buyers by keeping interest rates as low as they did for as long as they did. Supply and demand sets prices. The Fed inflated supply through artificially low rates, thereby putting a lot of people into the market that otherwise wouldn't have been buying – resulting in prices going through the roof. This went on steroids during COVID because the government was also throwing money at people through the stupid stimulus packages at the same time. What did lots of people do with that stimulus? They bought new homes at 3% mortgage rates and inflated prices even more. Then the Fed did what should have been done years before – raise interest rates to levels that would cool off the market. Normally raising interest rates would result in a marked decrease in sale prices, offsetting somewhat the pain of the higher rates. But in this case prices have mostly held steady because a huge % of the existing owners are now in 3% rates that they will do just about anything to not lose. That can't happen forever. People will have to move eventually and turn over the inventory. When they do, they'll have to pay the higher interest rates.

I said the system will reset in favor of new buyers – I didn't say it was going to turn into a "buyers market", which implies a quick change. I don't believe the change will be very quick. I think it will be gradual and take time. But if the Fed will stop playing political games with interest rates, the market will eventually equalize itself and get back to normal supply/demand conditions, and that will make it easier for new home buyers to get into the game. Until then, the scales are very tilted to those that were in the ownership game pre-2022.