Patrick Boyle (financial YouTuber) deleted my comment after I noticed he had plagiarized a NYT article.

I was watching the latest video from Patrick Boyle, a successful finance YouTuber, and a line he said about the 30-year mortgage rang a bell in my head. He said:

"In the U.S., because the interest rate is fixed, homeowners get to lock in their monthly loan payments for 30 years, even if inflation or interest rates rise. On top of that, because most U.S. mortgages can be paid off early with no penalty, homeowners can refinance at a lower interest rate if rates decline."

Well, unfortunately it sounded familiar to me because it's lifted nearly verbatim from this New York Times article titled "A 30-Year Trap: The Problem With America’s Weird Mortgages." Here's the line:

"Because the interest rate is fixed, homeowners get to freeze their monthly loan payments for as much as three decades, even if inflation picks up or interest rates rise. But because most U.S. mortgages can be paid off early with no penalty, homeowners can simply refinance if rates go down."

Unfortunately, there were several paragraphs in his video script that he pulled from this article, with only minor changes. The article was not cited or referenced in his video or the description. Some more examples below.

Patrick's video:

"Thirty year fixed rate mortgages are not really available outside of the United States. In Britain and Canada and a lot of the rest of the world, mortgage interest rates are generally fixed for only a few years. That means when rates go up, the pain of higher rates is shared more evenly between new homebuyers and existing homeowners. In countries like Germany, fixed rate mortgages are common but buyers can't easily refinance the way Americans can. That means new buyers are dealing with higher borrowing costs but so are longtime owners who bought back when rates were higher than they are today.

NYT article:

"This isn’t how things work elsewhere in the world. In Britain and Canada, among other places, interest rates are generally fixed for only a few years. That means the pain of higher rates is spread more evenly between buyers and existing owners. In other countries, such as Germany, fixed-rate mortgages are common but borrowers can’t easily refinance. That means new buyers are dealing with higher borrowing costs, but so are longtime owners who bought when rates were higher."

In another part of Patrick's video:

"Sales of existing homes have fallen more than 15% in the last year, to their lowest level in over a decade."

From the NYT article:

"...sales of existing homes have fallen more than 15 percent in the past year, to their lowest level in over a decade."

Patrick's video:

"The thirty year fixed rate mortgage in the United States came about because of government interference in markets during the great depression, when nearly 10% of U.S. homes were in foreclosure. The government created the Homeowner's Loan Corporation which issued government guarantees bonds to buy up defaulted mortgages and reissue them as fixed rate long term loans. The HOLC gave way to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac - private companies whose implicit backing by the government became explicit after they were taken into federal conservatorship when the housing bubble burst in 2007."

NYT:

"The story of the 30-year mortgage begins in the Great Depression... At one point in the early 1930s, nearly 10 percent of U.S. homes were in foreclosure... In response, the federal government created the Home Owners’ Loan Corporation, which used government-backed bonds to buy up defaulted mortgages and reissue them as fixed-rate, long-term loans... The mortgage system evolved over the decades: The Home Owners’ Loan Corporation gave way to Fannie Mae and, later, Freddie Mac — nominally private companies whose implicit backing by the federal government became explicit after the housing bubble burst in the mid-2000s."

Another line from Patrick:

"Banks would likely be unwilling to lend the average American a large sum of money at a fixed rate over 30 years without some form of government guarantee."

And from the NYT:

"There is no way that most middle-class Americans could get a bank to lend them a multiple of their annual income at a fixed rate without some form of government guarantee."

I left a comment on Patrick's video letting him know that I noticed the similarities and that it appeared that he had used lines from the article without citation or reference. That comment was deleted. I've emailed the NYT author, hopefully they see the message.

Edit: Unfortunately can't change the title, but wanted to note that it's possible my video was deleted by an automated rule due to including a URL to the NYT article. I've added another comment and will keep an eye on it.