It would depend how long your friend plans to remain in the house. A low fixed rate would not help her much if she only lives in the house a few years. I would not buy a house now unless I planned to keep it at least 10 years. Focusing on monthly payment is fine as long as your friend won’t need to sell when prices are even further depressed.

There are too many factors affecting interests rates so no one can predict how high or low they’ll get.

I wonder the proportion of buyers who got fixed 30 year mortgages when rates were at 5%? I guess only a small proportion.

We’ll see prices decline then stagnate for 8 years. In those 8 years, there’ll be plenty of buying opportunities. Also new buildings with better technologies will continue to be built. Land that was previously not buildable will be developed.