Mortgage rates have climbed above 7%, reaching a nearly two-year high and raising new questions about how buyers and sellers will respond across the North Texas housing market. <\/p>\n
While the increase could make purchasing a home more expensive for some buyers, local real estate experts say higher rates could also reduce competition and create opportunities for people who remain in the market.<\/p>\n
Brent Myers, director for the Greater Fort Worth Association of Realtors, said the increase was anticipated.<\/p>\n
“I think a lot of people anticipated it. It makes a big difference in how real estate is handled,” Myers said.<\/p>\n
Myers pointed to inflation as one of the factors behind higher rates.<\/p>\n
“So I mean it\u2019s inflation and I realize that\u2019s part of what the overall issue is, is that everything is expensive and so the idea to bump those rates up to bring down inflation,” Myers said.<\/p>\n
Despite the higher cost of borrowing, Myers said the changing market could work in favor of some buyers by reducing the number of people competing for homes.<\/p>\n
“I know that sounds a little counterintuitive, but the fact that the rates are up a little bit, there\u2019s going to be less competition for houses,” Myers said.<\/p>\n
“We\u2019re going to see some people drop out of that market and so there\u2019s going to be some good opportunities there.”<\/p>\n
But interest rates are only one part of the affordability equation.<\/p>\n
Justin Landon, president and CEO of the Metro Texas Association of Realtors, said buyers also need to consider other expenses that come with owning a home.<\/p>\n
“I think it\u2019s important to understand that there\u2019s a lot of factors that play into that. It\u2019s not just the interest rates,” Landon said.<\/p>\n
Those factors include property taxes and homeowners insurance, which Landon said can have an even greater effect on affordability.<\/p>\n
“A much bigger headwind for affordability than interest rates. The rapid increase in valuations in our property taxes over the last couple of years has been huge,” Landon said.<\/p>\n
“And the cost of homeowners insurance is absolutely skyrocketed. And those are actually having a much greater impact on affordability than interest rates are.”<\/p>\n
Myers and Landon said the American dream of homeownership has become less clear as buyers navigate higher costs. Still, they said owning a home remains attainable with strategy and planning.<\/p>\n
This story was originally reported for broadcast by NBC DFW. AI tools helped convert the story into a digital article, and an NBC DFW journalist edited it again before publication.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mortgage rates have climbed above 7%, reaching a nearly two-year high and raising new questions about how buyers…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":437278,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[111,27,29,28],"class_list":["post-437277","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-texas","tag-real-estate","tag-texas","tag-texas-headlines","tag-texas-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/437277","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=437277"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/437277\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/437278"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=437277"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=437277"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=437277"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}