Sales have gone nowhere for over 3 years. Median price keeps rising.
The National Association of Realtors reports Existing-Home Sales Report Shows 0.2% Increase in April
“Despite mixed macroeconomic signals—including a record-high stock market and historically low consumer confidence—home sales were modestly boosted by the continued improvement in housing affordability,” said NAR Chief Economist Dr. Lawrence Yun. “Mortgage rates are lower from a year ago, and average income growth is outpacing home price gains.”
“Inventory still remains tight,” Yun added. “Multiple offers, though not as intense as a few years ago, are still occurring. At the same time, days on market are lengthening on average, implying that consumers are taking their time before making decisions.”
“The increase in second-home purchases reflects stronger finances among higher-income households, as well as the post-COVID rise in remote work and hybrid job schedules.”
All Noise
These fluctuations for over three years are all random noise.
Homes are not selling because there are not affordable.
Accumulated Wealth Myth
Last month, Yun was yapping about “accumulated wealth”.
No one has accumulated any wealth over this other than landlords who raised rent more than their expenses have gone up, and those who refinanced mortgages at a much lower rate.
Everyone else lost wealth due to rising property taxes, homeowner’s insurance, and HOA fees.
The wealth impact of rising home prices has been negative for many, if not most homeowners, especially those who purchased late in the game and did not refinance lower.
Existing-Home Sales Month-Over-Month
Since March 2023 I count 20 down months, 15 up months, and 2 unchanged months, all of which accumulates to a decline from 4.35 million to 4.02 million.
It’s ridiculous to attribute any meaning to these random month-over-month fluctuations. However, Yun does, every month.
Key March 2026 Statistics
- Sales Month-Over-Month: 0.2% increase in existing-home sales month-over-month to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.02 million.
- Sales Year-Over-Year: No change in sales year-over-year.
- Inventory Units: 1.47 million units: Total housing inventory, up 5.8% from March and 1.4% from April 2025.
- Inventory Supply: 4.4-month supply of unsold inventory, up from 4.2 months last month and up from 4.3 months one year ago.
- Median existing-home price: $417,700 Median existing-home price for all housing types. 0.9% increase from one year ago ($414,000)—the 34th consecutive month of year-over-year price increases.
- Market Time: 32 days: Median time on market for properties, down from 41 days last month, Up from 29 days in April 2025
Median Price
Prices have gone up 34 consecutive months year-over-year.
Existing-Home Sales Year-Over-Year
It took many years for year-over-year sales to turn positive.
Sales went negative again in 2025, and have now stabilized at a low rate near 4 million, seasonally adjusted, annualized.
Existing Home Sales Supply
The NAR does not seasonally adjust much of its data.
Nonetheless, we can see rising supply over time. But rising supply has not helped sales.
Existing-Home Sales vs Mortgage Rates
Rising mortgage rates from late 2021 until late 2023 led to rapidly falling sales.
Since then, ignoring minor fluctuations, sales have basically gone nowhere even as rates fell from 7.62 percent to 6.05 percent.
But rates have risen again. The current Mortgage News Daily rate is 6.33 percent.
MND is more accurate than the Freddie Mac data in my chart because it includes points and fees. I use Freddie Mac data because I have a download from the St. Louis Fed.
The only conclusion is home prices are still too high, mortgage rates are too high, or both.
Jobs and inflation from the war in Iran are also huge concerns.
Trump Says He “Wants to Drive Up Housing Prices”
Pleaser recall Dear Zoomers, Trump Says He “Wants to Drive Up Housing Prices”
Somehow, I doubt Gen Z will like this message.
Is it time to declare success? Demand a Nobel prize for economics? Build a housing statue?
Related Posts
April 9, 2026: Inflation Has Been Above the Fed’s Target for 5 Straight Years
The Fed’s preferred measure of inflation has been above 2 percent since March of 2021.
May 8, 2026: Consumer Sentiment Falls to a Record Low, Consumers Cite Gasoline and Tariffs
Consumers Inflation expectations and overall concerns remain elevated.
May 7, 2026: Whirlpool Sales Plunge, Warns of 4 Percent Price Hikes, Blames Inflation
Whirlpool eliminates its dividend and cut its forecast citing tariffs, inflation, and debt.
