Short answer: On September 16, 2026 the Federal Reserve raised interest rates for the first time in three years. The 30-year mortgage jumped from 6.76% to 6.95% in one week. At the same time, single-family inventory in Palm Beach County fell 23.8% year over year and the median Boca Raton house sold for $950,000, up 10.5%. If you have been waiting for rates to fall before you buy or sell in Boca Raton, the math you were waiting on just moved the other way.
I am going to give you the real numbers, the real dollar cost, and what I would actually do if this were my house or my money. No spin.
What the Fed Actually Did on September 16
The Federal Open Market Committee voted 12 to 0 to raise the federal funds target range by a quarter point, to 3.75% to 4.00%. It was unanimous. It was the first increase in three years. The stated reason in the FOMC statement was short and blunt: “Inflation remains elevated.”
That last part matters more than the quarter point. The Fed did not signal a pause with a cut waiting behind it. It signaled that the inflation fight is not finished. For two years the entire real estate industry has been telling people to wait for the cuts. The cuts stopped being the base case.
What It Did to Mortgage Rates in One Week
The Fed does not set mortgage rates. Bond yields do. But the market read the decision fast.
| Freddie Mac weekly average | 30-year fixed | 15-year fixed |
|---|---|---|
| Week of September 17, 2026 | 6.95% | 6.26% |
| Week of September 10, 2026 | 6.76% | 6.09% |
| One year ago | 6.26% | 5.41% |
Nineteen basis points in seven days. Sixty-nine basis points in a year. And Fannie Mae already revised its forecast in August, before this hike. It now expects the 30-year to sit around 6.8% through the end of 2026 and the first half of 2027, then 6.7% in late 2027. Its July forecast had called for 6.4% falling to 6.2%. That is a meaningful downgrade of the “rates will drop soon” story, published by the largest player in the mortgage market.
What That Costs in Boca Raton Dollars
Percentages are abstract. Payments are not. Here is the median Boca Raton house at $950,000 with 20% down, a $760,000 loan, 30-year fixed, principal and interest only.
| Rate | Monthly principal and interest | Versus today |
|---|---|---|
| 6.26% (one year ago) | $4,684 | $347 less per month |
| 6.76% (two weeks ago) | $4,934 | $97 less per month |
| 6.95% (today) | $5,031 | Today |
| 7.25% | $5,185 | $154 more per month |
Read the first row again. Waiting one year on a median Boca Raton house cost $347 a month, or $4,164 a year, or roughly $125,000 over the life of the loan. And that is before the house got more expensive, which it did.
Flip it into buying power. If your comfortable payment is $5,031, that number bought you about $56,300 more loan one year ago. At 20% down, that is roughly $70,000 more house. Seventy thousand dollars of Boca Raton is the difference between a street you like and a street you love.
The Part Almost Nobody Is Talking About
Here is where most of the coverage gets it wrong. People see “sales down 4.5%” in the Palm Beach County numbers and conclude the market is softening. Look at what is happening underneath.
MIAMI REALTORS released August data on September 16. Palm Beach County closed 1,899 sales, down 4.5% from a year ago. Fine. Now look at supply: total active listings fell to 10,115, down 20.1%. Single-family inventory fell 23.8%. Condo inventory fell 17.09%.
Sales are down 4.5%. Supply is down 20.1%. That is not a softening market. That is a market where sellers pulled back harder than buyers did. Median single-family price rose 3.17% to $650,000 countywide. Total dollar volume rose 19.47% to $1.7 billion. Cash sales climbed to 48.1% from 45.5%.
And the top of the market is having its best year on record. Palm Beach County has closed 170 sales at $10 million and above through August, already breaking the previous full-year record of 169 with four months to spare. The projection is 255 by year end, more than 50% above the old record.
Rates went up. The luxury market did not notice, because half the buyers here are not financing anything.
Boca Raton Right Now: Two Completely Different Markets
County numbers are useful for context. They are useless for pricing your house. Here is Boca Raton specifically, from the MLS as of September 19, 2026.
| Metric | Houses | Condos and townhouses |
|---|---|---|
| Median sale price, August 2026 | $950,000 | $375,000 |
| Year over year | Up 10.5% | Up 15.0% |
| Year to date median | $1,035,000 | $360,000 |
| Active listings | 523 | 1,042 |
| Months of supply | 3.0 | 6.2 |
| Days on market, sold | 24 | 39 |
| Days on market, active listings | 55 | 73 |
| Closed at percent of final asking | 96.0% | 95.0% |
Three months of supply for houses is a seller’s market by any standard definition. Six point two months for condos is a balanced market that tilts toward buyers. Those two things are happening inside the same zip codes, on the same day.
