The amount of time it takes to sell a home has been dropping for the last four consecutive years, but in February, the typical home sat on the market for 83 days, which is unchanged from a year ago. That’s a sign that the market is slowing but not reversing, according to realtor.com®.
The site’s researchers evaluated the 250 largest metro areas from March 2018 to February 2019 to see where homes are selling the fastest, and there’s wide fluctuation. For instance, in the fastest-moving markets, homes are selling in about 30 days, while in some of the slowest markets, homes are taking 131 days to sell.
Many of the markets seeing the quickest sales are in pricey coastal areas, and markets that are seeing homes linger the most are in smaller Midwestern and Southern cities where home prices have long lagged, realtor.com® notes. “In a lot of these markets, you can probably negotiate on price more than you could a year ago,” says Danielle Hale, realtor.com®’s chief economist. But “in a fast-moving market, you need to move quickly. A home you saw one week might be gone the next.”
The following markets are seeing some of the quickest sales this year, according to realtor.com®:
San Jose, Calif.
- Median list price: $1.1 million
- Median days on market: 30.1
Salt Lake City
- Median list price: $397,000
- Median days on market: 37
Seattle
- Median list price: $592,000
- Median days on market: 37.8
Denver
- Median list price: $462,000
- Median days on market: 40.2
Boise, Idaho
- Median list price: $340,000
- Median days on market: 40.9
On the other hand, the markets where homes are lingering on the market for some of the longest times are Brownsville, Texas (130.9 median days on the market); Claremont, N.H. (119 days); and Houma, La. (112.8 days).
Source: “Spring Housing Slowdown? No Way! Here’s Where Homes Are Flying Off the Market,” realtor.com® (March 11, 2019)