May 5, 2026: Manufacturing Is the Biggest Net Loser in Jobs, 5 Quarters Total
Here’s a breakdown of BLS Business Employment Dynamics (BED) by sector.
I was browsing houses for sale and saw two houses where they were placed back on the market after being “sold”. Some houses that have great curb appeal have been languishing on the market for more than 8 months. Sellers are starting to lower prices as well.
Many are predicting crisis. Very big crisis. May be once in a life time.
Will you ever hold the devaluing currency or the tangible property.
Now is the testing time.
Decide yourself.
Over the last couple years, I posted ad nauseum here about how prices are going gangbusters in the Northeast (NY, NJ, PA & New England) in addition to Wisconsin and Chicago among other hotspots where there is an EXTREME shortage of apartments and houses for sale. Unless you live on one of those states, you won’t understand that.
There are BIDDING wars for houses in Connecticut right now and that has been the case going back to 2020. Because…the apartment vacancy rate is like 2.7%. Both rents and housing prices have doubled since 2020. No joke. It’s insane. That’s why I left there because I retired and literally couldn’t afford to live there (not that I’d want to anyway).
I relocated to Iowa this month and it’s a completely different market. Apartment vacancy rates are 7-9% because they overbuilt during the COVID easy money days. There is NO shortage of housing here, yet house prices here are still going up (about 4% year over year in Des Moines, and more like 10% in Cedar Rapids which is getting a lot of inflow because the housing is so cheap) It’s a slight sellers market, but not an extreme one like the Northeast.
So…even though Texas and Florida are in a slump, more than half of the country is seeing price increases. The housing market is locked up because nobody with a 3% mortgage wants to give it up.
People want to live in the NE, which drives up prices. You may not be at the stage in life for it to still be a fit, but clearly the market demand is high for NE.
The flatness of that data looks suspiciously like “managed” sales volume, rather than a free market. Just saying…
Copium., today
Q: Iran has agreed to allow the removal of all their enriched uranium?
TRUMP: Yeah, they did two days ago. But they changed their mind because they didn’t put it in the paper.
Erm 🤓….”nuclear dust”….lolz
This is the “deal”. Make shit up and claim that the other person agreed to it. When they deny that claim, claim they are a dirty rotten scoundrel and go for a public opinion win.
He is constitutionally incapable of a peace deal. He has no “cards”. He can’t threaten to bully them any more than he already has. He certainly is not going to offer them incentive. Unless that incentive is “do it or else”, which is just bullying.
I think his only choice is to arbitrarily claim the war is over without providing any details on the outcome. He will try to walk away from it and pretend it doesn’t exist, just like he did with covid. And anyone who attempts to question him will admonish publicly and privately see about prosection or at least persecution.
House prices are about to plummet in 300 of the biggest markets in the US. Our interactive map reveals if you should sell your home now before it’s too late
DailyMail, paywalled 😖
Netanyahu Says Israel Plans to ‘Wean Ourselves Off’ U.S. Military Aid Over Next 10 Years
Cool, now we know when the US will go t!ts-up….in 11 years
Israel will hump the corpse for a year or 2 after.
try to keep your fantasies to between you and your cousins.
I saw that interview with Bibi on 60 minutes, as soon as those words came out of his mouth I knew it was a lie. Israel will cease to exist if it “weans” itself off. The only truth from that interview was the acknowledgement that the US taxpayer is sick of Israels bulsh!t.
Israel must making some sort of deal with Saudi Arabia. Middle East politics are shifting.
It’s an obvious lie.
How they’re going to wean off from free money automatically? That’s FREE MONEY.
Israel will take it as long as there is free money.
Instead US government ( upon US tax payer’s pressure ) will cut off AID.
Simple. From 2006-2020, interest rates were at zero percent, which allowed the already rich to borrow billions for free, and they bought up anything that wasnt nailed down .. including what was nailed down. Stocks bought and up, bonds bought and up, the number of companies on the NYSE cut in half cause free money now available to buy your competitors, houses bought up, apartment buildings bought up, mobile home parks bought up … then Biden comes along and got the interest rates back up to 4%, and the great American giveaway to the new lords and ladies stopped … for awhile …
Yellen even mentioned this as the pros for doing QE2? Said they need to buy down interest rates to help the working class by creating jobs. She said yes, it will make the rich more rich by causing asset prices to go up. But that would be a side effect of helping the working class.
