New High: 62% Expect To Pay Higher Interest Rates Next Year

More Americans than ever predict they will be paying higher interest rates a year from now, despite the fact that most say they’re paying about the same in interest as they were last year.

The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey shows that 62% believe their interest rates will be higher one year from now. That’s up five points from July and up 28 points from April 2009. Prior to this most recent survey, expectations of higher interest rates had never topped 59%.

Just seven percent (7%) expect their rates to be lower in a year’s time, while 24% expect to be about the same as they are now. (To see survey question wording, click here.)

But only 25% say they’re paying higher interest rates now than they were a year ago, down from 29% last month. This finding has ranged from a low of 22% in May and April to a high of 32% in October 2009.

Just 11% say they are paying lower interest rates than they were a year ago. Most (57%) say they are paying about the same in interest as they were last year, the highest finding in two years.

Fortunately, fewer adults owe more money than they did last year. Twenty-five percent (25%) now say they owe more now than they did a year ago, down from 28% last month and tying the lowest finding to date. Thirty-one percent (31%) say they owe less than they did a year ago, showing no change over the past month but is below results found earlier this year.

A plurality (39%) says they owe about the same amount of money now as they did a year ago.

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The survey of 1,000 Adults was conducted on August 8-9, 2011 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. Field work for all Rasmussen Reports surveys is conducted by Pulse Opinion Research, LLC. See methodology.