Purchasing a home, which has long been an integral part of the American Dream, continues to grow more and more out of reach for the majority of Americans, as home-buying costs just reached yet another record high. Hurray for Bidenomics!
For young people like me, even renting has become nearly unaffordable, and buying a home is largely out of the question. But even older people might find their home-owning dreams fading. Mortgage rates just spiked again, according to Fox Business, on April 19, reaching the highest level yet for this year.
“Market conditions for homebuyers remain challenging with few homes listed and costs for ownership still climbing,” commented Ben Ayers, Nationwide senior economist, per Fox Business. “Despite strong fundamentals for demand from demographics and a strong labor market, many first-time buyers are being shut out of the market by elevated financing rates and rising prices.” From Fox:
Findings from Redfin show the combination of steep mortgage rates and elevated home prices has pushed the median monthly housing payment to a record $2,775 – an 11% increase from the same time last year.
Fox identified several reasons for the increase. Underbuilding and owners’ reluctance to sell post-pandemic are two, but of course increasing mortgage rates and the rising costs of materials for construction also contribute significantly to the issue. Economists predict continued high mortgage rates throughout the first half of 2024, with falling rates after Federal Reserve cuts, Fox explained. But the low rates during the Covid-19 pandemic are unlikely to come back again.
Mortgage buyer Freddie Mac said Thursday that the average rate on a 30-year loan this week crossed the 7% threshold for the first time this year, jumping from 6.88% to 7.1%. While that is down from a peak of 7.79% in the fall, it remains sharply higher than the pandemic-era lows of just 3%.
Fox quoted the Redfin report: “Some house hunters are hoping to buy now because they’re concerned rates could rise more, and others have grown accustomed to elevated rates and pushed down their home-price budget accordingly.”
It is mind-blowing that Biden’s campaign ads still claim he helped the ordinary American worker. The economic bad news just keeps coming, as inflation climbs up and up in spite of propaganda to the contrary, real wages drop, and the value of the dollar goes down both at home and abroad. And even while real wages are decreasing, inflation is costing Americans an estimated $1,000 extra every month.
Related: Joe Did That: Inflation Costs Americans an Extra $1K Monthly
The rich are doing well, but the rest of us are struggling. The wealthiest Americans reportedly increased their fortunes by $195 billion just in Biden’s first 100 days in office back in 2021, and it didn’t stop there. Economist Dave Brat noted on April 10 that the wealth of America’s top 1% hit a record $44 trillion. The top 1% own half of our country’s individually held stocks, while 87% of such stocks and mutual funds belong to the top 10% of Americans.
Biden’s economy helps the uber-rich, but it is absolutely disastrous for ordinary Americans.