and instead of refinancing I just put it towards principal.

Today for instance on My Fidelity Screen of the 2,000 Maryland Muni bonds for sale only three had a yield above 5 percent and they were long dated risk bonds.

As recently Fall 2024 there would be hundres of 5 plus muni bonds in Maryland some paying 5.5 percent tax free. Same goes for Treasuries. If we do get 100 BPs cuts in 2026 you might see a lot of people with car loans, mortgages, student loans, HELOCs etc start paying down debt as no point buying a 1 percent CD when you have a 6 percent mortgage.

This is amazing news for all of us that got mortgages in the last couple years!!

https://www.cnbc.com/2026/01/09/heres-whats-happening-now-with-mortgage-rates-.html

Today, the 30-year fixed fell to 5.99. heck yeah!

Economists saying it could drop another 25-50 basis points.