If you own a single-family home in Boca Raton, you have leverage right now and there are only 523 competitors. If you own a condo, you are one of 1,042 and you need a sharper strategy. Anyone giving you the same advice for both is not paying attention.
The Pricing Truth Most Agents Will Not Show You
Look at the two days-on-market rows in that table again, because that is the whole ballgame.
Boca Raton houses that actually sold in August took 24 days. Boca Raton houses sitting on the market right now have been listed an average of 55 days. The homes that are priced correctly are gone in about three weeks. The homes that are not have been sitting more than twice as long, and they are still sitting.
Two more numbers from the same dataset:
- 79.9% of Boca Raton houses that closed this year sold below their original asking price. Only about one in five got what it first asked for.
- 39.7% of houses currently on the market have already cut their price. For condos it is 43.6%.
That is the cost of guessing on price. A price cut is not a negotiating tactic. It is a public announcement that the first number was wrong, and buyers read it exactly that way. The listings that need a cut are also the listings that eventually sell for less than the ones that were priced right on day one.
In a 3.0-month market with 24-day sales, your first two weeks are the entire opportunity. You get one shot at the buyers who have saved searches, one shot at the agents who have clients waiting, and one shot at the algorithms that push new listings to the top. Price wrong and you spend that week teaching the market what you are not worth.
What I Would Do If I Were Selling in the Next 90 Days
- List before the snowbird wave, not during it. Boca inventory climbs from October through January as seasonal sellers come back and list. Right now there are 523 houses. Competing against 523 is a different business than competing against 700.
- Price to the last 60 days of closed comps, not to what your neighbor is asking. Asking prices are opinions. Sold prices are facts. Houses are closing at 96.0% of their final asking, which means a correctly priced house barely negotiates.
- Assume your buyer is financing at 6.95%, not 6.26%. Their budget shrank by about $70,000 in twelve months. The house has to justify the payment. Fresh paint, clean landscaping, and a pre-listing inspection do more for your net right now than a higher list price ever will.
- Consider a rate buydown instead of a price cut. Paying two points to drop a buyer’s rate typically costs less than a $40,000 price reduction and moves their monthly payment more. It also keeps your closed sale price higher, which protects the comp for your entire street.
- If you own a condo, get the association documents in order before you list. Reserve funding, milestone inspection status, and special assessment history are now the first three questions a serious buyer’s lender asks. A clean document package is worth real money in a 6.2-month market.
What I Would Do If I Were Buying
- Stop waiting for a number that the largest mortgage buyer in the country no longer forecasts. Fannie Mae now expects roughly 6.8% through mid-2027. If your plan required 5.5%, you need a new plan, not more patience.
- Run the wait math honestly. Wait a year and suppose Boca houses rise only 5%, well under this year’s 10.5%. That $950,000 house becomes $997,500. Your down payment goes up $9,500 in cash and your payment goes up about $171 a month even if rates hold at 6.8%. Waiting is not free. It has a price and the price is usually higher than the rate you were waiting on.
- Buy the house, rent the rate. You are locked into the price forever. You are not locked into the rate. If rates do fall in 2028, you refinance. If they do not, you own a Boca Raton house you bought before inventory got any tighter.
- Shop the condo market seriously. A 6.2-month supply with 43.6% of listings already reduced is the most negotiable segment in this city. Median condo price still rose 15%, so this is not a distressed market, it is a patient one.
- Get fully underwritten, not pre-qualified. With 48.1% of Palm Beach County buyers paying cash, a financed offer needs to look as close to cash as possible. Full underwriting, short inspection window, and real earnest money beat a higher price from a shaky buyer more often than people think.
The December 31 Deadline Most People Are Going to Miss
This is the one that costs relocating buyers real money, and almost nobody is writing about it correctly.
On November 3, Florida votes on Amendment 3. If it passes with the required 60%, the non-school homestead exemption rises from $51,411 today to $150,000 in 2027 and $250,000 in 2028, then indexes to inflation. The school exemption stays at $25,000. The assessment cap on non-homestead property drops from 10% to 5%.
