This 2-part overview for mid-September provides a snapshot of the current housing market. Part 1 will review inventory and sales, and Part 2 will review house prices, rents, mortgage rates, and more.
The key story for existing homes are:
Sales in August were down 1.2% YoY and historically low.
Sales SAAR (seasonally adjusted annual rate) have been very low for 4 years.
Months-of-supply increased sharply and is at the highest level in over a decade.
Inventory growth might have picked up again year-over-year.
The median price is up 1.6% YoY, but has peaked for the year.
There are also significant regional differences.
And 2026 has been a difficult year for homebuilders. There are still a large number of completed homes for sales, a larger than normal number of unsold homes under construction and builders have been reducing prices to clear inventory.
Active Listings for Existing Homes Up Slightly Year-over-year
Realtor.com reports in the August 2026 Monthly Housing Trends: Price Cuts Catch Up, Pending Sales Turn Negative that new listings were mostly unchanged year-over-year in August. And active listings were up 3.6% year-over-year.
Active listings: 1,140,000
vs. previous month: +1.2%
vs. previous year: +3.6%, a slight acceleration from July’s +2.1% and the fastest year-over-year growth so far this year.
vs. pre-pandemic: Nationwide inventory is 11.1% below typical pre-pandemic levels, roughly unchanged from July’s gap.
Note the seasonality for active listings. We should expect active listing to be mostly flat for the next couple of months before declining near the end of the year. Listings are still below pre-pandemic levels (2017 - 2019 on the graph).
Here is some more data on supply and sales.
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