Purchases of homes are either done in cash (more rare) where the buyer owns the home entirely at the time of purchase, or they get a loan from a bank (a mortgage) usually spanning 15 or 30 years. If they are borrowing from a bank, then they must pay a portion of the loan and interest back monthly. This is the mortgage payment. At the end of the 15 or 30 years, the buyer owns the home entirely themselves and does not have to make a monthly payment on their home. I’m simplifying this a bit and ignoring that homeowners need to pay monthly insurance and taxes on their homes usually.
Those that either cannot afford to buy their home (or choose not to for other reasons) pay a monthly rent to the owner of the property (landlord).
Is this the same way people pay for their housing in Argentina, or does it work differently?
Most people here cannot save enough for a down payment for a house /department. So the only solution are mortgages. Little problem is that mortgages have been absent in anything but paper so Argentines have not been able to acquire property or housing with ease since years ago
Last time mortgages were available, it was in 2017/2018. After the currency devaluation that came on 2018/2019, banks, understandably, faced towards different ways of earning interest on their capital savings. Banks turned to high interest, high yield governmental bonds during the last 4 years, which was the way the leftist government found to capture all the extra pesos they were printing thrift the central bank daily to subsidize everything from food to services.
Little problem? The interest rates implied that the central bank had to pay even more pesos to the banks every time. So to avoid paying in an unpredictable bank run, they kept increasing the interest rate, therefore the banks would keep their money on the aforementioned bonds, the interest would increase, then to avoid an unpredictable bank run, the government would increase interest rates again and so on.
It was a literal trap.
But that explains why banks would not loan money for mortgages. Why would they if they had the government at their service printing money for them?
It’s not for nothing that the arrival of Milei is so celebrated by the 57% voting population. They guy literally saved us from hyperinflation.
Now thanks to Milei, banks now have to work and earn their money through real lending, not just interest rates being hiked at the expense of the people
Little problem is that mortgages have been absent in anything but paper so Argentines have not been able to acquire property or housing with ease since years ago
Last time mortgages were available, it was in 2017/2018.
This is the major piece of information I was missing! Thank you!
So even with the price of housing for sale falling substantially (because of the rental price caps), unless a would-be home buyer had 100% of the cash to buy the home (which I imagine is very rare), then they simply couldn’t get a loan (mortgage) at all. So they couldn’t buy the, at the time, very cheap housing even if they wanted to.
That explains it very clearly. I appreciate the time you took to explain that. I also appreciate the rest of your explanation about the further actions of currency devaluation impacts, banks on investment in government bonds, and the impacts on the nation from having to pay interest on those bonds at the inflated yields. Thanks!
First, your English is very good!
I am understand why landlords sold (when the price caps on rents were put in place).
I’m wondering if I am not understanding how people in Argentina pay for housing. In the USA most people buy the homes they are living in for housing:
source
Purchases of homes are either done in cash (more rare) where the buyer owns the home entirely at the time of purchase, or they get a loan from a bank (a mortgage) usually spanning 15 or 30 years. If they are borrowing from a bank, then they must pay a portion of the loan and interest back monthly. This is the mortgage payment. At the end of the 15 or 30 years, the buyer owns the home entirely themselves and does not have to make a monthly payment on their home. I’m simplifying this a bit and ignoring that homeowners need to pay monthly insurance and taxes on their homes usually.
Those that either cannot afford to buy their home (or choose not to for other reasons) pay a monthly rent to the owner of the property (landlord).
Is this the same way people pay for their housing in Argentina, or does it work differently?
Most people here cannot save enough for a down payment for a house /department. So the only solution are mortgages. Little problem is that mortgages have been absent in anything but paper so Argentines have not been able to acquire property or housing with ease since years ago
Last time mortgages were available, it was in 2017/2018. After the currency devaluation that came on 2018/2019, banks, understandably, faced towards different ways of earning interest on their capital savings. Banks turned to high interest, high yield governmental bonds during the last 4 years, which was the way the leftist government found to capture all the extra pesos they were printing thrift the central bank daily to subsidize everything from food to services.
Little problem? The interest rates implied that the central bank had to pay even more pesos to the banks every time. So to avoid paying in an unpredictable bank run, they kept increasing the interest rate, therefore the banks would keep their money on the aforementioned bonds, the interest would increase, then to avoid an unpredictable bank run, the government would increase interest rates again and so on.
It was a literal trap.
But that explains why banks would not loan money for mortgages. Why would they if they had the government at their service printing money for them?
It’s not for nothing that the arrival of Milei is so celebrated by the 57% voting population. They guy literally saved us from hyperinflation.
Now thanks to Milei, banks now have to work and earn their money through real lending, not just interest rates being hiked at the expense of the people
This is the major piece of information I was missing! Thank you!
So even with the price of housing for sale falling substantially (because of the rental price caps), unless a would-be home buyer had 100% of the cash to buy the home (which I imagine is very rare), then they simply couldn’t get a loan (mortgage) at all. So they couldn’t buy the, at the time, very cheap housing even if they wanted to.
That explains it very clearly. I appreciate the time you took to explain that. I also appreciate the rest of your explanation about the further actions of currency devaluation impacts, banks on investment in government bonds, and the impacts on the nation from having to pay interest on those bonds at the inflated yields. Thanks!