One in seven purchase contracts signed in July never made it to the closing table. Redfin's read on July shows 14% of homes that went under contract fell out — the highest seasonally adjusted share since November 2023, up from 13.7% in June. The metro numbers are worse where inventory has built fastest: Atlanta at 19.8%, Houston 19.6%, San Antonio 18.7%, Las Vegas 18.6%, Orlando 18.2%. Rates are not the story on their own — the 30-year sits at 6.72% this morning, four basis points above yesterday and two below where it was a week ago. The story is that buyers now have room to walk, with roughly 51% more sellers than buyers nationally, and they are using inspection findings and payment anxiety to do it.
Yesterday's edition led with the cost side: MBA put independent mortgage bank production expense at $10,936 per loan in Q2 with 85% of firms profitable, against Fannie Mae's trimmed 2026 origination forecast of roughly $2.17 trillion. Today's cancellation data is the other half of that equation — a fallout rate near a three-year high means more of that per-loan cost is being spent on files that never fund.
FHFA's May report fills in the refinance picture. Fannie and Freddie recorded 67,281 refinances in May, down from 96,028 in April — a 29.9% drop the agency attributes to the average 30-year moving up to 6.44% from 6.33%. Cash-out made up 43% of that smaller pool, well under the 82.4% peak from September 2022, but a reminder that most of the refinance volume still in the market is equity-driven rather than rate-driven. Foreclosure prevention actions also slowed, 15,855 in May against 17,201 in April, with 6,616 of those permanent modifications. Put the three data sets together and the shape of the market is clear: fewer rate-motivated refinances, purchase files that are harder to hold together, and a servicing book that is not yet producing distress volume.
There is nothing on today's economic calendar. Mortgage News Daily called it a data-free summertime Friday, and bonds have been flipping between marginally stronger and marginally weaker all morning on light participation. Yesterday's Treasury buyback announcement and the follow-on commentary made for good headlines, but the market impact was spent within minutes — fuel prices have been doing more to move bonds this week than anything policy-related. The 10-year sits at 4.65%. The next real catalyst is core PCE on August 28, and after that the September 15–16 FOMC meeting, which carries a Summary of Economic Projections. For a borrower in a 30-day window, the lock decision now spans one inflation print and one Fed meeting with a fresh dot plot — worth saying plainly to anyone floating right now.
On the industry side: CoStar closed its $800 million acquisition of Zonda, folding it into a residential segment that reported $444 million in Q2 revenue, up 33% year over year. Unlock MLS is redefining participation — starting September 15, platform brokerages must commercially license listing data feeds and pay a fee, worth watching as a template other MLSs may copy. Luminate Bank acquired select assets of First State Mortgage Services, adding Midwest volume. And Zillow, which cut more than 500 roles in early August, is drawing analysis on whether listing control is shifting toward brokerages and private networks faster than the portal model can absorb.
pull every purchase file sitting between contract and appraisal and call the agent on each one. A 14% national fallout rate means roughly one in seven of those files is statistically at risk, and the two named causes — inspection leverage and payment anxiety — are both things you can get ahead of with a fresh payment scenario and a conversation before the buyer starts having it with someone else.