Well, that depends on whether or not you dream of owning a home?
For the past several years I’ve been screaming my head off about the way the Dems have spent money our government doesn’t have (by borrowing). To be fair, this started with Obama and continued with Trump. The Republicans may not have not endorsed such but they certainly did little to little to stop it. US public debt stood at $10 trillion when Obama took office. It now stands at $32 trillion.
So where are we and why can’t this nation’s young look forward to owning a home (unless very wealthy)?
First off, as I suggested would inevitably be the case, rampant borrowing has caused inflation to take off and interest rates to rise too. Some of this was due to COVID supply chain issues, which have largely abated. Notwithstanding, mortgage rates today hit their highest point in 20 years.
Meanwhile, a shortage of housing has created a perfect storm where housing prices have risen nationally (29% just in 2020 & 2021, source Freddie Mac House Index). Ergo since the pandemic buying a house costs 36% more PLUS your mortgage rate has gone from 2.5% to 8%.
That means the average monthly cost of owning a home costs has more than doubled (20% down, 30 year mortgage).
At the same time with inflation still running over 3% (after being 8.5% in 2022) workers are seeing their real wages under attack.
Is this ever going to get better? I suspect not. Can it get worse…you bet. If the government continues to overspend it will get considerably worse. Then again if you want the Federales to solve every problem get ready to pay.
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