Episode summary
How many times will the Fed hike rates this year?
HousingWire Daily
· · Hosts: Sarah Wheeler, Tracey Velt · Guests: Logan Mohtashami
Summary
Logan Mohtashami said the Fed is likely to hold steady at this week’s meeting, but he expects the central bank to lose its easing bias and sound more openly hawkish under new chair Kevin Warsh. He described the meeting as the start of a new regime, with markets already pricing in about one rate hike and some Fed officials talking about as many as two, three, or four if inflation and labor data stay firm. His view was that a single hike is already in the market, but that the bigger question is whether Warsh pushes back against the more hawkish voices at the Fed or even changes how the Fed communicates.
Mohtashami tied the rate outlook to oil, tariffs, and inflation breadth, saying higher energy prices and a re-acceleration in growth would be the main reasons mortgage rates could rise further. He reiterated his mortgage-rate range for the year: 5.75% on the low end and 6.75% on the high end, with any move above that likely requiring a stronger bond-market reaction and a sharper hawkish shift from the Fed. He argued that spreads have kept mortgage rates from moving much higher and that housing has not yet shown a clear slowdown, especially with home-price growth still muted enough to help affordability.
Key takeaways
- Mohtashami expects the Fed to leave rates unchanged at this meeting, but to drop its easing bias and sound more hawkish.
- He said about one rate hike is already priced in, while some Fed officials are floating two, three, or four hikes if inflation stays sticky.
- His 2026 mortgage-rate range remains 5.75% to 6.75%, with rates above that requiring a much more aggressive Fed and stronger growth.
- He argued mortgage spreads are helping keep 30-year rates below 6.75% even with policy uncertainty and elevated oil prices.
- He said the biggest surprise would be Warsh sounding more hawkish than expected or aggressively changing Fed communication norms.
Notable quotes
“some people have four rate hikes coming up, some people have two, some people have three”
“just to remind everyone, your forecast for mortgage rates this year was 6.75 on the high end”
How the episode opens
Welcome everyone. My guest today is lead analyst Logan Mohtashami to talk about this week's Fed meeting, the first under new Fed chair Kevin Warsh, and how many rate hikes we should be expecting this year. Before we jump in, I want to recap the top five trending stories on housingwire.com.
First step is the story from several days ago on Google expanding real estate listing ads to all 50 states. And then Logan's article on why the conflict hasn't pushed oil prices and mortgage rates higher yet. Next is Jay Clayton tapped for DNI role as Congress pushes back on Pulte.
Then One Trust sues UWME Mortgage Capital over trade secret theft. Finally, we have an article on how AI could push real estate commissions lower. You can read all of those articles with a subscription, and as a listener of this podcast, you can get a 20% discount with the code podcast20.
Logan, welcome back to the podcast.
It is wonderful to be here. Of course, it's Friday morning. A lot of news yesterday, of course.
Deal in the works, when are we going to get signed, anything like that, but um oil prices 84, 10-year yield 446 448 like we've always talked about. You know, if the if the bond market really thought that this is ending, that's where we should start the next stage of this conversation. So, and the next stage of this conversation is how many times are the Fed is the Fed going to hike rates now?
Yeah, so okay, we have a Fed meeting on Wednesday. This is going to come out on uh Monday, so on Wednesday we'll have a Fed meeting. All eyes are on the Fed. Um do you expect them to do anything at this meeting?
From the episode’s captions: roughly the first two minutes, lightly cleaned. Keep watching on YouTube →
Topics
- fed rate hikes
- fed chair kevin warsh
- housing market rates
- mortgage lending
- real estate listing ads
Companies and tickers mentioned
- GOOGL
- GOOG
- PHM
- UWMC
- Pulte
- UWM
- E Mortgage Capital
- OneTrust
- Alloy Advisors
Watch the episode
Watch “How many times will the Fed hike rates this year?” on YouTube
Summary, takeaways and quote selection by Octagon. Quotes are short excerpts; the full conversation is in the episode.
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