Why do we constantly read incorrect information about interest rates when the historical numbers are so readily available??!! Interest rates were not zero from 2006-2020. They were at zero for all of Obama’s term save perhaps the last month when the Fed gifted the beginning of a series of rising rates to Trump 45–>aka NOT zero! They rose basically his first month in office and continued to rise (not finally under Biden as the post implies) before the last year of covid brought them crashing down. And then you say Biden got them back up to 4. Actually above 4 but not until about half way through his term’s own ZIRP regime when inflation was up something like 4.x, 8.x, and 4.x respectively as the Fed claimed the inflation was transitory (oh boy!).
I mean the rest of the comment is spot on as to what zero percent rates look like, what they’ve caused, how they create massive wealth inequality, but why the inaccuracy around the rates and timing? The comment quoting inaccurate information makes it look more political than necessary, after all the Fed’s zero interest rate policy, QE, reverse repo and their illegal Maiden Lane 1, 2, etc real estate purchases created and continue to create all sorts of problems…no need for it to be political, they are independently evil.
ZIRP did/does enrich a HUGE number of people, the upper and middle-middle class groups included, just not to the same degree. It’s a sinister mechanism. But it buys off a lot of complicity. I know folks have made infinitely more passively in the last 4 (or 17?) years than they did actively working their entire life.
I hope the 7 up votes were for discussion on ZIRP’s deleterious impacts and not for the inaccuracy catering to the blog comment section’s current left-leaning tone.
Show the chart back to 2018/2019 so that we can see the previous baseline!!!!!!
Just like at stonk tops…they’ve exhausted the pool of idiots willing to pay $2,800,000 for a house that was $1,400,000 before CONvid
Then add in: insurance, property taxes, HOA fees, maintenance, etc
And, yeah, thanks but no thanks…see you down the road at lower price city
Here in rural ks you can get a brand new 900 sq ft home with no basement in tornado alley on 10 acres for $500k.
Average KS rural household income around $70K
To comfortably afford a $500K house, household income should be between $125 and $165K
A big mismatch
Im not far from Kansas City and a lot of those people that are above average spill over and unfortunately find their way out here. Most of the gunfire out here is friendly vs. the alternative.
Sounds like a free ride to the Land of Oz.
what was the price for same or similar in 2013?
I don’t recall as I’ve been in this spot over 40 years and really haven’t paid attention until seeing my property tax valuations. I do know a friend sold a fully remodeled 3000 sq ft farm home with a shop on 5 acres for 120k in 2005.
Yun would be more accurate if instead of focusing on the stock market he focused on two other factors: demographics and relative mortgage rates. Boomers are staying in their houses a long time because they want to “age in place”. I see that a lot in my neighborhood. There are many of us who moved into the neighborhood 20-30 years ago with children. But we aren’t moving now that the children are grown–we are staying in our 4+ bedroom houses that are larger than we need. Second is mortgage rates in the 6-7% range. The absolute rate is not the problem–rates have been this high or higher in the past. The problem is the comparison of rates at 6-7% now to rates in the 4% or lower range a few years ago. People are resistant to going from a mortgage at 4% to one at 6.5%. Net effect of these two factors: diminished supply.
Neither of these things are going to change soon. Demographics is baked in for a few more years until vast numbers of Boomers simply get too old to be able to stay in place any more. And given inflation and deficit projections, I don’t see mortgage interest rates returning to the 4% range. So Yun should come out, state this, and say “I will have my next comment a year from now”, but of course he won’t do that.
If most Boomers got through the ’80s without VD, why move to The Villages now?
Nobody can afford to have enough kids to fill those houses.
Mish, this was a well-timed article. My dad is sitting on a mountain of time demand with 14 acres and a 6,000 Sq Foot House…..Mom died. It is absurd. He is old and we might get stuck with it.
Not sure where in Cali this house is but depending on the area, a developer might buy it from you to split into multiple 1 acre lots.
salaries stagnant + supply of homes tight + people locked in lower rates w/no incentive to let them go + high rates for new borrowers + remote working + mismanaged large blue cities.
