Finance News
Homebuyers are backing out of deals at a record rate as prices march higher

DFW Housing & macro econ analyst Amy Nixon joins ‘Making Money’ to discuss the impact of big banks investing in residential real estate.
Would-be homebuyers are getting a case of cold feet as they confront still elevated mortgage rates and record-high housing prices.
New findings published by Redfin show that a growing number of buyers are backing out of deals to buy a house at the last minute because buying a home is more expensive than ever. About 56,000 home purchases were canceled in June – about 15% of homes that went under contract – the highest percentage of any June on record.
The median home sale price rose 4% in June to $442,525, the highest level on record. At the same time, the average 30-year mortgage rate was about 6.92%, more than double the pandemic-era lows.
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“Buyers are getting more and more selective,” said Julie Zubiate, a Redfin real estate agent near San Francisco. “They’re backing out due to minor issues because the monthly costs associated with buying a home today are just too high to rationalize not getting everything on their must-have list.”

Homes in the Issaquah Highlands area of Issaquah, Washington on Tuesday, April 16, 2024. (Photographer: David Ryder/Bloomberg via Getty Images / Getty Images)
Still, there are some signs that home prices may soon fall.
The Redfin report showed that one in five homes for sale saw a price cut, the highest level of any June on record. It marks a notable increase from the 14.4% pace seen one year ago and is just shy of the 21.7% record set in October 2022.
There are a number of driving forces behind the affordability crisis.
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Years of underbuilding fueled a shortage of homes in the country, a problem that was later exacerbated by the rapid rise in mortgage rates and expensive construction materials.
Higher mortgage rates over the past three years have also created a “golden handcuff” effect in the housing market. Sellers who locked in a record-low mortgage rate of 3% or less during the pandemic began have been reluctant to sell, limiting supply further and leaving few options for eager would-be buyers.

A home available for sale is shown on May 22, 2024 in Austin, Texas. (Photo by Brandon Bell/Getty Images / Getty Images)
Economists predict that mortgage rates will remain elevated for most of 2024 and that they will only begin to fall once the Federal Reserve starts cutting rates. Even then, rates are unlikely to return to the lows seen during the pandemic, with investors predicting just one or two rate reductions this year.
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“Some prospective buyers are simply waiting for mortgage rates to come down after the Federal Reserve cuts rates, most likely in September,” said Lisa Sturtevant, Bright MLS chief economist. “With inflation cooling and the job market still solid, rate cuts are now almost a foregone conclusion, which means those buyers who can wait are doing so.”
Most homeowners say they are nearly twice as willing to sell their home if their mortgage rate is 5% or higher, according to a Zillow survey. Currently, about 80% of mortgage holders have a rate below 5%.
Finance News
Consumers may face higher beef prices from businesses

FOX Business correspondent Jeff Flock discusses the record ground beef prices due to supply issues on ‘Varney & Co.’
High beef prices have been weighing on U.S. businesses and consumers.
They have forced some businesses to make tough decisions about how to handle the increased costs, and some are passing the costs on to customers.
Rob Passio, the owner of Lombardi’s Prime Meats in Philadelphia, told FOX Business correspondent Jeff Flock on “Varney & Co” that “there’s only so much you can absorb as far as the hit to your bottom line before you say to yourself you have to raise these prices.”
The butcher shop, Passio said, hasn’t seen its customers balk at higher prices “because they see it.”
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Organic ground beef Oct. 30, 2020, in Bavaria, Nuremberg (Daniel Karmann/picture alliance via Getty Images / Getty Images)
“They see the inflation. They see the pricing. You know, everything is up,” he told Flock.
Bureau of Labor Statistics inflation data measured by the consumer price index (CPI) showed prices for beef and veal were up 2.4% month-over-month and 7.6% year-over-year in February.
The overall CPI posted a 0.2% increase month-over-month and a 2.8% jump year-over-year.
Courtney Schmidt, sector manager at Wells Fargo Agri-Food Institute, told FOX Business last month that high beef prices were driven by tighter U.S. beef production with consistent consumer demand.
The U.S. cattle herd is experiencing a down cycle, with cattle inventories at historically low levels in 2025, according to Schmidt.

