In many markets — including Washington DC, California’s Inland Empire, Las Vegas and Phoenix — paying for a mortgage is less expensive than renting.
An increase in U.S. mortgage interest rates, of course, would quickly make U.S. home ownership less amazingly affordable.
If you can get a mortgage loan and you want to move, this could be your time. (Click on graph below.)
From Credit Suisse via HousingWire.
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
Shift 07.18.10 at 10:01 am
This metric is not of any real value.
The affordability looks just fine for the worst time to have EVER bought a house.
John Wake 07.18.10 at 5:50 pm
Good point. The affordability nationally was okay in 2005 (a bad time to buy in metro Phoenix) which supports your point but the worst time to buy was mid-2006 and then the affordability in the graph was probably the worst in the 2000s. So I think the metric has some use.
If the metric was for metro Phoenix or Scottsdale or a zip code, then I think the metric could be very useful. I’d have to see the data first, however, before deciding how useful it is.
Cbass 07.18.10 at 8:43 pm
I know the NAR changed their metrics some years ago for the housing affordability index. Not sure what effect that has had on those numbers.
I guess this is one of those times when we have to consider the source…