Despite optimism from people listing their homes for sale, pending sales and new listings followed expected seasonal slowdowns. Mortgage rates are starting to creep up, which could let some steam out of the market.
Asking prices of homes listed for sale increased to an all-time high during the four-week period ending September 26. Pending sales were up just 4%, the smallest year-over-year increase since June of 2020. Other housing market measures continued to show a typical seasonal cooling, with fewer than half of homes selling above list price and new listings of homes for sale down 20% from their 2021 peak.
“Home sellers continue to show their optimism with increasing asking prices,” said Redfin Chief Economist Daryl Fairweather. “However, there are already signals from the Fed and markets that mortgage rates are starting to creep up. The hit to affordability that comes with higher rates and higher home prices could let some steam out of the market. It’s never a good idea to overprice your home, but I would be especially wary of overpricing as seasonal cooling trends persist and rising rates take some affordability out of the homebuying equation.”
Key housing market takeaways for 400+ U.S. metro areas:
Unless otherwise noted, the data in this report covers the four-week period ending September 26. Redfin’s housing market data goes back through 2012. Except where indicated otherwise, the housing market is generally experiencing seasonal cooling trends, similar to what was seen during this same period in 2019.
Data based on homes listed and/or sold during the period:
- The median home-sale price increased 13% year over year to $356,358. This was up 0.2% from the four-week period ending September 19.
- Asking prices of newly listed homes were up 12% from the same time a year ago to a median of $361,250, an all-time high. Asking prices have been on the rise throughout the month of September, in a typical late-summer seasonal uptick.
- Pending home sales were up 4% year over year, the smallest year-over-year increase since June of 2020.
- New listings of homes for sale were down 8% from a year earlier. New listings have been below 2020 levels since the four-week period ending August 22.
- Active listings (the number of homes listed for sale at any point during the period) fell 22% from 2020.
- 46% of homes that went under contract had an accepted offer within the first two weeks on the market, above the 43% rate of a year earlier.
- 33% of homes that went under contract had an accepted offer within one week of hitting the market, up from 31% during the same period a year earlier.
- Homes that sold were on the market for a median of 20 days, nearly a week longer than the all-time low of 15 days seen in late June and July, and down from 32 days a year earlier.
- 48% of homes sold above list price, up from 34% a year earlier.
- On average, 5% of homes for sale each week had a price drop, up 1.4 percentage points from the same time in 2020, and the highest level since the four-week period ending October 13, 2019.
- The average sale-to-list price ratio, which measures how close homes are selling to their asking prices, decreased to 101.0%. In other words, the average home sold for 1.0% above its asking price.
Other leading indicators of homebuying activity:
- Mortgage purchase applications decreased 1% week over week (seasonally adjusted) during the week ending September 24. For the week ending September 23, 30-year mortgage rates were up slightly at 2.88%.
- From January 1 to September 26, home tours were up 7%, compared to a 29% increase over the same period last year, according to home tour technology company ShowingTime.
- The Redfin Homebuyer Demand Index fell during the week ending September 26, but was up 8% from a year earlier. The seasonally adjusted Redfin Homebuyer Demand Index is a measure of requests for home tours and other home-buying services from Redfin agents.
Refer to our metrics definition page for explanations of all the metrics used in this report.
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