Somerville Corporation is considering investing in specialized equipment costing $ 684,000. The equipment has a useful life of 5 years and a residual value of $ 52,000. Depreciation is calculated using the straight-line method. The expected net cash inflows from the investment are: Year 1 $ 180,000 Year 2 $ 190,000 Year 3 $ 177,000 Year 4 $ 72,000 Year 5 $ 88,000 $ 707,000

Somerville Corporation's required rate of return is 14%. Is the internal rate of return of the investment equal to, higher than, or lower than 14%? (The present values for this scenario are as follows: Year 1 - 0.877, Year 2 - 0.769, Year 3 - 0.675, Year 4 - 0.592 and Year 5 - 0.519)