By Clare Trapasso | Realtor.com
After months of anticipation, the Federal Reserve announced it will be raising its key interest rate for the first time this year and just the second time since the housing bubble burst. That quarter-of-a-point hike is expected to result in higher mortgage rates—making it even more expensive to buy a home.
“If you’re planning on buying next year, act sooner rather than later, because the financing costs are only going to go up,” says Chief Economist Jonathan Smoke of realtor.com®. “We likely have a window of time between now and early 2017 before rates move dramatically higher again.”