Personal Anxiety: The Market Is Stable, Rates Are Down to 6.35%, and You’re Still Paying Rent. Let’s Talk About That.

One of the slides that stopped me at this week’s Economic Summit was a simple bar chart. It showed median net worth projections for 2026 with homeowners on one side, renters on the other. Homeowners: $446,000. Renters: $12,000.

That gap doesn’t happen by accident. It compounds quietly, year after year, while the rent check clears and nothing comes back to you.

I want to be direct about something, because I think a lot of people in Northern Virginia are making a financial decision by default rather than by choice. If you are paying $4,000 a month in rent — which is not unusual here, and is actually on the lower end for a single-family home in many parts of the region — you are spending $48,000 a year on housing with zero return on that investment. No equity. No appreciation. No asset. The landlord has all of those things. You have a lease.

Now, buying isn’t right for everyone, and I won’t pretend otherwise. If your job situation is unstable, if you’re likely to relocate within two years, if your credit or savings aren’t where they need to be, those are legitimate reasons to rent. Timing matters, and circumstances matter.

But if you have stable employment, reasonable credit, and you’re paying rent that rivals or exceeds what a mortgage payment would be, the decision to keep renting deserves more scrutiny than most people give it. Mortgage rates are currently around 6.35%, down from the highs of the past two years and forecast to continue gradual improvement through 2026. Northern Virginia inventory, while slowly increasing, remains at just 1.39 months of supply. Homes are selling. Not as ferocious as a couple of years ago. Yes, I always recommend getting a home inspection, and now it is more likely that we can negotiate a contract at a solid price after you have thought about it for a few hours and maybe even toured it at leisure AND get that HOME INSPECTION.

The market is not waiting for the perfect moment to arrive.

The wealth gap between owners and renters is not a temporary phenomenon driven by one unusual market cycle. It has been widening for decades. The data from NAR make clear that homeownership remains the single most reliable vehicle for building household net worth for middle-income Americans. That doesn’t mean buying is easy. In this region, it isn’t. But it does mean the cost of waiting has a number attached to it, and that number grows every year.

If you’re renting in Northern Virginia and wondering whether buying makes sense for you right now, I’m happy to walk through the actual numbers — what you qualify for, what’s available, and what the honest comparison looks like between your current rent and a mortgage payment on a comparable home. No pressure, no pitch. Just information.

Reach out through the contact page or DM me on LinkedIn.