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Rising Rates Vs. The Housing Market

NPR

Interest rates had been falling for most of the past three decades – but two years ago, they started climbing. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note recently climbed above 3%, up from less 1.5% just a couple of years ago.

Among the reasons that rising rates matter is that they have numerous effects on the housing market. Some of these effects are obvious. As interest rates climb, so will mortgage rates, making houses relatively less affordable. Refinancing also becomes less attractive.

But there are also surprising ways in which interest rates affect – and in one case, don't affect – the housing market. Laurie Goodman of the Urban Institute walks us through them.

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Stacey Vanek Smith is the co-host of NPR's The Indicator from Planet Money. She's also a correspondent for Planet Money, where she covers business and economics. In this role, Smith has followed economic stories down the muddy back roads of Oklahoma to buy 100 barrels of oil; she's traveled to Pune, India, to track down the man who pitched the country's dramatic currency devaluation to the prime minister; and she's spoken with a North Korean woman who made a small fortune smuggling artificial sweetener in from China.
Cardiff Garcia is a co-host of NPR's The Indicator from Planet Money podcast, along with Stacey Vanek Smith. He joined NPR in November 2017.
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