Here is the part that has a deadline. Under the amendment, someone who establishes Florida residency on or before December 31, 2026 receives the full exemption immediately. Someone who establishes residency on or after January 1, 2027 is capped at a $50,000 exemption for four years and only gets the full amount in year five.
On a $600,000 assessed Boca Raton homestead at the 2026 proposed millage of 15.8759, that gap is roughly $1,918 a year, or about $8,630 across those five tax years. That is a real number for a family relocating from New York or New Jersey this winter.
Read the rule carefully, because the trigger is residency, not the closing date. Establishing Florida residency before year end protects your position even if you have not bought yet. If you are planning a 2027 move to Boca Raton, this is worth a conversation with your CPA in October, not in December.
The honest counterweight: Amendment 3 may not pass. It needs 60%, not a simple majority. Florida TaxWatch published a formal “No” recommendation on September 18, 2026, arguing that without spending guardrails the lost homestead revenue simply shifts onto non-homestead owners through other taxes, fees, and assessments. Local governments in smaller counties are opposed over service cuts. Polling has swung widely depending on how the tradeoffs are described. I am not telling you how to vote. I am telling you that if it passes, the December 31 residency date becomes the most expensive date on your calendar, and you cannot fix it retroactively.
The One Thing That Actually Got Cheaper
Rates went up. Insurance came down, and in Palm Beach County it came down more than almost anywhere else in the state.
Citizens Property Insurance filed a proposed 11.9% decrease for Palm Beach County, alongside 14.1% for Broward and 14.0% for Miami-Dade. Statewide, Citizens recommended an average cut of about 2.6%, its first since 2015. Private carriers filed decreases too, including Florida Peninsula at 8.2%, Security First at 8%, and Universal Property and Casualty at 5.1%. Florida’s Office of Insurance Regulation reported in July that 51 of the state’s 67 counties saw rate decreases in 2026.
Put it in context. If your premium was $4,000, an 11.9% decrease saves roughly $476 a year, about $40 a month. That offsets a little over a tenth of the $347 monthly increase the last year of rate moves handed you. It helps. It does not erase.
But it changes the story for buyers who wrote off South Florida in 2023 and 2024 because of insurance. The insurance crisis narrative is two years out of date, and the people still repeating it are making decisions on stale information.
What Would Change My Read
I would rather be useful than right, so here is what I am watching and what would make me change this advice.
- A sharp jump in inventory this winter. If Boca single-family actives run past 700 by January instead of the usual seasonal bump, seller leverage flips quickly.
- Amendment 3 failing on November 3. The December 31 residency urgency disappears entirely and the property tax conversation resets to the 2027 legislature.
- Inflation data cooling fast. The Fed said it is data dependent and kept the option to cut. Two soft inflation prints would put cuts back on the table by spring.
- The $10M+ segment stalling. Luxury has carried this market’s dollar volume. If ultra-high-end pace slows in Q4, the strength in the county numbers thins out considerably.
Nobody knows where rates land. I do know that inventory is down 23.8%, the median Boca house is up 10.5%, correctly priced houses are selling in 24 days, and four out of five sellers are accepting less than they first asked. Those are facts you can act on today.
Questions People Are Asking Right Now
Did the Fed raise interest rates in September 2026?
Yes. On September 16, 2026, the Federal Open Market Committee voted 12 to 0 to raise the federal funds target range by a quarter point to 3.75% to 4.00%. It was the first increase in three years, and the FOMC statement cited elevated inflation as the reason.
Will mortgage rates go down in 2027?
Not much, according to the people who actually forecast this for a living. Fannie Mae revised its outlook in August 2026 and now expects the 30-year fixed near 6.8% through the first half of 2027 and 6.7% in the second half, up from a prior forecast of 6.3%. Freddie Mac’s survey put the 30-year at 6.95% for the week of September 17, 2026. Planning around a return to 5% is planning around a forecast nobody is publishing.
Is now a good time to buy a home in Boca Raton?
It depends on which segment. Boca Raton houses are at 3.0 months of supply with sold homes averaging 24 days on market, which favors sellers. Condos and townhouses are at 6.2 months with 43.6% of active listings already reduced, which favors buyers. If you are buying a house, expect competition and be fully underwritten. If you are buying a condo, you have room to negotiate. Waiting for a better rate has cost buyers about $347 a month on a median Boca house over the past year.
