Finally— Some Calm in the Market. Why That’s Good News

The Market Has Finally Settled — And That’s a Good Thing

For nearly three years, the housing market has felt like one long waiting game. Since 2022, buyers, sellers, and armchair experts have repeated the same phrase: “Let’s just wait and see what happens.”

Well — we’ve seen it. And in my professional opinion, the guessing phase is officially over.

The Federal Reserve has now cut rates twice this year, signaling a return to steady, deliberate policy rather than the wild swings we saw before and after the pandemic. Mortgage rates haven’t crashed — and they probably won’t — but they’ve stabilized in the 5–7% range. That’s not a crisis. It’s normal.

I get that it feels strange. We’ve all been conditioned by a decade of ultra-low borrowing costs. Every time rates started to rise, some global or economic shock knocked them back down. But those days are gone, and what we have now is a return to economic gravity.

At the same time, sales volume remains slow — like, really slow. 2023 through 2025 will mark three straight years of the fewest home sales in decades. By any textbook standard, higher rates and weaker demand should push prices lower. But they haven’t. In fact, they’re slightly up.

Here’s why: distress simply isn’t in the picture. Half of U.S. homeowners have 50% or more equity — nearly $18 trillion collectively — and only one in every 4,000 sales today is a foreclosure. People aren’t selling because they have to; they’re selling because they want to. That’s why values have held firm.

So where does that leave us? Rates are stable, prices are steady, and the “wait and see” game can be retired. This is the market. It’s not volatile, it’s not collapsing, and those 2% mortgages from 2020 aren’t coming back.

For buyers, that means opportunity through clarity. For sellers, it means realism and balance. After three years of uncertainty, the housing market has finally found its rhythm again — and this time, it’s a beat everyone can move to.