For two years the advice in this corridor has been some version of wait for the cut. This week three Fed presidents voted to raise instead, and J.P. Morgan told clients to expect a hike on September 16. I am not predicting that. I am saying the direction of the risk flipped, and the people I work with should plan against the direction, not against the hope.
The local calendar is doing the same thing. Federal flood authority expires September 30. Marion’s impact fee steps up October 1, about $530 more a house, on the way to roughly $5,300 by 2028. Every candidate in Tuesday’s District 2 primary ran on slowing growth. None of those are forecasts. They are dates, and each one lands between now and Thanksgiving.
So my read is that the cost of waiting has passed the cost of moving. A buyer who locks this fall at 6.67 percent trades a hoped-for cut for a known number. A seller waiting on the rate that brings buyers back is waiting on a committee arguing the other way. This corridor prices on carrying cost, and carrying cost is exactly what these dates move.
For buyers
Plan against the rate in front of you, 6.67 percent, not the one you hoped for. If you are building new in Marion, a permit pulled before October 1 avoids the next $530 impact fee step, and two more steps follow in 2027 and 2028.
For sellers
Waiting for a cut is now a bet against three sitting Fed presidents. Price for the market in front of you: Marion’s median is down 3.7 percent and Ocala approved 741 new units in a single August week.
For investors
HB 1389 opened county, city and school land to apartments with administrative approval and no local board vote. In ring counties with cheap public land and thin rental stock, that is a buildable path, if you can hit 40 percent affordable.