Some Home Buyers Resigning Themselves to High Interest Rates, Survey Shows

Some potential home buyers may be resigning themselves to pay higher mortgage rates.

That’s according to Fannie Mae’s Home Purchase Sentiment Index, which dipped to 71.9 in March, its first decline since November. Potential home buyers have been feeling put off by mortgage rates that have seesawed near 7% for most of the year.

However, data from the survey showed consumers have begun to set their expectations around the higher rates, said Doug Duncan, Fannie Mae senior vice president and chief economist. The measurements for “good time to buy” and “good time to sell” in the housing market both moved higher—although nearly 80% said now was a bad time to buy a house.

“With the historically low rates of the pandemic era now firmly behind us, some households appear to be moving past the hurdle of last year’s sharp jump in rates, an adjustment that we think could help further thaw the housing market,” Duncan said.

The government-sponsored enterprise also forecast a gradual increase in home listings and sales this year with those adjustments by potential homebuyers in mind.

Mortgage rates have moved down from the highs of 2023, when they nearly reached 8%. Since dropping below 7% last year, mortgage rates have mostly moved sideways, hovering in the same range since December.

Homeowners have been reluctant to give up the low mortgage rates they got during the pandemic and sell their properties, creating a “lock-in” effect that has chilled the housing market. 

The survey also showed more than two-thirds of consumers think mortgage rates will go up or stay about the same over the next 12 months, with fewer responding they believed rates would fall.

Similarly, fewer consumers expected home prices to go up over the next year, but at the same time, fewer believed they would fall, with more expecting house prices to remain about the same.