Demand for beef has remained strong since the pandemic, according to the American Farm Bureau Federation. (Kennedy Hayes/Fox News / Fox News)
The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) reported in late January that U.S. farms had 86.7 million head of cattle and calves. The count for beef cows specifically was 27.9 million, a decline of 1% compared to the same time last year, according to the USDA.
“I know they’re killing smaller cattle, so they’re trying, I guess, to kill them faster to create the supply that demand is needing,” Passio said.
Some big companies source beef from Canada and Mexico, Flock reported on “Varney & Co.”
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President Donald Trump imposed 25% import tariffs on goods entering the U.S. from those two countries March 4 and, more recently, introduced exemptions for Mexico and Canada on goods under the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement until early April.
Such a levy on imported beef would “increase the price,” according to Passio, adding that consumers “are going to pay for it.”
“My philosophy is to sell it as low as you can to show a savings, a value to the customer. And hopefully you have more customers to generate your revenue,” the Lombardi Prime Meats owner told Flock.

Packages of beef are displayed for sale at a supermarket Jan. 12, 2023, in Foster City, Calif. (Liu Guanguan/China News Service/VCG via Getty Images / Getty Images)
In the U.S., ground beef averaged $5.63 per pound in February, while the per-pound price of boneless sirloin steak came in at $11.90, according to data from the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. Those average prices were 9.6% and 1.6% higher, respectively, than the same month in 2024.
EGG PRICE SPIKE: WE ARE ‘PAST THE TOUGH PART,’ AGRICULTURE SECRETARY ROLLINS SAYS
The USDA projected in a report released this month that U.S. beef production is poised to amount to 26.685 billion pounds this year.
Daniella Genovese contributed to this report.
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Finance News
Is a Florida condo crisis brewing? Real estate developers claim rising costs are necessary

Gutman Development Marketing’s Phil Gutman, The Continuum Company’s Ian Bruce Eichner and BH Group CEO Isaac Toledano explain to Fox News Digital why they support Florida’s ‘Condo 3.0’ bill.
High-rise condominium owners along the sunny and serene Florida coastlines are facing a costly reality, but prominent developers in the state argue surges in HOA fees and maintenance reserves are necessary to prevent a future tragedy.
“A lot of people have seen their maintenances double. They’ve seen some of the assessments become extremely unaffordable. It’s definitely impacted many residents here in Florida,” Gutman Development Marketing President Phil Gutman told Fox News Digital.
“There is a conflict, and the conflict is a bit complicated, and it’s a bit complex because you have three competing issues. One, you have the issue of safety. Two, you have older buildings,” Ian Bruce Eichner, The Continuum Company founder, also told Digital. “The last issue that comes from [the Condo 3.0 law] is a requirement that unless the condominium’s declaration, what the original offering said 50 years ago provides otherwise, you need 90% of the residents to agree to terminate the condominium.”
“We have the state, cities, city officials, code enforcement, city managers more involved in buildings. I think it’s important to prevent the next disaster, God forbid, the next catastrophe. Let’s not forget that there [are] thousands of old buildings, and thank God we didn’t see any other catastrophe except the Surfside building,” BH Group CEO and founder Isaac Toledano added.
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“I think the fact that you have more inspections, more regulations, I think it’s good for everybody and for everybody’s safety.”