I think that sums it up, no?
The only place for rich peoples money to go is the stock market and real-estate.
With the Government debt set to keep increasing and most likely double in 10 years….I don’t see how prices of houses will fall over this time frame. Yes, in a recession they will fall because of forced selling but the cost of land, materials, and labor will always increase. Not because value has increased but because it just takes more USD to buy the same thing. I am guessing the Median house price will at least be $550k to $600k and the home ownership will drop into the 50% range.
Anyway, in regards to Gold, Silver, and SP500, home prices have been falling for 26 years. The following calculations are based on a home in the Midwest.
In 1999 prices to buy my current home that cost $186k USD in 1999. Here are alternative metrics.
In 2026 prices to buy this home it will cost $420k USD, or:
Or let’s put it this way.
Now this house is in a big midwest city and has only appreciated 125% over 26 years (3.6% annually).
I am guessing if this house was on the East Coast or West Cost, the same house would cost $800k today.
Everybody forgets the $39 trillion the Federal govt alone borrowed had to wind up somewhere.
The problem moving forward isn’t the capital cost of the house nor the mortgage. It is insurance, property taxes, and maintenance (maybe HOA) that now costs MORE than a mortgage. Even if you paid cash or traded gold/silver/shares, you are perpetually on the hook for property taxes and insurance. Property values keep increasing so if your thesis is true that values will never go down then neither will your taxes or insurance.
That’s the problem, inflation has distorted reality to the point that reality is broken.
There won’t be a fix until the whole system crashes so best to just exit onto a new reality that is livable and wait till things sort themselves out.
Got exit strategy?
Yep. Better to own a small home to keep property tax and insurance expenses low and take the extra and invest.
Good post. Pricing anything in USD for anything but a current transaction is a fool’s game. With the dollar declining in value rapidly, pricing in dollars is like measuring lumber with an elastic tape measure, a board does not change but gets longer in inches. Another measure that gets really messed up is comparing value of dissimilar products or services, the measured value of the services changes differently and the measuring tool is changing, it is impossible to know if the product price changes are real changes in value or mispriced.
I live in the Orlando area. A recent youtube video by a realtor explained some of the numbers as they pertain to central Florida. Neighborhoods in the central core (within 5 miles of downtown) are pretty solid in pricing. As you move farther out, there are many new developments going up. Those builders & relatively new homeowners are having to cut prices to make a sale. Lots of cookie-cutter developments going into southern Orange County and northern Osceola County. I guess newcomers want to be close to DisneyWorld. Traffic is a nightmare. With high gas prices & toll roads, these areas become even less desirable.
BTW in an interview with Adam Taggert, Melody Wright has a different perspective on housing indicating a significant chance of collapse in the near future. She makes a compelling case.
I heard that. Facts and rationale right on. On the other hand, everything she mentioned the government can paper-over on behalf of the banks and “the market”. . Forbearance for evah!
There are some places that are bubbles, certainly. In a recession we can have a collapse too. But short term only. If they drop 30%, back up the truck. Builders will not build a house a loss. It costs at least $150 to $250 sq ft to build a normal house and then all $50k to $150k for the lot depending on the size.
I can really only est estimate prices in the midwest. I am sure it is more expense and probably doubled on the coasts.
Minimums for SFH in midwest areas:
2000 sq ft house: 2000 x $150 = $350k + 50k lot = $400k
1500 sq ft house: 1500 x $150 = $225k + 50k lot = $275k
Maximums for SFH in midwest:
2000 sq ft house: 2000 x $250 = $500k + 150k lot = $650k
1500 sq ft house: 1500 x $250 = $375k + 150k lot = $535k
I had a 2800 sq ft, 4 bedroom rental. Just sold it for $370k. Insurance company made me insurance it for $490k as that would be the replacement cost to build it if a tornado or a fire destroyed it.
This is the correct answer.
People keep thinking 2011 prices can come back. But they can’t because costs to build have doubled thanks to what happened during Covid (free money) along with ever more stringent building codes that require more expensive items.
I wonder what the cpi would be if they actually included home prices. Meanwhile Warsh being the sycophant he is wants to use a new inflation metric to even further understate inflation.
The taco economy continues to langusih similar to its leadership.