On Interest Rates and Pastries
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}I've said it before and I'll say it again: Don't leave me alone in a bakeshop -- it's way too tempting. I mean it's as if those éclairs are just sitting there for the taking: too easy, too dangerous. I kind of feel the same way about interest rates (search): They're almost too low and too tempting.
Now, for a lot of people, especially people in debt, these low rates are good: It keeps their borrowing costs down and their heads above water.
Just one word of advice: Don't overdo it. Low rates are like Napoleans: Great to look at, just don't go to town on them. Here's why. They're like giving crack to an addict.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Don't get me wrong. Most people borrow sensibly and wisely. They don't get in over their head. But some do and lenders make it almost too easy. And so do very low rates.
People can afford to buy more and they do.
They can leverage more and they do.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}They can risk more and they do.
Right now, all that's been OK because rates keep going lower and the value of homes keeps going higher. It's sort of like a one-two, croissant-cream puff combo that keeps those "with" a fix from getting "in" a fix.
But cream puffs do have calories and interest rates do go up.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Borrowing is cheap and easy today, but that doesn't mean it can't be painful tomorrow.
If you go crazy in the bakeshop, you'll pay for it long after you've left the bakeshop.
If you go crazy with all that easy money, you'll pay for it long after it's not so easy money.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}The only difference between tantalizing sweets and tantalizing rates is the tantalizing sweets just leave you fat. The tantalizing rates could just leave you homeless.
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