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What’s the mortgage interest rate forecast for September 2024?
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Buyers have faced unprecedented challenges in the real estate market since the start of COVID-19. Record low interest rates and low housing supply during the pandemic pushed home prices to record highs, leaving many borrowers facing bidding wars. In the post-pandemic era, surging inflation caused would-be buyers to take another hit, as mortgage rates skyrocketed to their highest level since the year 2000.
Inventory remains low today and mortgage rates remain high, but frustrated buyers may soon see a light at the end of the tunnel. “All indications are the Fed will reduce short-term rates in September, said Fred Bolstad, Head of Retail Home Lending at U.S. Bank.
Many future homeowners are looking toward this important date as the opportunity they’ve been waiting for to access an affordable mortgage. Unfortunately, even if the promised rate cut occurs, some buyers may end up disappointed. Here’s why.
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What’s the mortgage interest rate forecast for September 2024?
While all signs point to the Federal Reserve cutting interest rates in September, there’s a harsh reality future buyers must come to terms with.
“It is important to keep in mind that the market has already baked in the September rate cuts,” says Sarah Alvarez, vice president of mortgage banking at William Ravies Mortgage.
Ralph DiBugnara, founder of Home Qualified, concurs.
“I do believe in anticipation of this cut, most of the reduction has been built into the market already over the last few weeks,” DiBugnara says.
The rate cut won’t come as a surprise to lenders, which is why rates are already down more than a point since their peak in the fall of 2023. Since lenders have priced in the rate drop, there’s no reason to believe the cost of a home loan is likely to decline sharply if the Fed acts as anticipated.
The Fed’s actions could, however, set the stage for continued mortgage rate drops throughout the fall and into 2025 if the central bank signals it will start to get aggressive at bringing rates back down after repeated increases to fight inflation.
“Everyone will be paying attention to how much they are reduced and what Fed talk indicates about the speed of future rate cuts,” Alvarez says.
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The Federal Reserve’s move isn’t the only factor that could affect mortgage rates
For some borrowers, a smaller-than-anticipated mortgage rate drop could come as a surprise because they don’t fully understand the relationship between the Federal Reserve’s benchmark rate and the mortgage market.
“Mortgage rates are not directly tied to the Fed fund rate,” Alvarez says.
When the Fed lowers rates, that reduces the overnight rate at which banks can borrow from each other. While banks often respond to cheaper credit by lowering the cost of consumer debt like mortgages, the Fed’s decisions are not the only things that impact the mortgage market.
“The 10-year treasury rate is another important data point,” Bolstad says. “In early August, we experienced a drop in the 10-year treasury rate. This led to a drop in mortgage rates, providing a glimpse of what actions investors could take and how it may lead to a spike in activity as rates move lower.”
The 10-year treasury rate impacts mortgage costs because mortgage-backed securities compete with treasury bonds for investor dollars.
Other economic indicators may also have an effect.
“We are seeing unemployment increase and inflation settle, which should signal further reduction over the next couple of months,” DiBugnara says.
Finally, economic and political instability may impact mortgage rates into September and beyond.
“We also have to be aware of the upcoming election. No matter what side you are on, the uncertainty of this time leads to a rocky period where we see rates jump all over the place until the results are final,” Alvarez says.
The bottom line
The bottom line is that those hoping for a low-cost mortgage or refinance loan may not find many new opportunities this month. With the September rate cut already baked in and unlikely to move the needle much, those sitting on the sidelines may need to decide whether to wait for rates to fall further or whether it’s best to move forward soon by exploring options already available today to get a mortgage with a rate under 7.00%.
Bela Karolyi, the charismatic if polarizing gymnastics coach who turned young women into champions and the United States into an international power, has died. He was 82.
A spokesperson for USA Gymnastics confirmed to CBS News by email that Karolyi died Friday. No cause of death was given.
Karolyi and wife Martha trained multiple Olympic gold medalists and world champions in the U.S. and Romania, including Nadia Comaneci and Mary Lou Retton.
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“A big impact and influence on my life,” Comaneci, who was just 14 when Karolyi coached her to gold for Romania at the 1976 Montreal Olympics, posted on Instagram.
The Karolyis defected to the United States in 1981 and over the next 30-plus years became a guiding force in American gymnastics, though not without controversy. Bela helped guide Retton — all of 16 — to the Olympic all-around title at the 1984 Games in Los Angeles and memorably helped an injured Kerri Strug off the floor at the 1996 Games in Atlanta after Strug’s vault secured the team gold for the Americans.
Karolyi briefly became the national team coordinator for USA Gymnastics women’s elite program in 1999 and incorporated a semi-centralized system that eventually turned the Americans into the sport’s gold standard. It did not come without a cost. He was pushed out after the 2000 Olympics after several athletes spoke out about his tactics.
It would not be the last time Karolyi was accused of grandstanding and pushing his athletes too far physically and mentally.
