This is my first blog post about Real Estate financial stuff and I do not intend to do it often but this stuff just blows me away! I just acquired an ancient financial calculator which had an actual manual with it. All home loan interest rates in the examples were between 14.5% and 16% which is what interest rates were then. So the payment on a $94,500 home loan over 30 years at 16% was horrendous ($1253.33/mth) – with interest at 4.5% you can borrow $247,358 for the same payment and have it paid off in exactly the same time! My point here being – better to borrow now and even pay more for the house (if you think prices are going down further) than wait until interest rates go up. You will buy more house for your monthly payment now over the same time period at low interest rates. Check out this calculator and manual picure.