[Analemma_]

Nobody but the United States has long-term fixed rate mortgages: they're horrible for lenders because the lender has to assume all interest rate risk. The reason they exist in the US is because the government acts as a backstop due to pro-homeownership politics, but it causes a bunch of market distortions that are made invisible to American borrowers.

[rvense]

30 year fixed-rate is very much the norm here in Denmark. There was a period of experimentation leading up to 2007, but I think fixed rate is very popular. I'm certainly happy that's what we went for when we bought our first house two years ago.

[lupire]

It's hard to call it a "norm" when it's so new that no one has yet seen one completed.

[rvense]

It's been like this for at least 50 years, maybe more - the underlying system of credit associations goes back to the lat 1700's.

The mortgage market was very tightly regulated to really only permit the 30-year fixed-rate mortgages until 2002.

[synu]

We have them in the Netherlands.

[prottog]

> a bunch of market distortions that are made invisible to American borrowers

Anyone who has taken a five-minute look at the real estate market in any major US city can see those market distortions plain as day.