Redfin: Asking Prices Slip Below Last Year's for the First Time Since March, With a Record 22% of Listings Cut

The national median asking price for a home is now lower than it was a year ago, and it is the first time that has happened since March. Redfin’s latest four-week housing report, covering the period that ended October 11, puts the seasonally adjusted median asking price at $396,881, down 0.3% from a year earlier. A record 22% of active listings carry a price cut, and pending sales are down nearly 13% from last year. TheStreet summarized the findings late on October 19.

Nothing in the report is a Long Island number, and a national median can hide a lot. Still, it describes the backdrop that North Shore buyers and sellers are negotiating against this autumn, so it is worth reading closely.

The numbers behind the headline

Redfin’s release lays out the picture in a handful of figures, all for the four weeks ending October 11:

Median asking price: $396,881, down 0.3% year over year, the first annual decline since March.
Median sale price: $391,116, up 0.5% year over year, the slowest growth since March.
Share of listings with a price drop: 22%, up from 20.9% a year earlier and the highest in Redfin’s records.
Pending sales: 286,531, down 12.7% from last year and close to the lowest level in Redfin’s data, which goes back to 2021.
New listings: 359,859, down 1.3% year over year.
Active listings: about 1.51 million, up 2% year over year, with 4.2 months of supply, up from 3.8.

Redfin treats four to five months of supply as a balanced market, so the national figure has moved from slightly tight to the edge of balanced. That shift is gradual, but its direction is clear.

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Why asking prices and sale prices are telling different stories

The median sale price is still edging up at 0.5%, while the median asking price has turned negative. That gap is typical of a market in transition. Asking prices reflect what sellers hope to get when they list. Sale prices reflect deals that were negotiated weeks earlier, often at earlier, firmer conditions.

When more sellers cut their price, as 22% now have, listing prices drift down first. Closed sales follow later, because a contract signed today does not show up in the sale data for a month or more. If the pattern continues, the sale-price line would be the next to soften, though that is an inference from how these measures usually behave, not something Redfin’s release states.

The monthly cost of buying matters here too. Redfin reports the typical monthly payment at about $2,777 on a 7.4% mortgage rate, up 8.8% from a year ago and at or near the highest in its records. A small dip in list prices does little against a payment that high.

What it can mean for buyers

Redfin’s economist cautioned, as relayed by TheStreet, that buyers should not expect dramatic discounts and that fairly priced homes still draw competition. What the data does suggest is more room to negotiate than buyers had a year or two ago. That room may show up as a price reduction, as help with closing costs, or as more time to inspect and decide.

Conditions also vary sharply by market. In the same report, Seattle, San Jose and Orlando showed the largest sale-price declines, while San Francisco, Detroit and West Palm Beach showed the largest gains. A national average says little about any one village, school district or price tier on the North Shore, which is why local comparable sales matter more than any headline.

A mug of coffee and a set of brass house keys on a wooden tray on a kitchen island

What it can mean for sellers

The mirror image is a seller’s market that has cooled. Sellers face weaker demand and longer waits, and Redfin’s chief economist said, in TheStreet’s account, that sellers are coming to terms with the reality of the market. Pricing a home against recent closed sales rather than last year’s listings is the practical lesson. Homes that start too high tend to collect price cuts, and a visible chain of reductions can make a listing look stale.

A price cut is not a failure, and it is not automatically a bargain signal for buyers either. The reasons vary: a property can be overpriced, need repairs, or simply have been listed at a slow time of year. Reading the listing history is more useful than counting the cuts.

Mortgage rates are still the main lever

Redfin said its weekly average mortgage rate reached a three-year high of 7.4% on October 8 and eased in the days after, with its daily measure at 7.45% on October 14. TheStreet cited a 7.4% average 30-year rate from Freddie Mac. Daily quotes differ by source and by borrower. Fortune, using Mortgage Research Center data, listed a 30-year conventional rate of 7.297% on October 20, up from 7.260% the day before but below the 7.457% of a week earlier.

In other words, rates have come down a little from their peak but remain high by recent standards. Until that changes, many would-be buyers stay on the sidelines and many owners with lower-rate mortgages stay put. That standoff is a big reason pending sales are so weak.

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Practical takeaways

Treat national figures as context. For a specific North Shore purchase or sale, ask a licensed agent for recent closed sales and current competing listings in the exact area and price range.
Check a listing’s price history and days on market before drawing conclusions from a single reduction.
If you are buying, compare total monthly cost across several lenders, because rate quotes vary by lender and borrower profile.
If you are selling, set the price from closed sales rather than from last year’s asking prices, and discuss timing with your agent.

This article is general information drawn from published reports. It is not legal, tax, lending or real estate advice, and it does not recommend or discourage any area or type of buyer. Please consult a licensed real estate professional, mortgage lender, attorney or tax adviser about your own situation.