During the height of the Larry Nassar scandal in the late 2010s — when the disgraced former USA Gymnastics team doctor was effectively given a life sentence after pleading guilty to sexually assaulting gymnasts and other athletes with his hands under the guise of medical treatment — over a dozen former gymnasts came forward saying the Karolyis were part of a system that created an oppressive culture that allowed Nassar’s behavior to run unchecked for years.
Still, some of Karolyi’s most famous students were always among his staunchest defenders. When Strug got married, she and Karolyi took a photo recreating their famous scene from the 1996 Olympics, when he carried her onto the medals podium after she vaulted on a badly sprained ankle.
Despite losing his boxing match to Jake Paul, Mike Tyson in a social media post Saturday said he had “no regrets” to getting “in ring one last time.”
The boxing legend was defeated by social media star Jake Paul in a highly anticipated fight on Friday night with an age difference of over three decades between the two contenders.
Netflix said Saturday that 60 million households worldwide tuned in to watch the match. The two fighters went eight full rounds, with each round two minutes long. Paul defeated Tyson by unanimous decision and the 27-year-old upset boxer and 58-year-old former heavyweight champion hugged afterward.
Paul was expected to earn about $40 million from the fight, and Tyson was expected to take around $20 million for the fight, according to DraftKings and other online reports.
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Tyson said on his social media that “this is one of those situations when you lost but still won. I’m grateful for last night.”
The fight almost didn’t happen after Tyson experienced an ulcer flare-up while on a plane in March. He addressed his illness Saturday, writing that he “almost died in June.” He said he had eight blood transfusions and “lost half my blood and 25lbs in hospital and had to fight to get healthy to fight so I won.”
Tyson retired from boxing in 2005 after a 20-year career. He last fought in a 2020 exhibition match against former four-division world champ Roy Jones Jr.
“To have my children see me stand toe to toe and finish 8 rounds with a talented fighter half my age in front of a packed Dallas Cowboy stadium is an experience that no man has the right to ask for. Thank you,” he said.
Alex Sundby and
contributed to this report.
In their final meeting, China’s leader Xi Jinping told U.S. President Biden that his nation was “ready to work with a new administration,” as President-elect Donald Trump prepares to take over.
The two leaders gathered Saturday on the sidelines of the annual Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit. Mr. Biden was expected to urge Xi to dissuade North Korea from further deepening its support for Russia’s war on Ukraine. It marked their first in-person meeting since they met in Northern California last November.
Without mentioning Trump’s name, Xi appeared to signal his concern that the incoming president’s protectionist rhetoric on the campaign trail could send the U.S.-China relationship into another valley.
“China is ready to work with a new U.S. administration to maintain communication, expand cooperation and manage differences so as to strive for a steady transition of the China-U.S. relationship for the benefit of the two peoples,” Xi said through an interpreter.
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Mr. Biden, meanwhile, spoke in broader brushstrokes about where the relationship has gone and reflected not just on the past four years, but on their long relationship.
“Over the past four years, China-U.S. relations have experienced ups and downs, but with the two of us at the helm, we have also engaged in fruitful dialogues and cooperation, and generally achieved stability,” he said.
Mr. Biden and Xi, with top aides surrounding them, gathered around a long rectangle of tables in an expansive conference room at Lima’s Defines Hotel and Conference Center.
There’s much uncertainty about what lies ahead in the U.S.-China relationship under Trump, who campaigned promising to levy 60% tariffs on Chinese imports.
Bobby Djavaheri, president of Los Angeles-based Yedi Houseware Appliances — which manufactures its products in China — told CBS News in an interview this week that such tariffs “would decimate our business, but not only our business. It would decimate all small businesses that rely on importing.”
Trump has also proposed revoking China’s Most Favored Nation trade status, phasing out all imports of essential goods from China and banning China from buying U.S. farmland.
Already, many American companies, including Nike and eyewear retailer Warby Parker, have been diversifying their sourcing away from China. Shoe brand Steve Madden says it plans to cut imports from China by as much as 45% next year.
White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan said Biden administration officials will advise the Trump team that managing the intense competition with Beijing will likely be the most significant foreign policy challenge they will face.
It’s a big moment for Mr. Biden as he wraps up more than 50 years in politics. He saw his relationship with Xi as among the most consequential on the international stage and put much effort into cultivating that relationship.
Mr. Biden and Xi first got to know each other on travels across the U.S. and China when both were vice presidents, interactions that both have said left a lasting impression.
“For over a decade, you and I have spent many hours together, both here and in China and in between. And I think we’ve spent a long time dealing with these issues,” Mr. Biden said Saturday.
But the last four years have presented a steady stream of difficult moments.
The FBI this week offered new details of a federal investigation into Chinese government efforts to hack into U.S. telecommunications networks. The initial findings have revealed a “broad and significant” cyberespionage campaign aimed at stealing information from Americans who work in government and politics.
U.S. intelligence officials also have assessed China has surged sales to Russia of machine tools, microelectronics and other technology that Moscow is using to produce missiles, tanks, aircraft and other weaponry for use in its war against Ukraine.
And tensions flared last year after Mr. Biden ordered the shooting down of a Chinese spy balloon that traversed the United States.
