Extended luxury

Hints from both George Osborne in his Mansion House speech and from Governor of the Bank of England Mark Carney that interest rates might rise sooner than previous announcements led to believe, bred the inevitable headlines that borrowers, especially mortgage holders, would have to endire higher repayments on their loans.  Well boo-hoo; we have had 0.5% interest rates for the best part of five years and when they were instituted, they were unprecedented in the 300 year history of the Bank of England.  We've been living this luxury for such a long time that we now take it for granted and if people overextend themselves, thinking the good times will never end (as they were doing in 2007) then they've only got themselves to blame.  If they didn't learn in 2007, I doubt a (slight) corrective will have any long-term impact now but that is human nature.  The Bank of England will only raise rates slowly so let's not get all mortgage-junkie tabloid about it.