A majority of the housing market data on any given month tends to come out mostly on the same week. This was that week and the takeaway was that the housing market could be doing worse. Some might even argue that we're seeing some resilience relative to the rate landscape. Let's refresh our understanding of the rate landscape first.  The bond market (which drives interest rate movement) has been broadly sideways recently as investors wait to see how quickly inflation (bonds' biggest concern) is subsiding.  That "wait and see" approach prompted the Fed to hold its policy rate steady at last week's meeting, but that was widely expected by the bond market and thus not worth much of a reaction. Fed Chair Powell gave his regularly-scheduled congressional testimonies this week and had a chance to talk a bit more about where the Fed sees things going from here.  We already knew the average Fed member saw about 2 more rate hikes before achieving a terminal "ceiling" level, assuming the economy evolved as expected, but Powell was able to clarify what "as expected" meant. Interestingly enough, the additional hikes are  not seen happening in response to some additional upward momentum in inflation or economic growth.  Rather, the Fed's baseline expectations call for continued cooling in the labor market, modest economic growth, and continued cooling in inflation.  In other words, inflation and the economy have a very low bar to justify a few more rate hikes.  Things would have to deteriorate pretty abruptly for the Fed to abstain.  Moreover, if things improve a bit better than expected, we could be looking at more than 2 additional hikes.