Why Buying a Home in 2026 is Great Idea

SPEAKER_1 (0:02)

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Michael Zuber (0:31)

Hey Mike, how are you doing today?

SPEAKER_3 (0:33)

I'm doing good, man, this is gonna be fun. You get to ask me a bunch of questions.

Michael Zuber (0:37)

Yeah, I like being the one that gets to ask questions instead of answering questions. The host, right?

SPEAKER_3 (0:42)

Instead of being on And we'll. see you next time.

Michael Zuber (0:45)

Yeah, sometimes easier, I don't know, we'll see.

So look, obviously today, Thursday, we're filming every Thursday morning, and a lot has happened in the last week in regards to, I would say, online kind of scare tactics, which can be true or not, you tell me, but there's a lot of articles out there about hitting mortgage rates, specifically 14-month highs. I'll validate that. That is true if you're looking at a, you know, average 30-year conventional loan on a primary residence, right? But what do you take from that? Do you think it's going to only get higher, lower? Short-term NICs, we'll call it three months through the end of the year to 2027

SPEAKER_3 (1:30)

Yeah, so I think there's a couple of things in that that are a little nuanced but important. It is factually correct we are at a 14-month high. I don't know about 14 months, but the last 12 months, I got the numbers this morning. The last report was 6.87 or something like that. But 12 months ago, we were like 6.41 or something. So yes, it's higher but not meaningfully higher. Right? If you have a 200, 300, $400,000 mortgage, a 30-bip basis spread is not that much of a difference. But it is higher. And it is certainly reversing a trend where for much of the year, we were lower than last year. So the trend is meaningful. I think there's a couple of things.

I do not see how we stay below 7%. I think we're gonna have a 30-year mortgage with a seven-handle on it sometime in September.

Now, I don't see us going to seven and a half. So something with a seven, but low sevens. And it's really interesting, because if you look at the mortgage data this week that comes out on Wednesday, purchase applications were up week on week, even though we were at a 52-week high. Why is that? Well, folks, I told you this was coming. If you want to get mom and dad off the sidelines, give them fear of a seven-handle, not hope of a five-handle. When mom and dad have a hope of a five-handle, they wait, they sit on their hands. But they take action when they fear a seven-handle. So that's why purchase applications were up week on week. Again, the consumer is remarkably predictable.

But I think we're going to be in this range for quite a while, higher for longer. I can't see currently over 7.5, 30-year mortgage. I don't see us go below 6.5 over the next 12 months, barring a significant recession or AI blow up, right? There's always those two nasty caveats. But we're in a higher for longer environment, which to me means if you're a seller, flipper, wholesaler, anybody who sells real estate, it sucks. It's going to suck, certainly through the spring. So call it the next seven, eight months.

But if you're like most of the people on my channel, probably the most of the people you deal with, if you're an investor, I mean this with every fiber of my body, you should be smiling. Because you and I don't care about rates. I wish I could snap my fingers and rates were 9%.

I want less competition, I want more supply, and I want more motivated sellers. Congratulations. For the next six to nine months, you'll get all three. So get off your ass, do the work, write offers that make sense with seven handles, and let's go make some money. That's what I would tell people.

Michael Zuber (4:29)

And you made me think a bit that this wasn't going to be the question that I was going to ask next, but I actually had a conversation late last night with one of our clients and his real estate agent. They are two weeks into escrow and ultimately negotiating with the seller for either a $25,000 price reduction or a $25,000 credit, okay? Now, this happens a lot. And I want to know your opinion, and we'll call it just in today's market, because I think it can change depending where you're at in timeline.