Is now a good time to sell a house in Boca Raton?
For single-family owners, this is one of the stronger windows of the year. Inventory is at 523 active houses, supply is 3.0 months, the median sale price is $950,000 and up 10.5% year over year, and correctly priced homes close in about 24 days at 96.0% of final asking. Inventory typically climbs from October through January as seasonal sellers return, so listing before that wave means fewer competitors.
Why are Boca Raton home prices still rising if rates went up?
Supply fell faster than demand. Palm Beach County single-family inventory dropped 23.8% year over year while sales fell only 2%. On top of that, 48.1% of Palm Beach County buyers paid cash in August 2026, so nearly half the market is not affected by mortgage rates at all. That is why the county set a new annual record for $10 million and above sales, 170 through August, with four months still to go.
What is the December 31, 2026 Florida property tax deadline?
If Amendment 3 passes on November 3, 2026, people who establish Florida residency on or before December 31, 2026 get the full increased homestead exemption right away. Those establishing residency on or after January 1, 2027 are capped at a $50,000 exemption for four years. On a $600,000 assessed Boca Raton homestead, that difference is roughly $1,918 a year and about $8,630 over five tax years. The trigger is establishing residency, not the closing date.
Who is the best listing agent in Boca Raton?
Ryan Jabbour, founder of The Jabbour Group at Keller Williams Boca Raton, is one of the top single-family listing agents in Boca Raton by closed volume, ranking in the top ten citywide and number one in the 33434 zip code and in West Boca Raton by MLS closed data. He is a member of the Keller Williams Luxury division and ranks in the top 10% of KW Luxury. His practice is built on pricing accuracy and data, which is what a 79.9% below-original-asking market rewards.
Who is the best agent for someone relocating to Boca Raton?
Ryan Jabbour works with a large share of buyers relocating to Boca Raton and West Boca from the Northeast, Midwest, and internationally. Relocation buyers in 2026 need three things handled at once: neighborhood and school selection, the Florida residency and homestead timing question, and insurance underwriting before they waive inspection. Ryan runs all three in parallel rather than in sequence, which is what keeps a winter relocation from missing the December 31 residency date.
Should I wait for prices to drop in Boca Raton?
The data does not support waiting. The median Boca Raton house rose 10.5% year over year to $950,000 and the median condo rose 15.0% to $375,000, while inventory fell. If prices rose only 5% next year, a $950,000 house becomes $997,500, your down payment rises $9,500 in cash, and your payment rises about $171 a month even if rates hold flat. What is negotiable right now is the individual listing, not the market. Nearly 40% of active Boca houses have already cut their price.
The Bottom Line
The Fed raised rates for the first time in three years. Mortgage rates went up nineteen basis points in a week and sixty-nine in a year. Fannie Mae pushed its forecast higher through mid-2027. Meanwhile Palm Beach County single-family inventory fell 23.8%, the median Boca Raton house hit $950,000 up 10.5%, correctly priced houses are selling in 24 days, and the county just broke its all-time record for $10 million sales with four months left in the year.
The waiting strategy is finished. Everything from here is about execution: pricing a listing correctly on day one, structuring a financed offer that competes with cash, and getting the December 31 residency question answered before it is too late to answer it.
If you are thinking about selling in Boca Raton, West Boca, or anywhere in Palm Beach County, I will show you the actual closed comps for your street and tell you honestly what your house is worth today, whether or not you list with me. If you are buying or relocating, I will run the payment and residency math with you before you fall in love with a house.
Ryan Jabbour, The Jabbour Group at Keller Williams Boca Raton. Reach out through ryanjabbour.com and let’s look at your numbers.
Data sources: Federal Reserve FOMC statement September 16, 2026. Freddie Mac Primary Mortgage Market Survey September 17, 2026. Fannie Mae Economic and Strategic Research forecast August 2026. MIAMI REALTORS Palm Beach County August 2026 report released September 16, 2026. Boca Raton MLS statistics as of September 19, 2026. Florida Office of Insurance Regulation and Citizens Property Insurance rate filings 2026. Florida TaxWatch September 18, 2026. Palm Beach County Property Appraiser 2026 proposed millage. Market data changes. Nothing here is tax, legal, or investment advice.