President Donald Trump capped a yuge Weekend of Winning with one of those WITAH? moments that left conservatives scratching their heads in wonderment.
Let's talk about all that winning real quick before we get to the weirdness, because only a fool sells Trump short — and I'd rather not kick off the workweek looking like one.
Here's an underreported bit of news you might have missed: Syria's UN envoy just spilled that a security agreement between Syria and Israel might drop any second now.
"This potentially locks in a ceasefire, Israeli pullback from occupied spots, and some border calm after months of tension," Mario Nawfal reported. "This ties into ongoing U.S.-brokered talks under Trump, with Syrian president al-Sharaa heading to the White House soon to push things forward."
If this pans out — and al-Sharaa has had peace feelers out for months, if perhaps only because of Islamist threats to his regime — score another W for Trump's aggressive peacemaking.
The news too big to miss, of course, is that Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) blinked, and the Schumer Shutdown is all but over. Actually, he did more than blink. Schumer squeezed his eyes shut hard and finally surrendered to the inevitable.
"After 40 days of a shutdown over a laundry list of demands, Democrats have nothing to show for it," PJ Media's own Matt Margolis wrote late Sunday night. "Their only 'win' is a vague promise of a future vote on Obamacare subsidies in December—a meaningless gesture that even they know is dead on arrival."
The best part is that Schumer's collapse has Democrats at war with one another, and I went long on popcorn back in mid-2024.
That's a solid weekend.
As I get ready to go to press, the continuing resolution — I hate these things, by the way; they represent a total breakdown in Congress's primary responsibility — hasn't yet been signed. The deal is agreed to in principle, but nothing is official.
In the midst of all that winning, we got this weirdness:
“Thanks to President Trump, we are indeed working on The 50-year mortgage - a complete game changer,” Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Bill Pulte posted to X on Saturday.
I wrote a personal note to America's young people just starting out.
Dear America's Young People,
Please oh please don't ever do this.
Love,
-Steve
That's from the heart. What follows is from the head.
The typical mortgage these days is $324,000. At 6% over 30 years, borrowers pay $1,942 a month, and over the course of the loan, $375,315.73. Extend that term to 50 years, and young homeowners get that monthly payment down to $1,705 — a savings of less than $250. But interest payments balloon to $699,331.
Let's call that what it really is: indentured servitude to a giant bank.
But maybe the worst part is the loss of equity. As Glenn Reynolds mentioned earlier today on Instapundit, "this is basically something close to an interest-only mortgage." Buyers might save a couple hundred bucks a month in mortgage payments, but it will be years before they get any equity in their homes. When it's time to trade up because of a better job or a bun in the oven, they won't OWN enough of the house they bought to roll that value into their next house.
President Trump is a real estate guy, and he knows all this. Honestly, there isn't much the president can do about housing costs. Interest rates are largely determined by the Fed, and it's state and local regulations that put the squeeze on the supply.
Why he’s pushing these 50-year absurdities, I have no idea — maybe it’s just smart politics, a way to look like he’s tackling the housing-affordability crisis.
But on the off chance Congress actually changes the law to allow 50-year mortgages, please, oh please, don’t ever take one. They might be smart politics, but they’re a spectacularly stupid way to finance a home.
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