Three prominent Florida real estate developers voice support for the state’s Condo 3.0 bill, even though it’s resulted in higher HOA and maintenance fees for unit owners. (Getty Images)
The higher condo fees are a result of the state’s “Condo 3.0” bill, passed by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis in early 2024, less than three years after the Champlain Towers collapse in Surfside. The new bill dictates a new set of reforms, including how a building is maintained to how condo associations are governed. The oldest buildings and their residents are likely to see the most costly impending assessments.
“Any rational person has to be supportive of the legislation because it goes to the issue of safety. So while it may have a financial burden, we have an obligation – the state, the city, everybody has an obligation to keep people safe,” Eichner said. “So there’s no question that the law is something that, unfortunately, was a consequence of an event, but certainly it’s something everyone supports.”
According to recent data from Redfin, multiple Florida cities on the east and west coasts have year-over-year double-digit increases on condo fees. Tampa saw the sharpest rise at 16.7%; Fort Lauderdale had a 16.2% increase; the average median condo cost in Miami is $835 per month; and Key West has the highest median HOA fee at $1,063.
FOX Business’ Ashley Webster reports from Fort Lauderdale, Florida, where condominium and HOA fees are rising and thus turning new residents away.
In some high-demand markets like Miami, unit owners at the 16-year-old 1060 Brickell Avenue building are required to split $21 million in special assessments after the board of directors reportedly identified areas of damage.
Many condo buildings that are 40 to 60 years old are more likely to be demolished and rebuilt as newer, luxury real estate projects, according to the developers.
“I think we’re going to see more and more of this transaction of prime real estate, older product getting replaced with the new product,” Toledano noted.
“The shift that we see in the market is the appetite of older product, older units, many other owners willing to work with the developers, and they understand that if you live in a three-story building that was built in the 1960s, this building will probably have some serious assessments, a lot of improvements, and sometimes it doesn’t make any sense to go and replace the roof, the electrical, the mechanical, something that will cost millions of dollars,” the BH Group lead also said. “[You’re] better off [to] sell the unit.”
Florida’s dubbed “Condo 3.0” bill requires yearly maintenance and reserve evaluations for buildings that are three stories or higher. | iStock
“Some of these buildings that are 50, 60 years old that really can’t be fixed anymore. Those buildings do need to come down,” Gutman explained. “If somebody has an apartment there that was worth $300,000 in the open market, and we come in at $750 [to] $800,000, I believe those people are in a much better position than they were, to be quite honest with you. But people will have to find possibly another area to live in, something that’s more affordable, something that’s newer, something that’s safer.”
While state lawmakers argue the Condo 3.0 law will improve the longevity and quality of high-rise buildings, there are fears that luxury mixed-use developers strip residents of deciding powers, add costly fees and price them out of their long-term homes – especially for retired or fixed-income owners.
Gov. DeSantis’ office did not respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment.
Eichner posed an example: “You have a building that is 62 years old, has $12 million in deferred maintenance, has a population of 20 or 25% of the building that’s retired, and that 20 or 25% either doesn’t want to move, doesn’t have the resources to move, need help to move.”
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“So what you have is building after building facing assessments that they really can’t afford. They do not have the will, i.e. the 90% that can require a termination, and so they sit now in this ‘Never-Never Land’ in which they attempt to have some partial assessment, deferred assessment. Where is this going to go? I don’t know,” Eichner continued. “But for sure, there are hundreds of buildings that are in this situation as we wind our way out of year one of the post-assessment requirement. I suspect that this is going to be a real issue in 2025, 2026.”
In February, new leaders in the Florida legislature said their next sessions will include potential changes to condo laws, but will not involve talks around direct financial assistance for condo owners.
The three developers insist they’re here to help those concerned residents.
“I think that after all, developer or not, we’re all human being[s]. And if the stronger person can help the weaker person, or the smarter person can help the person with less knowledge or less experience, I think this is something that it’s good to see, and we should all help each other if we can,” Toledano said.
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Naftali Group chairman and CEO Miki Naftali discusses the insurance cost as Hurricane Helene makes its way to the Gulf Coast on ‘The Claman Countdown.’
“We don’t go in to try to take over buildings and don’t prefer a hostile environment. When we approach a building, we approach it and we move forward because everybody in the building wants to sell. And they don’t want the assessments, they don’t want the hiked-up maintenance fees,” Gutman chimed in. “That’s just our approach. We’re not fighters, we’re trying to help.”
“Part of the offer that we made was, to the extent that you are interested, we will help move you. To the extent that you’re not sure where you want to go, we will recommend some brokers to work with you,” Eichner said. “So it’s an attempt to have a more holistic, full-service approach rather than simply say: We’re offering you ‘x’ million dollars for your apartment, and that’s that, thank you, goodbye.”
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