Weekly Real Estate News
Summary
Redfin reports U.S. asking prices down 0.3% year over year for the four weeks ending October 11, 2026, while 22% of active listings have price reductions and pending sales remain near record lows.
The typical asking price for a U.S. home slipped below its year-earlier level for the first time since March, another sign that sellers are adjusting expectations as high mortgage rates keep buyers on the sidelines.
National median asking prices fell 0.3% from a year earlier to a seasonally adjusted $396,881 during the four weeks ending October 11, according to Redfin’s October 15 housing-market update. The brokerage also found that 22% of active listings had price reductions, its highest share on record, up from 20.9% a year earlier.
These are asking prices, not final sale prices. The median price of homes that actually sold was still 0.5% higher than a year earlier, at $391,116, although that was the slowest annual appreciation since March. The distinction matters because a price cut on an unsold listing does not necessarily translate into the same discount at closing.
Demand remains near the bottom
Redfin counted an estimated 286,531 pending sales on a seasonally adjusted basis, down 12.7% from a year earlier. Pending transactions improved 1.5% from the previous week but remained near the lowest level in the brokerage’s records dating to 2021. Pending sales declined year over year in each of the 50 largest metropolitan areas covered.
At the same time, active listings increased 2% from a year earlier to roughly 1.51 million. Months of supply rose to 4.2 from 3.8 a year earlier, moving the national market closer to a balance between buyers and sellers. That national figure masks important local differences, including areas where listings are still scarce.
For sellers, the adjustment can mean longer marketing periods and more negotiation. Homes spent a median of 49 days on the market, one day longer than a year earlier. The average sale-to-list ratio was 98.4%, indicating that completed transactions generally closed below their final asking prices, though the ratio was marginally higher than a year ago.
Monthly payments are not following asking prices lower
Even as list prices soften, financing remains a barrier. Redfin estimated the typical monthly mortgage payment at $2,777, up 8.8% year over year and the highest in its records except for the previous week. The calculation used a 7.4% mortgage rate.
Daily rate measures cited by Redfin eased from roughly 7.61% a week earlier to 7.45% on October 14, but those daily figures are not the same as Freddie Mac’s weekly Primary Mortgage Market Survey. Different sources use different samples and methodologies, so their numbers should not be presented as directly comparable.
Redfin’s latest report follows its October 14 finding that sellers outnumbered buyers by a record 63% in September. The new weekly figures are a material update, not a repeat of the earlier seller-buyer estimate: they show the actual pricing response, with asking prices turning negative and reductions becoming more common.
Metro-level conditions remain uneven. Seattle and San Jose recorded year-over-year median sale-price declines of 6.3% and 4.8%, respectively, while San Francisco showed an 18.1% increase. Those contrasts reinforce why national headlines should not be mistaken for a uniform local market forecast.
The weekly data cover more than 900 U.S. metropolitan areas and are subject to revision. For agents and lenders, the immediate takeaway is a market in which buyers have more room to negotiate, but the cost of borrowing continues to limit how many can act.
