Co-authored by Redfin and Mike Larson, Editor-in-Chief at MoneyShow
When you’re simply beginning out in actual property, the housing market would possibly really feel like a puzzle with too many shifting items. Costs rise, then fall. Properties appear plentiful one yr and scarce the following. If rates of interest climb earlier than you’ve locked in a mortgage, your potential month-to-month cost could change drastically.
Studying the right way to acknowledge and adapt to those housing market development shifts will help you whether or not you’re excited about shopping for, promoting, or just maintaining a tally of the market.
To assist break all of it down, we’ve partnered with MoneyShow, the place main voices in actual property just lately shared their insights on the agency’s Digital Expo platform. On this Redfin information, we’ll stroll by way of key forces shaping actual property immediately, then take a better have a look at professional views on what’s occurring in 2025. Whether or not you’re eyeing a house in Los Angeles, CA or in Boston, MA, this piece goals to provide the context to learn the market with extra readability.
Why market developments matter
Developments are greater than speaking factors; they supply context and guardrails for decision-making. With out them, you may simply misread short-term spikes or dips as one thing extra everlasting.
Right here’s what Redfin information reveals proper now:
In August 2025, U.S. house costs rose 1.5% year-over-year, with a median sale worth of about $439,419.
In the meantime, the variety of houses offered declined 2.5%, whereas lively listings elevated 10.1% over the identical interval.
One telling statistic: there are almost 500,000 extra sellers than consumers within the U.S. market, up to now the most important hole on report per Redfin’s information.
And simply over 28% of houses are promoting above asking worth, down from round 32% a yr in the past.
What this information suggests:
The truth that listings are rising whereas gross sales are falling factors to loosening demand and extra room for negotiation.
The excess of sellers relative to consumers is a traditional sign of a purchaser’s market in lots of locations, that means consumers would possibly achieve extra leverage.
Slower gross sales and softer competitors scale back the probability of intense bidding wars, making timing rather less frantic (although native dynamics nonetheless matter lots).
Briefly, developments flip noise right into a sample, serving to you see when markets is likely to be cooling, heating, or settling into stability.
Core components that form the market
To make sense of developments, it helps to know the forces at play. Beneath are the large components and the way they present up in immediately’s information:
Provide and demand: The stability between out there houses and keen consumers shapes costs and negotiation energy.
Rates of interest: Larger charges make mortgages dearer, decreasing affordability and infrequently cooling demand. Decrease charges can draw extra consumers in. Examine Redfin’s mortgage calculator to see how charges have an effect on month-to-month funds.
Laws and insurance policies: Native or state guidelines, like short-term rental restrictions or new tax proposals, can shift the profitability of proudly owning property in sure areas.
Investor exercise: From small landlords to bigger buyers, their choices to purchase or maintain properties can affect each provide and competitors.
Consider these because the “levers” that maintain the housing market in movement.
Learn>> Is Now a Good Time to Purchase a Home?
A have a look at the present actual property market
So, what do these developments appear like proper now? In accordance with MoneyShow contributing specialists, 2025 is shaping as much as be a yr of transition, the place stability is beginning to return, however not with out a few surprises.
Multifamily alternatives could also be rising
Kathy Fettke, founding father of RealWealth.com, says multifamily is getting into a “very different world” than latest years. With much less new provide coming on-line in comparison with 2023–2024, she expects pricing and rents to stabilize. She calls this era a possible “sweet spot” within the cycle for buyers.
When provide is constrained, the prevailing rental inventory features significance. For anybody watching markets with robust demand for leases, that might imply extra regular money stream and fewer volatility than in oversupplied circumstances.
Single-family householders are holding regular
Fettke additionally identified that immediately’s householders aren’t dealing with the identical struggles seen throughout the mid-2000s housing bust. As a result of so many are locked in low, fixed-rate mortgages, they’re not underneath strain to promote even when charges are excessive now. That stability makes a widespread housing crash unlikely.
For on a regular basis consumers, because of this whereas costs should still really feel excessive, they’re much less prone to see sharp, destabilizing drops. It’s a reminder that not all “slowdowns” out there are the identical.
International consumers and life modifications are bringing motion
This is a vital reminder that the housing market is rarely static; life occasions and outdoors consumers create churn even when affordability is tight.
Traders stay an lively presence
Thomas Malone, principal economist at Cotality, observes that small and mid-size buyers nonetheless account for about “25–30% of market activity.” Even because the broader market cools, their continued presence helps stability in sure segments.
That blend of participation helps clarify why provide imbalances don’t all the time result in giant worth declines — investor demand can take in some slack, particularly in markets with rental demand or upward momentum.
The takeaway
For anybody starting their journey in actual property, the objective isn’t to foretell the longer term; it’s to know the forces at play so you may make knowledgeable, assured choices when the time is true.